“You are falling for her.” It was not a question. Rafe swirled his port with satisfaction. “No, that is not quite right. You have already fallen. Completely. Utterly. Rather spectacularly, actually.”
Rees considered denying it, but what was the point? Rafe had known him too long to be fooled by protests. “Perhaps,” he admitted, then added with a slight smile, “Yes.”
“The same woman you called a schemer and worse just weeks ago?”
“I was wrong.” The admission came easily. “About everything. She is... Rafe, she is remarkable. Intelligent, talented, resilient. The way she has handled everything—the scandal, my initial coldness, society’s censure—with such grace. And now that she has begun to trust me, to be herself...” He paused, searching for words. “This marriage I never wanted has become something I treasure.”
Rafe studied him for a long moment, his expression shifting from amusement to seriousness. “Does Victoria know?”
“Know what?”
“That you did not enter that challenge willingly. That you were drunk and had no idea what ‘traditional stakes’ meant.”
The question landed like cold water, dousing the warm satisfaction Rees had been feeling. He set down his port glass, his hand suddenly unsteady. “Why would that matter now?”
“Because secrets have a way of surfacing at the worst possible moments,” Rafe said gently. “And because she deserves to know that your anger those first weeks was not just about being trapped—it was about being trapped without knowledge or consent, just as she was trapped by Sterling.”
“It is not the same thing,” Rees protested, but doubt crept in even as he spoke.
“Is it not? You were both forced into situations without fully understanding what was happening. The difference is, she knew she was desperate. You thought you were just playing a game.”
The truth of it sat heavy in Rees’s chest. He had been so focused on forgiving Victoria for trapping him that he had never considered she might need to forgive him for not entering the marriage willingly, for not understanding what he was agreeing to. Would she see it as another betrayal? Another man who had not chosen her freely?
“She is happy now,” he said, hearing the defensiveness in his own voice. “We both are. Why disturb that with old grievances?”
“Because if she finds out from someone else—Sterling, perhaps, or Mrs. Dove-Lyon if she ever decides to cause trouble—it will be far worse.” Rafe leaned forward, his expression earnest. “Tell her, Rees. Tell her everything. Trust her with the truth as she trusted you with hers.”
After Rafe left, Rees found himself unable to settle. He wandered the house, eventually drawn to the hallway outside the morning room, where soft humming indicated Victoria’s presence. He stopped in the doorway, watching unseen as she arranged roses in a crystal vase, her movements graceful and assured. She had changed into a soft blue evening dress that complemented her coloring, and the lamplight caught the threads of gold in her dark hair.
She was beautiful, but that was not what held him transfixed. It was the contentment in her expression, the small smile that played at her lips as she adjusted a bloom’s position. She was happy—truly happy, perhaps for the first time since Sterling had destroyed her life. How could he risk shattering that peace with revelations about his initial ignorance?
Yet Rafe’s words echoed in his mind. Secrets had a way of surfacing. And Victoria, who had been lied to and manipulated by Sterling, who had been forced to deceive to save herself, did not she deserve complete honesty from the man who had vowed to protect her?
She looked up then, catching sight of him in the doorway. Her face brightened with a smile that made his heart constrict. “There you are. Has Rafe gone?”
“Yes,” he managed, entering the room properly. “Just now.”
“He is a good friend,” she observed, turning back to her flowers. “The kind who tells you truths even when you do not want to hear them.”
The innocuous comment felt weighted with meaning, though she could not know how precisely it hit the mark. Rees moved closer, ostensibly to admire her arrangement but really just to be near her, to breathe in the soft scent of her perfume mingled with roses.
“Victoria,” he began, then stopped, the words catching in his throat. How did one begin such a conversation? How did one risk the fragile happiness they had built?
“Yes?” She looked up at him, those dark eyes trusting and warm, and his courage failed him entirely.
“The roses are beautiful,” he said instead, cowardice winning over honor for the moment.
She smiled, pleased by the compliment, and returned to her arranging. Rees stood beside her, watching her capable hands work, and wondered how long he could keep this secret before it destroyed everything they had begun to build. The answer, he feared, was not nearly long enough.
Chapter 13
The afternoon light streamed through the hallway windows, warming the Turkish carpet beneath Victoria’s slippers as she approached Rees’s study. Her fingers itched to touch the worn leather spine of the investment journal he had mentioned at breakfast, something about Dutch shipping routes that had ignited a spark in him. In recent weeks, even mundane discussions about trade winds and cargo manifests had turned into small intimacies, each shared interest bringing them closer together.
The study door stood slightly ajar, an unusual sight for this time of day when Rees typically kept it closed to avoid distractions. She raised her hand to knock, smiling at the thought of his pleased surprise; he always seemed genuinely delighted when she sought him out, as if her presence were a gift. But Rafe’s familiar voice drifted through the gap, warm with the concern he reserved for close friends.
“Are things better with your wife?”
The question made Victoria hesitate, her knuckles hovering inches from the oak. She should announce herself, should knock properly, but something in Rafe’s tone, gentle and probing, held her frozen. Through the narrow opening, she caught a glimpse of the room: Rees’s shoulder in his favorite brown coat, the edge of Rafe’s crossed ankle as he lounged in the leather chair.
