“I propose to provide him with advantages befitting his position.” Thaddeus turned, his grey eyes meeting hers, his brow furrowed. “He cannot remain in the nursery indefinitely, coddled and sheltered from the realities that await him.”
“Coddled?” The word emerged sharp as broken glass. “You call providing affection and stability coddling? You call ensuring he knows he is loved rather than merely tolerated coddling?”
He released a sigh. “I call it ensuring he does not grow soft. The world shows no mercy to weakness, Maribel. Better he learns such lessons now, in controlled circumstances, than discover them later when the cost proves considerably higher.”
“He has already paid a cost no child should bear!” She was shouting now, her careful composure shattered entirely. “He has lost his parents. Watched everything familiar stripped away. And now you would take from him the one place he has begun to feel safe? The one person—” Her voice caught. She steadied it with effort. “The people who have shown him genuine care?”
“You know I care for the boy,” Thaddeus spat. “Which is precisely why I want what is best for him!”
“What is best for him, is being here with his…”
She abruptly halted her sentence. Hisparentsshe had almost said, but that was not what they were. She looked at Thaddeus and he saw the truth in her eyes.
“This discussion is concluded.” He spoke softly, though not without finality. “I shall inform Stanton of my acceptance tomorrow.”
“You shall do no such thing.”
The command rang through the drawing room with an authority that surprised them both. Maribel watched Thaddeus go absolutely rigid, his hands clasping behind his back in that gesture she knew signified his desperate grasp at control.
“I beg your pardon?” His voice was dangerously quiet.
“You heard me perfectly well.” Maribel moved closer still, her pulse hammering against her throat, her entire body trembling with fury she could no longer contain. “I shall not stand idle whilst you destroy that child’s chance at genuine happiness simply because you remain too terrified to acknowledge your own feelings.”
He turned slowly, facing her with an anger that looked almost dangerous.
“You presume too much, madam.”
“I presume exactly enough.” She lifted her chin, refusing to retreat despite every instinct screaming caution. “You care for Oliver, you say. And I believe you. You say that is precisely why you want to send him away… and perhaps it is, but it is not because it is what is best for him. It is because you are terrified. Terrified of appearing vulnerable, appearing human!”
“That is not?—”
“It is precisely what you are doing!” Her voice cracked with emotion she could no longer suppress. “You are terrified, Thaddeus. Of losing control, of losing the walls you’d built around your heart. So you would rather send him away now, on your terms, than risk him remaining and breaking your heart later.”
“You understand nothing?—”
“I understand everything!” She was close enough now to see the rapid rise and fall of his chest, to catch the scent of sandalwood and smoke and something uniquely him. “I understand that you are repeating the same mistake with Oliver that your father made with you. Sealing away love. Treating affection as liability. Ensuring that another generation of Blackwoods learns that caring for people is weakness rather than the only thing that makes any of this bearable!”
She froze then, realizing what it was that she had said. Her face grew hot as Thaddeus stared at her, his face drained of colour, his hands trembling visibly before he clenched them into fists. Every line of his posture spoke of a man pushed beyond endurance, of restraint stretched to breaking.
“You know nothing of what my father—” He stopped, his throat working. “You know nothing of what it costs to lose people you?—”
“I know nothing? You say that like I hadn’t lost everything too! And yet I am not afraid! I am not afraid to care, to love Oliver, to love…”
She broke off then, and he stepped forward.
“To love who?”
His voice was quiet and she shook her head. “No one, it seems,” she muttered. “Don’t… leave me be please.”
He moved. Towards her.
One moment they stood separated by barely a foot, tension crackling between them like a living thing. The next, Thaddeus had closed the distance entirely, his hands coming up to frame her face with a desperation that stole her breath.
For one suspended heartbeat, neither moved. His grey eyes held hers with such intensity she felt as though he were searchingfor something—permission, perhaps, or absolution, or simply courage to cross a threshold from which there could be no return.
Then his mouth descended upon hers.
Maribel’s hands rose instinctively to his chest—whether to push him away or pull him nearer, she could not have said. She felt the wild hammering of his heart beneath her palms, felt the tremor running through his entire frame. Then reality crashed upon them with the force of a wave against stone.
