Page 19 of Courting the Duchess (Spy Society #1)

B lack took his leave shortly after delivering the information he’d obtained, but Sterling remained in the study in stony, agonizing silence. He slouched back in his chair, propping up his tense jaw with his white-knuckled fist, his gaze boring holes in the sheaves of paper still laid out on his desk.

Black had been right.

This information could disappear.

He could feign ignorance.

He and Alaina could go about their new life; he could pretend that their bubble of peace hadn’t been pierced by the harsh pin of reality.

No.

He couldn’t live like that…not when he’d been as honest as he could be with her.

It wasn’t so much the money that bothered him, it was the lie of it all. For her to have duped him so successfully was more than galling.

It was bile-inducing.

It was humiliating on a deeper level than any public shaming of him she’d attempted.

She made him love her and still, she hid things from him.

Because he did love her.

He’d begun to suspect it whenever his heart stopped when she smiled at him, when he counted the hours and minutes until he could see her again, when he struggled not to touch her at every opportunity, how he wanted nothing more than to hold her against him and shut out the rest of the world. She’d charmed him with her strong will, bewitched him with her body. He’d thought they’d finally reached a point where they might plan for a future, but how could that be the case when she continued to lie to him? What was keeping from him? His mind spun with the possibilities. He’s seen enough of the dark side of human behavior in the last eight years that his mind automatically went to the worst possible scenario, even though he realized he was being ridiculous. Still, he couldn’t let it be.

He rationalized that his lies were all in the past—that he hadn’t been anything but as honest as possible with her since his return—but she clearly could not say the same. After all he and Alaina had shared, she still didn’t trust him.

Anger fueled by pain boiled within his breast until it threatened to overflow. He was cut more deeply than any physical wound he’d ever endured in his years of training beneath Ramsay and the rest of the masters in his spy society. He’d made no secret of wanting to give Alaina everything, yet she couldn’t even be honest about where she went. And who she might be involved with.

How dare she?

His actions decided, Sterling shoved himself to his feet and snatched up the papers in his fist. He flew from the study like a furious hurricane and stormed up the stairs and down the hall with his boots falling like thunder until he reached Alaina’s private study. He saw none of the vibrant furnishings, the small oil paintings she’d selected so carefully, his eyes only focused upon the woman seated at the dainty writing desk. The smile upon her face when she saw him—the moment before she registered his barely masked rage—fully shattered what was left of his heart.

Her expression fell and she set aside her quill. “Sterling, whatever is the matter?” The concern in her tone served only to chafe the wound in his soul.

“The orphanage,” he demanded in a low, dangerous tone.

“I beg your par—”

“Mrs. Worthy’s. The donations.” He held the crumpled sheaves of parchment in her face. “Tell me about your donations to the girls’ home,” he growled, sounding more like a monster every second, but he cared not.

Alaina shook her head. “I don’t—”

“Don’t lie!” he demanded, one decibel below a roar. “No more lies.” He shoved the documents at her until she had no choice but to take them.

*

Her heart pounding in her ears, Alaina could only skim the pages Sterling had shoved into her hands. He paced furiously back and forth, raking his hands through his chestnut hair and making it stand up in odd tufts. A deep notch was carved between his brows, and his mouth was set in a grim line.

Rather than explain his agitation, she grew only more and more baffled as to how he’d discovered so much about her schedule. Somehow, he’d tracked her movements to and from the girls’ home, down to the minute. The notes listed the names of the matrons and staff with whom she was most closely acquainted; there was an accounting of her donations made directly to the orphanage. Her confusion swiftly grew to anger when the full realization of what she held struck her.

He’d had her followed.

He’d had reports written up on her like some sort of errant employee or suspect of a crime.

Despite his words of honesty and sincerity, it turned out that he trusted her less far than he could throw her.

It was Alaina’s turn to twist the papers in her fists. “How did you obtain this information?” she ground out.

“What does it matter?” Sterling whirled on her, though he was unable to meet her gaze. It was telling that his hazel eyes were evasive, aimed at a point above her left ear. How had they once looked upon her so warmly and now they reflected only frigid fury?

“It matters because you had me followed!”

“Clearly, with good reason.”

“Good reason?” she scoffed incredulously.

“It is obvious you were hiding something.”

“If this is about the funds, then you know I tracked them in the household accounts. I balanced the funds from my unused pin money, so I took nothing that was not mine—”

“Damn the money!” Sterling snarled. “It is not a drop in the bucket. I gave you a chance for honesty; I might have forgiven you had you told the truth weeks ago. I deserve to know why my wife is lying to me about her whereabouts!”

The words hit Alaina like a swift slap to her cheek.

Her arms fell limply to her sides.

