My Aunt Abandoned Me In The Freezing Storm — Then The Duke Opened His Front Door
Part 2
Aunt Barbara’s mouth opened and closed silently.
“Your Grace,” she finally stammered, executing a jerky curtsy.
“That is highly inappropriate.”
“She is my ward.”
Thomas fixed her with a flat, chilling indifference.
“She is of age, and she has just informed you she is not leaving with you.”
He stepped aside, gesturing toward the front doors where Jenkins stood with the rigidity of a palace guard.
Aunt Barbara looked from Thomas to me, the malicious calculation in her eyes shifting into something smug and venomous.
“I see,” she sneered softly, adjusting her cloak.
“Well, it seems you have found a way to secure a roof over your head after all, Brenda.”
The insult hit the air like a physical slap.
The blood drained from my face.
Thomas stopped tapping his gloves.
The casual indifference vanished from his posture, replaced by a sudden, terrifying stillness.
“Get out.”
The words were gravel and ice.
Aunt Barbara didn’t need to be told twice.
She grabbed Megan’s arm, her perfectly manicured nails digging into my cousin’s sleeve, and dragged her toward the open doors.
They practically ran across the foyer, scrambling into their carriage.
The heavy oak doors shut with a resounding final thud.
Outside, iron wheels ground against wet gravel, fading down the long drive until the only noise left was the ticking of the grandfather clock.
I stood at the top of the stairs, my hands completely numb.
Thomas looked up at me, his expression unreadable.
He didn’t offer a platitude or tell me it was going to be all right.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
I followed him through the silent house like a ghost in my borrowed dress.
With the guests gone, the true scale of Blackwood Hall revealed itself—massive, echoing, and profoundly empty.
He led me to his private study at the back of the house, a room that smelled of old leather and cold ashes.
He leaned his hips against the edge of a heavy oak desk, crossing his arms over his chest.
“You ruined my life,” I said.
I hadn’t planned to start there, but the words forced their way out of my throat, flat and factual.
“Your life, from what I could see of it from a three-story window, appeared to be already ruined,” he replied.
“It was mine,” I snapped, closing the distance between us.
“I understood the rules of my misery, but what am I supposed to do now?”
He uncrossed his arms and pushed off the desk, stopping just two feet away from me.
“Fourteen women,” he said softly, his dark eyes locking onto mine.
“For three days I have sat in that drawing room, treated not as a man, but as a bank vault wrapped in a title.”
He reached out, his hand hovering before gripping the edge of the bookshelf beside my head.
“I walked to that window to get air, and I saw you fighting back against a piece of iron because it was the only thing you could hit.”
He took a step back, giving me space to breathe.
“I am not sending you away, Brenda.”
“What then?”
I demanded, the fight draining out of me.
“I am making you my wife.”
The grandfather clock in the hallway chimed a single, dull strike of brass.
I stopped breathing, waiting for the punchline that never came.
“You are insane,” I breathed, taking a step backward.
“Probably,” he agreed, walking over to the desk and pulling out a single sheet of thick, cream-colored paper.
He dipped a quill in ink, scribbled two lines, and held it out to me.
The ink promised me the absolute right to leave the estate at any time with ten thousand pounds to my name.
“I get quiet,” he said, reading the disbelief on my face.
“I get someone who won’t lie to me, a real person sitting across from me at the breakfast table instead of a porcelain doll.”
I stared at the paper in my hand, feeling its impossible, terrifying weight.
I had spent my entire life fetching things for people who despised me, but as I stood there holding the Duke’s lifeline, I had to ask myself—was I really brave enough to trade the devil I knew for a man I didn’t?
