CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
"You'll never be the man you think you are, or the man you ought to be!"
Those words, fallen from the mouth of his love Anna, stuck with him; they hurt him, crippled him. He imagined that day with her; he had found her rather inebriated and in a compromising position with Lord Rossing, a man he had only ever held the foulest of contempt for. He had retrieved his love, but her actions had brought great sorrow to his heart. He asked her if she had ever truly loved him.
She said she had.
"Anna, please," he pleaded; scaling the stairs of Berrewithe Manor he followed her to her room, only to find she had locked the door shut. "I'll... I'm sorry," he pleaded, pressing his shoulder against the door, longing to feel her body against his once more. "I love you... I want to have your hand in marriage, Anna, doesn't that mean anything to you?"
"Of course it does! I find that you think otherwise to be quite insulting," her voice, muffled, rumbled through the locked door.
"M'lady, I didn't—I would never intend to insult you, please," Lord Beckham pleaded.
"If you hadn't meant to insult me you wouldn't have questioned my integrity over matters so simply as an evening with Lord Rossing!" she sniped back, her voice hysterical.
"Anna, please... I'm... sorry, I..." his heart throbbing, he couldn't bring himself to break his last barrier; to let her take so complete a control over him. He had to stand up for himself, he thought... he couldn't simply let another man have his wife so thoughtlessly. But he couldn't bring himself to do it; to chastise her. He loved her too deeply, and so caught was he in her spell that nothing could break it.
"You can't even apologize properly for something so outrageous!" she shouted.
"I..." he withered against the door, falling to his knees, eyes full of tears. Ms. Cauthfield had warned him of the woman and her capricious cruelty; of her manipulations. Still, he couldn't say no to someone he loved so deeply.
"Won't you ever say you're sorry for wronging me?" Anna shrieked through the door.
"You're not going to apologize, are you?" Ms. Cauthfield emerged from the shadows, having listened to the conversation. "She's devastated you, m'lord! Spending the evening with another man? She's using you," Ms. Cauthfield whispered. Broken, Lord Beckham looked up to his loyal servant; a woman who had helped raised him, a second mother.
"What am I to do, Ms. Cauthfield? I love her dearly. She is everything to me," Lord Beckham pleaded, tears at his eyes.
"You deserve loyalty, m'lord. Anyone - man, woman, or otherwise - who gives love, deserves love back," Ms. Cauthfield excoriated him.
"Marshall? Marshall! How dare you ignore me!" Anna screamed through the door. Lord Beckham's expression fell, his voice cowed.
"I'm... sorry."
***
His eyes flashed open, that fetid reverie still clinging like spores of mold to the back of his mind. She had been right, all along; she had broken him, and he knew he could never make a woman like Nadia happy. Anna had been his nadir, but she had taught him that his love would never be enough.
Worse yet, he had claimed the woman's first time; something which had grown to a great storm of dread in the depths of his churning stomach. Since returning to the manor he had drowned himself in loathing for being so crass, so short-sighted, as to steal one of the most sacred things to a young woman! The more the panic set into him the more he convinced himself of the need to settle this the only way he could now, without ruining Nadia's life as he had ruined his own, and his sister's.
"She's quite a creature, isn't she? Takes after her mother, who had all those same, wild, unmarriageable characteristics," Lord Havenshire's hoarse laugh echoed through the hall as night began to creep across the moors. Watching night fall at the top of the stairs, where a towering window gave him view of night's silvery lunar eye, Lord Beckham turned at the sound of the old man's voice, his dark coat bathed in the moonlight.
"M'lord," he said with a nod.
"Quite a storm we had today, hmm?" the old man nodded knowingly, excitement crisscrossing his worn, pale face as he hobbled weakly up the stairs to try to join the younger man. "Did you and my daughter manage to find refuge from the rain somewhere safe?"
"Thankfully so, though unfortunately not before taking a bit of the storm on my back, as you might be able to tell," Lord Beckham chuckled humbly, glancing down at his own rather frumpy-looking, still-damp shirt. "Your daughter is... quite the rider."
"She bloody ought to be, given all the money and time she spent on lessons!" Lord Havenshire commented with a laugh. "I can only imagine how the two of you managed to pass the time."
"We found a gameskeeper's cabin out in the wood," Lord Beckham responded hesitantly. "It had... a fireplace, and some firewood still, thankfully. We talked. It's... been a pleasure getting to know her, and for your sake I feel we may wish to speak in your study, if you have one available." Lord Havenshire's face lit up.
"I think you'd make Nadia the happiest woman in all northern England. Ms. Mulwray, she might have a tendency towards the shrewish at times, but she's got quite an eye, and she regaled me today with a story of just how excited Nadia was to see you this morning," the elder lord exclaimed. The more he spoke, the more uncomfortable Lord Beckham grew. "Have you a mind for pursuing her, then? Let's away to the study for some brandy," Lord Havenshire offered, struggling to drag himself along the stairs.
"It's not quite..." Lord Beckham's words caught in his throat; he didn't quite know how to explain the situation to the sickly old man. Your daughter is wonderful. She's far, far too wonderful for me. But I know of your predicament. I don't want to disappoint her, or you; I don't want to shame her. At least I can help make her happy by giving her freedom. He wished he could say it aloud; instead, he only thought on it as the ailing duke led the two of them through the corridors in a weak hobble. He seemed more ill each time the two of them met, and that only exacerbated the worry in his heart. Need to do this quickly.
