And without so much as a goodbye, he left.
Chapter Four
“Your Grace, are you well?”
Nathan looked up to see his valet staring down at him, a concerned look on his face. It took Nathan another few seconds to realize exactly why his valet was so concerned.
Oh yes. You’re sitting on the street outside of White’s, drinking directly from a bottle of red wine.
It wasn’t exactly the most ducal behavior.
“What are you doing here, Gibbs?” he asked, squinting up at the valet. “Why aren’t you back at the house?”
Gibbs looked confused. “You told me to wait here for you, Your Grace. In the carriage…”
“But…” Nathan tried to remember how long ago he had arrived at White’s but couldn’t. “That was hours ago, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” the valet agreed. “You’ve had quite a lot to drink tonight, Your Grace. Perhaps you lost track of time?”
“Ha! If only. But no, time is moving faster than ever, what with my wedding just a few hours away.”
The whole affair had moved so quickly—too quickly—speaking to Lord Carfield, Rosalie’s cousin, and getting his permission, making a short but speedy announcement in theTimes, securing the special license, and now, the wedding day, a mere week after he had asked Rosalie to tell him she wanted to marry him.
One week after she had said yes but only because there was no other option.
“Would you like to go home, Your Grace?” the valet asked anxiously. “You may have time to catch a few hours of sleep before you need to be at the church.”
“It’s too late for that,” Nathan said, waving a hand dismissively. “What I need is… James!”
“Your Grace?”
“The Duke of Attorton, my dear fellow! My cousin!”
“Ah…” Gibbs bit his lip. “But it is six in the morning, Your Grace. The Duke of Attorton will be asleep.”
“Then wake him up!” Nathan said, shaking his head. “It’s my wedding day, after all! Just tell him I’m having cold feet. That will get him here in record time.”
His valet still looked unsure, so Nathan reached into his pocket and pulled out several pounds which he set into Gibbs’ hand. “Take this,” he grunted. “It’ll give speed to your wings.”
Gibbs nodded, pocketed the change, and left him there, sitting on the pavement.
Nathan sat back and took another long swig from the bottle of wine. Above him, the gray sky was lightening to pink. Dawn was upon him.
The dawn of my wedding day. The dawn of my married life.
A sick feeling rose in his stomach, but he forced it down. It was dread, he knew, dread and guilt.
“I never wanted to be married,” he said out loud. No one was about at this early hour, so he was thankfully spared a response. “I never wanted to cause a woman the kind of pain my father caused my mother.”
To his shock, his eyes filled with tears at the words, and he had to cough and splutter until at last, the tears dissipated.Memories were threatening to burst from where he usually kept them sealed away, deep in a vault inside his brain he never touched. But he couldn’t let them now; even with all the wine, he couldn’t…
Father screaming. Mother cowering. Mother pushing her food away at the table, refusing to eat, telling us that Father deserved a wife who could be abstemious.
Ethan laughing. Ethan hugging Mother. Father ripping him away, telling him boys did not hug their mothers after the age of eight.
Mother growing thinner, weaker…
Ethan, with his kind eyes and easy laugh.