“How dare you?” she whispered, no longer recognizing the man before her as the one who’d held her so tenderly, who’d confessed to her his devotion unwavering. It was a lie. The man she’d believed him to be was a lie.

“I have a right to know,” Sterling insisted, thumping his chest. “You were making secret visits to a girls’ home, funneling money into it. It makes one wonder what else you’re hiding.”

All sense of decorum fled Alaina at that point. Her husband’s irrational rage doused any tenderness she’d begun to hold for him. How foolish she had been to ever consider forgiving this man. It was mortifying that she’d allowed her guard to fall, that she’d welcomed him into her bed, that she’d done those things to his body to return the pleasure he’d shown her, that she’d allowed him to seep through the cracks in her heart and fill the spaces with what she might have one day considered love. The illusion was so easily crumbled to dust that it was clear now to her how fragile the facade had been.

Furious, she sprung to her feet and stalked toward Sterling. “The donations helped fund a library at the orphanage and paid tutors for the girls. Do you know that many of them were leaving the home with little to no education to speak of and couldn’t even write their own names? What kind of preparation is that?” Her voice continued to rise, but she cared not who heard them. Let the servants gossip. Let them whisper about her volatile marriage. As far as Alaina was concerned, Sterling had just toppled every pillar upon which they’d begun to rebuild their life together. “To speak of the funds, you were so generous as to provide me with more pin money than I could ever spend. I decided to put the money to good use and directed it where it was more needed. I might have been a good little wife and begged your permission to add Mrs. Worthy’s to the estate’s list of charitable funds, but you’d never responded to my letters before…how was I to hope for a different outcome if I made such a request? And I’m sure you can tell how receptive Mr. Bates is to my involvement with anything related to accounts. I practically had to wrestle the books from his hands months after you and I were wed, so I would have wasted my breath had I asked him for his approval in adjusting the budgets.

“The ladies of my Reading Society and I regularly take up donations for Mrs. Worthy’s. We pool what funds we can, and I made it my mission to fill in the gaps in their needs when and where I could. The home has no formal board, so I have done what I can to help them.

“As for the visits you have so kindly tracked and outlined, they were so I could personally inspect the facilities and make sure they were up to my standards. Sometimes, other members accompanied me; other times I went on my own. I wanted to be certain the funds were being used as allocated.” Alaina exhaled a shaky breath. “And I read to the smaller girls… I, of all people, know what it feels like to be abandoned without explanation. I thought only to make the children feel a little less lonely and unloved and unworthy…and here I am being crucified for it.”

As she spoke, Sterling felt a knife plunge into heart and twist. His rage cooled, his vision slowly cleared, and he began to see reason…and what an ass he’d been. All the progress they’d made came crashing down around his ears in a matter of seconds with his accusation. It would have been easy for him to blame Black for it, but the information had been flawless…it had been Sterling’s own rash reaction that had been faulty.

“Five years I’ve been championing Mrs. Worthy’s—among other charities and causes—and now you choose to take issue?” Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. “What changed?”

Sterling wanted to say that she’d done something wrong in sending funds to the home. He wanted to take issue with the charity she was performing. But how could he begrudge her reading to girls and ensuring their wellbeing and education?

In truth, it was the perceived lie that had added fuel to the fire. He’d hidden behind secrets and half-truths for so long that it had been a relief to feel as if he was moving past all of it—that he’d left behind that constant uncertainty for a life with a woman who was made of candor. And, when he’d felt that had been threatened, he lost his whole sense of self. He lost his head.

His only close example of a marriage had been his parents. They’d cared for one another and adored him, but they’d lived a life of companionability and not love. There had been no volatile fights, but there had also been no outward passion. Upon the announcement of his engagement to Alaina, he’d been warned by older members of his club that marriage could cause a man to lose himself. All the books and poems and plays he’d been exposed to had echoed shades of this. Love was a powerful, all-consuming emotion that often guided men astray; it could cause the sanity of even the most logical person to slip.

And it was precisely why members at every level of the spy society were strongly discouraged from forming strong attachments that might lead to love—why Ramsay had displayed so much displeasure when Sterling had announced his intention to marry Alaina before he left for the Continent. A man in love was a man who made mistakes. He understood that first-hand now.

All of this spun over and over again in his frantic brain, but no words came as the noose tightened around his throat. His outburst had been disgusting and pathetic, but it was clear remaining levelheaded was hardly ever an option when it came to the woman he loved…that he’d never stopped loving.

“Is this the first time you’ve had me investigated? Followed?” Alaina demanded. She whipped the papers at him, though they fluttered uselessly to the ground before reaching him.

