Page 65 of The Baron's Reluctant Bride
His voice was low. “I never intended to—”
“I do not care what you intended,” she interrupted. “I care what you havedone. And what you have chosen to keep from me.”
He was silent again, but his jaw was tight, his shoulders taut with restraint. Then, at last, he spoke.
“I was trying to protect you.”
She stared at him. “Then you have failed. Because I amnotprotected. I am merely kept in the dark.”
“You deserve more,” he said, voice rougher than she had ever heard it.
She blinked, she was undoubtedly startled. “Then give me more.”
Their eyes locked—his burning, hers searching—and for the first time, neither of them turned away.
The silence stretched once more, no longer brittle, but full of possibility. Heavy with truths unsaid. Jameson took a breath and looked at her, really looked, as though weighing whether she could bear the truth, or whether sheshouldbear it at all. But the choice, like so much else, had already slipped from his hands.
“I have not lied to you,” he said at last. “But I have omitted.”
Gemma said nothing, but her silence pressed upon him like judgment.
He ran a hand through his hair, the motion weary. “Before we wedded—long before, in fact—I entered into partnership with a group of gentlemen. Men of standing, influence. Hawthorne Trading Company is what we called it, though there is little poetry in trade.”
Gemma’s brows lifted faintly. “I’m aware of your business. You sponsor shipping routes to India and the West Indies. Rum, silks, spices.”
“Yes,” he said. “And more.”
He paused, glancing toward the cold hearth as though the coals might offer him the words he lacked.
“We began with modest ambitions,” he continued, “but as our success grew, so too did our exposure. True trade, the sort that alters economies invites enemies. Albert Thorne is among the most persistent.”
She said his name like a curse. “Thorne has driven entire families into ruin.”
“I am fully aware.” His voice was low, tight. “He seeks to do the same to mine. And not only mine.”
Gemma stepped closer, her eyes fixed on his face. “So you’ve been fighting him.”
“Yes. In silence. In shadows. Because the wrong whisper in the wrong ear could collapse it all, investments, livelihoods, families with names older than the Crown.”
“Thenwhykeep it from me?” Her voice cracked, there was too much emotion spilling through the question. “Why let me believe you were indifferent? Why build walls instead of bridges?”
He turned to her then, fully. His voice, when it came, was gentler than she expected.
“Because I did not believe I could survive it again.”
She blinked. “What?”
“You asked for honesty.” He stepped closer, slowly. “Lady Caroline—what I shared with her, what Ilostin her betrayal—it taught me not merely caution, Gemma, but armour. I do not show what I feel because I scarcely know what remains that is safe to reveal.”
Gemma looked down. “You wear your rakish reputation like a medal.”
“It keeps questions at bay. It gives people what they expect. And it ensures that no one looks too closely at the man behind it. Neither in the gentleman’s club nor in Parliament or in my own abode.”
“Not even my wife.”
Her chin lifted. “That choice wasyours.”
“I know.”
