Stolen by the Ruthless Duke (Stolen by the Duke #2)

Chapter 34

Chapter Thirty-Four

“ Y ou paint an appalling picture, Max.”

Freddie’s voice droned through Maxwell’s headache the following day.

“I thought Lucy might rope you into this mess,” Maxwell muttered.

“Of course, she did. She also told me how you rudely dismissed her when she merely expressed concern.”

“Misplaced concern,” Maxwell pointed out.

“Is it, truly?” Freddie’s voice was flat as he looked him over. “Your eye is half swollen shut, your ribs are black and blue. You are limping, and your lip is so split that one might mistake it for one of the gulfs of the coast.”

“You are rather dramatic,” Maxwell sighed.

“Regardless, Maxwell, you look in a terrible state. Lucy was, and is, right to be concerned. Look at you—it is almost midday, and you have not risen from your bed. You have duties to perform, business to conduct.”

“I do not care,” Maxwell groaned. “Blasted things, the lot of them. What good are my duties if I am to spend my life in this large castle alone?”

“Well, you would not be alone if you were not such a foolish, stubborn man who thinks he does not need anybody!”

“I do not,” Maxwell snapped.

“No, but you can want them, Maxwell! And you can open up to them, even if it hurts sometimes. Even if it takes a while to adjust. Even if you need to make a conscious effort to do so. Because that is what love—and what marriage—is. Fighting, yes, but fighting for the same side, and that side is love.”

“What would you know of love?” Maxwell asked, sounding cruel, but Freddie barely flinched.

“You cannot wound me, Maxwell.”

Maxwell rolled his eyes, throwing an arm over his face. “Just get out, please, Freddie. I tire of you already, and I ache. I need to bathe.”

“You need to find your wife.”

“And you need to find a sense of minding your own business.”

Silence settled over the room for a few moments. By the time Maxwell peeked out from beneath his arm, Freddie was shaking his head and leaving.

In the drawing room later that day, Maxwell stared down Freddie and Lucy.

“I am dressed and bathed,” he snapped. “Are you both pleased now?”

“Yes,” Lucy said. “I certainly am. You no longer smell like the tavern.”

Maxwell gave her a cold look.

“Have you given more thought to asking Ophelia to return?” Freddie questioned.

Maxwell shook his head. Instead of facing them, he looked at the maid dusting the mantelpiece. It was Bridget, the maid that Ophelia had searched for.

Another display of her selflessness. Another proof as to why I do not deserve her.

“I will not ask her to return,” he said flatly. “She is not happy with me.”

“Says who?”

“I saw it clear as day on her face,” Maxwell insisted. “At your ball, Lucy. She never stopped smiling or laughing. She was sociable, and I-I realized how I have deprived her of that.”

Bridget cleared her throat and moved closer. “Your Grace, I could not help but overhear.”

She looked meek, as if afraid to speak up, but he gestured for her to continue.

“I have not seen my mistress so happy than when I returned to Stormcliff. Before the ball, she spoke at length about her honeymoon with you, how grand everything had been with her new husband. Even since before her father passed, I have not seen her so happy.”

“She was planning a ball,” Maxwell said. “It is merely further proof that these things make her happy and I have deprived her of them.”

Freddie frowned. “You were not all right, as you tried to tell me, at the ball.” He sighed. “Maxwell, you truly cannot admit your shortcomings, can you?”

“I will ask you to leave in a moment,” Maxwell warned.

“You left, though,” Freddie continued. “You left after we spoke, and when you returned, you avoided her all night. Why?”

“I went to the garden, and I… Well, I know myself and what I was doing to her, how she deserved far better. Lord Kirkland had a brilliant, bright legacy and a beautiful future planned for his beautiful daughter. I cannot live up to that.”

“You are a fool if you think that’s true, Maxwell,” Lucy said, “Yes, Ophelia enjoys hosting and throwing parties. But you have not seen her happiness when she and I had a picnic on the beach, or when you danced with her and glanced away for a moment. She glowed , Maxwell. Ophelia lights up around you—party or not—and if you cannot see that, then you are a fool.”

Maxwell blanched. “You think she is truly happy?”

“You know her pretenses,” Freddie said. “You have told me yourself. Do you truly think she only pretends to be happy?”

Maxwell thought before shaking his head.

