Page 99 of Wedded to the Scottish Duke

“Well, enough then.” She went back to her pacing. “I shall do as he wants me to. I shall oversee all the changes he began here. I shall help the tenants and the farmers, I shall look after the estate. I will be the obedient wife he always wanted.”

Her voice hitched as she halted behind her own chair. Elizabeth reached for her again. Her gentle demeanor was making Celia want to cry again, but she fought against it.

“What would be the point in doing anything else?” Celia said in a small voice. “He has decided for the both of us that we shouldn’t be together.”

She was quickly losing that battle with her tears now.

A sudden shadow in the doorway made her jump. Celia turned away, a hand on her stomach, not sure she could bear talking to anyone but Elizabeth right now.

“Thank ye for the rest, Your Grace, My Lady.”

It was Mairi. She had napped for much of the afternoon to recover from her journey. Now she smiled breezily, not sensing what sort of awkward conversation she had walked into.

“I am ready to see my patient. Where will I find him?”

“Ah, how about I make the arrangements?” Elizabeth offered, rising from her seat. “Lord Pembroke is at his house. I can prepare a carriage to take you there, and I will accompany you to explain. What do you think, Celia?”

“Yes. Thank you,” Celia whispered, trying her best to keep her voice level. “That is kind.”

Her breath was coming thick and fast now as tears pricked her eyes.

“Come, I’ll take you to him,” Elizabeth said.

She walked past Celia, squeezing her shoulder soothingly before she was gone, with Mairi following behind her.

As the door closed behind them, Celia’s tears spilled over. She covered her mouth with both hands, trying to stifle the sound.

To know now why Keith had run away somehow only made things worse. Maybe he was trying to protect her, maybe that was a noble thing, but he had made a decision that they should have made together. If he had loved her, as she loved him, he would have been honest.

He couldn’t be honest with me. That is the problem.

She reached for the carafe in the middle of the table and frantically topped up her wine. She spilled a little in her haste and rushed to wipe it with a cloth, then grabbed the glass and marched out of the room. Rather than heading to the drawing room to find Frances, or to her chamber to hide from the world, she went to the study.

Earlier that day, Frances and Elizabeth had shown her this room and told her this was where Keith conducted his business. She pushed the door open to see two desks in the room. One was Keith’s desk. It was piled high with paperwork. The other desk was empty. It had once belonged to the late Duchess of Hardbridge, but she had been gone for some time.

Slamming the glass down on the desk, she reached for the paperwork and transferred it to her own desk. She left behind anything to do with the lairdship and instead focused on everything to do with the dukedom. There were tenants’ papers, plans for a new building, farm plans, and even the servants’ schedules.

She spread them across her desk and sat down, picking up her glass and taking a large gulp of her wine.

It was nearly dark now, and she only had a couple of candles to keep her company as she looked at the papers. Through that candlelight, she was painfully aware of how empty the room was. Her eyes landed on the empty seat behind Keith’s desk, thoughshe managed to look away eventually as her tears ran down her cheeks.

There were no sounds, no murmurs even in the distance, and the darkness seemed to be closing in on her, making her painfully aware of the dark shadows in the corners of the room and the emptiness of it all.

“So, this will be my life now?”

CHAPTER 28

“Now, stranger, that’s a lonely look. You all right there, pet?”

At the gentle and rather motherly voice, Keith looked up from the table.

Sitting alone, he had been staring down into his glass for some time. His footman and groom had grown tired of his foul mood, something he couldn’t blame them for, and they had gone to share some drinks with the locals.

“Aye, I’m well enough,” Keith lied as he lifted the glass to his lips and downed the whisky.

“Sure you are, pet,” the soft voice said.

The woman was roughly his mother’s age. She must be working at the inn they had stopped at for the night, as she was clearing the table beside him as she spoke.

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