Page 65 of A Duke's Christmas Carol
“I imagine so,” the housekeeper replied. “It’s likely that her father has denied her the means to write. She said he was cruel. Goodness, I hate to think of her under the rule of such a man, waiting to marry some… oaf she doesn’t know and doesn’t want to marry. What if the man is cruel? What if he’s unkind? What if he treats her badly? I can’t sleep, worrying about it.”
“Nor can I,” Jarvis admitted. “And it’s not just because of her. I confess, I was angry with the duke when he sent her away, but… now I am just anxious about his welfare. He is not himself: he doesn’t sleep, he doesn’t eat, he doesn’t seem… alive. Obviously, he is breathing and whatnot, but there is no vitality in him anymore.”
Mrs. Mullens made a noise of agreement. “He misses her, so he is punishing himself. It is what he has always done.”
“I wish I had known about the betrothal when Miss Wightman departed,” Jarvis said with a sigh. “I am certain I could have persuaded His Grace if I had known. Although, I understand why you were reluctant to mention it. It can’t have been easy for her, to know what awaited her back home, then unexpectedly finding a place for herself here. She must have been so torn.”
She thought she could trick me, you mean.Adrian frowned, anger prickling in his veins. What right did the servants have to speak about him in so casual a manner? What right did they have to feel sorry for Valerie, when she was not the one who had been lied to?
“There must have been a good reason she said nothing to His Grace at first, though,” the housekeeper ruminated. “I daresay she was falling for him, and thought it best to be truthful. Perhaps, she didn’t realize it was important until she found herself falling in love with him.”
“Well, that, and His Grace accused her of being a scheming vixen when he first met her,” Jarvis pointed out, the words striking Adrian in the chest with a bolt of shame. “Heavens, she was probably too afraid to say anything, in case he thought she had planned it all.”
“My thoughts exactly! Mercy, I could shake His Grace. I mean, why would she scheme to get a proposal from one duke if she had another duke already waiting in the south for her?” Mrs. Mullens said pointedly. “Quite wealthy, I hear. No less wealthy than His Grace. She simply would not do that; it makes no sense, but I doubt His Grace could be convinced of that.”
Adrian froze, his forehead so deeply furrowed that he could see the edge of his eyebrows. There were parts of Valerie’s story that he had been missing, and the housekeeper had just slotted a few of them into place. Not that they made his thoughts any clearer; if anything, they had just muddled him more.
A duke? She is to be married to a duke?
He had berated her for seeking out a better prospect, but clearly that was not true. He had also accused her of trying to ruin herself so she would not have to proceed with the wedding, but it was becoming clear to him that she could not have set out to dothat. After all, she had not known what she would find when she stumbled up to his door. Which meant that it was highly unlikely that she had been enacting a scheme or ploy with him.
She will be another man’s duchess…
The thought boiled his blood, his heart clenching like a fist squeezed too tight.
“It is just so tragic,” Mrs. Mullens continued in a voice heavy with regret. “Clearly, they were fond of one another. Now, he has ruined it, and I just cannot understand why. If he had permitted her to explain, I am certain she would still be here right now, no longer betrothed—not to that other duke, at least.”
Jarvis sighed in unison with the housekeeper. “She would have been the perfect duchess.”
“What a waste of her good humor, her wit, her charm, her vibrant character, and her beauty, to be sold to a man who will not see her worth,” Mrs. Mullens said, her tone edged with bitterness.
“Sold?” Jarvis asked, at the same moment that Adrian thought it.
“Her father is a terrible gambler, or so she told me,” Mrs. Mullens answered. “Terrible in that he loses often and plays often. He has an immense debt, and it is dear Miss Wightman who must pay for it. I assume her father and this duke have cometo an arrangement: her hand in marriage in return for covering the debt.”
Adrian had to move away from the door in order to exhale the breath he had been holding. Walking to his bureau, he braced his hands against the wood and expelled that air in a gasp, before dragging more of the room’s stale air back into his lungs.
Is that what she was trying to tell me?
He struggled to shake off the thought as his eyes darted back to the closed door. A barbed thought lodged inside his mind: Were they saying all this on purpose? Did they know he could hear them? Perhaps, Valeriehadmanaged to send a letter, instructing them on how to help her avoid her arranged marriage.
The butler and the housekeeperwereloyal to Valerie, after all.
“I cannot do this,” he murmured, so exhausted and frustrated and confused that he thought his head would burst apart.
There was supposed to be peace in silence, so why could he find none?
I will not be lured in again. Even if Iwereto go to her, to help her, and I find that everything is true, I will be more unworthy of her than I was before.
He stalked toward the door and headed out into the hallway, his footsteps matching the pounding thud of his heart. He did not stop until he was all the way upstairs, striding into the darkness of one of the guest bedchambers that were never used but always ready for visitors.
At least these rooms held no memory of Valerie. At least here he might find some peace and solitude, away from everything that reminded him of her, everything that was driving him mad.
There in the dark and the cold, a sliver of moonlight to see by, he stripped off his clothes and climbed into the bed, his weary bones sinking into the comfortable mattress while his breath plumed in the air. No fire had been lit, but he did not care; he was too tired to care, for he had not slept well since before the party. He had not slept much at all, in truth, and those endless, waking nights were beginning to catch up with him.
Church bells chimed out across a gray and moonlit graveyard, thick fog slithering between headstones like something living, each toll sending a shudder up Adrian’s spine.
One o’clock… two o’clock… three o’clock…
