“I am not finished.” Her voice cut through his attempted response. “When she came back here three days ago, she did not weep. Did not rage. She simply sat in that very chair—” Eleanor gestured to the wingback near the window “—and she never spoke. I had last seen her that way when her sister passed. I worked… spent all my days picking her up after Margaret’s death and you let her fall again.”
The image made something crack in Thaddeus’s chest. He could see it so clearly—Maribel sitting in that chair, composed and hollow. Broken.
“I convinced myself that she didn’t matter, but I was wrong,” he said hoarsely. “She matters. More than—more than I knew how to tell her. More than I allowed myself to acknowledge.”
“Pretty words, Your Grace. But words are cheap when actions have already spoken.” Eleanor crossed to the door, her hand resting on the handle. “I will ask if she wishes to see you. If she refuses, you will leave immediately and not return. If she consents...” She paused, her gaze hardening. “Then you will listen. You will not interrupt. You will not defend yourself. And you will accept whatever she chooses to say to you with the grace she deserves. Are we understood?”
“Yes.”
Eleanor opened the door, then stopped. Without turning, she said quietly, “She loves that boy. Loves him as though he wereher own. The thought of losing him terrifies her. And yet, she left. How heartbroken she must have been to do that.”
She left before he could respond.
Thaddeus stood alone in the drawing room, his heart hammering against his ribs. The clock ticked. Rain pattered against the windows. He tried to prepare himself for what was to come—for Maribel’s anger, her pain, her perfectly justified refusal to grant him a moment of her time.
But he could not prepare. Could not construct a strategy or plan his responses. All he could do was stand in this borrowed drawing room and pray that she would give him the chance he did not deserve.
The door opened again.
Maribel stepped inside.
She wore a simple day dress of charcoal grey, her dark hair pinned back with severe practicality. No jewellery. No ornamentation. Nothing to soften the stark lines of grief that had settled into her features over the past three days. She looked thinner. Paler. As though some essential vitality had been drained from her.
And she looked at him with eyes that held no warmth. No hope. Just a terrible, composed emptiness that was worse than any rage.
“Lady Maribel,” he began.
“You wished to speak with me.” Her voice was steady. Flat. “Lady Eleanor said you claimed to have something important to say. So speak.”
Thaddeus’s carefully rehearsed words evaporated. He had planned this conversation during the long carriage ride from Blackwood. Had constructed apologies, explanations, admissions of fault. But standing before her now, seeing the damage he had caused written in every line of her posture, the words felt inadequate.
Still, he had to try.
“I came to apologise,” he said. “And to listen. If you will allow it.”
“An apology.” Maribel’s mouth curved into something bitter. “How very civilised. Shall I ring for tea? Make this a proper social call?”
“Maribel—”
“I do not have all day, Your Grace.”
The formality stung, but he accepted it. “Of course... I apologise.”
She crossed to the window and stood with her back to him, her arms wrapped around herself in a posture of self-protection. “What exactly do you wish me to say? That I forgive you? That I understand you were protecting yourself and cannot be blamed for your fear?” She turned, and her eyes blazed with suppressed emotion. “I will not grant you absolution, Your Grace. You do not deserve it.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” She took a step toward him. “Do you have any comprehension of what these past months have been? I came to Blackwood believing I could help Oliver. That was all. I did not expect—I did not want—” Her voice cracked. “And then you kissed me.”
Thaddeus felt the words like a physical blow.
“That kiss in the library,” she continued, her composure fracturing. “Before the ball. You kissed me as though I mattered. As though you wanted me. And for one foolish moment, I allowed myself to believe it was real.” Her laugh was hollow. “But it wasn’t, was it? It was simply... convenient. I was there. You needed a wife to deflect scandal. And I was foolish enough to imagine there might be something more.”
“It was real,” Thaddeus said hoarsely. “Maribel—Lady Maribel—that kiss was?—”
“Don’t.” She held up a hand. “Don’t tell me what I experienced. You made me feel wanted. And then, as though it were easy todo so, you withdrew. You made it abundantly clear that I was an obligation. A duty to be managed rather than a person to be—” She stopped, pressing her lips together.
Thaddeus remained silent, forcing himself to listen despite every instinct screaming at him to defend, to explain, to make her understand that he had been terrified rather than indifferent.
