The documents will be filed in chancery by the end of the week. The estate is secure. Thank you, Mr. Finch, I said. When the carriage finally rolled out of the courtyard, taking Reginald and the last threat to our survival with it, the silence in the hall was deafening. I walked back into the library.
Nathaniel was still standing by the fire, staring into the flames. I walked up behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist, pressing my cheek against his broad, solid back. He let out a long, ragged breath, his hands coming up to cover mine where they rested over our unborn child. He was right about one thing, Nathaniel whispered to the fire. "What?"
I asked. "You are terrifyingly arrogant when you hold a ledger." I laughed. It was a real unguarded sound that bounced off the ancient stone walls. Nathaniel turned in my arms, pulling me flush against his chest.
He kissed me, tasting of smoke and survival. The winter that followed was the harshest Yorkshire had seen in a decade. The snow drifted up to the first floor windows, turning Harwood Hall into an isolated island in a sea of white. But inside the fires burned relentlessly. Our son was born in the middle of a blizzard, entering the world with a furious, healthy cry that echoed down the warm corridors.
We named him Thomas after the grandfather who had originally bought the estate, not the ones who had squandered it. I sat in a heavy rocking chair in my chambers. The baby swaddled against my chest. The room smelled of lavender and warm milk. The door clicked open and Nathaniel stepped inside.
He moved quietly as if afraid he might break the fragile piece of the room. He came to the side of the chair and knelt on the thick rug. He looked at the tiny sleeping face of his son. Slowly, carefully, Nathaniel reached out a massive calloused finger. Thomas shifted in his sleep, his tiny fist instinctively grasping Nathaniel's finger, holding on with surprising strength.
Tears welled in Nathaniel's good eye, spilling over onto his scarred cheek. He didn't try to hide them. He didn't turn his face away. "He has your chin," Nathaniel whispered, his voice thick with an emotion so profound it bordered on pain. "Let us pray he has my head for numbers as well," I replied softly, running my hand through Nathaniel's dark hair.
"Or this estate will be ruined again in 20 years." Nathaniel smiled, leaning his head against my knee. They called him the rotting duke. They whispered that he was a monster, hiding in the dark, decaying into nothingness. They said I was a victim, traded for a pile of debt, doomed to wither in the frozen north.
They were all fools. Henry had traded me for silver. In doing so, he had handed me a kingdom. We were not a fairy tale of flawless beauty and effortless romance. We were forged in mud, smoke, and sheer stubborn pragmatism.
We had taken the broken, decaying pieces of a ruined life and built an empire out of the stone. I looked down at the scarred man kneeling at my feet, holding his son as if he were holding the sun itself. He was my husband. He was my duke. And we were never going to be cold again.