Page 50 of Captured By the Cold Duke
“Why would you say that?” she whispered, looking back up at him. “It was not a mistake!”
“It was,” he insisted. “I told you from the very beginning: I cannot have children. And I cannot be married to you as your husband.”
“Please don’t do this!” Cherie said. She could feel the nausea rising in her stomach, the panic beginning to course through her. “Please, Thomas, don’t push me away!”
“I’m not pushing you away,” he said coldly, “I’m telling you how it is with me: despite what we shared yesterday, I am still not able to give you a real marriage.”
“But why?” Cherie cried desperately. “Why won’t you have children? And why can’t we just be happy together?”
Thomas opened his mouth, but no words came out. He looked as if he were holding himself back from saying something important.
“Please just tell me,” she begged. “I am sick of the silence and the secrets. Tell me why you can’t be my husband, and we can work through it together.”
“There’s nothing for you to work on,” he said at last. “None of this is your fault, Cherie. I am the one who is unworthy of being your husband. And the more you get to know me, the more you will realize that.”
“How can you say?—”
“Believe me, I am saving you from a lifetime of disappointment by cutting this short now,” he interrupted. “If we were to try and be happy, I would only hurt you again and again by being unable to be the man you need.”
“Is this about your father again?” she asked, peering into her husband’s eyes, which were so much more dead than they usually looked. “Because he made you feel worthless and unworthy? Because I’m here to tell you: he was wrong. Anyone who knows you would tell you he was wrong.”
“You didn’t know my father,” Thomas snapped, and for the first time, he sounded truly angry at her. His eyes blazed and his voice rang. “Nor do you understand the complexity of the relationship between fathers and sons. There is no way for you to know if he was right about me. Only I can know that!”
Cherie stepped back, fear and sadness overtaking her. When she spoke again, it was in a dull, lifeless voice. “You’re right, I didn’t know your father. And I have no way of knowing if the things he told you about yourself were true. But I do know that every day you choose to believe him and not me is a day you let him win.”
Thomas scoffed and turned away. He moved deeper into the shadow, until all she could see was the outline of his body, like some sort of dark angel.
“He has already won,” he said, and his voice scraped against her like a claw. “There is nothing that you or I can do about it. Now go, Cherie. Leave me before I infect you even more.”
She turned and fled, but not because he had told her to; she didn’t want him to hear her sob.
Nineteen
“Idon’t know what happened,” Cherie sobbed into Cassandra’s lap. “One day, he was kissing me and telling me that he has cared for me for years, and then the next day, he was telling me that it could never happen between us, that he wasn’t worthy, and that I would be better off without him.”
Her tears wouldn’t stop falling down her cheeks. All Cherie wanted was to stop crying, but ever since her conversation with Thomas, she hadn’t been able to stem the flow.
Cassandra patted her head. “Oh, my dear, I’m so sorry,” she murmured, and Cherie felt the usual flush of warmth she always felt for her kind, sweet friend.
Minerva, who was sitting on the edge of Cassandra’s bed, sighed. “It sounds as if this is his issue, not yours,” she said, and Cherie could practicallyfeelher shrugging. It was also a very typicalMinerva response, but it didn’t bother Cherie at all. She was grateful to have all her friends’ different perspectives.
Samantha, of course, could always be relied on to get up in arms for her friends, and she was now pacing around the bedroom. When she spoke, she didn’t sound resigned at all. “What did he say, exactly?” she asked. “He didn’t say that he doesn’t love you, right?”
“R-right,” Cherie hiccupped, “but he also d-didn’t say that he loved me.”
“But he said he had strong feelings for you two days ago,” Samantha clarified.
“That’s right.”
“Hmm.” Samantha stopped pacing and turned to look at her. “So, his feelings haven’t changed. The problem is not that he doesn’twantto be married to you in a traditional way. The problem is that for whatever reason, he feels as if he is unworthy to be married to you.”
“Yes, that’s right,” Cherie said. “But it amounts to the same thing: he does not want to be properly married to me.”
“But one of those things you can’t change, and the other you can,” Samantha pointed out. “For instance, you could not convince a man to love you who doesn’t. But youmightbe able to convince him that he is worthy of being your husband.”
“But should she?” Minerva asked, and all three of them turned to look at her. “I just mean, is it really her job to talk the duke into believing he’s worthy of love? That sounds exhausting, and he is a grown man. He should be able to do that for himself.”
“Even grown men often need support,” Cassandra said wisely. “As do grown women! We are none of us islands unto ourselves, and we all sometimes need a loved one to reassure us.”