"Here we are, the coziest room in all the manor," Lord Havenshire exclaimed in his rasp, hurrying to set upon one of the two armchairs facing a roaring fire, bookshelves and desks arrayed along the walls. Lord Beckham quickly took to one of the writing desks, searching for pen and inkwell, drawing a piece of parchment along the desk.
"I've a proposal for you, and for your daughter, m'lord," Lord Beckham said, as the old man nearly collapsed into the chair behind him.
"Come, there's no need for a rush! I'll have Ms. Mulwray get one of the serving girls to grab a pair of glasses for us and a bottle of some of the finest the cellars have in stock. This is a time for celebrating, after all!" Lord Havenshire exclaimed. Lord Beckham realized that the old man had come to hope his daughter would fall in love... that the marriage would be fruitful for the two of them. Perhaps she had... but he knew no matter how much love the two of them held, love could never work for him. Anna had made sure to show him that this - a marriage just for the sake of name and title - is the most he could do for a woman. At least he could make himself useful in some manner.
"M'lord, it's fine, I don't think this will take long," Lord Beckham insisted, scribbling out the terms as quickly as he could. He took to phrasing them as succinctly as necessary, putting to paper the thoughts he had in his head, but couldn't dare speak aloud.
"I must confide, Lord Beckham, I had little doubt you'd find her manner agreeable - or, at least agreeable as any manner of lord in this entire nation would find her agreeable," Lord Havenshire coughed out with a laugh. "Below the skin, and the fire, and all those wild ideals she carries in her head, she's one of the gentlest, sweetest, and most dedicated hearts you'll find. She came all the way back, here, to England," he continued, "...simply on hearing her father wanted to see her. Of course, I had much... more dire need of her, than I had let on in my letters," Lord Havenshire admitted, as Marshall scribbled hastily across the piece of parchment. The ailing lord's words stung, each of them a reminder of his own failings; that he would fail so beautiful and wonderful a woman as Nadia. "I'm fortunate to know a man like you will be taking care of my Nadia, and the estate, once things... well, once I'm gone."
"There's no need to be fatalistic, m'lord. Nadia will have what she wishes," Lord Beckham insisted, finishing the last lines. He drew an 'x' and a line at the bottom of the contract, drawing a line across it and scribbling his name to the terms he had drawn up - then left another empty line for Lord Havenshire, and another for Nadia. He turned abruptly and offered the page to Lord Havenshire, who began to read its terms with a face full of mirth.
"May it be known Lord Marshal Beckham, Duke of Berrewithe, and Lady Nadia Havenshire of Emerys, be joined into a contract of matrimony to be consummated at the nearest church - oh, consummated, I like that," Lord Havenshire smiled, "and maybe it be known that their marriage be one of... financial, marital convenience, for the method of keeping title, and that Lady Nadia Havenshire shall be known as steward of Emerys, bound not by the usual... sorts of marital expectations..." Lord Havenshire's voice fell away as he continued to read the terms; Lord Beckham recalled them in his head, and when the old man finished, he nodded.
"A marriage simply for your daughter's convenience. For your title, wealth, and lands. She'll not be beholden to me. She'll be free to court and to live as she pleases. I'll have... well, nothing to do with her. It's... best this way, m'lord," Lord Beckham painfully insisted; he felt warmth in his cheeks as a melancholy struck him, as if tears threatened to well over his eyes and splash upon the pages of the contract. "I only want to make her happy."
"B... but, m'lord, Beckham, certainly you don't think my daughter would be happy with this? Ms. Mulwray..."
"I feel she was mistaken about your daughter's... excitement, perhaps. I don't... think, I'm the man that your daughter would want - far from it, m'lord. But for your sake, and for hers... I want to ensure everything is good and proper before anything dreadful should happen to you," Lord Beckham pleaded; he kept his voice stern and settled, though he felt a fire raging inside of him. He realized all too deep in his gut that he had fallen for her; that he had begun to love this wild firebrand, and that he shared her father's disillusionment.
But he knew this is how it had to be, in this twisted world they lived in.
"Lord Beckham, did you... not get along, with my daughter, today? Did... something happen?" the shocked old man asked through a cough. "I was certain you would... grow to... love her," he said, his words limp and pained.
"We... we got along fine, m'lord. Knowing your daughter... this is what she wants. It's what's best for her," Lord Beckham said resoundingly. He could see the heart break in the father's eyes as he came to terms with the contract. "If you'll sign it, and have Nadia do the same, we can have a wedding publicly, if you like... or privately. Whichever is simplest for her."
"I just don't... understand, I suppose," Lord Havenshire sighed. "My daughter... she deserves love. I had hoped I would see it, before I died. Her face... experiencing that amazing feeling. Do you know it, Marshall?" Lord Havenshire asked, crestfallen. Lord Beckham looked away, stilling his raging heart.
"I should really be off for the eve, m'lord," he evaded answering the question deftly.
"You won't stay the night? Certainly, it's too late to be out among the moors. Bandits often prowl these roadways at night, and the sheriff..."
"I should be off," Lord Beckham insisted.
"...Very well," Lord Havenshire said with a weak sigh, a coughing fit claiming him.