Though he knew the truth would damn him further, he couldn’t help but admit to everything. He owed her that much at that point. Atonement was often a painful, rocky path, but one worth traversing.

Sterling shook his head.

There were several seconds of stunned hesitation. “Who?” she scoffed in disbelief. “When?”

“I needed a source of consistent, personal updates on you—information about how you were faring behind closed doors while I was abroad,” he admitted evenly, keenly aware of the growing danger. She crossed her arms over her chest, holding herself as she waited, and Sterling took a bracing breath before he continued. “I had contacts here in London. When they could, they provided me with information as to the events you attended and your public activities—it is how I learned about the notoriety of your Reading Society while I was away—and they also directed some discreet inquiries to the household staff. This was more difficult because you’ve managed to garner quite the loyal staff; still, I was able to glean enough information that you were safe in my absence, even thriving .” That had been a dagger to his gut if ever there was one. It had been part of the reason why he’d come back so determined to prove that he could be necessary to Alaina’s future—that she needed him.

“You—you had strangers prying into my life to help assuage your guilt about abandoning me?”

“Not strangers,” he sighed with resignation. “These were people I trusted.”

“Apparently, they weren’t reliable enough to provide you with the reason for my visits to Mrs. Worthy’s!” Alaina snapped. The fire in her eyes would have been beautiful if he hadn’t sensed the potential for it to burn his world down. And he was the one who sparked the tinder.

“You are a woman who garners loyalty wherever you go, Alaina. Your staff was incredibly reluctant to divulge any information.” Alaina scoffed, but he forged on. “I couldn’t have you watched the entire time, not without raising suspicion or planting someone with questionable morals in your household, which was never an option.” This, of course, didn’t mean staff didn’t chatter amongst themselves and let slip a few tidbits here and there to delivery men or others they believed to be their partners in service. They could be a wealth of information if one knew how to place the proper inquiries, but even they had their limitations. “You managed to acquire one of the most loyal staffs in all of London.” The termination of her letters to him, the secret donations and frequent visits to the girls’ home, and his own wavering confidence that leaving Alaina had been the right thing to do meant Sterling was primed for a wildly outrageous and unfair judgment of his wife. An overreaction.

Disbelief, anger, and sadness flashed across Alaina’s face in a carousel of emotions, finally landing on incredulity. “So…you cared enough to hire people to ferret out information and feed you snippets of my life for eight years, but not enough to enquire after me yourself? You knew I wrote you all those letters and you never responded to a single one. I overlooked this fact because you were making such an effort now, but…Sterling…surely you must see how upsetting and backward this is.”

He barely suppressed a flinch. Hearing his name on her lips was something he’d never grow tired of, but the circumstances transformed the word into a blade. “I couldn’t, Alaina,” he insisted. “It was unsafe.”

“Why?” she demanded and advanced on him, prodding his chest above where his heart had once resided. The organ was now singed to ash fine enough to blow away on the breeze. “No more secrets; we’ve had enough of those for a lifetime, and I will scream in earnest if I am forced to endure any further hypocrisy from you.”

Sterling’s eyes looked heavenward and slid closed.

It was now or never; he would divulge his secrets, or he would die alone with them.

“I was sent to the Continent by the Crown as a spy,” he began evenly. “I could not let on that I had a wife at home whom I cared about in case my true aim was discovered. Your existence could have been used against me. You could have become a target and I refused to put you at risk.”

To his dismay, Alaina laughed in disbelief and turned to flee the room. Sterling’s hand darted out and grabbed her wrist to stop her. She’d demanded the truth and he’d be damned if he didn’t give it all to her now that he knew they walked a razor’s edge between understanding and utter disaster.

“It is the truth.” The sincerity in his gaze must have given her pause because she ceased tugging at his grip. “I realize it sounds unbelievable, but I swear it is the only thing that could have dragged me from your side all those years ago.

“I was a diplomatic spy in the courts of Europe, chosen for my looks, youth, and title. I could misbehave and assume the role of debauched young duke, all while never drawing any suspicion. My title granted me access to inner circles in high society and my carefully cultivated reputation endeared me to my targets. They believed I was an immoral fop. It was all a facade; I swear it. What I told you before about my time on the Continent was the truth. Everything the tabloids reported was a lie. There were no other women…ever. The life I led was all for show.” He chose to take it as a good sign that her furious eyes never left his face. At least she was listening, and he was determined to plod on.

“I was recommended by one of my professors at university and my training began before my eighteenth birthday. I was too busy to chase skirts like my peers, which is why I’d avoided any romantic entanglements. I never counted on meeting you…of falling in love with you, Alaina.” His heart skipped a beat at her sudden intake of breath. “Our engagement had already been in the works by the time they’d deemed me ready for the plans they made, and I received my orders. I was strongly encouraged to break off our relationship…but we both know how well that turned out.

