Page 36 of Her Beast of a Duke

“And you can always change,” Edmund countered. “If she is worth it, if you care enough, Oscar, then you can become better for her.”

Oscar scoffed. “Better.” He scowled. “What does that even mean?”

“I think you know exactly what it means, and you would not be sitting here speaking to me about it otherwise.”

Oscar went to argue the point but found he had nothing to say. He frowned, looking askance at his friend.

“Merely think it over, stay an hour or so. Get some space from your castle, and your wife, if you need it.”

He nodded at Edmund, his mouth set into a grimace, and he finished off his brandy.

Perhaps space was the exact thing he needed. Still, his thoughts strayed to Isabella, and the feel of her mouth on his, reciprocating his kiss, if only for a moment, before the horror on her face had been clear.

How could she be attracted to and want to kiss such a monster of a man?

It had not even been two nights since Isabella had visited Mary when she was jolted from her sleep, groggy from the sharp awakening.

However, she swore she had heard something.

No, not just something.

Ascream.A man’s scream.

At once, she was upright and looking around herself, as if she expected the man in question to be there.

Had she dreamed it?

Right as she was still questioning it, she heard that ear-piercing shout once more. She was on her feet in an instant, looking at the door of their connected chambers.

Stilling, she heard a calling out—and she knew it was her husband. While the words were incoherent, the tone of them had her moving.

She had the adjoining door open in a second, her breath coming fast. It was open in a moment, and she rushed to her husband’s bedside. She had seen him drenched in sweat from exercise, but this was different. This was a cold sweat, and she could feel it radiating when she dared to hover her touch over him.

At his side on the bed, Morris sat, whining, his deep brown eyes on her. She held the hound’s gaze, wondering if he protected his master or begged for help from the man’s apparent nightmare. It seemed as though the room darkened several shades deeper, and Isabella felt helpless for a moment.

But when the Duke gave another pained cry, Isabella jolted into action, shaking him awake.

“Oscar,” she whispered, daring to use his name so casually. It rebelled against everything in her, but she still did it. “Oscar. Wake up—please, please, wake up.”

At her first touch, the Duke woke with a start, his body sharply snapping upright. His eyes were wild, fixed on her, as his breaths came ragged. His hand reached out, already clawed, but it didn’t get anywhere. It was nowhere near her, even as Isabella remained standing over him, unafraid.

Still, she could not help but step back, her own eyes wide.

“Oscar?” she whispered, startled and unsettled.

Her shock curled deep in her stomach at the state he was in, so lost in whatever haunted his mind that he dared not speak to her about it.

But thosescreams.

She knew they would haunt her, even when she slept, even when she lived through the next several days.

“Isabella?” His voice was rough and crackled from sleep, from screaming, and she noticed how, in his sleepy state, he forwent her own titles.

“I am here,” she told him, though her voice shook.

Her husband looked around himself, frowning, as if confused about where he was. He slowly dragged his gaze back to her, his scowl deepening as he seemed to slowly recollect himself.

“What are you doing in here?”