“You have driven her back into the lair of the world,” Lucy told him. “If that is not enough to make you realize your mistake, then I do not know what will.”

The two of them excused themselves from the room, and Maxwell looked at Bridget. “She is truly happy here?”

“The happiest I have seen her in many years,” the maid swore.

Maxwell stood up and retreated into the garden, needing to clear his head. He thought of everything. Ophelia’s declarations of safety, her willingness to take his anger onto herself, to soothe him, to dine with him, to drink with him. To dance and pretend they were a starry night, a constellation.

Her talk of a love match.

And it hit him like a wave of cold water.

He was her love match. He had lived up to her father’s wishes—and he had ruined everything just as surely, sending her right back to London. Back to her terrible stepmother, who had abused her heart and mind as surely as his father had abused his body.

For although Maxwell had moved past his anger in the past few weeks, he realized he had only fallen deeper in love with Ophelia.

And he was a fool to let her go.

“I must get her back,” he muttered to himself.

Without a second thought, he dashed to the stables, mounting Valor without bothering to saddle him up.

He would find Ophelia and bring her home—her true home, with him.

Ophelia had forced herself to attend one of Arabella’s social events. It was held in a lovely townhouse not far from their own, and the dining hall glittered with the chandelier lights, under which Ophelia still felt miserable.

There was dancing, and she did not feel any joy.

Everybody spoke around her, and she did not feel any joy.

Ophelia did not participate in any of it, unable to find even a flicker of happiness.

Her heart ached for the happiness she had found in Stormcliff, in attending social events withLucy. How she wished her friend was there now. How she wished…

How I wish Maxwell was here, too.

Her chest ached with her heartbreak.

“Excuse me for a moment,” she said, smiling politely at the women who stood around her, all chattering.

Arabella simply glanced at her, giving her that smile that made an uneasy shiver run down her spine. But Ophelia had grown used to it this past week. At least there was a smile. Discomfiting or not, it was an unusual sight on her stepmother’s face.

She could have thrown me onto the streets, Ophelia reminded herself, trying to be grateful.

But when she returned from refreshing herself in the hallway, she stopped, hearing Arabella’s voice, having changed from the softer tone she had been using with Ophelia.

“The wretch does not even see what is in front of her, nor what I have done for her over the years,” Arabella was saying.

Ophelia hid around the corner, watching her.

“But she is naive. She will realize one day and come back on her knees, begging for forgiveness.”

The group of women giggled, nodding.

“And I must say,” Arabella continued, “for a duchess, she is rather… messy. I tried to fix her hair at the house, but she refused! Terribly ungrateful. I cannot wait to have her out of my sight. She makes me rather ill.”

“I still cannot believe she would disgrace you the way she did at the ceremony,” one of the women said, astounded. Ophelia’s chest tightened, her heart aching. “Lord Anworth still seethes over it!”

“I do as well,” Arabella muttered. “It is terrible to pretend to like her.”

Ophelia’s throat tightened, but she fixed her smile back into place and rejoined the group.

“Ophelia!” Arabella greeted. “You look exhausted.” She looked at her friends. “Poor Ophelia has not slept well since her return, but I am taking excellent care of her. We are helping one another, are we not?”

“Indeed,” Ophelia said, her voice tight. “I am rather tired, in fact. I think I may excuse myself.”

“I agree,” Arabella said. “This party is rather boring.”

“Most boring,” her friend agreed.

“Tiresome and exhausting,” another chimed in.

Ophelia fought down her frustration as Arabella readied herself to return home. In the carriage, the two of them rode back together, and Ophelia kept her mouth shut.

Until they entered Rowden House.

Suddenly, she was right back where she had been the day of her wedding, confronting the woman as she had the day Maxwell had entered her life.

“I heard you,” she said.

Arabella stilled, one hand on the banister. “Whatever do you mean, Ophelia?”

“You may drop the act. I overheard the conversation you had with your friends. How I am a disgrace, how it is terrible to be nice to me, to pretend to like me. How awful I am.”

“Oh, Ophelia, we were merely making light of the situation.”

“What situation?!” Ophelia shouted. “You have faked your kindness when I needed it most. It is what you have always done, Arabella. You have tamped down my grief, forced me to smile in order to remain part of this family, even when my father was alive. At the first chance, you tried to marry me off to Lord Anworth. You wished to be rid of me, I understand, but you are cruel.”

