Page 89 of Duke of Wickedness
He was trying to be kind, and while part of her was grateful, part of her hated him for it. It would be easier to walk away if he was cruel about it—but at the same time, she knew thateasierwasn’t the same asbetter. Not for her, most likely, and certainly not for David, who had admitted with such sincerity that he just wanted to be better than his awful father, that he wanted to be honest and open and good.
And hewas. He was all that. She appreciated it, appreciated that it had to be hard for him, appreciated that he could so easily have just refused to see her or could have been unkind. It wasn’t as though she had any recourse; she couldn’t do anything to slander him for unkindness that wouldn’t hit her ten times as viciously.
But he was being patient and gentle because he could. Because it was important to him.
But God.God. It hurt.
“I suppose I can’t change your mind,” she said. She sounded sad about it, but shewassad, and that was better than revealing the awful part of her that wanted to shake him, wanted to rant andrave and scream that things had been good between them, why couldn’t he just let them stay good?
“This is for the best,” he repeated. This time, he sounded as stiff as an automaton, like the repetition was difficult—or perhaps, she thought less generously, like he was simply sick of her and running out of patience.
“I see,” she said, because she feared that if she tried to get anything else past her lips, she would burst into tears, and truly, she would throw herself out the window before she allowed that. She wasnota shrinking wallflower—at least not anymore. And she would not regret these past weeks.
They werehers. The memories were hers. The knowledge—hers. He couldn’t take that from her.
“Well,” she said crisply when the silence between them stretched for an unbearable length of time. “I suppose that’s all there is to say, then. Good evening, Your Grace.”
She spun on her heel. She hadn’t sat down, and she hadn’t taken off her cloak. She’d only been in the house for, what, five minutes? Maybe even less.
She thought that maybe, just maybe, she saw him take a step toward her, thought that she caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye as she turned. But she didn’t dare look back. If she tried to look back now, she would lose her nerve—or worse, her composure.
She nearly faltered in that resolve when she saw that the butler was lingering in the front hallway of the house; he’d clearly expected to see her emerge from the study again quickly, or else he would have returned either to his duties or his bed. It stung beyond measure to think that she’d been so foolish, so blind, that even the staff had known she would be summarily turned out on her heel.
But she kept the burning in her eyes in check by sheer force of will, if nothing else. She was a Lightholder, damn it all. She wasn’t going to crumple like some pathetic little girl.
“If you could fetch me a carriage, I would greatly appreciate it,” she said. She didn’t stutter over the words. She did not sound teary or like she wished to burn down the world.
“I’ll have the groom come around,” the butler said immediately, but Ariadne shook her head.
“No; don’t bother him. A hired hack will do,” she said.
The butler hesitated. “I’m sure His Grace would prefer?—”
She held up a hand to stay his objection. “A hack, please,” she said firmly.
Another hesitation and then, to Ariadne’s great relief, he nodded.
“Very well, my lady,” he said, offering her a bow and then hurrying away.
Ariadne breathed out a slow sigh. If David was going to be gone from her life, she needed him to be fully gone. She didn’t care that it was a little childish to start with something like refusing a carriage. She needed to be away from here.
Besides, she told herself as the butler handed her up to the hack he had quickly summoned from the street, in this anonymous conveyance, she could be free to cry as much as she wanted.
David had never really had a problem with his reputation, which was, if not respectable in the eyes of Society, at least honest.
He found the first flaw in being known as an inveterate pleasure-seeker five days after he’d sent Ariadne away, however.
If he withdrew from Society, people noticed.
And then people—loose-lipped busybodies that they were—told other people.
Namely, Percy.
David knew that his staff had to be gossiping, too, because they let the Duke of Seaton right in.
“David, what is—are you not even dressed?” Percy asked when he barged into the bedchamber—the bloodybedchamber—where David was whiling away the hours of another interminable day.
Not his own bedchamber, of course. He hadn’t been able to bear sleeping there. He’d known this would happen, but he had still been stupid enough to bring Ariadne in there anyway. And now he had to stay here, in his own guest wing.
