Never Desire a Duke

of his waistcoat. “I understand I have hurt you. It is why I followed you here tonight, in hopes of answering for myself. Please say whatever you have to say. All of it, Sophia. Because after tonight, it is done. After tonight, I will defend myself no more.”

A long moment passed, wherein Sophia paced in front of the fire. Once she spoke the words, they would be impossible to retrieve. She had held them inside so long, never confiding them even to her mother or sisters.

“You are not completely to blame. If I hadn’t been so naive and had such unrealistic expectations of marriage, I wouldn’t have been so wounded and hurt by it all.” She closed her eyes and forced the words out. “It all started with Lady Darch.”

Claxton’s sudden exhalation of breath compelled her eyes open again. He pressed his lips together and looked away. A damning confession. The resulting stab of pain to her heart spurred her on.

“The morning we were married, in fact.”

She lowered herself to the settee and untied the ribbon underneath her chin, removing the cap from atop her head, because suddenly the satin felt like a coarse ligature across her throat, making it near impossible to breathe.

“You remember her ladyship.” Sophia scrutinized his face, wanting to observe his every reaction. “She was in my wedding party. A very beautiful widow.”

He did not move. He only listened, his face several shades paler and his jaw clamped tight.

She could not stop now. “We were alone for only a few moments after the ceremony, before we all went into breakfast, but she was kind enough to assure me how fortunate I was to be wedding you.” With each word spoken, her courage increased. It felt good, at last, to speak a secret she’d held inside so long.

Expressionless, Claxton closed his eyes because obviously he knew what she was about to say.

“That she knew from intimate experience how very satisfying you would be as a lover. That you were imminently talented in that regard, not only in the bedroom, but in the carriage and”—here she paused for breath, for the courage to say the rest—“in the garden. Wherever your passion might strike you.”

The blood drained from Vane’s cheeks. Her heart pounded so hard it hurt. But she knew if she had not died from heartache after losing their child and after he had abandoned her, she would not expire from it now.

“Sophia—” he uttered, his voice thick.

She lifted a silencing hand. “Lady Darch never stopped smiling, the whole time she spoke, but I suspect she was quite heartbroken that you and I had married.” She looked Claxton directly in the eye. “Which is why I tried very hard to forget the whole unpleasant matter.”

He held both of his palms open to her. “I never spoke to her again after you and I were betrothed. I swear it.”

Sophia nodded, her hands working the ribbon of her cap. “I believe you, Claxton, and that’s what I believed then as well, which is why I never mentioned her to you. I forgave you Lady Darch. After all, it wasn’t as if I believed you to be a virgin when we married.”

“Then what?” he demanded quietly. “Why tell me this now?”

Sophia blinked. “Once we married, I was very satisfied being your wife. More than satisfied. I was happy.” Her voice failed on the word, and she had to clear her throat to continue. “I think you know that to be true. I believe you were happy as well?”

“I was, yes,” he answered.

“I fear, though, her ladyship’s words always stayed somewhere in the back of my mind, like an ugly little whisper, which is why I overreacted when I accidentally opened that letter from the actress.”

Claxton’s chin jerked.

She closed her eyes, pressing forward. “After we lost the baby, you were gone so much, especially at night. You seemed so miserable in our marriage, as if you didn’t like me very much anymore.”

“That’s not true.” He shook his head. “It was never true.”

“Then that French letter fell out of your pocket.”

“Received in jest from an old military friend,” he provided in a controlled voice. Yet his knuckles, where they gripped the mantel, whitened. “A bawdy bit of male humor you were never intended to see.”

Sophia frowned and glanced at her lap. “I’m certain that’s what every husband says to his wife upon her discovering something untoward in his pocket.”

“It’s the truth.”

“You must understand that by then numerous rumors had already reached my ears—”

“Rumors,” Claxton hissed.

“That you’d been seen in Hyde Park in a parked carriage, passing time with Lady Bamber.”

“She is—an old friend.” His lips grew thin and white, and his nostrils flared. “Passing time. Mere conversation. Nothing more—”

“Mrs. Burke. Lady Dixon.”

His eyelids fluttered, and his teeth clenched. “If you would just—”

“There were more rumors, of course, and they didn’t stop after you accepted your diplomatic assignment. I could recount them here for you to deny, to talk them away, but my heart and my mind are weary of it all.” Sophia gave a little shrug.

“Weary of the rumors or me?”

She looked at him directly. “I only know what my old nanny, Mrs. Hudson, used to say, that to every rumor there is a kernel of truth.”

“You would justify my condemnation with an…an idiom?” His eyes widened.

“A very wise idiom by my way of thinking. Perhaps I was naive when we married, but I’m not anymore.” Her voice softened. “Besides, none of that really matters. The rumors, those women—”

“They don’t?” he inquired hoarsely.

“No.” Perhaps it ought to make her feel good and satisfied to see him so discomposed by her words, but it didn’t. She examined his face, feeling too old and too wise for her years. “What matters most is that when I needed you to be my husband, to tell me everything would be all right—”

“Yes, I know—” His blue eyes, in that moment, became black and empty. “The baby. It’s just that—”

“You left me and went on to live your life without me. As if the baby and I meant nothing at all to you.”

Claxton opened his mouth as if to speak.

Sophia stood from the settee. Leaving her cap there, with its shining ribbons trailing onto the floor, she walked the edge of the carpet. “I don’t think I can ever forgive you for that. What a strange and terrible thing to say, being that it’s almost Christmas, but it’s the truth. It’s wedged here, like a piece of broken glass in my heart, and I don’t think the hurt will ever go away.”

He moved toward her. “Sophia—”

“Please.” She stepped back, shaking her head. “I’m not finished.”

Now that she’d gone this far, she felt strong enough to say the rest. He’d left her no choice.

“While you were away, I passed a lot of my time alone, thinking.” She straightened her shoulders to signify her resolve. “It is why I came here tonight. After seeing you, I knew I needed to make a decision, and everyone would have such different opinions, you see. My mother. My sisters. Grandfather. I needed to ruminate, to be alone and make my own decision, without being pulled in different directions.”

His face hardened into stone, but at least, thankfully, he remained silent and allowed her to speak.

“And then I found you here with Lady Meltenbourne, who had already quite humiliated me tonight in front of all my family and friends, asking everyone your whereabouts. At my grandfather’s party, no less.” She shrugged. “Even if she is not your lover, I don’t believe I’ll ever get the image out of my head. I’m not that sort of wife.”

Claxton did not say anything. He only stood there, his eyes burning like cinders.

“It would only be a matter of time until there was a similar misunderstanding or difficulty to drive us apart. As things stand, I don’t see that there is any way to return to the way things were before. I know what I am about to say may shock you, but I can think of no other solution.”

His gaze lost its heat to be replaced with an icy gleam.

Her heart pounded so that she could barely catch her breath. He only stared at her, making each word a challenge to speak.

“If you care about me at all, Claxton, one little bit, I want…well, I want a separation.”

* * *