Page 111 of Married to a Frozen Duke
"My autonomy is my right. You can't make decisions about my life without consulting me."
He turned finally, and she was struck by how exhausted he looked. "Even if those decisions are for your own good?"
"Especially then. Alexander, what were you really discussing with those people?"
"Options," he said again, that careful word that could mean anything.
"Stop being evasive. Tell me the truth."
"The truth is complicated."
"I'm intelligent enough to understand complexity."
He studied her for a long moment, then said, "I was exploring what would happen if our marriage was dissolved. What provisions could be made for you, what settlement would be appropriate, how to ensure you were cared for regardless of the mechanism of separation."
Her heart sank even as she'd expected it. "So you are planning to set me aside."
"I'm planning for contingencies. There's a difference."
"Is there? Because from where I stand, it looks like you're planning my future without me."
"I'm trying to ensure you have a future worth living."
"And you think that future is without you?"
"Don't you?" The question was quiet, almost vulnerable.
She wanted to say no, wanted to deny it, but the word stuck in her throat. Did she think her future would be better without him? This morning she would have said yes. Now, after seeing his exhaustion, his struggle, his attempt to protect her even if misguided, she wasn't sure.
"I think," she said carefully, "that we're both so busy protecting ourselves from each other that we've forgotten we're supposed to be on the same side."
"Are we? On the same side? Because it doesn't feel that way when you sneak behind my back to make decisions about estate matters."
"And it doesn't feel that way when you meet with solicitors in secret to plan my future without me."
"Then what do we do? How do we move forward when every step seems to take us further apart?"
"Maybe we stop trying to move forward and just... stop. Take a breath. Actually look at each other instead of looking at the problems between us."
"And what would we see?"
"I don't know. But it has to be better than this constant warfare."
He set down his brandy and moved closer, close enough that she could see the fine lines around his eyes, the tension in his jaw, the way he held himself like he was afraid of breaking something.
"Your brothers were right about one thing," he said quietly. "I am afraid."
"Of what?"
"Of you. Of what you make me feel. Of how you're changing things I thought were immutable."
"Change isn't always bad."
"It is when you've spent your entire life maintaining stability. My father died when I was seventeen, Ophelia. Seventeen years old and suddenly I had to prepare being responsible for all of this—the estate, the tenants, the legacy, the name. And all of this before my grandfather would die. I learned very young that feeling too much, caring too much, trusting too much led to chaos. So I stopped."
"Stopped feeling?"
"Stopped allowing feelings to matter. And then you arrived, with your warmth and your kindness and your absolute refusal to follow the rules I'd built my life around, and suddenly everything I'd kept controlled started unraveling."