"It's been a pleasure, m'lord," Lord Beckham said.
"... A pleasure," the ailing man replied.
––––––––
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The day broke and the sun draped across Lady Havenshire's body, still lain atop the sheets as she had been while speaking with Mary. She'd drifted away; the day had been exhausting, even life-changing; but worry knotted her stomach the moment she rose from the bed, worry over the nature of her relationship with the man who had claimed her intimately for the first time; the man she found herself helplessly falling in love with.
Men can be animals... men can take what they want and leave. Ms. Mulwray had said the same thing; had warned the girl against being taken advantage of. Nadia considered herself far too strong, far too independent to ever be taken advantage of by something so simple as a man, or silly concepts like love.
Of course, it's those too full of hubris and confidence who often fail to see those signs. Her self-doubt welled up as a sickness in her stomach; she longed to see him, and hoped that, perhaps, he had stayed the eve in the guest-rooms on the grounds. That would give the both of them an excellent chance at speaking about the issues that had come up between them; perhaps they could clear the air, and reignite whatever passion had wavered after their intimate time together in the cabin. A knocking on the door alerted her and she sprung from the bed, still clad in her messy riding uniform; she pulled it off, throwing it into a pile in the corner, grasping at her collection of soft, silken-white gowns to face the day with.
"Who is it?" she asked, her heart ringing hopeful that she'd hear a man's deep, stormy voice on the other side of the door.
"M'lady, your father wishes to see you," came the prickly and stern response. Ms. Mulwray's voice proved not nearly as pleasant as Lord Beckham's, and the harsh tone of her gave pause to young Nadia, who held in her churning stomach a strange little bit of excitement for today's events, hoping to reaffirm her love for the man who had showed her what it meant to be close; showed her just what love could feel like.
"I'll be down in just... a moment, Ms. Mulwray," she responded, her voice shaky. The tone had upset her, and she hastily threw on whatever garment she could get ahold of, running her hands down to smooth the rumples and curls; glancing in a mirror, she paid particular attention to herself; her hair still a mess, her skin dirty, her face tired... she could never present herself to Lord Beckham like this, she thought. Her nerves alight and her heart thumping, she yet hoped she could see him - perhaps he would accept her, no matter how desperate she looked. Her dreams had not been kind; that simmering fear in her stomach had turned to wild dreams of abandonment; Mary's words had made her imagine the duke leaving, never to speak to her or the house staff again.
She contemplated the dream as she fixed her hair, wrapping it into a small bundle with a pretty yellow ribbon. He wouldn't do that, would he? Certainly not. He couldn't! Not when he'd so intimately spent time with her; not when her father had searched him out so. He couldn't do that.
Or perhaps that was the simple girl inside of her talking; the girl with no knowledge, no understanding of relationships. The words of a hopeful heart crying out for him, while her stomach turned, unsure of what to expect when she left her bedchamber.
"He's waiting in the study, and he's quite fragile this morning, m'lady," Ms. Mulwray warned, her eyes focused deeply on Nadia. "Don't set him to desperation today, please."
"Father, yes... is Lord Beckham in the manor? Or in Emerys, perhaps? Did he stay the evening?" Nadia asked tensely, searching the hallway for any sign of the nobleman. Ms. Mulwray's expression flooded with confusion.
"Did you expect him to?" Her words struck Nadia like a resounding cudgel thudding against her head; he hadn't stayed... of course he hadn't. What a stupid girl I'd been, Nadia thought, to expect him to. She walked along the corridor like a tormented revenant; slow, plodding steps, searching endlessly for a love she began to fear she had lost. Why wouldn't he stay? Had he not wished to see her? Wouldn't a man in love be dying to sleep so near to his lover? Wouldn't a man in love spend his waking moments begging, pleading to see his love once more?
She arrived finally at the door of her father's study; she could hear the crackle of its fireplace. The sound triggered memories; her pulse pounded harder, and she imagined his body, strong and nude, so close to hers; his tongue pleasing her as she begged for him never to stop, as they shared quiet words of love and devotion and emotion, words she had never dared say to any man for fear of what he might try to take from her. She hadn't felt that with Marshall; she had found in him a spirit she thought would reject her or use her.
Dread filled her stomach at the thought that he had just been another man... that her worst fears had been true, that all men had the same wicked thoughts and feelings in their head. She took a deep breath and pushed her way into her father's study. He sat in the armchair, swirling a glass in his hand; a piece of parchment grasped in the other, lost in thought. He didn't even notice her at first, something that... rather startled her, and so she began to speak to catch his attention.
"I heard Lord Beckham left last evening? Has he sent word of a safe arrival? The bandits in the moors tend to be ruthless in the evenings," she asked, her words shaky, as she tried so hard to maintain the confidence her father knew her for.
"He's made it back, I'm certain," Lord Havenshire murmured absentmindedly.
"Are you certain? The bandits..." her voice trailed.
"Nadia, I wanted to... to congratulate you - you've found a husband," her ailing father said. "It's a day for celebration. You should be proud."
"Wh... what?" Nadia blinked. "A husband?" She stormed towards her father, her expression stern. "What manner of trickery is this, father?"
