But as she went on, he feared this outburst was more than simple irritation. His wife cried more than normal now that she was with child, but he thought the tears he currently saw lurking in her fierce eyes were something other than a maternal shift in her emotions.
The dark thing they tried not to speak of still lurked on the edges of their lives, finding small ways to wear them down and destroy their fleeting happiness.
“I don’t understand why you stay here if you hate us so much.” Mari’s voice trembled as she spoke. “You have the means to go back to Sussex or Chiswick, or lease a different house here in town. Why do you tarry here? You never stayed here before. Not once in all the years I lived here in this hell with the duke.” Mari halted her tirade and looked at the other woman as a bird might examine a worm.
And then her face cleared, as if she’d had a major epiphany. Which, perhaps, she had.
“You never stayed here,” Mari repeated as her eyes went wide and accusing. “You never stayed here because he was here. Isn’t that true?” she demanded.
“I have no idea what you’re babbling about. I’ve been in this house many times.”
“You occasionally visited for a few hours, but you never stayed. And come to think of it, I cannot help but notice you never once asked me why I killed the duke.” Mari narrowed her gaze on the dowager. “Because you knew all along how he was. What he was.”
The dowager’s thin lips pursed in displeasure, but she didn’t refute Mari’s claim.
Was it really possible the woman knew what a violent bastard her son had been?
Cam reached for Mari’s hand, suspecting she would need his strength to get through the rest of this conversation.
“Could you not have warned me, so I’d not be put through hell as his wife?” she accused.
The older woman laughed without humor. “You came here with bright eyes and dreams of being a duchess. I tried to save you. I tried to stop the marriage. But your parents were blinded, too enamored of an alliance with such a prize.”
“But if you’d come here to help me, maybe he wouldn’t have—”
“Oh, he wouldn’t have stopped on my account, I can assure you.”
“But if you’d been here, I wouldn’t have felt so all alone.” With that, Mari burst into tears and fled the room.
Cam would give her a moment before going to her. For now he needed to deal with the prideful, unfeeling woman before him. So, she hadn’t ever visited while her son was alive. Cam didn’t think it had anything to do with Mari. If so, the dowager wouldn’t be staying here now.
Something else was the cause.
Someone else.
“Did ye fear him?” Cam asked quietly. “Was he so far into evil that he’d raise a hand against the woman who bore him?”
The dowager said nothing, just sat there looking at him as her eyes glistened. But no tears fell, even as she clenched and released her fingers.
“I see,” he said and reached over to place his large hand over both of hers. She flinched, but he kept her gaze. Her backbone seemed to be made of steel, the way she sat there so stiffly.
“Tomorrow Mari and I will gather down here by the fire,” he informed her. “We’ll have breakfast and share stories until the day grows late, and then we’ll eat a wonderful meal. You are welcome to join us or not. It’s your choice. But I will do this for my wife, because she wants it. We’re not blind as to what lies ahead for us. We know we have only a short time. That is why I’ll not lose the chance to make this new memory.”
He let out a breath and swallowed against the tightness in his throat.
The dowager watched him carefully, her face a mask of neutrality.
“Can you give us this?” he asked. “I ken I have no right to ask anything of you. We don’t get on all that well, and it’s true Mari and I have invaded your home. But I beg you to let her enjoy this one day.”
When she said nothing, he squeezed her hand, surprised she hadn’t flung him off.
“Next Christmas I’ll be in Scotland with our child. And Mari…”
He couldn’t finish. The horrible words wouldn’t come out of his throat.
The frail woman before him pulled one of her hands out from under the weight of his, and to his utter shock, she rested it on top of his hand in a gesture of comfort. She cleared her throat in that regal manner of hers and straightened her already stiff spine. “I suppose we can share a meal. However, I’ll not tell any stories.”
“Of course,” he agreed, and leaned over to place a kiss on her gnarled knuckles. “Thank you, Your Grace.”
Knowing she wouldn’t want the attention, he gave a quick bow and left the room to go comfort his wife.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Mari sat in the seat next to the window and tucked her feet under her. It was raining, but even as she sat there, the sound against the glass changed to the faint tinkle of ice.
Eventually the door opened, and Cam came in to sit next to her.
“It’s all worked out. She’s agreed to allow our celebration.”
“It was never about that.”
“I know.” He pulled her tight against him. “But it’s the one thing I can do, so I’ll thank ye to pretend to be impressed that I’ve done it.”
She let out a laugh despite not being in the mood for levity. That was Cam. He always knew how to make her happy. Even when she didn’t want to be.
“You’re going to be a splendid father.”
“Well, if I’ve managed to win over the miserable old goat, I should have a fair chance at earning the respect of a more reasonable person.”
“You
