Page 100 of The Governess and the Brooding Duke
‘And it is what I need. I could not... I could never enter into something like what I had with Jane again. I failed her, I feel. We did not talk about this, not ever. We did not speak of what her desires might’ve been. She confessed, when she fell pregnant, that she had taken lovers many times over the course of our marriage. She needed a man who excited her more, and I could have been. I could’ve been, if I had not made a sweeping decision about how things would be conducted in our marriage, and by the time I realised where I had gone wrong it was too late to repair it. She was carrying another man’s child, and at that point I could not... My pride did not allow me to lie with my wife while she was with child in that fashion.’
‘Of course it didn’t. You didn’t fail her there.’
‘I know. But I did fail her along the way. I did what I thought was right. I tried. I did the best that I knew to do. I did not want her to live out the same experience that my mother did. But she...’ He stopped suddenly. ‘She met the same end as my father. Killed, by extension, by her lover. I am doomed, it seems.’
She leaned in, and touched his face. ‘You are not doomed.’
‘It feels it.’ He gripped her wrist and pulled her close, pressing their foreheads together. ‘This is such a strange thing.’
‘What is?’
‘Speaking to you like this. I have never cut that deepest part of myself open and spoken words like this to another soul.’
‘Neither have I. You were the only person to know the entire story of what happened to me in Scotland. And how I ended up here. I have kept that to myself. I have kept it and guarded it most fiercely, because I needed to become something and someone entirely different. I could not endure the shame of somebody knowing what had happened, but you took all the shame away from it. I did not hesitate to tell you, because when you came upon Pelham in the library, you believed me. You did not blame me. You have never blamed me and that is a rare thing. While I know it. My own mother blamed me. And my father would’ve killed me. After I had my son, I was kept in the castle until it was safe for me to travel. I never returned home.’
‘Do you feel as if you left part of yourself behind?’
She shook her head. ‘No. It is much more complicated than that. I feel as if I took all that I could with me, the broken pieces of that girl, and I fashioned something new. I have felt English for all these many years. I have felt like this was where I belonged. This life, this person. I made her into my truest self. She is me. But you have found a way for me to be honest about where I came from. With myself, and with you. To take all of it and stop hiding. At least with you.’
He nodded slowly. ‘I will regret how unhappy my wife was for the rest of my life.’
‘She could have also talked to you. Look at us. I took the measure of what sort of man you were from the moment we met. I know men. I told you that. I know when a man enjoys using his power to hurt others, because I have seen it up close. I know full well that what happened to me was an act of violence, because I could see the violence in that man’s eyes. He wanted me to be small and reduced, and he wanted power over me. Like your father. A man who enjoyed the aftermath of the destruction, not the love. Not the affair. And I took the measure of you from the moment we met and I knew you were not that man. She could’ve seen it. You did not talk to her. But she did not speak to you. And you cannot bear all of the blame.’
He shook his head. ‘That is where you’re wrong. I am the Duke. And I set the intention for what we were. She would have feared voicing something that she thought I might not accept gracefully.’
‘She thought you would accept her affair gracefully? Another man’s child?’
‘By that stage it was far too late. We built a wall out of small grievances. That is what occurs. Stone by stone, if you leave them there, they only grow higher. And tearing it down would have to be an intentional act, and when you are both steeped in your own dissatisfaction, you do not make such an effort. We were selfish. Both of us. I was angry she withheld her attentions, and as a husband I could have demanded them. I felt entitled, because I did not go to brothels. Because I did not get my pleasure elsewhere, and I had accepted less for our entire marriage than I truly desired. But of course I never enforced my husbandly rights. Because what I desire is not...’
‘Submission does not come through force,’ she whispered. ‘You want surrender. That is entirely different.’
‘Yes. As you said. That is what men like my father do, and in the end they are weak. In the end, the bullet wins. The consequences of the disaster that those men spend their life sowing. As happened to the man who attacked you, I believe.’
‘Yes. Often in life, I feel there is not a surplus of justice. But in these instances...’
‘Agreed. Jane was also angry at me. She found me cold and distant. She did not know how to connect with me. She wanted something I could not give, for our expectations of marriage were entirely different. Much like with the children. I thought that if I simply wasn’t my father it would be enough.’
‘Perhaps it is more important that you are you, West.’
‘I don’t know what that means.’
‘This man, in bed with me. Naked. That man is the best that I have come to know. And the man that you are when we go on walks with the children. When you speak of your childhood.’
‘I must write to my brother. I should have him and his wife and children visit.’
‘Please do. Michael and Elizabeth would love that.’
‘I have been distant from him. Primarily because of the babe. Because of Lachlan. I did not know how to explain the situation. Why he was not named.’
‘Of course. But you should. Have him come. Have him come visit you and see you. He is your brother, and you...you are not your father, West. He should have a chance to see that you have made this home different.’
He nodded slowly. ‘I will write to him.’
‘Good.’
She saw the sky beginning to lighten outside and felt a stab of sadness. ‘It is time for me to go. I feel that I cannot linger any longer.’
‘I resent it,’ he said.