"Trickery? There's... no trickery. I've thought on it all evening, and I've signed the contract. Lord Beckham authored this, and he... he told me, it's what you wanted. What would be best for the both of you," he said. He handed the document gripped in his fingers to her, and she snatched at it with a slow, nervous rage building in her chest, the pressure pushing out the love and replacing it with terror. Her eyes pored over the words and with each sentence she felt the urge to scream; she felt pain filter into her, and she nearly collapsed as she finished reading.
Marriage of convenience. Marital freedom. No obligations. She felt... used. As if he'd relieved his guilt over his sister - his guilt over his manhood in a system that favored him - by writing out a silly contract and dismissing her. She had given him something so important, something she had never given any man - something she didn't want to give to any other man, but him. Not just her body, not just the most sacred of covenants; but her love, something she'd never felt.
Now whatever scars he bore had ruined all that and it made her feel... broken. She had felt rage, she had felt bitterness; but now, all she wanted was simply to shrivel away as a flower blustered by a harsh winter.
"I only... wanted to see your face happy, some day, Nadia. I had hoped it could be with him... he seemed to understand you, like no other suitor," Lord Havenshire lamented sadly.
"Father, I... I don't know, why he would do this, our day... together, we..." she huffed, exhaling sharply. "I don't understand this. It doesn't make sense! Why would he want?" She held her fists tight, shaking. "I... I can't... Egan!" she shouted through the doorway.
"Nadia, please, as much as it pains me, at least let me have the opportunity of giving you a wedding," Lord Havenshire pleaded.
"I'm preparing a carriage," she said in a flurry," destined for his manor. We're going to discuss this. I'm... I'm sure it's simply a misunderstanding," she murmured. "...Certainly."
But had it been? As she stormed through the halls, barking for Egan to prepare a carriage, she thought on darker things. Had Mary been right? If the man who had her had claimed her virginity and simply left her afterwards, not to speak to her again...
How could you be so stupid? Lady Havenshire asked herself, swallowing hard. She had been sweet-talked right into the place that he had wanted her. He had gotten what he wanted - and now he had left.
No. He couldn't have. She would get to the bottom of this.
––––––––
CHAPTER TWENTY
"Has something happened between you and Lord Beckham, m'lady?" Egan asked, breaking his little, jaunty whistle of his favorite tune. It was a bad time to ask such a question of Lady Havenshire, who had spent hours now as a nervous disaster; she had boarded the carriage with breath heavy and heart throbbing, full of fear and full of rage about the pithy contract that the man she had fallen in love with left behind to be signed. A marriage of convenience. Loveless. Hardly a marriage at all. She found it odd, the more she thought on it, that she had ever thought of such an arrangement as attractive at all! Who would enter into bonds so deeply-held, without love to bind it together? She couldn't believe that he would do such a thing! Hadn't he fallen in love with her, just the same as she had fallen for him? Hadn't he felt that spark, like the flash of flint and tinder against the dried wood, erupt into a heart-gripping fire, just as she had? Hadn't he said those adoring words to her by the light of the raging flames, as thunder cracked and rumbled in the distance, rattling the windows to the cabin?
He'd promised her everything. He'd called her a goddess, and he worshiped her just the same. And now he proposed a loveless marriage, simply for the inheritance of name and title? Her heart hurt, and she fought away tears, spurred on by Egan's poorly-timed question. He glanced back as the carriage pulled through the mountains and rocky pathways leading up the hills towards the Berrewithe estate; seeing redness staining her eyes and flowing along her cheeks, he took sudden alarm.
"M'lady, has something happened? Should we turn around?" he queried, full of worry.
"No! No," she shouted insistent, her voice wracked and ragged from the warbling of her angry, melancholy voice. "We've got to see Lord Beckham. He needs to speak with me, to answer for... for this," she said, voice harsh and shrill, waving the contract - she'd taken it with her, if only to throw it into his face as she cried at the loss of love.
"M'lady—he's asked for your hand in marriage, hasn't he?" Egan questioned curiously.
"It's not that simple, Egan. To him, I'm just a convenient excuse for his guilty conscience, for taking advantage of his sister - and this... this contract, it's just him relieving himself of guilt for taking advantage of me," she shouted.
"M'lady, I'm... isn't that what you... wanted? To have a man in marriage, but not to stifle your life?" Egan questioned. She swallowed hard; her throat hurt from the shouting, and the tears, but she had to say it; if only to hear herself say the words aloud.
"I... I don't want that, Egan. I love him," she said, quivering. Surprise in the portly porter's face, he turned to the horses, coaxing them along the roadway faster.
"We'll get you to the manor, m'lady," Egan called back to her, the horses picking up pace until they practically bounded forward, along the hills and rocky roadways, the carriage bouncing wildly along the path. The vehicle came to an abrupt stop as Egan called out to the creatures who whinnied loudly, the creaking wheels spinning their last as the hasty chauffeur unlatched the carriage door.
"Tell him that, m'lady," Egan pleaded. "Tell him. Any lord who would turn down true love - he doesn't deserve you, Nadia. Tell him." She nodded to Egan, who bowed; the doors swung open, and Ms. Cauthfield emerged from the manor; when she saw Nadia, a wanting sympathy filled the old woman's face as she dashed across the yard.
