Page 34 of Her Beast of a Duke

“And he shouted at a little boy who was only trying to help me redecorate,” she confessed. “My husband is ill-mannered, and the way he glowers—heavens, I cannotendureit. And his infernal love of the shadows that slither throughout his castle! How can he love them so much? I have my share of hiding at times—from Hermia when she tried to coax me to my lessons when I was younger, from my mother who pushed me at suitors—but this is quite another thing. What sort of man needs to hide in his home?”

She realized how sad her voice sounded as she asked that last question. She frowned into her wineglass, wondering just how strong it was, but no, the thoughts were her own.

When you look at the way I have been, light is sometimes not a friendly thing.

What had thetondone to him that he would bury himself in darkness even in his own home?

“Isabella,” Mary enquired softly, “when will you simply let yourself admit that you have empathy for him?”

“Maybe I see part of myself in him,” Isabella posed. “Maybe that is all it is. There have been too many times that I have been groomed for performance when all I have wanted to do is slip between my bedsheets instead and be alone. Yet, he is a duke, so he must oblige theton’sdemands.”

“Isabella.”

“What?”

“You like him.”

“I do not.”

“Let yourself admit it.”

“No.”

“Isabella.” Mary laughed into her wineglass. “We have been friends for too long for me not to know you, not to read you like a book.”

Isabella only scowled at her friend, but deep down, she wondered how true her friend’s words were. She sat there in her deep-blue day gown across from Mary in her own rose-colored dress. She felt foolish thinking such things. She was not Sibyl, with thoughts of falling in love.

Isabella was a decoration, a diamond to be bestowed upon the crown of the man who chose her, nothing more, nothing less. Alicia could be confidently outspoken, and Sibyl could be a dreamer, and Hermia the steadfast logistic of them all, but Isabella…

Her mother had made it clear that she was to be the pretty one, the one to raise their family out of Hermia’s former shame and back into the good graces of theton.

Of course, before her own shame had befallen them.

“Isabella?” Mary probed.

“I am fine,” she said, almost too quickly. “I just—my dreams are nothing. They are insignificant.”

“No dreams are insignificant, dear friend. You are entitled to your own, as your sisters are.”

Isabella forced a scoff, tossing her hair. “Dreams are for fools, Mary. I am married now, a duchess, and I must be happy.”

“Yes, butareyou? All I see is my friend denying herself a lot of things.”

“I deny myself nothing,” she lied.

She thought of the intimacy she had craved for the longest time, the intimacy that her mother had not told her about, but Hermia certainly had alluded to. The intimacy she had tucked away into the darkest corners of her mind, and, if she was truly honest, the romance she had quietly craved in the moments when she wasn’t performing.

“Just think of my words, friend,” Mary told her gently, reaching out to squeeze her hand gently. “Promise me.”

“I will,” Isabella said, and she hoped she could keep to that, even if it went against everything that she had followed for all of her life. “Thank you, Mary. But we truly must discuss finding you a husband. What of Lord Davington?”

Her friend’s responding blush was enough said, and Mary even giggled. “Things are… progressing well.”

“Oh, yes?”

“Indeed.” She took a sip of her wine, giving Isabella a conspiratorial look. “My mother does not think he is high enough in rank, but sometimes one must put aside rank when it comes to real feelings.”

“Indeed,” Isabella agreed, even though she had married a duke of high rank and without feelings. “Take what you wish, Mary, for you deserve every ounce of love you want.”