Page 58 of Wedded to the Ruthless Duke

“Well, it can’t have been a good wedding night then,” Aaron said, stepping away to grab a towel and wipe his head.

“What?” Philip spluttered, reaching for his own towel.

“You’re fighting like a man full of need. Did you not consummate the marriage?”

“Aaron!” Philip threw down the towel over the racking nearby, startled that Aaron of all people would ask this question. Aaron just shrugged, as if it was a natural thing to ask. “This is my wife we’re talking about. She’s not just another lady anymore. She’s not my sister’s embarrassing friend. She is my wife.”

“Embarrassing friend? A curious description,” Aaron mused on these words. “Let’s go again.”

Philip was still debating what his friend meant by this when the next blows came. Absorbed in the fight, he could only parry, blocking some of Aaron’s hits and coming very close to landing a few of his own though he never quite caught Aaron. He was too much the skilled soldier.

“I was just wondering,” Aaron said curiously as they rocked back and forth on their toes, sizing each other up in a natural pause.

“What?”

“If you had forgotten she was your wife. You’re here, Philip. The day after your wedding, you’re here and not there.”

Sudden vehement anger overtook Philip, and he tried to lash out again, but his fury made his technique sloppy. Aaron blocked the blow all too easily.

“Get your head in the game,” Aaron barked, walking around him. “Or are you not training up for a proper fight?”

Philip didn’t answer. He focused instead on the match for a few hits before Aaron’s previous question wormed his way into his mind, and he had to say something.

“We did our duty as a married couple,” he said, dodging another one of Aaron’s hits. “We hardly need to spend more time together than that.”

Abruptly, Aaron lowered his hands. Rather than Philip taking advantage of the relaxed stance, he stopped too.

“What’s wrong?” Philip asked. “We’re not done, are we?”

“One minute.” Aaron moved to the side of the room and grabbed the towel again. He sat down on a bench, eyeing Philip carefully. Distracted, Philip reached for his own towel and wiped his brow.

“What is it now?”

“Where have you got this idea that you and your wife are best when you’re far apart from each other? Surely not your father.”

Stunned at the intimacy of the question, Philip turned to look at his friend. The serious look told him all. Aaron thought he was perfectly entitled to ask this question.

“Aaron —”

“You and I have told each other plenty of secrets in our time,” Aaron said stoically in a low tone. “You know most of mine.”

Philip sighed, knowing it was the case. There was darkness in Aaron’s past, demons that had chased him from the battlefield. He also knew that it was Aaron’s way of coping not to talk about what had happened at all, but they had spoken a little of it at some point.

Slowly, Philip moved to the bench. He sat down too though at some distance from Aaron.

“You know about my father,” Philip said in a low tone, preferring to stare into the distance across the room at the muskets on the far wall rather than at Aaron at all.

“His gambling, I know. How bad was it?”

“More so than you know.” Philip wasn’t talking about money. Things hadn’t been easy, but he was coping. Just the day before the wedding, he’d heard great news of another of his investments in foreign trade doing surprisingly well. He was now confident of reclaiming the fortune the dukedom needed.

“What is it I don’t know?” Aaron asked calmly.

“He wasn’t just a gambler though that was traumatic enough for my mother. His infidelities also plagued her. His constant furies, his coldness toward her.” Philip muttered curse words under his breath. “Even though he is long gone, it still affects her.”

Philip sighed, thinking of how his mother wouldn’t come up to London particularly often, of how large crowds still made her uneasy, and how often she cried over losing his father.

“She loved him, badly,” Philip said coldly. “And he did nothing but return her love with darkness.”

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