"Lady Havenshire, Lord Beckham has..." Ms. Cauthfield sniffled. "He... he thought you would come to see him, but he's requested... no visitors, at this time. He's had a difficult time—"
"HE'S had a difficult time?" Nadia exclaimed, the tears still staining her eyes red. Ms. Cauthfield, face full of regret, full of worry for her master, shook her head.
"Has he not told you about Anna? About his wedding, in the Delshire Moors? About..." Ms. Cauthfield appeared broken, fearful. "I told him... he needed to get past it. I told him, but he never did. And now he hates himself, and won't have a word with you, Nadia."
"Ms. Cauthfield, I love him," Nadia urged. "I... I truly do love him." Ms. Cauthfield's face lit up when she heard Nadia's exclamation; she smiled, even as tears began to stream from the old woman's face.
"He shall have my head for this, but... I'm not going to stop you from speaking with him," Ms. Cauthfield said, sniffling. "Go, please... talk to him. Try to break him from this spell that's driven him to despair... please," she muttered. Nadia pressed past the old woman and to the front door, pull it open with a flourish, a sudden spark of hope glimmering in her eye. They could talk; he would be reasonable, wouldn't he? After all, she loved him.
"Nadia, I should have expected you'd come, and that... Ms. Cauthfield, bless her, would think it best if I saw you, in spite of my wishes," Lord Beckham announced, standing at the stairwell of his grand foyer. He sighed, his voice not that booming, enthralling baritone she had so enjoyed in their first meetings. No, now it felt like a simple shell, a show of false-authoritativeness put on to convince listeners of his sincerity. "M'lady, I don't think... we have much to speak about. Has your father given you the contract? I do believe he... signed it, after I left," Lord Beckham asked. A sea of maidservants and house staff stood at the base of the steps, pretending to work; in truth, few of them could pay attention to their duties, as their attention slipped away to the exchange between the nobles instead.
"Lord Beckham, I don't understand—we need to speak about this... contract," she said, the words slithering with venom.
"What's not to understand?" he said, brooding, watching farmers and ranchers and workers out on the moors beyond through his window. "I thought this was... well, precisely what you and your father have been looking for. Your freedom... the freedom you deserve as a grown woman. A freedom from the cage you were unfortunately born in to. Your father agreed. It'd be for the best."
"My father agreed? My father agreed because he's an ailing old man! He wants me to be happy, and this isn't happiness!" Nadia shouted.
"It's precisely everything you wanted - and you won't have to deal with me at all. No men to control you - not even I can do that, with the terms I've written here. And I don't want to cage you. I don't expect that of you, or any woman. I'm not worth that," Lord Beckham scoffed dismissively.
"You're not worth... I love you!" Nadia exclaimed angrily. A quiet murmur sounded from the maidservants, who all watched with rapt eyes. "Have you in your stubborn, stupid mind forgotten the things we said together? The feelings that we felt? Was it a lie?"
"I..." Lord Beckham hesitated; he saw the pain he'd wrought, and began to reconsider... if only for a second. His expression vexed, brow furrowed, he turned away. "I can't do that."
"All I am is a convenient excuse for you, then? A way to ease your guilty conscience?" Nadia asked accusingly. "Is that what matters to you, more than my love? To ease the painful memory of your sister, estranged from you over this sordid mess of an estate? To ease the pain, you feel about your past?"
"You are not an excuse," Lord Beckham began to grow angrily resenting at the accusations. "I've done this for you. For your own good. For everything you want. I'm not what you think I am; I'm not what you want," he roared.
"You've spent so much time convincing yourself of that that even love can't break this disgusting self-loathing!" Nadia shouted, storming up the stairs towards him. "I'll not let it happen. This contract - here! I'll not be a party to your self-destruction, Marshall," her voice raised higher and hotter, and with all eyes on her she threw it at his feet. "You lied to me. You used me!"
"I did not use you!" he retorted, turning to face her, his expression torn, shredded by hatred. She could see pain beneath, tears forming at the corners of his eyes.
"You took my virginity! Is that all I was meant to do for you?" The revelation sent a wave of shocked gasps through the assembled crowd of maidservants, their eyes wide. "Is that what you had searched for? And now that you've gotten it, you're quite content, aren't you? That's all you needed," she sneered.
"That had nothing to do with... with any of this, though I... I regret taking you, in that manner," he admitted painfully. "It was a mistake. It shouldn't have happened, and I shouldn't have let it happen. I'll never be good enough for—"
"For what? For me? I said I love you! Am I not the person to make the determination of who is good enough, and who is not?!" Nadia shouted, stamping her shoe's heel into the contract. "I can choose whomever I wish to be good enough for me! Or perhaps you're just like the other men, thinking yourself above a woman? Thinking yourself better equipped to make her decisions for her?"
"And with every word you speak you only prove to me that I made the right decision with that contract - that I've failed you, just as I failed before, and just as I will always fail," he rumbled.
"Why have you set yourself so stringently on this path, Marshall? Why?" Nadia pleaded, tears flowing freely along her cheeks now. "You feel it inevitable that you will fail. Any trouble that befalls you is evidence of that failure; any good fortune is simply luck, or happenstance. You've dedicated yourself so completely to this lie that you'd break my heart for it," she sobbed.
"It's not my choice, Nadia. It's my destiny to fail the ones I love, and I can't put you through that," he lamented. "Please. Let me at least do some good, for you. Some small amount of good. Let me save your father's heart; let me give to you what he wants for you."
