Chapter Twenty-Three
In the absence of information about the noticeably thinner and paler Lord Dominic Kirke, more rumors sprouted like mushrooms. About his health and finances and love affairs and by-blows.
And even those who heretofore might have gloated over the notion of Kirke becoming a shell of a man were worried and disgruntled. Where would they focus all of their rancor now? It was much more fun when their opponent clearly held them in contempt, too. Where was the sport in resenting a clearly suffering man?
And there were those who rubbed their hands together gleefully. Bertram Rowley, for instance. “Kirke is a spent force,” he declared to those who would listen. “His debauchery has caught up to him. Why would you want such a man representing you in the Commons?”
Dominic had friends of the sort who would politely inquire after his health at White’s but not pursue the matter after he said, “I’m well, thank you, and you?” Friends of the sort who enjoyed and sought his company for a game of cards, or a good debate.
A determinedly friendly Mr. Delacorte tracked him down through his man of affairs and issued invitations to come and play chess with him in a noisy pub. He went. Paradoxically, the loud Mr. Delacorte was surprisingly soothing company.
But he had no real confidants. No friends of the kind that Hardy and Bolt seemed to have in each other, for instance.
None whom he would trust with his current torment, if even he’d been able to articulate it.
As it turned out, this very realization was like the rope thrown into the deep, dark well he’d been down for weeks.
Thanks to Catherine, he realized now that it was because he’d long held himself apart from allowing himself to be fully known.
And in so doing, he had only hurt himself and others.
That in a lifelong commitment to protecting the vulnerable, it had never occurred to him that he was one of them.
That he had constructed his life in such a way to protect and disguise the grave damage of an old shame. If he’d let himself be known, it had seemed inevitable to him that people would eventually discover how contemptuous he really was.
It was a bloody unwelcome thought, and it joined the rest of the delightful torment stew he was currently enjoying.
Because he realized it was the source of all his problems.
And then it brought an epiphany: it might also be the source of all the answers.
She can’t hurt me if she doesn’t know me.
He mulled this again.
He was not convinced life-ruining was his vocation. God only knew worse things had been said to him and he’d survived it. But the accusation had been a spear to the ribs because she knew whereto aim. It was the best and most unnerving thing about her. And he’d given her the ammunition.
He’d apparently done a stupid thing by arranging for her to have the dress. He realized now it was his way of saying “I love you” before he’d even known he did.
He’d insulted her with the world’s most stunted marriage proposal, a craven, strategic attempt to keep her while still shielding himself from the threat of grave pain if she did not, in fact, love him.Christ. He sucked in a breath.
Still, he was blackly amused at himself. He couldn’t fault a man for trying. His own instinct for survival was clearly pronounced. Because he simply had ceased being able to imagine a life without her.
Then again, most of the things he did werenotstupid.
Gingerly, he ran his thoughts over the wounds and errors of his past, inspecting them honestly.
Anna was content in her life now, surrounded by her family. Leo was thriving.
And even though Keating knew the messy truth of him...
She’d still done a mad thing, and climbed up on a desk in the hopes she could hear him breathing.
Hope stirred and needled him.
He refused to allow himself to dodge away from the exquisite terror of hope. He sat with it, even as it unsettled his breathing. He allowed himself to imagine joy. To feel it fill his body, unfettered. Told himself he was not a fool to do it.
How long had it been since anyone had truly known him—and loved him anyway? So long he had gone blind to the signs, like a cave creature?
