Page 47 of Duke of Chaos

“It is not the only thing I got from you,” he muttered, unable to keep the bitterness from his tone.

After all, it was from her blackened soul that he had been born.

“Do not pretend to know what my relationship with your father was like,” Sophia said, coming back around to his earlier comment. “It was no one’s business what he and I agreed to behind closed doors.”

“Whatever it was you had with him, it was not enough to keep you by his side though, was it?” Ezra asked, ignoring the faint hurt in Sophia’s voice. “The moment you found out he was dead you just left.”

“He wasdead,”Sophia shot back, glaring at him. “What else was I to do? Simper over his lifeless body? Plead with bankers and debt collectors to leave me be?”

“That’s what I did,” Ezra stated, his tone blunt. “You left a fourteen-year-old boy in the claws of those debt collectors and bankers. You did not have to stay. I did not particularly want you to. But you could have used some of your family’s inheritance to help dig us out of debt. You could have failed to show up to Father’s funeral foxed out of your mind on opium and Lord knows what else and then attempted to put me in the coffin with him!”

“Your father wanted a son so I gave him a son,” Sophia spit out, giving him a cold, disgusted look. “He said all I had to do was make sure you made it out into the world as a boy. Well, I did allthat I was tasked to do, did I not? You were to be his. You were never mine. I figured you would want to go with him.”

“Did you ever even want me?” Ezra asked though he was sure he knew the answer.

The disgusted look on Sophia’s face did not change.

“We are nobles, Ezra. Even when we do get what we want it always comes with a bite of bitterness. Even if I did want a child, you were never that. You came out cold and silent, you know that? You did not cry, did not move as they pulled you from me. Just glared at everyone in the room. Like you somehow knew you were just…a pawn and you hated us all for it.

I knew then that any hope of loving you was gone. How could I love you? It is not normal nor healthy to love a thing youknowcould never love you back.”

Hatred boiled in Ezra’s stomach as he drew in a shaky breath through his nostrils. He had expected some sort of derivative of that notion, but her eloquent if not vehement vitriol had certainly painted a more detailed portrait of his mother’s views. She placed no blame upon her own shoulders. She had been absolved of the sin of birthing an emotionless demon instead of a child.

Sophia looked down at Ezra’s knuckles which were turning white from the strain of his fists and smiled prettily.

“Little Lydia will soon discover such burdens herself,” she said, her voice soft and sweet as she slowly raised her eyes back to his. “Poor little thing. She has no idea what you are.”

Ezra felt his body lurch forward a step before he could even help it, and he fought with his anger to keep from taking another. She was goading him, he knew it, and he would not allow her to win.

“Do not speak her name,” he warned.

“Your wife, from what I am told, is very sweet,” Sophia went on as if she had not heard him. “It was so shocking to hear that you would accept such a bride. So much like your father, in that respect.”

She turned away from him to open the patio doors. Ezra quickly followed her out, not noticing the slight tension of the wind or the gray clouds slowly forming in the sky.

“Her sweetness is none of your concern,” Ezra quipped, keeping one eye on his mother and the other on the nearby street.

Not even thirty paces away, their fellow nobles walked by casually, but the trees and the gate offered them some privacy.

“Perhaps she should be yours,” Sophia replied, “After all, what happens to an innocent thing when it is cast into the darkness? Is it not the first to die? Or turn? What dark, twisted thing will you turn her into, Ezra?”

Alarm, rage, and an overwhelming urge to protect surged through Ezra as he turned his glare toward Sophia and clenched his fists.

“You will watch what you say, Mother,” he warned, his tone grave, “especially when it comes to my wife.”

Sophia laughed at him, the sound loud and obnoxious enough to draw the attention of the passing people.

“Oh, youstupiddarling,” she taunted, shaking her head at him, “It is not I you need to protect your wife from. It is you.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

“Juliet, the table settings you chose are beautiful, absolutely beautiful!” Lydia gushed.

Though she was hesitant to leave Frampton, Lydia quickly set her worries aside once she was surrounded by her friends. They had laughed, talked, gossiped, and best of all, had not spoken of Ezra since her most intimate confession.

“They are stunning, are they not?” Juliet beamed, linking her arm through Lydia’s as they walked. “I cannot believe that this is truly happening. Edmund will not be home for another fourteen months, and that is saddening, but it does afford me additional time to plan a more ravishing party. Oh! I still cannot believe that my new in-laws are willing to help pay for such a lavish wedding! Papa would never, you know, but now I truly get the wedding of my dreams! It shall be perfect!”

“Of course it will,” Lydia replied warmly.

---