Page 11 of Duke of Iron (Unyielding Dukes #2)

Eleven

M ay turned to look out the carriage window when it stopped.

The house no longer looked welcoming, and she took a fortifying breath as Logan hopped down.

He had not said a word since they left Wildmoore House a quarter of an hour ago.

No, he was the cold Duke of Iron that Society knew, and no longer the Logan she’d grown to—to admire.

Taking the hand he offered, May alighted, and her feet landed with a jolt on the cobbles. She did not feel as steady on her feet as she’d hoped.

Before them, a straight line of servants waited, their backs rigid and eyes forward. Their livery was immaculate, but their faces were utterly blank. It was as if someone had hired a team of marble statues and told them to keep perfectly still until the end of time.

Logan offered his arm. “Shall we?”

Words at last.

She took it, uncertain, and together they approached the house. The servants dipped their heads in a movement so precise it might have been choreographed.

“Welcome home, Your Grace,” the butler intoned. “May we extend our congratulations.”

Logan’s eyes moved over the line in a quick, sharp survey. “I trust everything is prepared?”

“Yes, Your Grace,” said the butler. “Mrs. Paxton awaits the new Duchess inside.”

May felt a chill that had nothing to do with the wind. She cast a glance at the servants, but their faces gave her nothing. If anything, they seemed to be looking through her. Or perhaps they were afraid to look at her at all.

Logan seemed to sense her discomfort. He leaned in, his voice pitched so only she could hear, “They are not accustomed to change. Pay them no mind.”

His words—and gentleness—surprised her. She gave a tiny nod, grateful for the illusion of privacy.

In the foyer, a woman whom May assumed was Mrs. Paxton stood by the stairs. She was a formidable figure in a severe black dress and hair swept back like a helmet. Her eyes, sharp and pale, did a swift appraisal of May from shoes to chignon. Then she curtsied to Logan.

“Welcome home, Your Grace.”

“Mrs. Paxton, this is the Duchess of Irondale,” he introduced. The housekeeper looked May over once more, the corners of her mouth still turned downward as if she found May wanting.

“Welcome, Your Grace,” she intoned as she curtsied again.

May could only give a nod. Logan turned to her. “I shall leave you in Mrs. Paxton’s care now. She will see to your every need.”

With that, he turned on his heel and disappeared into a doorway to her left. May swallowed and regarded the housekeeper, shifting her weight slightly from one foot to another.

“If you will follow me, Your Grace,” Mrs. Paxton said, not smiling. Her tone suggested she doubted very much that May would last the week.

May followed her up the marble staircase. At the end of a long hallway, Mrs. Paxton stopped at a heavy wooden door. “These are your chambers, Your Grace. I trust they will be to your liking.”

May entered. There was a sitting room adjoining a bedchamber, which was large and perfectly symmetrical, as if it had been measured with a compass and set square.

Two tall windows admitted a weak shaft of light.

The bed was vast, dressed in heavy brocade.

A dressing table stood in the corner with a single, stern-backed chair.

It smelled faintly of lavender and much more strongly of new paint.

Mrs. Paxton gestured, not unkindly, to the bell pull. “Should you require anything, Your Grace, you may ring for a maid at any hour.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Paxton,” May said, managing a smile.

The housekeeper looked her in the eye for the first time. “If I may—” she began, then seemed to think better of it. “Never mind.”

May’s smile faltered, but Mrs. Paxton was already gone, leaving her more perplexed.

May stood in the center of the room, listening to the silence settle around her. She was not sure how long she stood that way, hands folded over her stomach, the thin chill of the room creeping into her bones.

It was only when she went to sit on a sofa near the hearth in the sitting room that she found herself struggling to breathe.

Her knees gave out halfway, and she landed on the sofa hard.

She pressed her hands to her cheeks, trying to slow her heart, but it only thundered faster.

The room felt both enormous and too small, as though the walls were creeping in with each breath.

