Page 72 of A Night of Passion with the Duke

My dear husband,

I am sorry to not have said this to you earlier, but I cannot continue this marriage any longer.

I thank you for confessing your struggles, so you’ll understand why I did this.

If you’re reading this now, I’m already on my way home.

Please don’t look for me.

Goodbye.

Arabella.

Edward read the letter again, frowning. The Arabella he’d come to know wasn’t one to put up false pretenses. Even with her family, it had been difficult for her to keep up their charade, and she’d nearly exposed them. And he’d come to know she was bold, having no qualms about voicing how she felt.

It was hard to imagine she just wrote a letter and left, when the woman he knew would most definitely have faced him head on.

He stepped out of her chambers, asking a maid scurrying past if she’d seen her.

“I haven’t seen Her Grace, Your Grace,” the maid answered with a curtsy.

Edward nodded. “Do send her my way if you do.”

“Yes, Your Grace.” She curtsied again, before scurrying away.

He went down to the dining room and then the drawing room. He spotted his mother and Charles deep in conversation.

“Mother, have you seen Arabella?” he asked, not looking at his brother.

He was yet to forgive him after the last argument they had and didn’t need any looks that would aggravate him now. There was an uncomfortable buzz under his skin, but he didn’t want to acknowledge it.

“No, Eddie,” Harriet answered. “At least not since this morning when you left for the picnic. She didn’t even come down for dinner, so I assumed you two were still together. Is everything all right?”

Edward looked away from her, trying to hide the frantic look in his eyes.

“Yes, Mother,” he answered. “We were just playing a game, and I am yet to find her.”

Harriet let out a laugh and waved her hand dismissively. “You young love birds are always playing such funny games.”

He walked off before she could say anything and stepped outside, tracing the path she’d taken when he’d last seen her.

He considered asking Joana where she’d last seen her but froze when he saw her bonnet on the floor near the bottom of the stairs leading up to the apothecary’s shop.

He picked it up, rushing up the stairs to the apothecary’s shop, which was empty. He rushed back down, moving towards his family wing and sending out the footmen to look for Arabella.

Fear started to creep into his heart as he wondered if she truly had left him. But if she had, how had she done it?

She was still new to his duchy, so she couldn’t have known anyone who would help her, but a suspicion lingered at the back of his mind.

What if she’d been kidnapped?

He remembered the incident with the straps of the saddle. They’d most definitely been cut, and he’d been grateful that Emily hadn’t been hurt badly.

He wondered how possible it was for Arabella to have made an enemy so quickly, and he couldn’t even imagine anyone wanting to hurt him, even for political reasons.

He’d been neutral in most parliamentary decisions, so he didn’t know anyone who could have cause to harm him.

He was pulled out of his thoughts when a painful groan rent the air. He looked up to see a footman tumble down to the ground.

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