Page 75 of Married to the Forbidden Duke
Her confusion, and then her relief upon seeing Frederick and knowing that her world was all right again. But he had been cold to her and sent her away.
She frowned, trying to put the pieces together. Why had she been so confused? It had taken three footmen to force her intothe carriage, and she remembered the disconcerting feeling of her limbs not obeying any of her commands.
“You’re awake.” Frederick’s voice caught her attention, and she turned so fast to him, her head pounded. She winced, squinting through the pain.
“Frederick.” The words scraped through her raw throat, and he handed her a glass of water. Still, she couldn’t help noticing his dour expression. “I’m so glad to see you.”
“Are you?”
She blinked, confused and hurt. “Why would I not be?”
“I hardly know.” He leaned in closer. “Perhaps because you chose our moment of unity—the unity thatyouproposed—to ruin me in a far more effective way than any of your past schemes.”
“I…” Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth, which tasted foul. She pulled a face and drained the remainder of the glass. “I don’t understand.”
“Don’t you? Let me put it plainly then.” He faced her with something alarmingly cold in his eyes. “You deliberately got yourself drunk in public and you told everyone you were with that I forced you into marriage. Your friend accused me of it to my face. Everyone could hear.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, and she felt a wave of pain and guilt so intense, she almostretched from it. “You induced me to trust you, and betrayed it at the worst moment for my career possible.”
“I didn’t! Frederick, I didn’t!” She launched herself at him, but the world spun and she collapsed onto the bed. “I don’t understand what happened, but I didn’t drink too much. I would have remembered—but I just remember this…”
She paused, trying to put into words how she had felt. The few memories shedidhave. “I… I felt so confused and disoriented. But I would never have said anything negative about you! You have to believe me. I went there so I could support you and so everyone would believe we were a team. I don’t understand what happened.” Her eyes filled with tears, and she thought she saw his face soften. “I wanted to support you, Frederick, I swear it.”
His fingers brushed the tears from her cheeks. “I want to believe you,” he said, so quietly she barely heard him over the sound of her own breathing. “So much, it’s killing me that I can’t.”
“Why can’t you?”
In answer, he brought out her journal and handed it to her.
“I read this while you were sleeping off the spirits.” He shook his head, nostrils flaring, as Alice gaped in horror at the splattered ink. This had been her last entry—she had been too busy thinking and spending time with Frederick to think about writing in it again. Her pain lay in looping handwriting across the page. “If you had just told me, I would have understood,Alice. I know how difficult this transition has been for you. But you made me believe that—”
“Everything I told you was true,” she insisted, looking up at him with blurred vision. The nausea in her stomach rose, but this time she didn’t think it was just from the aftermath of her over-indulgence. This time, it was inspired by fear that she might have lost everything she had come to want. “Some days it is difficult to forget, yes, but I have forgiven you for everything, Frederick. I promise. I wrote that in a moment of anger, but that doesn’t mean I want to sabotage you any longer. I—”
I love you.
She stopped herself, knowing he wouldn’t believe a declaration like that made in the heat of the moment, even though the pain in her stomach told her it was true. Only love could ever hurt like this.
She had lost her parents and now she was on the verge of losing the only other person she had ever come to care for in that way. His emotions were written all across his face—his hurt, the new distance established between them.
“I can’t deny that you have every right to act as you see fit regarding me,” he muttered in a voice she didn’t recognize. “And I acknowledge that I hurt you in ways unimaginable to me. But this has been a betrayal the likes of which I cannot endure, no matter how much I might wish to. You are at liberty to do as you choose, but I am sorry, I can no longer stomach standing byyour side and watching you do it.” He rose then, and more of that terrible, endless fear gripped her.
“Nothing will stop you from being married to me,” he continued. “And I would not choose anything else, even now. But this…”
He shook his head, and instead of finishing his sentence, walked toward the door, closing it behind him and leaving her alone.
She collapsed back on the pillows, her mouth dry and her head pounding. If she could have endured it, she would have cried, but there was nothing inside her but more of that awful hollowness.
Something wasterriblywrong.
Surely she had not had too much to drink? She recalled asking Charlotte for lemonade, and the other lady must have done so, because she would otherwise have refused it.
So what happened?
Could she have suffered from a sunstroke? That might explain her illness now, but it wouldn’t explain the rumors going around theton, if Frederick was to be believed. But why would they discuss her marriage and how it had come about now?
Whynow?
She rolled over, squeezing her eyes shut, and when she opened them again, half the day had passed. She lay precisely where she had before, and it was obvious no one had come to disturb her.
Certainly not Frederick.
