“Except it is, because your Duchess is her dearest friend.” John’s tone had lost its teasing edge. “And because, despite your best efforts to convince everyone otherwise, I know you’re not actually made of stone. So, what did you do?”
Theodore’s hand tightened around the glass as he contemplated how he was going to broach the extent of his… blunder.
“I told her the truth.”
“Which truth? There are several varieties. Some helpful, some catastrophically ill-advised.”
“That she’s a contract. A marriage of convenience that satisfied my aunt’s meddling and her father’s greed.” The words tasted worse the second time. “That’s what she is. That’s what this has always been.”
John stared at him. “You said that to her? Those exact words?”
Theodore knew what his friend was going to say even as he replied, “Yes.”
“You’re an idiot.”
Yes.But…
“I’m honest.”
“You’re an idiot,” John repeated, with more emphasis. “A spectacular, self-destructive idiot. What the hell were you thinking?”
“I was thinking she needed to stop looking at me like I’m capable of being what she wants. Like I’m some reformed rake from one of her novels who’ll suddenly discover the redemptive power of love.” Theodore drained his glass. “Better she understand the truth now than spend years waiting for something that doesn’t exist.”
“The truth.” John leaned forward. “Let me tell you about the truth, Ashmere. The truth is, you’ve been happier these past weeks than I’ve seen you in seventeen years. The truth is, yousmile when you talk about her, even when you’re trying not to. The truth is, you rode to London instead of spending one more night under the same roof because you’re terrified.”
“I’m not?—”
“You’re terrified,” John continued, his voice sharp now, “that if you let yourself care about her, you’ll end up like your father. Or your uncle. That wanting her will destroy you the way your mother’s wanting destroyed your family.” He paused. “Am I close?”
Theodore said nothing. The whiskey had stopped burning somewhere around the third glass, replaced by a hollow numbness that felt appropriate.
John’s expression shifted, sympathy replacing irritation. “Theodore, what happened to your family wasn’t about desire. It was about betrayal. Your uncle and your mother made choices that hurt people.”
“And those choices were driven by passion. By… by uncontrolled wanting.” Theodore heard his voice flatten. “My uncle was a good man. Everyone loved him.Iloved him, and then desire turned him into someone who’d destroy his own brother.”
“Or,” John said quietly, “he was never as good as you thought. And your mother made a choice that had nothing to do with your father’s worth and everything to do with her own selfishness.”
Theodore refilled his glass with hands that weren’t quite steady. The crystal decanter caught the afternoon light slanting through the club’s tall windows, fracturing it into pieces that reminded him distantly of the way the sun had caught in Cressida’s hair that morning in the gallery. Before everything had splintered.
“She uncovered Charles’s portrait.”
John’s eyebrows rose. “Ah.”
“I specifically told her not to touch it. Seventeen years, John. Seventeen years, I’ve kept that curtain in place, and she—” Theodore cut himself off. “She thought she had the right. Because we’re married. Because I’ve let her into my bed, she thinks she’s entitled to every corner of my past.”
“Or,” John countered, “she cares about you and wants to understand what hurt you.”
“She wants to…fixme.” The words came out harshly. “Turn me into whatever fantasy she’s constructed about reformed dukes and happy endings. But I can’t be fixed, Whitebrook. What broke in me when my father died—when I watched Charles manipulate me into silence, when I saw what unchecked passion could do—that doesn’t heal. It isn’t meant to.”
John studied him with an expression Theodore couldn’t quite decipher. “Do you actually believe that?”
“Iknowthat.” Theodore gestured with his glass. “The evidence is compelling. My father loved my mother, and look where that got him. Charles loved her too, enough to betray his own brother. And I—” He stopped.
“You what?”
Theodore stared at the amber liquid in his glass. Easier to focus on that than on John’s too-perceptive eyes.
“I cared about them both. My mother and Charles. Trusted them. Believed what they told me.” The old shame crept up his throat. “They convinced me to keep quiet about their affair. Said it would hurt the family if it came out. I was seventeen, and I believed them. I kept their secret.”
