Page 70 of A Family Bargain with the Duke

“I intend to answer it directly. I mean to make a public statement admitting my father’s wrongdoing, clearing Whitmore’s name, and exposing Vane’s role in covering the scheme all these years. It will end his hold over us entirely, whatever damage it costs my name in the process.”

“Good.” Louisa’s chin lifted. “I will stand beside you when you make it.”

“No.”

She blinked, startled by the immediate refusal. “No?”

“I want you and Eleanor to stay at Henswick House until the statement is made and the scandal has run its course.”

“You are sending me away.”

“I am trying to keep you safe.”

“I am your wife, Julian. I belong beside you, not tucked away at my father’s house while you face this alone.”

“You do not understand the danger of it.” Julian’s voice rose, frustration and fear tangling together in a way he could not properly separate. “Vane attacked Eleanor's very parentage in print, Louisa, and he did it because he knows precisely what she means to you, and what you mean to me. That is not the action of a man merely trying to protect his own reputation. That is a man showing me exactly where I am most easily wounded, so that he might use it against me the moment I refuse to bend. I do not know what he intends to attempt next, but I will not have you and Eleanor within his reach while I find out.”

“So you would rather have me out of your reach entirely.”

“That is not what I said.”

“Is it not? You have decided, without consulting me, that the safest place for your wife is somewhere you are not. I am beginning to wonder, Julian, whether it is Vane's threats you wish to be rid of, or mine.”

“That is not fair.”

“Is it not fair, or is it simply uncomfortable to hear?” Louisa's chin lifted, though her voice had gone quieter now, something wounded creeping beneath the anger. “You do not send Kit away. He remains here, under this roof, named in that same pamphlet, and yet somehow it is only Eleanor and I who require removing to safety.”

“Kit is my ward, under my legal guardianship, in my own household, surrounded by servants who would raise the alarm the instant anything seemed amiss. Vane cannot simply have him spirited away, nor threatened directly, without answering to me and to the law both. You and Eleanor are rather more easily reached, Louisa, through gossip, through whispers that follow you into every drawing room, through whatever further cruelty a desperate man might invent once print alone has failed to move me. I am not sending you away because I want you gone. I am sending you away because I do not know how to protect you properly while you remain within his reach, and that terrifies me considerably more than facing him alone ever could.”

“Then let me stand beside you and face it together, as we have faced everything else these past months. I did not run from Thomas Whitmore’s account, whatever risk it carried. I will not run from this either.”

“I cannot allow it.”

“Allow it.” Louisa’s eyes flashed, her voice sharp and wounded. “You speak as though the choice belongs entirely to you, Julian, as though I have not proven time and again that I am capable of judging danger for myself and choosing to face it regardless.”

“Why can you not simply trust that I am trying to protect you?”

“Because I do not need protecting from my own choices, Julian. I need a husband who trusts me enough to make them.”

“I cannot think clearly with you standing in the path of whatever comes next!” The words tore out of him louder than he had intended, and he lowered his voice, though the raw edge beneath it remained. “Because I am afraid, Louisa. I am afraid of what a man desperate enough to attack children might do next, and I cannot think clearly with you in danger. I need you safe. I need you away from this house until I know what Vane intends to do.”

“So you have decided on my behalf what I am permitted to face.”

“I am trying to protect you.”

“By removing me from my own home, without my consent, the moment matters become difficult.”

“That is not—” Julian stopped, a desperate feeling rising in his chest, the words arriving before he could properly weigh them. “Louisa, I am only trying to give you the life you asked for. A marriage without burdens you never wanted to carry.”

The moment the words left his mouth, he knew, with sick and immediate certainty, that he had made a terrible mistake.

Louisa went very still. The color in her cheekbones deepened, and Julian watched helplessly as whatever warmth had existed between them a minute before vanished, replaced by something cold and considerably more frightening than her earlier anger.

“You’re right,” she said, very quietly. “That is exactly what I asked for.”

“Louisa, what I meant⁠—”

“I will have Eleanor’s things packed within the hour.”