"My father wanted me to be happy. Did he not tell you that? The estate—all of it. He cared more for my heart, for love - than he did for title or peerage," Nadia exclaimed. Lord Beckham struggled, his hands shaking; tortuously close to that precipice or seeing reality, of seeing the heart breaking in Nadia's chest.
"He's a good man... and he will understand me in making this decision," Lord Beckham said, turning his shoulder to the woman as she cried.
"...That's it, then? Ms. Cauthfield... she had hope of saving you. I suppose I did, too. I had hoped, from that first night, that our hearts could find one another. It was only a glimmer of hope, a whisper of it, but I held on to it. The morning we rode together... I had never felt any sort of joy or excitement for so simple, so dull a task. But with you, I saw something. I saw the sun. And you've stifled it; choked the life from it. I loved you."
"This is how it has to be, Nadia. I'm deeply sorry," Lord Beckham insisted. "Please... go back to your estate. Make your father happy. He's a good man. He would like to spend what time he has left with you, I'm certain. We will resolve matters of title, and then you shan’t need to see me in your life ever again. You'll be happy, Nadia. That I promise you."
"No, I won't," she spat bitterly as she stormed down the stairs, giving him one last searing look. "You don't have to fail again, and again... but you will, because you insist upon it," she said, and with that she threw open the doors and left the estate, her heart heavy.
––––––––
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The door to Lord Beckham's bedchamber flung open, he retreated to the only place he knew he could; the only refuge he had from the memories; from the pain. The only place no one could force him to face reality. From the window, he watched her leave the manor's front door; she stormed towards her family's carriage, and she tried so firmly to appear angry; but as she reached the vehicle he watched what lay beneath. He watched her fall to her knees and begin to weep; he could hear her sobs, even at his window, carrying cries of sorrow soaring over the moors. He looked away, swallowing hard, his expression canted towards the carpet; trying to drown out the pain with something, anything; any thoughts.
But everything in his mind came back to her.
He pulled the curtains shut; the sight had only reaffirmed precisely what he had gotten into his head. He would fail; he would always fail. Just as Anna had fled him, racing up the stairs with tears in her eyes. Good, he thought to himself; she had to learn eventually. Nadia would have found herself hating him; it was the only natural consequence, just as it had been before.
He closed his eyes. He felt his own chest welling with emotion; he, too, wished to weep, looking upon another failure. You'll never be the sort of man a woman will ever want. He heard her voice calling to him; from the rafters of his bedchamber, shrieking through his dreams, like a ghost he could never escape; a doom he could never hope to outrun. He closed his eyes, but even then, he saw her; now, he saw Nadia, too, her face crossed with tears, stained a blushing red, another ghoulish failure of his past. He heard her berate him, just as he had heard Anna. You only fail because you insist upon it!
He threw himself upon the chair to his writing desk, fighting back the tears and the rage; his hands balled into fists he grasped at his liquor shelf, squat with a door of glass, pulling it open. He thought it the only way of forgetting the dreams; the dreams of failure, dreams that soon would bear home to a new haunting memory, one of the beautiful woman he had taken to the cabin; the beautiful, free-spirited firebrand of a woman whose innocence he had claimed so shamelessly.
He swallowed hard; through flames of tears and rage swelling his eyes and blotting his sight Lord Beckham grasped a bottle of muddy-brown liquor, stoppered with a simple cork. He slammed it upon his desk and took in a deep breath, trying to still his shaking hands and cool the flow of emotion pouring from within him. He examined the glass; examined his hand. He closed his eyes, and she hadn't left him yet; he saw her nude, wriggling in the warmth of the fire, whispering to him just how much she wanted him.
If only she had known.
Trembling he grasped the bottle. He pulled the stopper from its mouth, overpowering and heady scent striking his nostrils. He lifted the foul decanter to his lips, taking a deep and unsteady breath.
Knock knock knock! A pounding upon the door shook him from his destruction and spite-filled reverie, and he gulped loudly as a brief, gleaming sunbeam of reality poured into his widened, melancholy-stricken eyes.
"I've no time for conversations," he replied in a muddied, weak tone. He waited, the haze drifting painfully through his mind. He heard no further protest, and turned his gaze once more to the bottle, the swill stinging his nostrils. He recoiled, before another loud knocking interrupted him.
Knock knock!
"Begone!" he retorted, beginning to fear his demons had coalesced into a hate-gnashing mob, come to drag him to his rightful spot in hell. He focused his mania on the bottle before him, his shaking hands lifting it to his mouth, but before he could sip, he heard the hinges to his bedchamber door squeaking quietly open. He heard footsteps... no, he wouldn't look away. He had made his decision. He would hear no more protest.
"M'lord," came a quiet voice.
"Ms. Cauthfield, I'm not in need of a dressing-down in any sort of fashion at this particular moment," the duke dismissed her with an obstinate venom.
"No, I think you are," she responded, like the bite of an angry beast whose rage had been simmering for some time. The old woman threw the door shut behind her and she charged heedless at her master, slapping the bottle from his hand, sending it careening to the carpet, shattering, its contents spilling and the foul, ichorous smell permeating the bedchamber. Lord Beckham blinked in utter amazement; his mouth agape and astonishment in his eyes, he watched as Ms. Cauthfield, who had spent so long a time as a reticent observer of his self-destructive tendencies, positively seethed at him. She had never seen her so, and it... well, it quite scared him.
