“We are a family. You and I.”
“That’s not the kind of family I require. I can’t lose the manor, Charlotte.”
She was cold and hot at the same time, al hurt and anger iced over by shock. “Is it money? You do realize that I can make us as much money as we need.”
He sighed. “You’re so flawless most of the time that occasional y I forget you’re not a blueblood by birth. No, of course, it’s not the money. Whoever owns the manor rules the family. It’s my inheritance; I was born first, I studied most of my life to take care of our family interests, and I won’t let it slip away.”
“It’s just a bloody house!” Her voice snapped.
Elvei’s composure melted, the polite veneer sliding off him. His voice rose.
“It’s my childhood home. My family goes back sixteen generations. Do you expect me to just let my idiot brother get it while you and I pretend to play house here, in this decrepit ruin? No, thanks. I have higher ambitions in life.” The words burned. “Is that what we were doing?” she asked quietly. “When you and I made love in our bedroom, we were playing house?”
“Don’t be melodramatic. We both enjoyed it, but now we’re done.”
The outrage swel ed in her, mixing with hurt. Last night he’d kissed her before they fel asleep next to each other.
This was the man she woke up to every morning? “Elvei, you realize, you’re tel ing me that I have no value to you except as a broodmare?”
“Don’t make me the vil ain in this.”
Elvei leaned back. “I’ve gone with you to al the tests and treatments. I listened patiently while you got excited over this specialist and that, I sat in the waiting rooms, and I gave it as much time as I could. There are no more treatments left. I just want to have a child, like any normal healthy adult.” Every time she thought she had
reached the limit of hurt, he twisted the knife a little more, digging deeper and deeper inside her, cutting at a raw wound.
“So I’m abnormal?”
He spread his arms. “Can you
conceive? No. You are defective, Charlotte.”
Defective. He actual y cal ed her defective. The pain inside her began to smolder with rage. “I’m curious, what’s the next word you’l reach for? How cruel wil you be, Elvei?”
“You cost me two and a half years.”
Two and a half years of
disappointment, of painful procedures and shattered hopes, of feeling like she was crippled, but no, it was al about him. She would never have a child of her own, but he only saw himself as the injured party.
She should’ve seen this in him. She should’ve known. How could she have been so stupid? “You’re a terrible human being.” He surged to his feet and leaned over the table. “Had I married someone else, I would’ve inherited by now. I tried to end this with as much civility as possible, but you’ve decided to cause a scene. I need an heir, Charlotte, and you can’t give me one.
What’s so complicated about this? I’m done letting you waste my time.”
“You told me you loved me.” She stil remembered how his face had looked when he said it.
“You needed encouragement to begin the therapy. Dear gods, Charlotte, are you real y that naive or are you just stupid?” The words slapped her. The darkness inside her shivered, stretching, getting ready to escape. She clenched herself around it, trying to hold it back.
“Let me spel it out: I married you because of your healing, which you could pass on to our children, and your poise.
You are attractive and educated, and I knew that you would never embarrass me in public. Other than that, there wasn’t much to recommend you.” The air turned thick and scalding like boiling glue. She couldn’t breathe.
“You’ve been a blueblood for less than three years. My family came to this continent on the Second Fleet, and they were already titled.” The darkness writhed inside her, begging to be released.
“My father is an earl; my mother was a baroness prior to their union . Your father is a cook and your mother is a waitress. In what world could you possibly think that you were in any way equal to me? I granted you a favor. I flattered you by my proposal, Charlotte, and you fel short.
Accept it with dignity. I believe an apology is in order.”
He’d pushed the blade so far into the wound that he reached the darkness she hid deep inside. Her defenses burst. The darkness slithered out, coating her skin from the inside out. “You’re right. You wil sit down now and apologize to me.” Menace suffused her voice.
He stared at her. “You’re hardly in a position to give me orders.”