“Instead, I insisted upon having enough time for us to marry and…convinced them it was vital that I get an heir on you in case the worst happened…but I just couldn’t go through with it. I was a coward who couldn’t chance the possibility of leaving you with child before I fled to my mission and na?vely rationalized that I could at least give you the security of my name and wealth. I was young and stupid enough to believe it was kinder to simply leave than sleep with you and disappear knowing the possible peril involved in the role I’d have to play on the Continent.”

“I—I need to sit down,” Alaina murmured, but she swatted Sterling away when he would have helped her to a chair near the hearth. She dropped into it and took a shaky breath before looking up into his face once more. It broke his heart how beautiful and broken and small she looked. “You truly didn’t leave me because you wanted to, but because you were ordered to? Everything I’ve read, everything I’ve believed about the past eight years was all a lie?”

“All an act. There were never any other women,” he replied definitively, reiterating what he’d already told her several times over and fully prepared to do it as many times as she required to believe it in her soul. “I arranged much of it, but never truly took part. The women were hired. I would put on a show, never exchanging more than a reluctant kiss or two to maintain appearances, and even those left me guilt-ridden. You must believe me; I had no choice. I’d committed to the role and I couldn’t simply break away from it.”

He looked deeply into her eyes, willing her to see the truth. “The entire time, I never stopped thinking about you. Not for a single hour.”

Rather than reassure Alaina, Sterling’s words served only to fan the flames of resentment and pain expanding deep within the pit of Alaina’s chest. His every explanation—every excuse—gradually enraged her more and more…made bile rise to the back of her throat. Everything she’d believed she’d known about her husband these past eight years was a lie. All of it. And he had the gall to accuse her of lying when she wasn’t even sure she knew the barest of truths about him.

And if he’d lied so smoothly for so long, then who was to say there weren’t still a thousand other lies littering the space between them?

“You never even considered telling me the truth?” Alaina’s voice shook more than she cared to admit. “With everything you’ve said, not once did you say you’d weighed the option of simply telling me why you had to leave.”

“I couldn’t, Alaina; it was not safe.”

“No!” she snapped. “Stop making yourself out to be some hero. You simply didn’t once consider that I might have respected your duties and been better equipped to handle the years without you had I had the bolster of the truth to prop me up in my darkest moments. It is quite obvious that you didn’t trust me enough or think me worthy of your secrets.” She jutted her chin in the direction of the paper detritus scattered where they’d once stood. “Your investigation was evidence enough of that. You formed your conclusions too hastily—not a trait I would think someone with true espionage experience would possess.”

“Everything is different with you, Alaina,” Sterling interjected through gritted teeth. “I—I cannot think properly when I am around you.”

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” She sniffed and then shook her head. “Whatever the truth, it is now impeccably clear to me that all of this was a mistake. All of it. ”

Alaina stood and smoothed her skirts. It was clear she was done meeting his eyes, no matter how hard he silently pleaded with her to do so…to not turn and slowly, woodenly stride from the room. This new stoic side of her unnerved him more than her anger—at least when she yelled at him, she saw him as worthy of her time and emotions. Her ice queen facade slid back into place, and he was frozen outside of an impenetrable wall.

“Where are you going?” he croaked out through his tight throat.

Alaina paused and spoke over her shoulder, never once raising her eyes. “I will be making arrangements to stay elsewhere for a while,” she murmured coolly. “I cannot be around you right now.” She turned once more to leave.

Sterling could no more stop his legs from closing the gap between them than he could his heart from beating. “You cannot just abandon this marriage.”

She froze, her back ramrod straight. This time, she didn’t bother turning her head. “Can’t I? It seems like abandonment is a rather common theme in our lives.”

He violently cursed his poor choice of words as Alaina slipped away. His emotions for his wife had turned him into the worst sort of overbearing husband. He was mistrusting when she’d truly given him no reason to be that way. He was irrational where he’d once prided himself on his level head. He’d become the worst sort of hypocrite for calling her out for walking away when that was precisely what he’d done on their wedding night.

He’d come to know Alaina fairly well since his return…short of bodily restraining her, there was no preventing her from leaving. He also knew he couldn’t be present while her things were packed. While she walked away. The mere thought of it sent a wave of nausea crashing through him with such force that he nearly staggered.

He had to let her go, even if it killed him. She needed time and space to consider whether the depth of his sins was worth overlooking, and he owed it to her to allow her that much.

Not knowing what else to do, he stormed down the stairs and bellowed for his hat and cloak. He’d go to his club and drink himself numb. It was the only chance he had at sleeping without her in his arms.