“Still Unmarried?” Her Ex Laughed—He Didn’t Know She’d Married The Most Powerful Duke In England

Chapter 8

The first letter arrived on a Tuesday in November.

It was addressed to Eleanor, not to Nathaniel. That was the first sign that something was wrong. The handwriting was unfamiliar. The paper was cheap. The postmark was from Philadelphia.

She opened it standing in the front hall, the morning light falling through the windows, the household moving quietly around her.

Dear Mrs. Graves,

I thought you should know that your husband has been seen in the company of a woman in Baltimore on multiple occasions during his recent business trips. I do not know what this means. I only know that I would want to be told. — A Friend

Eleanor read it twice.

Her hand did not shake. Her face did not change. She folded the letter carefully, placed it in the pocket of her dress, and went to review the morning correspondence as though nothing had happened.

Because she was not going to become that woman. The woman who opened anonymous letters and believed them. The woman who let suspicion eat through the foundation of something real. She had spent two years being destroyed by Jonathan Mercer’s lies. She was not going to be destroyed by a stranger’s either.

But the second letter arrived four days later.

Then the third.

By the end of November, there were seven letters in the drawer of her writing desk. All anonymous. All claiming the same thing. Nathaniel Graves had a woman in Baltimore. He had been seen with her. He was not the man Eleanor thought he was.

She did not confront him. She did not mention the letters. She told herself it was because she was being rational. Because anonymous letters were the weapon of cowards, and she would not give them the dignity of a response. Because she had built this marriage on honesty, and she would not let it be destroyed by shadows.

But there was another reason. One she did not want to admit.

She was afraid.

Not of losing Nathaniel. Of losing what she had found in herself since she had married him. The competence. The usefulness. The quiet pride of being seen clearly by someone who did not lie.

If the letters were true, she would lose all of it.

And so she said nothing.

The letters continued into December. She stopped opening them. She put them directly into the fire, unread. She watched them burn the way she had watched Jonathan’s letter burn, and she told herself the same thing she had told herself then.

She was done.

She was not done.

She was terrified.

It was Mrs. Harding who found them.

She was cleaning Eleanor’s study and discovered the drawer where Eleanor had kept the first seven letters before she had started burning the rest. The housekeeper brought them to Eleanor without a word, stacked neatly, and laid them on the desk.

“I found these in your drawer, ma’am.”

Eleanor looked at the stack. She had forgotten about the first seven. She had been so careful to burn the rest.

“Thank you, Mrs. Harding. You can leave them.”

Mrs. Harding did not leave. She stood at the desk with the particular stillness of a woman who had decided something.

“Ma’am,” she said. “I’ve worked in this house for nine years. I know Mr. Graves’s comings and goings better than anyone. I know every letter that arrives and every carriage that departs.”

She paused.

“There is no woman in Baltimore.”

Eleanor looked up.

“Mrs. Harding —”

“I don’t know who wrote these,” the housekeeper said. “But I know it’s a lie. Because I keep the household records. And I know where Mr. Graves goes and who he sees when he gets there.”

Eleanor was very still.

“Mr. Graves has been in Baltimore four times this year. Each time, he met with a shipping commissioner. The man is sixty-three years old and has a wife and seven children. I know because I have the receipts from the dinners they shared.”

The silence stretched.

“Why are you telling me this?” Eleanor said.

“Because I’ve watched you, ma’am.” Mrs. Harding’s voice was not unkind. “I’ve watched you come into this house and take it apart and put it back together. I’ve watched you grow into something I didn’t think you were when you arrived. And I’ve watched him —” She gestured toward the door, toward the rest of the house. “I’ve watched him become someone I didn’t think he was capable of becoming.”

She paused.

“Whatever these letters are, they’re not the truth. And I thought you should know.”

Eleanor sat in silence for a long moment after Mrs. Harding left. She looked at the stack of letters. She thought about the twelve she had burned. She thought about the weight she had been carrying for six weeks, the one she had refused to name, the one she had been telling herself she was handling.

She had not been handling it.

She had been hiding from it.

She found Nathaniel in his study, working by lamplight, the fire burning low in the grate.

“We need to talk,” she said.

He looked up. He saw something in her face. He set down his pen.

“All right.”

She crossed the room and set the stack of letters on his desk. She did not sit down.

“These began arriving six weeks ago. I did not tell you. I thought I was protecting myself. I was not. I was protecting my fear.”

Nathaniel looked at the letters. He looked at her.

“Eleanor —”

“There are seven here. I burned twelve more. They claim you have a woman in Baltimore. They claim you are not the man you say you are.”

His face did not change. But his hand, resting on the edge of the desk, tightened.

“And you believed them?” His voice was quiet.

“I didn’t know what to believe.” She said it honestly. “I know we built this on honesty. I know you have never lied to me. But I also know what it feels like to be deceived by a man I trusted. And I was afraid.”

She paused.

“Mrs. Harding found these. She told me about the shipping commissioner. She told me it was a lie.”

“It is a lie.” Nathaniel’s voice was level. “I can prove it.”

“I know.” Eleanor sat down across from him. “I believe you.”

She looked at him steadily.

“But I should have believed you before Mrs. Harding told me. I should have come to you. I should have trusted what we have built.”

Nathaniel was quiet for a long moment.

“Who sent these?” he said.

“I don’t know. They were unsigned.”

He picked up the top letter. Read it. His face was unreadable.

“Someone wants to damage us,” he said. “Before we become stronger than they can touch.”

Eleanor looked at him. “Who?”

“I don’t know yet.” He set the letter down. “But I will find out.”

He looked at her across the desk.

“Eleanor.” He said her name carefully. “I have never lied to you. I am not going to start now. I have no woman in Baltimore. I have no one anywhere. I have —”

He stopped.

“I have you,” he said. “And that is the only thing I have been thinking about for months.”

The fire crackled. The wind pressed against the windows.

Eleanor looked at him and felt something break open in her chest. Something that had been holding itself closed for so long she had forgotten it was there.

“Neither have I,” she said quietly. “I have been thinking about you. I have been trying not to. I have been telling myself this was an arrangement, that I was not supposed to feel anything, that I had promised myself I would never be that vulnerable again.”

She paused.

“I was wrong.”