They Called Her the Duke’s Unwanted Wife, Sold to Pay Her Father’s Debts — But When His Signet Ring Split Her Cheek, the Cold Duke Stood Between Them and Made Her Realize She Was Never Powerless Again

PART 3

Harrington spun around, his face morphing from viciousness to a greasy, panicked smile in an instant.

“Westford! Your grace — I didn’t hear you arrive. I was merely disciplining my daughter. She forgets her place.”

Arthur stepped into the room. He didn’t look at Harrington. He walked until he was standing directly between Beatrice and her father — a full head taller, broader in the shoulders, radiating a tightly coiled, dangerous energy.

“She is my wife.” His voice dropped to a terrifyingly soft register. “She has no place beneath your hand. Ever.”

Arthur slowly turned his head to look at Beatrice. He saw the blood trickling down her cheek. He saw the way she was pressed against the bookshelf, shaking. A muscle in his jaw feathered. He dropped his riding crop onto the table.

Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out a clean linen handkerchief. He didn’t hand it to her. He stepped closer and gently pressed the cloth to the cut beneath her eye. His touch was shockingly light.

“Did he ask you for money?” Arthur asked quietly, his eyes fixed on the wound.

“Yes,” Beatrice whispered.

Arthur nodded once. He turned back to Lord Harrington. “Your allowance is terminated.”

Harrington’s face went purple. “You cannot do that. It is in the contract.”

“Sue me.” Arthur’s voice was dead calm. “Bring the contract to Chancery. Let us stand before a judge and discuss why the Duke of Westford broke a settlement. I will tell them it was a penalty for trespassing on my estate and assaulting a duchess.”

He took a step forward. Harrington instinctively stepped back, tripping over the edge of the rug.

“Get out of my house.”

Harrington sneered, trying to salvage some shred of authority. “Beatrice. Tell your husband—”

“I said—” Arthur’s roar made the glass in the windows vibrate. “—get out!”

Harrington swallowed hard. He grabbed his wet gloves from the settee and practically ran from the room. The heavy front door slammed shut a moment later.

The silence rushed back in, but it felt different now. Heavy. Charged.

Arthur stood perfectly still, listening to the carriage wheels tear out of the driveway. Then he turned back to Beatrice. The terrifying fury had vanished, replaced by something much more complicated.

He reached out and gently took the bloody handkerchief from her trembling hand, pressing it back against her cheek himself.

“I am sorry.” His voice was rough. “I should have been here.”

Beatrice stared at him. She was twenty-two years old, and it was the very first time in her life a man had apologized to her.

Arthur didn’t step away. He kept the linen pressed to her skin. His knuckles grazed her jawline — cold, rough from holding the reins, and remarkably steady.

“Press this.”

Beatrice brought her hand up, her fingers brushing his, as she took over holding the handkerchief. Arthur finally stepped back. He looked down at the shattered vase, the puddle of water, the bruised white petals scattered across the Persian rug. He didn’t call for the servants. He crouched down, his heavy wool coat pooling on the floor, and began picking up the jagged shards of porcelain with his bare hands.

“You don’t have to do that,” Beatrice said. “The maids—”

“The maids will gossip.” Arthur didn’t look up. “And I will not have my staff discussing the color of your bruises over their supper.”

He was meticulous. He found every tiny, razor-sharp sliver. When he finished, he stood, wiped his hands on his trousers, and poured a stiff measure of whiskey from the decanter. He didn’t drink it. He walked back to her and held the crystal glass out.

“Drink.”

Beatrice took it. She hated whiskey. Her father smelled of it when his temper was at its worst. But she took a sip, the liquid burning a harsh, fiery trail down her throat. She coughed, her eyes watering.

Arthur pulled a chair from the writing desk and positioned it near the fire. “Sit down.”

She obeyed. The adrenaline was fading, leaving behind a cold, hollow ache in her bones. She sank into the leather chair, pulling her knees together.

Arthur stood by the mantel, leaning his forearm against the dark wood, staring into the flames.

“How often did he hit you?”

It wasn’t a gentle question. It was forensic. A doctor probing a wound to see how deep the rot went.

Beatrice looked down at the glass in her hands. “Only when I proved inconvenient.”

“That is not an answer.”

“It is the only answer I have. Your grace.”

Arthur turned his head. His pale gray eyes locked onto hers. The formality of her address seemed to grate on him.

“My name is Arthur.”

“Arthur?” she corrected softly.

He stared at her for a long moment, the muscle in his jaw working. “I am not a violent man, Beatrice. I find it inefficient. It requires a loss of control, and I despise losing control.”

He paused, looking down at his own hands resting on the mantel.

“But when I saw him touch you — I would have killed him. I am a magistrate. I know the law. And I would have beaten him to death on my own floorboards.”

The admission hung in the air. It was a terrifying confession, stripped of all polite society pretense. It wasn’t romantic. It was raw, ugly, and fiercely protective.

“He is my father,” she whispered.

“He is a parasite.” Arthur’s voice was flat. “And his access to you is permanently severed. The footmen will be instructed. If he steps foot on Westford land again, the constables will remove him.”

He walked to the bellpull and gave it a sharp yank. Mrs. Higgins appeared in the doorway moments later, her eyes darting nervously between the Duke and his wife.

“Mrs. Higgins. Her grace tripped against the side table and suffered a minor injury. Please fetch some ice from the kitchens and a tin of salve.”

The housekeeper’s eyes widened slightly as she took in the ruined vase and the bloody handkerchief. But she was a professional. She bobbed a curtsy. “At once, your grace.”

Dinner that evening was a disruption of their established routine. Beatrice sat at her usual place at the foot of the long table, the cut on her cheek throbbing beneath a thick layer of yellow salve. She expected Arthur to take his seat at the far end, separated by twelve feet of polished wood and silver candelabras.

Instead, he walked past his chair. He pulled out the seat immediately to her right — directly in her line of sight — and sat down.

The footman serving the soup froze, a ladle of clear broth hovering midair. Arthur gave him a flat, impatient stare.

They ate in silence for ten minutes. But the proximity was startling. Beatrice could smell the faint scent of rain and saddle leather that clung to him. She could see the fine lines around his eyes.

“The Sussex land,” she said suddenly, breaking the quiet. She didn’t look up from her plate. “That is why you married me. To secure the borders.”

Arthur set his spoon down. “Yes.”

“Why didn’t you just buy it outright? My father was desperate. He would have sold it without the marriage.”

“I tried. Three times. He refused.” Arthur’s voice was even. “He knew the land was the only leverage he had to secure a title for his daughter. He wanted a duke in the family to legitimize his own standing in London. He told my solicitors: ‘The land comes with the girl. Or not at all.'”

Beatrice swallowed hard. “The land came with the girl. An accessory to a mud patch.”

“I needed the valley.” Arthur’s voice was devoid of pity. “It controls the primary water source for my lower tenant farms. Without it, three hundred people lose their livelihoods during a dry summer. I weighed the cost of a wife against the cost of a drought.”

It was a brutally honest assessment. Beatrice appreciated it. She preferred harsh truths to pretty lies.

“You made a poor bargain.” She finally looked at him. “The valley is fertile. But you acquired a liability. My father will not stop. If you cut off his allowance, he will find another way to extract blood.”

Arthur picked up his wine glass. He looked at her over the rim, his eyes catching the candlelight. “Let him try. He is used to fighting a terrified girl. Let him see what happens when he fights a duke.”