She balled her hands into fists, feeling her own sorrow and desperation building to a pitch within her. “Your mother did bolt, but it was your father who kept you from her. It was your father that owned you. Do you not see?” she demanded, wishing she could be softer, kinder, but there was too much at stake. “She had no rights to you at all. It was his decision. And I’m terribly sorry for it. I fight for women like your mother every day, and I will not hear you speak the lies society has taught you.”
Tears filled her eyes as she watched his shoulders sink.
“She did not have to go,” he gritted. And in that moment, the duke was gone. William, a boy lost and confused and suffering, remained.
“No, she did not,” she agreed, her own eyes stinging. “Perhaps she hoped your father would allow her to visit. It is impossible to know. But I cannot make Margaret marry your brother to assuage the wounds of the past—to assuage your wounds.”
He gazed at her, and yet he seemed empty, his eyes hollow. “You’re going to support her, aren’t you?”
“Of course I’m going to support her,” she said. “Margaret is my cousin, and I believe in her. And I believe in her right to make the choice to marry Kit or not.”
She waited for him to make some comment about the money. To throw that in her face.
Instead, William nodded. “I see. So, two young people shall be brokenhearted, and you and I are in discord.” His face twisted. “That is what comes of love.”
“I suppose it is,” she said, “because the truth is…”
It hurt so much, what she was about to say, she couldn’t believe that she was going to say it, but she couldn’t leave it unsaid. She couldn’t ignore it any longer. He needed to know. He needed to understand how his plans had gone thoroughly awry and that the world was not his to control, even though he was a duke.
“Will,” she began, her own voice far shakier than she would have liked. “You insist that I do not love you. You’ve said it more than once. And you insist that you do not love me.”
She swallowed the pain tightening her throat. “And that is fine. I never expected you to fall in love with me. But you cannot control other people’s feelings and emotions. You cannot dictate them as if they were pawns on a chess board, pieces of logic in an argument, or figures in a ledger.”
Her shoulders tensed as her throat tightened. She struggled for breath to speak.
Dear God, she was going to cry. Now that she had grown accustomed to the idea of being his duchess, of working with him, of sharing so much, she couldn’t imagine losing that…
It hit her then. And she couldn’t stop herself.
Beatrice sucked in air, and her whole blasted body trembled, devil take it. “Because the truth is…I love you, Will. I have loved you now for days; for weeks, even. I knew the moment that you began to pass out pamphlets with me before Parliament that I loved you.”
He blanched, and his whole body winced as if she had struck him.
She flinched.
It was the most horrifying response, and yet she was not surprised; he was so averse to love. “I cannot take it back, and I know that you hate it. But there it is. You are the love that I never thought I’d find. We respect each other. Believe in each other. Support each other. And I love you.”
He shook his head, unrelenting. “No. It’s not possible. I planned… We agreed… Beatrice. I am not going to fall in love with you. And I do not want you to love me. And I do not see how you could, if you will help Maggie abandon Kit.”
The words cut down to her bones.
But she couldn’t ignore his resolve to cling to his pain in spite of what could be theirs. Though her heart was breaking, she drew herself up. “I love Maggie and will support her,” she said, “just as you are protecting Kit.”
“If all this is love?” He shook his head. “No wonder I do not want it.”
She gasped, the words like icy water to her face. His pain—his old, dark grief—coated him, directing him to this cruelty. But she couldn’t excuse it. “I think that we should spend some time apart until all of this is sorted. Our separation should not bother you too greatly. Since, as you insist, you do not love me.”
He blinked, uncomprehending. “That is not necessary.”
“It is.” She rolled her hands into fists, longing for the accord they had felt that day of her boxing lesson. Or in her office. Or even yesterday morning when they’d prepared to go to the Ladies’ League of Rights.
It seemed a lifetime away now. “Until you understand that we cannot bring Kit and Margaret back together by decrying either of their needs or feelings, until you can see that it is not bad that I love you…I cannot bear to be near you.”
She threw her gaze to the ceiling as if some answer might lie there. “Can you not see, Will? No one is listening to Margaret. And that is why she feels as she does—because everyone has acted for her and not allowed her to act for herself. She did not understand what was happening behind her back, and now she does. So, she wishes to make a decision based upon what she now understands to be the truth.”
She let out a frustrated growl. “And you don’t wish that for her because of feelings.” She began to shake. Shake with the power of her own feelings as she raised her gaze to meet his, which was dark with memory.
Beatrice refused to look away. “Love is not awful, Will. Love is not the source of pain. Love is a source of great joy. You make me happy, but right now it is fear that is making us miserable. Margaret’s fear, your fear. And I will not be a party to it.”