Page 71 of Her Duke Next Door
“No! No, I am only explaining what happened.”
“What did you tell her?” he demanded, reaching for Mary’s shoulders. She stepped back, appalled.
“Dominique, do not lay an angry hand on me.”
Her words struck him and he stopped, wide-eyed. “I am sorry, Mary. Forgive me. I am only panicked over my daughter. I need to go searching for her immediately.”
“No!” Mary cried. “No, we must wait until morning.”
Dominique paused. “Why?”
I am afraid of men who linger in the shadows. Men like Hugh Yore, the man who has been waiting for me to be vulnerable and caught off-guard. Her late husband had stalked the Hatson residence at any hour of the night; who knew if his uncle was the same? He could be watching the house at that very moment.
“Why, Mary? Why do you stop me from searching for my daughter?” His voice was low and flat.
“I—I just—It is dark! It is better to wait until it is light to see better. She is clever and knows the outdoors well. She could hide herself very well.”
“There is something else,” he said. “You enjoy holding eye contact as it makes you feel more confident but that only makes it easier to see when you are not confident. Do not lie to me, Mary. You cannot hold my gaze for more than one moment. What are you not telling me and why is it at the expense of finding my daughter?”
“Dominique, please! Please do not push this.”
“Mary.” His eyes set on her, intense, unraveling her in a way she had not known before. He took a step toward her, and although she did not feel threatened, shedidfeel exposed and vulnerable. “Tell me everything you are keeping from me.”
“I—I?—”
“My daughter ismissing, Mary,” he growled. “And you were the last to talk with her. What did she say? What didyousay?”
“Only that you would return!” Mary exclaimed, half hysterical in her need to keep her secrets to her chest. This was not how she wished to confide in her husband. She had wanted to tell him calmly, rationally. “She told me not to wait for you, that it was a mistake she made too many times. She said you never come back but I tried to tell her this time was different and she said she wished it to have been.”
“And what else?”
“There is nothing else.”
Dominique cocked his head. “Before I left for my trip, Eloise mentioned you were upset over a letter. What was the letter, Mary?”
“It is nothing,” she lied. But then she bit her tongue. She collapsed onto the edge of her bed. Tears spilled from her eyes as her hands covered her face. “Hugh has been sending me threatening letters. He warned me about you, he has sent me paper clippings of your late wife’s murder. He somehow got hold of pictures and taunted me with those. The other day, Katie’s ball hit my face and caused a bruise on my cheek. Many ladies thought you were… Hurting me.”
She met his gaze and watched as fury built a storm in them.
“But I corrected them!” she insisted. “It was an accident.”
“Do you believe I could ever hurt you?” Dominique asked, his voice deathly quiet.
“No,” Mary answered.
“Do you truly think I keep you safe, as you told me before I left for my trip?”
“Yes.”
“Then why would you tell me not to raise an angry hand to you?”
Mary gritted her teeth. “Why would you apologize if not recognize that it might look terrible to do that?”
He paused. “Do you fear me?”
“Dominique, no. You took me away from a truly awful man and?—”
“Then why would you not tell me that he has been threatening you? You are mywife, Mary! Did you not think I would protect you at all costs?”
