"No," she said, without looking back. "I will find my own way.”
He stood frozen as the door shut behind her, her footsteps echoing down the hall.
She was gone.
And yet the scent of roses lingered.
He poured another glass of brandy, the motion habitual now, and drank with the desperation of a man trying to drown more than just his thoughts. The third glass of brandy went down rough, its burn less punishing than the emptiness that filled the room in Frances's absence. The fire snapped and spat, throwing restless shadows across the drawing room's richly paneled walls. The empty space she had occupied faced him like a silent accusation. Her shawl, forgotten in her haste, hung over the arm of the chair, and its presence felt more intimate than a kiss. The scent of her perfume still lingered—roses and rainwater—intertwined with the smoke and aged oak, ghosting the air with memories he dared not name. The sherry bottle on the side table glinted, half-drained, a mirror of his own depletion. Shadows curled along the baseboards, and the echo of her voice seemed trapped between them. The room, once merely somber, now seemed haunted.
Her words echoed. Each one another blow. But it was one in particular that landed with the sharpest edge—"Perhaps I no longer care." It had tumbled from her lips not with bitterness, but with exhausted conviction, a quiet surrender that struck him deeper than any accusation. That she could speak those words—Frances, who once believed in choice, in freedom, in hope—meant he had failed her more thoroughly than he had realized. It was not anger in her eyes he could not forget. It was that brief, harrowing flash of hopelessness.
“I will not marry him.”
“I no longer care.”
“I still see the boy…”
Johnathan slammed the glass on the table and stalked toward the window, throwing it open. Cold air hit his skin, but it did nothing to cool his thoughts.
He told himself it was right—an act of sacrifice, not cowardice. She deserved better. Not the broken pieces of the man he had become. He stared at the flames snapping with restless energy, and for a moment, he felt that same fire clawing at his insides. Involving himself in her life again would do more harm than good, he repeated like a mantra, but the words rang hollow in his mind, lingering in the shadows.
That look in her eyes—raw, pleading, furious—had nearly unraveled him.
He had failed her once. When she had needed him most—when her brother died and she had reached for someone to steady her—he had disappeared into London’s shadows, drowning his grief in wine and women instead of offering her comfort. He had left her to mourn alone, and the guilt of that choice had haunted him ever since.
And now… he had done it again.
His gut twisted. Shame warred with something darker. Something possessive. The idea of her in Cranford’s arms made bile rise in his throat.
He had tried to forget her. He had tried to drown every memory of her in brandy and scandal. But she had never left him. She had lodged herself in the corridors of his memory, a ghost he could neither banish nor forget.
She was his. Not by society’s laws or the church’s blessing, but in every unspoken truth of his heart. She had lived in the creases of his mind, in the sound of wind against stone, in the silent spaces where regret made its home. And he had let her go.
Again.
He swore under his breath and paced the room. His boots scuffed against the rug as he passed the fireplace again and again, his stride uneven. On the mantel sat an old silver frame—once containing a sketch of her they'd done together, long forgotten, the paper yellowed at the edges. He picked it up now, thumb grazing the corner, but he could not bring himself to look. With a growl, he set it down too forcefully, the frame tilting askew. Then his gaze flicked to the writing desk in the corner, where a half-written letter to William Atteberry lay forgotten. He crossed the room, snatched the paper, and tore it clean down the center. A useless letter. A useless excuse. The room seemed to pulse with ghosts of the past and frustration, every object a relic of who he had once been—and might never be again.
Memories returned unbidden: the summer she bested him at archery; the winter she pressed a kiss to his cheek on a dare; the way she had cried into his shoulder the day her brother died. He had loved her even then, though neither of them knew it.
He did not deserve her.
But perhaps deserving her was no longer the point.
If he let her marry Cranford, he would never forgive himself. In his mind’s eye, he saw her—Frances—in some cold manor house with shuttered windows, her smile dulled by duty, her vibrant laughter stifled beneath the weight of obedience. Cranford’s hand on her arm, possessive and controlling. Her gaze, hollow. A ghost of the woman she was meant to be. The image struck him like a blow to the chest, breath-stealing and savage. That future—silent, lifeless, cruel—was a vision he could not abide. Not if he had breath left in his body to change it. More than that, he would never look at himself in the mirror again.
The clock struck one. He turned, grabbing his coat from the chair. The halls were empty as he strode out the door, his footsteps echoing like thunder.
He did not know how he would save her.
But he would.
Even if it meant burning every bridge he had left. Even if it cost him what little reputation remained, the loyalty of the Wayward Dukes, or the last remnants of peace he had carved out for himself. She was worth it. She had always been worth it.