"I've watched you struggle along this path alone for far too long, Marshall, and I'll not tolerate it any longer," she sneered.
"Ms. Cauthfield, this is outrageous," Lord Beckham rumbled in protest. "You—"
"No, you're outrageous! You're utterly outrageous, Marshall, and I'll not stand for seeing it any longer," Ms. Cauthfield exhorted him, tears beginning to stream from her own eyes. "I'll not watch you destroy yourself again. That girl loves you!"
"Anna loved me too," Lord Beckham lamented. "Anna—"
"Enough with Anna! Enough! How could your mind be on something from so long ago with a beautiful young girl who's fallen in love with you, pleading to have you? How?!" Ms. Cauthfield exclaimed, and in a sudden surge of emotion the older woman slapped her master across the face, stunning him. Her eyes widened; she couldn't rightly believe her own actions, her wrinkled cheeks reddened with tearful rage. She cleared her throat, shivering.
"Ms. Cauthfield..." Lord Beckham mumbled halfheartedly.
"I'll not... apologize, for what I've done, and if you'll have me dismissed for it, so be it," Ms. Cauthfield said, shaky. "I'd far prefer to be dismissed, to find myself on the streets of London, than to stay in this manor, and watch it die; watch the family I've served loyally my whole life wile away their lives and fortune, to watch the boy I've known for so long give in to his self-hate, to destroy himself, and destroy so true a love as he has right in front of him," she exclaimed through sniffles. Try as she may to maintain her professional dignity, Ms. Cauthfield couldn't let her emotions simmer. "Decades of braised honey beef and scraped knees; decades of service to your father, your mother; to you, and I promised your parents - promised them - I'd watch after you, until I no longer served the Beckham household. And I suppose I shall consider today to be that day, because I cannot simply watch that poor girl walk away, Marshall, because you despise yourself so deeply! Because of that blasted woman, and that day in the Delshire Moors. She never loved you, Marshall! But Nadia, this poor girl, you showed her something she's never seen before," Ms. Cauthfield seethed.
"Ms. Cauthfield, I don't want to dismiss you," Lord Beckham insisted, his voice weak. "I don't..."
"Then I'll offer instead my resignation, for I can't bear to do this any longer," she said shrilly. In a storm was she off, the bedchamber door slamming behind her; Marshall sat in stunned silence for a long and quiet moment, breath caught in his throat. He smelled the rank burn of the liquor rising from the carpet and swallowed hard.
He gathered himself up, and wandered out of the door to his bedchamber in search of the maidservant, but silence crept across the entirety of the manse. In an emotional haze, he stumbled back to the stairwell; deathly silence fell across the chamber, and he spied on the carpet - stamped and ripped - the contract he had drawn up, his own name next to Lord Havenshire's. At the front door stood loyal James, though in his expression Lord Beckham could read the same disappointment with which Ms. Cauthfield had only recently bludgeoned the duke with.
"James," the duke said, acting as if in a trance, his mind addled with some sense of shocked madness.
"M'lord," the butler responded coldly. He saw her in the window... he saw her down the stairs. Always that smile. When Lord Beckham looked upon the dead fireplace at the rear of the foyer, he saw her again; flashes, pained flashes, like the memories of Anna.
He needed to forget Anna, he told himself. Perhaps Ms. Cauthfield had been right.
"A carriage... a carriage," Lord Beckham blurted. He stepped lightly down the stairs, his mind wandering. He could hear Nadia's words echoing through the vaulted ceilings. He saw her face; heard her fiery exhortations.
"A carriage, m'lord, bound for where?" James asked.
"The Emerys estate, I... I need to have Nadia sign this contract," he rambled. "I need..."
"M'lord... I think you need something different," James murmured.
"...Perhaps... perhaps I..." Lord Beckham exhaled.
"Do you love her, m'lord?" James asked.
"I... think, I do," the duke responded hesitantly.
"You'll only ever know what can happen with love if you try," James pleaded. He could only hear her words; every time he closed his eyes he saw her face.
"I think... I do, love her," he shuddered. "But how could anyone truly love me back?"
"You can't let that woman haunt your life forever," James said.
"...prepare a carriage, James... this contract..." Lord Beckham repeated his idea, a curious mantra of self-protection.
"I'll do as you wish, m'lord, but perhaps you should reconsider your course of action," the butler added, before stepping through the grand front doors.
He closed his eyes. He saw her again.
"Perhaps..." Lord Beckham's voice trailed.
––––––––
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
"I'm certain your father will be fine, m'lady," Egan murmured as the carriage pulled alongside the front of the Emerys manor. Her heart shattered, Lady Havenshire had spent the trip back across the moors with her mind awash in rage, in pain; she felt utter loss, betrayal. She had never felt something so acute in her life; something so stinging in her chest as a round and utter rejection.
"Father is going to die, Egan, and all he wanted was to see my face happy before that happened," she lamented with a sigh. "I loved that man. I didn't know what real love meant, and..."
Her mind flashed back to the first night together. How she had treated him harshly after hearing of his sister. She thought of the laughs; the smile, before a darkness crept across them. She thought of his stormy eyes; how she had seen him, a darkness against the backdrop of Lord Perrywise's gaudy and ostentatious ballroom; she had seen something different in him. Had he truly been different? Or had he used her as any man would - in all that ways that Ms. Mulwray had warned?
