When he was a lad, around eight years of age, he had developed a great fondness for a dog that he’d found roaming through the woods of Southwick Castle. The dog—which he’d named Wags—had been so thin that Ambrose was able to count all his ribs. Having never been allowed to keep a pet before, he’d fallen instantly in love with the scruffy hound. But as he was aware of what his father would say if he asked for permission to keep Wags, he’d hidden the dog away in an empty stall in the stable and for weeks kept his secret pet fed with scraps of food from the kitchen.
Under the cloak of darkness, Ambrose and Wags had romped together through the fields and explored the abandoned remnants of a nearby cottage that the local villagers swore was haunted. Ambrose would bring books out to the stable and read aloud to Wags for hours. On occasion, he’d even lost track of the time and fallen asleep curled up beside his pet.
Over the duration of the summer, Wags became his confidant, his companion, and the only friend of a little boy who had none. Until one day, when Ambrose went to the stall and found his father standing beside the open door and the groundskeeper standing beside him, a hunting rifle resting on his left shoulder.
“Where... where is Wags?” he asked, even though in the pit of his stomach he already knew.
“That flea-ridden mongrel has been disposed of,” his father said coolly. “Would you care to explain yourself, Ambrose?”
“Wags wasn’t hurting anyone!” At his sides, Ambrose’s small hands knotted into impotent fists of rage. How he yearned to use them against his father! But the duke loomed large, as big as a mountain, and his power was without limit. Ambrose could no more strike him than he could the sun. “You didn’t have to kill him. I would have found him a different home!”
“You never should have found him at all.” Most men would have been moved by the glistening of tears in their young child’s eyes. But the duke had seemed to feel nothing more than a mild twinge of disgust. “The dog’s blood is on your hands, Ambrose. Let this be a warning. Follow the rules I’ve set forth or suffer the consequences. Now go inside and get ready for dinner. The Wentworths will be joining us and you’ll be on your best behavior... or else.”
With his eyes wet and his chest aching, Ambrose had bolted out of the stables.
My fault, he thought as he ran.
My fault, my fault, my fault.
If not for him, Wags would still be alive. The dog had trusted him, and he’d betrayed that trust by getting him killed. It was a brutal, hard-earned lesson. To love something was to endure the pain of losing it. And on that day, at the tender age of eight, Ambrose decided that he never wanted to feel that pain again.
It was a lesson he’d carried with him into adulthood. As he had stood over his father’s grave with rain lashing at his back and his weeping mother holding onto his arm, he hadn’t been overwhelmed with the fury he’d once experienced as a helpless boy.
He hadn’t been joyful or sad.
He hadn’t been melancholy.
He hadn’t been regretful.
He had been... nothing. Well, nothing but vaguely annoyed that his mother was wiping her face on his new coat.
Six months after assuming his sire’s title, Ambrose sent the dowager duchess to live at a cottage estate several hours from Southwick Castle. He paid for her every expense including a staff of twenty, dutifully wrote her a letter four times a year, and otherwise forgot that she existed. Much as she had done for the entirety of his adolescence.
On the one-year anniversary of the duke’s demise, he’d set about finding himself a wife. The requirements were clear. He needed a woman of excellent breeding who was passable in appearance and meek in nature. A woman who would bear him an heir and then leave him alone. After a brief search, he found Lady Marabelle Holden.
The red-haired, doe-eyed eldest daughter of a viscount was plainer than he would have liked, but she was quiet and shy, and she didn’t babble incessantly about fashion or the weather. He courted her for less than a month. They were married in May, and by June they were already estranged... just as he’d wanted.
The only thing that hadn’t gone according to his meticulously crafted plan was that Mara’s belly remained devoid of child. But in order to put a babe there he’d have to repeat their wedding night, and sincethatwasn’t going to happen, he’d pushed off the matter of his heir to some undetermined time in the future.
With another Season rapidly approaching, Ambrose had been giving serious consideration to traveling abroad. Sans wife, of course. Maybe a mistress, although he’d not kept one of those since taking a duchess. Not out of any sense of loyalty or obligation to his vows; rather he hadn’t desired the headache. A mistress was all well and goodinbed, but out of it previous experience had revealed that the endless requests for jewels, finery, and (worst of all) attention weren’t equal to the pleasure gained from such an arrangement.
He had a hand, didn’t he? And while it wasn’t comparable to the clench of a tight, wet quim, it was better than the fake tears of a female as she begged him not to leave.
And theclinging.
Behind his desk, Ambrose gave a shudder. How he abhorred the clinging.
Taking a drink of coffee, he began to sort through the correspondence piled high in the center of his desk. The morning ritual set him up for a day of organized tasks that began with the post and culminated in a brandy at March House, for if there was anything that Ambrosedidenjoy, it was routine.
Flipping through the various letters, invitations, and invoices, he paused when he came across an ivory envelope decorated in Mara’s unmistakably elegant handwriting. He was unable to recall the last letter he’d received from his wife. Come to think of it, he was unable to recall the last time they’d occupied the same room.
Christmas, perhaps?
No, he’d spent Christmas here, at Mill House, a four-tier residence that bordered the northwest corner of Hyde Park.
November, then, or maybe October.
A year.
