Page 72 of Caught With the Scarred Duke
Cyrus sat up a little taller, still watching those flames rise higher. They were beginning to blacken the edges of the log, finding ways into the wood, sparking and crackling in their determination to burn. And if those formerly dim embers, little more than charred lumps, could find a way to blaze again, with a bit of encouragement, then perhaps hecouldreignite what he had extinguished.
Nobody can avoid death. It is inevitable. But onecanstop avoiding life.
His friends were right; hehadallowed fear to keep him behind his castle walls for fifteen years. He had allowed the fear he felt in his boyhood to rule his life, as if his father and grandfather had never died, as if they were still there, crushing him to dust with their fists and their barbed words. When he had begun to feel something for Teresa, he had merely replaced thetypeof fear for another, but it was fear nonetheless.
But fear never kept me safe before…It was a startling realization, like a difficult knot finally unraveling after an age of trying to pick it apart. Somehow, he had thought that it did, remembering things through a cloudy lens. He had told himself falsehoods—that when he was afraid of his father and grandfather, and stayed out of their way, that they had not punished him.
But it was not true. They had found him anyway. They had sought him out, for no reason at all, just to make themselves feel powerful, or to soothe the ache of a grief that had warped into a monstrous, terrible beast. Indeed, he remembered times when he wondered if his father even recalled why he hated his son so much, or if that hate had just become a habit.
I will not be like them. I will not be unhappy. I will not be alone in that castle, existing.
Fifteen years was long enough. He would not spend the next fifteen years—God willing—in fear, and he would certainly not spend them without the woman he loved.
“Anthony, start making toast,” Cyrus said, the fog of all the liquor and sorrow lifting. “Silas, make the tea—as strong as you can. I am going out to the river to bathe and, when I return, and have sobered and made myself presentable, I will ride to my wife. And yes, I will beg if I must.”
A great grin spread across Silas’ face. “Tremendous news, Darnley.” He got up and turned, as if to begin his task, but glanced back at Cyrus. “There is only one problem.”
“What is that?” Cyrus asked, also rising to his feet, eager to feel the river water cleansing him of the last three days, and the past too, if the current was strong enough.
Silas grimaced, scratching his chin. “I have not the faintest notion of how to make tea.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Cyrus rode as though his life depended on it, hoping that the distance between him and Teresa would not be like the staircase in his nightmares, never-ending. The country roads flew past, his attention fixed directly ahead, noticing nothing of the landscape around him. He could admire it on the way back, when he had his wife by his side once more.
By the time he came to the gates of Grayling House, the sun had transformed the world into a haze of buttery gold, putting on its last beautiful display before it began to descend to the horizon.
I will not let another night pass without you, Tess,he vowed, taking a breath as he viewed the long driveway ahead of him: the last stretch of what might have been the most important journey of his life.
The scent of cypress greeted his senses as he slowed his horse to a walk, hooves crunching the gravel. The windows ofGrayling House winked in the golden light, though whether in encouragement or mockery, he did not know.
When his horse was but ten strides from the carriage circle, and the front entrance to the manor, a figure appeared. A blur in pale green, darting out of the house and down the steps, glancing back as if pursued.
Tess?His heart lurched and leaped, all at once.
But the young woman was not his wife. He realized it a moment later, when she ceased looking back, and turned her gaze toward him.
I ought to brace myself. This is likely to be the first of many unpleasant encounters.
Still, Prudence Wilds had been the one who was warmest to him when she had visited her sister at Darnley. He remembered that as she came sprinting toward him with a scowl upon her face, glancing back intermittently.
“You should not be here,” Prudence hissed, coming to a halt alongside him. “I saw you from the window, but no one else has seen you yet. You must leave, Your Grace.”
Cyrus looked down at her, shaking his head. “I cannot do that, Lady Prudence.”
“If you do not leave of your own volition, I shall have to spook your horse,” she warned, her gaze flitting up to the manor, searching the windows. “You have done enough to my sister. If she sees you, it will break her. Please, for her sake, leave at once!”
Again, Cyrus shook his head. “I know the pain I have caused your sister, but I am not leaving. I shall wait here until she is ready to see me. If that takes until tomorrow, so be it. If that takes a week, so be it. I will stay for as long as it takes.”
“For as long aswhattakes?” Prudence eyed him with sudden curiosity.
“That is between me and your sister.” Cyrus offered an apologetic smile. “I do not blame you for trying to protect your sister—it is entirely right of you—but all I want is to talk to her. I cannot leave until I have done so.”
Prudence frowned. “Do you believe you deserve to speak with her, after what you have done?”
“I believe everyone deserves a chance to explain themselves,” Cyrus replied. “If she does not accept my explanation, if it is not enough, andshetells me to depart, then I will.”
“Perhaps, I lied. Perhaps, I came down here as her messenger, to inform you that she does not want to see you, you are not welcome here, and you should bloody well go before you cause greater trouble for yourself,” Prudence countered, her demeanor anxious, every word spoken through gritted teeth.