As the horses' hooves clopped along the roadway, her family manor looming close, she closed her eyes and saw him again. She saw his dusky expression at the far end of the dining hall; she felt in her mouth the sweet succor of honey-braised meat, a recipe that felt as delectable in her imagination as it had in person. She smelled the steam of fresh food, heard the echo of his darkly-commanding tone rolling through the dining hall. His quips took her heart away to a different place; to a better time, to laughter at his expense as he saw the terrified lord atop the back of a lazy, aging horse.
It brought her back to that day. The rains fell and she thought her very life in danger at the spine-tingling chill of the rain across swaying autumn trees. Hearing his voice call out across the forest, like a rescuing lifeline. She saw the old cabin; the smell of mold, spurts of dust; dried wood. She recalled his scent; his body. An exceptional body; one she wanted to wake up next to, every single morning.
"Your father will be waiting, m'lady..." Egan broke into the reverie; they had arrived at the front door of the manor, the horses clopping their hooves impatiently, wanting for the embrace of the stable. Her eyes opened and that memory drifted away, even as he heard in her mind memories of her name burning passionately from his gaping mouth. She shivered, recalling the rainy cold of that day; a cold she felt now renewed, as a breeze passed through the opened door of the carriage. She stared at the face of the manor - it felt flat; everything felt flat, as if all the color and all the life and vigor of all the world had withered away without the thought of him brimming in her mind. The vibrant, burning fiery-oranges and reds of the trees in autumn, the blanket of fallen leaves and swaying yellows of bushes dying away for the season felt dull compared to the fire he brought to her life.
Soon, she thought, winter would come; a freezing blanket of white would claim the bright colors of autumn, washing away warmth and filling bones that had once felt the sudden, lively surge of love with the icy fingers of contempt; of loneliness. Frozen in the unchanging, gray doldrums of that dark time would be her memories of him, gleaming within the frozen wilds, always beckoning her back to that embrace. But she couldn't have them; she couldn't cling forever to fall, for winter would come and claim everything she had loved. It would claim her father, as it had claimed her mother; it would claim her fortune, and her freedom. She'd be a captive bird shrilly squeaking from a crushing cage.
"M'lady..." once more her gloomy recollections fell victim to the quiet, meek tone of the portly man at the head of the carriage. The horses whinnied and waited; dark-gray clouds gathered at the far edges of the sky, and she could hear faint rumblings of thunder threatening to bring back those memories all over again. Wherever a storm brewed, she saw him - the stormy man she had fallen for, who had slain her dreams.
"Yes, Egan, I... I know," she murmured. As she stepped from the carriage a great wind swept up, throwing dust and rotting brown-gray leaves into her messy hair; she exhaled deep, taking a breath of the air; she couldn't taste it, her senses dulled to their depths by the experiences of the morning. She hesitantly stepped towards the door to the manor. Her eyes closed again, the wind whipping against her, her dress clinging to her body; her hair thrown in tangled masses across her shoulder by the powerful gusts.
I loved him, she thought to herself. She wanted to give herself to him - just as they had promised in those hot, tense, wet throes of flaming passion. When he drew his coat atop their quaking bodies she had everything she had ever dreamed of - a true gentleman, one who respected her; one she loved, a man different from the others.
She entered the manor, immediately greeted by the sight of her father - arms spread, hopeful and caring, at the base of the foyer's grand stairwell.
"Nadia! Dear, how... how did everything go?" he asked, his face crested with pain. Clearly, he had hoped to see the two of them return together, and heartbreak filled his expression at the sight of a lone woman standing in the opened doors.
All he had wanted was to see her happy, before he passed. And she had been happy - happy like she never thought she could be, here in England; here in the moors and forests, where the world had been built against her freedom and happiness. But somehow, she had found it - for those few passing days with him, she had found it.
"Father, remember the story you used to tell? About mother?" Nadia asked, the winds gusting across her back. "About how you met."
"Your mother," he chuckled. "Oh, how I miss her... we met not far from here, remember?"
"Tell me," she insisted, her body shaking.
"Come inside, please, Nadia," her father pleaded through a cough.
"Please, father, tell me," Nadia insisted.
"I tripped in her dress and she called me a scoundrel," her father coughed out a laugh. "She hated me. And yet we met, again and again, at dinner parties, and because our parents insisted upon it," he chortled. "You know the story."
"She hated you, but you never gave up, did you, father?" Nadia asked, her voice shaking.
"Love is... a complicated thing, Nadia. It takes dedication, it takes sacrifice, it takes... well, stubborn, persistence," he advised.
"Stubborn persistence? And what's that you once said of me, father?" she demanded. His vexed expression shifted slowly to a warm smile.
"You're the most stubborn young woman I've ever known, Nadia," he responded gently.
"I have somewhere I need to go - I need to be rather stubborn, father," she said with a smile, "as I've a very... stubborn man. A man I love."
"Egan will get you there I'm certain," he replied.
"No, I must move with great haste. Shadow will take me there far faster," she responded, hurrying towards the stables. Her father beamed with pride as the door slammed behind his daughter. He'd finally gotten to see her so awash with that feeling - love.