You are married. There is no going back. The thought did not arrive in words, but as a sharp, physical punch to the chest. There would be no escaping through a side door or calling the whole thing off with a few clever sentences. May had made this choice, and now it was a chain around her neck.

She was going to be sick. Or faint. Or both.

The wedding dress did not help. It clung to her waist and ribs, pressing in where she most needed space. She tried to reach the buttons at the back, but they were tight, the fabric resisting every effort.

May pulled harder, but the dress did not budge. She gripped the arm of the sofa and tried to breathe, but her lungs would not cooperate. Then she made a strange, high-pitched sound and realized with horror that it was her own voice, helpless and desperate.

Someone knocked at the door. Or was she imagining that? The knock came again, softer this time.

“May?” It was Logan’s voice. “Are you unwell?”

She could not answer or move.

A moment later, he was at her side. He kneeled and took her hands. “May,” he said, “look at me.”

She shook her head.

“May. You are frightened.” His voice was gentle—excessively so. “It will pass, but you must breathe for me. Do you hear?”

She nodded, but the sob that escaped her gave the lie.

Her vision had blurred despite her spectacles, and she could not see his face.

She tried to pull her hands away, but Logan held them firmly.

“Follow me, May. Take a deep breath. In through the nose, out through the mouth. You can do it, I promise you.”

She did as he asked, filling her lungs as much as she could.

“There.” He smiled at her. “Just like that.”

Logan breathed with her, slow and measured, until her vision cleared enough to see his face. He was not mocking her. There was no smile at all, only careful attention, as if she were a puzzle he very much wanted to solve.

But then her breath began to hitch again, her lungs squeezing out the air as if rejecting it. “God! We need to get you out of this dress.”

Logan stood, moved behind her, and began unbuttoning the row at her back. His fingers were quick, the buttons popped free, and the dress went slack around her frame.

His hands paused behind her, and his voice was low when he spoke. “I am going to loosen the laces of your stays, if you permit me.”

She nodded, her face burning, and she did not stop him.

He worked quickly, and as soon as her lungs had even more space to expand, she exhaled in relief. Her shoulders sagged. He pulled the dress gently from her shoulders, careful not to touch her skin, and let it fall to her waist.

She was still in her stays and chemise—fully decent, by the standards of art and portraiture—but the intimacy of it made her head spin.

He drew her up from the chair and, without pretense or hesitation, wrapped his arms around her shoulders. For a moment, May thought she might faint again, but his hold was warm and very steady, and when he began to rub her back in slow circles, she realized he was coaxing her to calmness.

“This is the oldest trick in the book,” Logan said softly. “My mother’s nursemaid used to swear by it. Rock and breathe. That is all.”

May let herself lean into him; let herself believe, for a moment, that it might actually help.

He rocked her, gently, as one might a tired child. The absurdity of it made her want to laugh, but the feeling was strange and sharp, and it came out as a quiet, shuddering hiccup.

“Better?” he asked, not moving away.

“Yes,” she said in a hoarse voice.

He gave her another moment, then drew back and straightened her chemise.

“Forgive me,” she whispered, not knowing why she was apologizing.

He tilted his head, as if the notion of apology was a foreign thing. “Nothing to be sorry for.”

They stood in silence, and for the first time, May realized that his hands—his bare hands—were still on her arms. She felt the warmth of them, and something within her curled tight.

He must have sensed the change, for he stepped away at once, clearing his throat. “I shall have a maid bring you some tea. Unless you would prefer brandy?”

“Tea,” she said quickly.

He nodded. “And I shall send for Mrs. Paxton, if you wish for her to sit with you.”

“Please,” she said, but only because she wanted an excuse for him to leave.

He moved toward the door, but hesitated before opening it. “You may take as long as you wish, May. No one expects you at supper. Least of all me.”

She said nothing, and he left.

The moment the door shut, May moved to the vanity table in the bedchamber and sat, cradling her head in her hands. Her hair was askew, her cheeks blotchy, her eyes red-rimmed behind the gold wire spectacles she had forgotten she was wearing.

She looked like a ghost of herself. The new Duchess of Irondale.