“I took you in,” Arabella snarled. “You looked pitiful on my doorstep when you returned from Sussex. I let you stay here despite your disrespect. How dare you stand there and speak ill of me to my face?”

“You are conniving. You have never let me simply exist. I have always had to be put in a box for you, have I not? I am tired of it, Arabella.”

“You were pathetic! All you did was cry over your mother, and then your father, and now the Duke.”

“I was grieving! I was a child !”

“And now you are a woman, so grow up, Ophelia. Life is not always fair.”

“But you did not have to be so cruel,” Ophelia raged. “You could have chosen to be kind to a young girl who had lost her mother. You could have chosen to offer solace when my father died and we both grieved him. But you did not. You chose cruelty and hatred, and I despise you for that.”

“ You despise me ? Heavens, Ophelia, you are thoroughly wretched!”

“Mama!”

Both women stiffened at the sound of James’s small, hoarse voice. He stood at the top of the staircase and rubbed his eyes tiredly as if woken up.

“Please, stop it. Stop shouting at Ophelia, Mama!” He rushed down the stairs. “Stop!”

“You are a disrespectful boy, James,” Arabella shouted. “Do not shout at your mother!” Her hand swung back as if to hit him, but James cried out and dashed to Ophelia, hiding behind her skirt.

“You are scaring him!” Ophelia yelled, scooping him up into her arms. “You would strike your own child?” She gaped at Arabella, aghast. “Shame on you,” she hissed.

“Do not judge my actions,” Arabella snapped. “Your father would have been ashamed of yours. Had he been alive the day of your wedding to Lord Anworth, he would have wanted nothing to do with you. He must be rolling in his grave, knowing he left you with nothing but disgrace. Shame on you , Ophelia. No wonder you are so desperate for the Duke. Only a murderer would want anything to do with you.”

The door flew open behind them, and Ophelia started.

Arabella’s face turned white when she looked over Ophelia’s shoulder.

And then his voice sounded in the entrance hall, quiet and angry.

“Do not speak to my wife in such a manner.”

Footsteps sounded down the hall, and Ophelia wanted to weep with nerves and relief.

Maxwell.

“Take the boy upstairs,” Maxwell instructed, and she started again when the butler took James from her arms and carried him upstairs.

Alone, with just the three of them, the house was silent.

Maxwell strode forward, standing so close to Ophelia’s side that she could feel his warmth. She ached to look at him, and so she did. She gasped quietly upon seeing the bruises on his face.

“Well, well, you have had quite the week, Your Grace.” Arabella chuckled.

“Lady Kirkland, you are a cruel woman with no good intentions toward my wife or me,” Maxwell said. “You would use my wife’s memory of her father against her. You never cared for her lady’s maid. Either way, you were planning to sack her. Yes, I know it all. I know of the deals you made, the bargains to get even more money after you squandered it following Lord Kirkland’s death. I know of your use of my accounts?—”

“Ophelia granted me use.”

“Ophelia was manipulated,” he snarled. “Ophelia has been vulnerable, and I believe you have taken advantage of that, as you took advantage of her after her father’s death and forced her into an arrangement with Lord Anworth. But I had an agreement with her father—to protect her. I am sure the late Lord Kirkland would roll in his grave if he knew that protection included from his wife.”

He glared across the hall at Lady Kirkland. “So I shall once again honor his wish to keep his daughter safe. You will leave the country, never to return. Never to contact Ophelia or myself. Never to have access to Lord Kirkland’s money. Never to be accepted into Society again.”

“But my son?—”

“The young Marquess will come to Stormcliff, where he will be under my care.”

“Lord Montford will never agree?—”

“Oh, he has already been offered a generous sum, and the transfer of care is looking very promising. I am certain neither of you will object. I witnessed your foul threat towards your son moments ago, and I am certain the ton will hear of it if you won’t agree to my stipulations.”

Arabella’s mouth opened and closed, her eyes wide with humiliation.

Ophelia clasped Maxwell’s lapels, drawing him closer as she heard her stepmother’s retreating footsteps before a door slammed shut upstairs.

“You are hurt,” she murmured.

