Her Family Sold Her to Pay Their Debts — But When Kora Faced the Ruthless Duke Who Had Quietly Chosen Her for Reasons Beyond the Harbor, He Leaned Close and Whispered, “You’re My Destiny.”

PART 2

The wedding was a fifteen-minute affair in a dusty registry office, witnessed by Vain’s solicitor and a bored clerk. Vain wore a dark blue coat that actually fit his broad shoulders, and Kora wore a slate gray dress — the only respectable garment she owned that was not patched. There were no flowers. There was no music. When the clerk pronounced them man and wife, Vain did not kiss her. He simply nodded, handed the clerk a banknote, and led her back to the carriage.

For the first week in the White Cliff townhouse, Kora felt like a ghost haunting a very clean, very quiet castle.

The house ran with terrifying efficiency. Mrs. Croft, the housekeeper — stern but not unkind — had immediately filled Kora’s wardrobes with silks and muslins in muted tones, arranged by dressmakers who came and went like silent clockwork. Kora was fed rich, hot meals. Fires blazed in every grate. But she saw nothing of her husband.

He left before she woke — taking a horse to the shipyards or his offices in the city — and returned long after she had retired to her chambers. The house was massive, but it felt hollow. It was a machine for living, devoid of life.

By the eighth evening, the silence became intolerable.

Kora sat in the grand dining room, staring at a silver platter of roasted duck that could have fed a family of six. The long mahogany table stretched out before her, empty save for her solitary place setting.

“Mrs. Croft,” she called out as the housekeeper entered to pour wine. “Is His Grace dining at home tonight?”

“The Duke rarely dines at regular hours, Your Grace.” The housekeeper replied carefully. “He takes his meals in his study, usually.”

“Not tonight.”

Kora stood up. She was tired of feeling like a porcelain doll placed on a shelf and forgotten. She was a duchess by law, and she had sold herself for this existence. She would not spend it staring at empty chairs.

“Have two plates brought to the study. I will dine with my husband.”

Mrs. Croft looked alarmed. “Your Grace — the Duke gave strict orders not to be disturbed —”

“I am not a disturbance. I am his wife,” Kora said, the title tasting strange on her tongue. “Bring the plates, Mrs. Croft.”

She walked down the long corridor toward the west wing. She did not knock when she reached the heavy mahogany doors. She pushed them open.

The study was dimly lit by a single lamp on the desk. The rest of the room was in shadows. Vain was at his desk, surrounded by maps of the Cornish coast and columns of numbers. He wore a rumpled linen shirt, his cravat discarded somewhere on the floor.

He looked up, a scowl instantly forming. “I said I was not to be —”

He stopped when he saw her.

“— disturbed,” Kora finished for him, walking in. Her silk skirts rustled against the carpet. “Yes, I was told. I am ignoring it.”

Vain slowly put down his compass. He leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest. He looked exhausted — the shadows under his gray eyes bruised and dark.

“To what do I owe this rebellion, madam?”

“I am eating roasted duck.” Kora stopped in front of his desk. “It is very good duck. And I am eating it alone at a table built for thirty. I decided I would prefer to eat it here — while you ignore me in person rather than from across the house.”

A flicker of surprise crossed Vain’s face, quickly replaced by guarded neutrality. “I am working.”

“Work while you chew.”

Before he could argue, the door opened and a terrified footman hurried in, carrying a heavy silver tray with two plates. He set them hastily on a small side table before bowing out and fleeing the room.

Vain looked at the food. He looked at Kora. “You are incredibly stubborn.”

“A necessity of survival.” She took a seat at the small table and picked up her fork. “Eat, Your Grace. If I must be married to a ledger, I would prefer the ledger does not starve to death and leave me to deal with the probate courts.”

For a moment, Kora thought she had pushed too far. The ruthless Duke of Wickliffe did not take orders in his own house. His jaw tightened.

Then he let out a long, heavy exhale.

He pushed his chair back from the desk and walked over, dropping into the chair opposite her. He picked up a piece of duck with his fingers, ignoring the silverware entirely, and took a bite.

“Barbaric,” Kora noted dryly.

“Silverware slows me down,” Vain replied, chewing.

They ate in silence for a few minutes. It was not the heavy, oppressive silence of the dining room. It was a working silence. Rain began to patter against the tall glass windows, a rhythmic drumming that insulated the room from the sprawling, dirty city outside.

“The port,” Kora said abruptly, cutting a piece of meat. “Is it progressing?”

Vain paused, his dark brows drawing together. “Why do you ask?”

“Because it cost you sixty thousand pounds and a wife. I am mildly invested in its success.”

Vain picked up a linen napkin and wiped his hands. He looked at her — truly looked at her, for the first time since their wedding day. The harsh lines around his mouth softened just a fraction.

“The surveyors are running into granite deposits. It will cost an extra ten thousand to blast through them. But yes, it is progressing. It will shave three days off the Atlantic shipping routes.”

“Making you richer.”

“Making the empire faster,” he corrected. “Wealth is merely a byproduct of efficiency.”

“A very convenient philosophy for a rich man,” Kora countered, taking a sip of her wine.

“And what is your philosophy, Kora?”

The sound of her given name in his rough, low voice made her stomach tighten inexplicably.

“That the world is a market.” Her voice dropped, losing its combative edge. “And everyone has a price. Some pay in gold. Some pay in blood. Some pay in compliance.”

Vain held her gaze. The air between them shifted — the cold, businesslike atmosphere suddenly thick with something unsaid. He saw the bitterness in her eyes, the deep, ancient fatigue of a woman who had spent her youth managing the collapse of her family. He recognized it because he had the exact same fatigue in his own bones.

“You think I bought you?” he said quietly.

“I signed the receipt,” she replied.

“I bought a tract of land.” Vain leaned forward, his forearms resting on his knees. “You are a legal obstacle.”

“Don’t flatter me, Your Grace.”

Vain’s eyes locked onto hers, fierce and sudden. “I do not flatter. If I wanted a docile, decorative wife, I would have bought one from the peerage with a dowry. Not a destitute woman with a gambling father.”

“Then why?” she challenged, her pulse leaping.

“Because when you walked into this study —” Vain’s voice dropped to a low, rough murmur that barely carried over the sound of the rain. “— you did not flinch. You did not cry. You looked at the abyss and you bargained with it.”

He stood up, towering over the small table. He looked down at her, the iron in his eyes burning with a sudden, unsettling heat.

“You are not collateral, Kora.”

He whispered the words, and they hung in the air like a spark in a powder keg.

“You are my destiny.”

He did not wait for her to respond. He turned on his heel and walked back to his desk, picking up his pen as if the world had not just tilted on its axis.

Kora sat frozen, the wine in her glass trembling as her hand shook. The ruthless Duke had just cracked open his armor, revealing something terrifyingly human underneath. And for the first time in her life, Kora Hemsley did not know the price of what had just been offered.