A soft tap at the door announced the arrival of Mrs. Paxton and her lady’s maid, Miss Abbot, with a tea tray. May let herself be fussed over, the hot cup pressed into her shaking hands, the housekeeper’s words of comfort sounding distant and strange.

“Would you like a change of dress, Your Grace?” Miss Abbot asked.

She nodded. The maid produced a simple white muslin, far plainer than anything May had ever worn for an evening. She let them strip the stays and help her into the dress, grateful for its looseness.

Mrs. Paxton hovered near the vanity table. “Is there anything else you require?”

May managed a weak smile. “No, thank you. You have been… very kind.”

Mrs. Paxton paused, then, with a sudden gentleness, set a hand on May’s shoulder. “It is always the first day that is the hardest,” she said. “After that, one finds a way.”

May nodded, though she did not believe it, for her marriage was unlike most.

When the room was empty again, she went to the window. Hanover Square was bustling, and she spied three women walking and laughing. The sight reminded her of her sisters and how much she missed them. May had to wonder if she would ever come to think of this place as home.

A small knock roused her from her reverie, and she turned. Logan was back, this time leaning in the doorway with his arms folded, every inch a duke. “May I?”

She gestured him in, and he moved toward the fire. May joined him there, perched on the edge of a chair.

“I wanted to ensure you were still among the living.”

She forced a smile. “Just barely.”

He moved to stand near the fire, but did not sit. “May I ask something personal?”

She tensed, then raised her chin slightly to give him permission. “I suppose I have forfeited the right to privacy.”

He seemed to weigh the words before speaking. “Why did you accept me? I do not mean to sound impertinent, but you had every chance to back away. Even up to the last moment, you could have refused.”

She stared at the Persian rug. She could not tell him the truth—not the whole, crumbling truth. She could not tell him that she had begun to hope for something more, or that he had made her laugh at a time when laughter seemed impossible.

Instead, she said, “Because it was the only way forward. For both of us.”

He nodded, looking neither pleased nor disappointed. “I suppose I respect that.”

May looked up at him, determined to hold his gaze. “What do you expect from me? As your duchess. As your—” she could not say the word wife , not yet— “As the mistress of this house?”

His eyes narrowed slightly as he considered. “Very little. I do not have expectations that are difficult to meet.”

“But you do have them.”

“As every duke ought to. First, that you comport yourself as a lady, which you already do. That you do not bring further scandal upon my name, which I do not believe you are capable of. And that you help with the child until we find his rightful family.”

Oh, the child… May had forgotten one of the reasons he had married her.

His words stung. Not because they were cruel, but because they were so brutally logical. No affection or warmth. Just requirements to be met.

May swallowed. “What else?”

He cocked his head. “This is a marriage in name only. You are free to do as you wish, provided it does not bring trouble to my door. I expect we may be friends, or cordial acquaintances, if you prefer.”

“Yes, that is quite reasonable,” she said, more to hear it said aloud and convince herself it was what she wanted too.

Logan nodded. “I am not looking for more than that, May. Not from you, nor from anyone.”

She should have felt relief, but instead she felt hollow.

“Thank you for clarifying,” she said, and found she meant it.

He watched her for a moment, as if weighing whether to say something more. Then he dipped his head. “Good day, Duchess.”

“Good day, Duke,” she replied, feeling for the first time the full distance between them.

Logan left her alone again, and May drifted to the bed, sat on the edge, and drew her knees to her chest.

Only emptiness remained within her now.

She thought of her sisters, of August’s sarcasm, of June’s laughter, and April’s fierce loyalty.

She recalled her mother’s tear-stained handkerchief and her father’s solemn pride from hours ago.

May wondered what they would say if they saw her now, sitting on the edge of a stranger’s bed, a duchess in name and nothing more.

Hugging herself and rocking slightly, she whispered, “What have I gotten myself into?”

The room had no answer, but the silence seemed to settle around her, gentle and implacable, as if to say, This is what you chose. And now, you must live with it.