“The pain inside of me is far worse,” he told her, wincing. “Your stepmother was right about one thing—my week has not been pleasant. Being separated from you has been terrible, and I never wish to endure it again. I have made regrettable choices, as you can see.”

He tried to laugh, but it was clear how much pain he was in, and how much he had hidden from Arabella.

Ophelia pressed her hand to his chest, feeling his heart pound.

“Ophelia, when I stormed through those chapel doors to save you from Anworth, I merely thought of you as an obligation. I did not see you . I saw the promise I swore to keep to your father. But over time, I have seen you. I have learned who you are. And I have grown to love you. You are sunshine, my Ophelia. You are brilliant and passionate, and every time you speak back to me, utterly unafraid, I find myself falling harder for you. I was a fool to ever let you walk out of Stormcliff, and I have come to beg for forgiveness.

“Come back with me. Come back to argue with me—so long as you do that. Come back. Let us argue until we are exhausted, for, as you said, it means we care. Come back to kiss me, or dine with me, or give me silence as I have given you. I only beg that you return at all, for my life without you is nothing, and it has taken me too long to realize such a thing. Forgive me, Ophelia, and let me spend the rest of my life making up for my mistakes and anger and silence. I will spend every day being here for you. Whatever the future brings. I listened to my doubts when I should have listened to you. ”

He took her hands in his own. “I love you, Ophelia.”

Ophelia only gazed at him, taking in his bruised lip and jaw, his mottled cheek and red eye.

He had been fighting again.

“I will not hear of you returning to the tavern.”

“I am done forever with boxing,” he swore. “I did it to fill the void that your absence left.”

“You truly mean it?”

“I do. You inspire me to be better than that. Better than my father, my uncle, anything anybody expects me to be.”

Her heart swelled. “How do I know you will not treat me with silence at the slightest thing that causes you doubt?”

“I cannot promise I won’t, but I can promise to try to open up more, to silence my doubts rather than myself. I wish to learn to let you in, Ophelia. For the rest of my life.” He smiled slightly. “Return with me?”

She nodded, knowing her week had been miserable.

“Forgive me?”

She hesitated, taking a step closer to him. “I wish to host more parties,” she warned.

“As many as you wish.”

“And I wish to visit the village together at least once a month.”

“All right.”

And she could see that he truly meant it. Whatever he had been through this past week had changed him for the better. Had taught him consequence and regret in its truest form.

Ophelia softened, and she let him pull her into his arms.

Finally, he embraced her and put her broken pieces back together.

“Yes,” she breathed. “I forgive you, and I shall return with you.”

He sighed deeply, falling into her, as she did him.

His mouth met hers with a groan as he scooped her up into his arms. And at that moment, she realized what she had—the love match she had always dreamed of.

Father, I hope you see that I am finally happy. I have found love—or rather, it has found me.

Ophelia smiled into the next kiss as she parted her lips for her Duke, her husband—her love.

Stormcliff Hall spread out over the cliffs of Sussex, as bold and foreboding as Ophelia had remembered it, and something in her chest that had been unbearably tight for days loosened.

“I feel like I am home,” she murmured to Maxwell as they left the carriage.

“You are.”

His confirmation made hope bloom in her chest as she smiled up at him. Before she could lean in to kiss him, a squeal came from the carriage, and James burst out from between them, laughing, as Bridget came out of the castle.

She stood aside for Lucy, but James recognized Ophelia’s lady’s maid, who had taken the time to play with him on some occasions when Ophelia had spent time with him before leaving for Stormcliff.

“Lord James!” she said, swooping him up into her arms and giving him a hug. “I hope you were well-behaved on your trip.”

“The best!” he declared.

“The worst,” Maxwell muttered, plucking a stray feather out of his hair that James had insisted on putting there. “I jest, of course.” Ophelia couldn’t stifle her laughter at his frown. “He was excellently behaved. Were you not, Lord James?”

“Yes! And His Grace said I can see the ponies.”

“Ponies!” Lucy repeated. “Well, I believe they are slightly larger than ponies.”

James’ eyes widened. “Really?”

They laughed before Mrs. Hesketh called them all inside. She had prepared tea in the parlor for Ophelia’s return.

As they entered, Maxwell slipped an arm around Ophelia’s waist, smiling at her. “Welcome home.”

Her forever home.

“You are my home,” she told him. “Home is wherever you are.”