My Aunt Burned My Dead Father’s Books — So The Duke Next Door Bought Me A Library
Part 1
Acrid smoke hit me the second I reached the drawing room doorway.
It wasn’t the romantic smell of autumn leaves, but the chemical choke of melting glue and ancient leather.
A book doesn’t merely catch fire, it shrieks in agony.
Pages curl inward, turning black at the outer edges before yielding completely to the flames.
Aunt Brenda stood by the hearth in her usual mourning black.
She always wore morning black even though her husband had been dead for a decade.
She held an iron poker in her gloved hand, her back perfectly straight.
In the center of the roaring flames lay a familiar thick blue spine.
My father’s copy of The Anatomy of Melancholy was blistering and bubbling into the fire.
Beside it, a stack of worn calfskin volumes was already reduced to a glowing structural ruin.
They looked like the charred rib cages of small animals.
They were a fire hazard, she said, not even bothering to turn around.
My legs gave out beneath me, my knees hitting the hardwood floor with a loud crack.
Get up, Aunt Brenda commanded, finally glancing over my shoulder.
The damp was ruining them anyway, she added, claiming she smelled mildew.
I crawled forward, the intense heat drying my eyes before tears could even form.
I reached straight into the grate.
I didn’t think about the searing heat or the blistering consequences.
I just saw a loose page from my father’s journal, fluttering at the edge of the grate and browning at the corners.
My fingers closed around it.
The searing pain was instantaneous and absolute.
Foolish girl, Aunt Brenda snapped as I dragged the smoldering page onto the hearth rug.
I beat the embers out with my bare palm.
The smell of scorched flesh mingled with roasted paper, but I didn’t cry out.
I just sat back on my heels, staring at the charred scrap in my hand.
Only three words remained legible in my father’s sprawling script: ‘to endure the’.
I will have the maid sweep this out in the morning, Aunt Brenda said.
You will wash your hands, put some salve on those ridiculous burns, and prepare your blue silk dress.
We are going to the Duke of Ashford’s ball tomorrow night.
You will smile, you will speak only when spoken to, and you will secure a proposal, Megan.
Otherwise, you will find yourself securing employment as a governess in the freezing north.
She swept out of the room, leaving me alone on the rug.
My right hand throbbed with an angry red blister rising across my fingers.
Crying wouldn’t bring the books back, and crying wouldn’t pay off the estate’s crushing debts.
I carefully folded the charred scrap of my father’s journal and slid it into my skirt pocket.
The assembly room at the Duke’s estate smelled of roasting meat and the frantic sweat of desperation.
Aunt Brenda had forced me into a tight blue silk dress that dug into my ribs with every breath.
I hated the noise, the forced laughter of girls pretending not to understand politics, and the booming voices of men who understood nothing else.
I stood by the punch bowl, pressing my back firmly against the flocked wallpaper.
My right hand rested against the folds of my skirt, concealed by a white silk evening glove.
The blister on my palm had popped that morning, leaving a raw, weeping circle of skin.
Every time the silk brushed against the raw skin, a sharp jolt of pain shot up my arm.
You appear as if you are plotting an assassination.
The voice was low and completely devoid of the forced joviality infecting the rest of the room.
I turned my head to find Craig, the Duke of Ashford, standing two feet away.
He hadn’t approached with the typical swagger of men with his title.
He wasn’t conventionally handsome; his jaw was too square, his nose had a slight crook, and his eyes were the flat color of winter iron.
Not murder, Your Grace, I said, keeping my voice perfectly even.
Arson, perhaps.
He showed no amusement, though a faint pulse jumped at his jawline.
A messy business, arson, he noted, leaning against the wall beside me.
Some barns are better off burned, I muttered, immediately regretting the words.
You do not speak of destruction to a duke when you are supposed to be marketing yourself as a docile wife.
Craig turned his head to look at me fully.
His gaze dropped from my eyes to my right hand.
I shifted slightly, trying to hide my hand further behind the folds of my blue silk.
You are injured, he said, and it wasn’t a question.
A clumsy accident with a hot kettle, I replied smoothly.
He took a slow sip from his crystal tumbler.
I have spent time in military camps, Miss Megan, and boiling water blisters wide and red.
He lowered his glass.
The burn weeping through your glove is concentrated, and the smudge on your lace cuff is greasy soot.
My pulse became a dull, sickening thud against my ribs.
You reached into a fire, he stated.
I looked back at him, my cynicism flaring up as a defensive shield.
Are you in the habit of interrogating your guests, or do you reserve your forensic observations only for the impoverished ones?
He didn’t look offended, just tired.
I watch closely because humanity is full of liars, he murmured.
You are standing against a wall at a marriage mart, nursing a burn you lied about, with ashes on your cuff.
You have a look in your eye that suggests you have lost something irreplaceable.
He paused, his eyes locking onto mine, and asked the one question I wasn’t prepared for: “What did you burn, Megan?”
