Abandoned by Her Fiancé, She Married a Feared Duke… Then Learned Why He Chose Her

Chapter 7

Two days later, Eleanor discovered something she was never meant to see.

It happened by accident. The morning had been gray and quiet, the kind of London morning where the sky seemed permanently undecided between rain and fog. Eleanor wandered through the Ashworth library, a vast room lined with dark shelves and rolling ladders. It was the only place in the house that felt alive. Books, at least, did not pretend indifference.

She was searching for something to occupy the long afternoon when she noticed a leather-bound journal lying half open on the desk.

The Duke’s desk.

She should not have looked. She knew that. But one line had already caught her eye.

I should have stayed with her.

Eleanor froze. The words seemed to rise from the page and grab her by the throat. Slowly, almost guiltily, she read the next sentence.

Charlotte asked me to remain that winter. I told her I had work in London. When the letter arrived saying she had fallen ill, I was already too late.

The room seemed to grow colder. The fire in the hearth dimmed, or perhaps it only felt that way.

Eleanor closed the journal immediately, her heart pounding against her ribs. So that was the truth. Not simply a sister lost to illness, but a guilt that had followed him for years. He had not been there when she needed him. He had chosen work over family. And Charlotte had died alone.

Footsteps sounded behind her.

Eleanor turned sharply. The Duke stood in the doorway. His gaze moved from her face to the journal and back again. For a moment, neither of them spoke.

“I did not mean to pry,” Eleanor said quietly.

He crossed the room slowly. “You already have.”

His voice was calm. Too calm. Eleanor braced herself for anger, for the cold fury she had seen in his eyes when he spoke of his cousins. But it did not come. Instead, the Duke picked up the journal and closed it carefully.

“You know now,” he said.

“Yes.”

Silence stretched between them, thick and heavy.

“I suppose,” Eleanor said gently, “that explains why you keep the house so quiet.”

The Duke laughed softly. It was not a pleasant sound. “Quiet houses do not demand attention.”

“And attention frightens you.”

“Yes.”

The honesty stunned her. The Duke walked toward the tall window, staring out at the gray garden where the last remnants of snow were melting into mud.

“For years,” he said quietly, “I believed that caring for someone meant risking their loss.” His hand rested against the cold glass. “So I stopped caring.”

Eleanor stepped closer. “But that did not prevent loss.”

“No.” His voice tightened. “It only prevented life.”

The admission hung heavily in the room. Eleanor studied him carefully — the rigid set of his shoulders, the tension in his jaw, the pain he had tried so hard to bury beneath layers of ice.

“You think if you allow yourself to care again, something terrible will happen,” she said.

The Duke turned toward her. “I know it will.”

“You cannot know that.”

“I watched it happen once already.” His eyes were darker now — not cold, but wounded. “I watched Charlotte waste away while I was sitting in a Parliament meeting, approving budgets that no one remembers. I was not there. I was never there when she needed me. The last letter she wrote — she said she understood. She said she knew I was busy. She said she was proud of me.” His voice cracked, barely, then steadied. “And I was not there.”

Eleanor felt the weight of his words settle between them like stones. She took another step forward.

“And yet you married me.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

The question was quiet but relentless. The Duke hesitated. For the first time since she had known him, Alexander Blackwood seemed uncertain.

“I told you,” he said slowly. “You were practical.”

“That was not the real reason.”

“No.”

Silence again. Then he said something unexpected.

“You reminded me of her.”

Eleanor blinked. “Your sister?”

“Yes.” He looked away, his gaze drifting to the garden beyond the window. “She was stubborn. She refused to let the house swallow her. She fought against the silence. She laughed too loudly and spoke too freely and never apologized for either.” He paused. “You looked the same way that day in the cold drawing room. Defiant. Even when you had nothing left to fight with.”

The admission surprised them both. Eleanor felt her chest tighten.

“So you married me,” she said softly, “to prove you could save someone this time.”

The Duke did not answer immediately. The truth was uncomfortable, and she could see him wrestling with it.

“Yes,” he said at last.

The words landed between them like fragile glass. Eleanor nodded slowly.

“That is a heavy burden to place on a marriage.”

“It was never meant to be a marriage.”

“It became one the moment you said the vows.”

The Duke looked at her again. The fire had faded from the hearth, leaving the room dim and shadowed.

“You are asking for something I do not know how to give,” he said quietly.

“Humanity,” Eleanor replied.

He gave a faint, bitter smile. “Yes.”

She held his gaze steadily. “Then learn.”

The word surprised him. “Learn,” he repeated.

“Yes.” Eleanor’s voice softened. “You are not a statue carved from ice. You are a man who is afraid.”

The Duke stared at her. No one had ever said it so plainly.

“And if I fail?” he asked.

Eleanor did not look away. “Then we will fail honestly. But at least we will not live as strangers.”

The room fell silent again. The Duke studied her for a long moment.

Then slowly, he nodded.

“I will try.”

It was not a promise. But it was the first step he had taken toward another human being in years. And Eleanor understood something important in that moment.

The feared Duke of Ashworth was not heartless. He was simply a man who had forgotten how to live.