Her frustration finally snapped, and she glared at him. “Stories, stories,stories,that is all you think of all the time. More lies, more pretenses, as though everything is a game to you. Spin a pretty story and think that all is well? My life is not like that, Lucien.”
His name felt strange on her tongue, but her anger overrode any concern she had about that.
“I cannot risk it, why will you not listen to me? The storm is nothing. Itneedsto be nothing because I must get home.”
“Then you would rather risk your carriage being struck, and you becoming stranded on your own, than sit with me for a while?”
“I would rather do a great many other things than stew in my panic, because that is how I feel.Panicked.Do you even know what that feels like? To have to worry about being caught? To worry over whatever punishment may come next for every toe stepped out line?”
“Of course I do,” he snapped back at her. “You do not know me.”
“Exactly! And you do not knowme,so how can you assume that I will be safe? That my stepfamily will feed on the pretty stories you keep on telling? One day, they are going to find out—find out about everything, and you will get to walk away unscathed. Iwill not. I will be stuck with them, and you expect me to relax? Icannot.”
“As you have said,” he said dryly, sipping on another spoonful of soup, and that casual action made Elinor’s anger flare.
“Heavens, you really do walk around without a care,” she whispered, appalled.
“Do I?”
“Stop it,” Elinor cried back. “Stop answering like that.”
“You are accusing me of assuming things, but so are you, Elinor.”
For a second, she was stopped by her name, without a title, on his own lips, and she blinked at him. It was enough to simmer her anger to a low burn. But then Lucien smirked at her, as if he had intended to make her pause in such a way, and that anger returned.
“I will not have you leaving in this storm, and that is final.”
“And who are you to get to tell me what to do?” Elinor challenged. “What we portray to the ton is a ruse. You are not truly my betrothed, you are a duke who found me tutoring children and somehow saw something in me worth investing in for your own gains.”
“And what of your gains?” he shot back. “What of the children’s gains? Does that not matter? It is not only I who reaps rewards with this arrangement. I will remind you of your dance card the other night, Elinor. Does that not please you?”
“You know it does not. I do not care about such frivolities.”
“Then you will be content to be a spinster?”
His question silenced her, her lips parting. “I … I have spent the years since my debut hoping somebody would notice me, hoping that somebody would see me as more than a mere wall decoration when I was pushed to the background. I came to learn to live with that, so no, I do not care what suitors want to fill up my dance card. Do you know why?”
“Humor me,” he invited, eating more soup.
“Because it is notreal,” she told him. “It is only because your attention has piqued theirs. They wonder what you see in me, so they want to know.”
“Is a win not a win?”
“Not when I have not gained it by my own merits.”
“Elinor.” Lucien leaned back, cocking his head. “Your pride is very quiet, but it can be potent in certain moments. Are you aware of that? Why does something have to be of your own doing? Why can you not simply accept assistance?”
Her jaw clenched, and she fought to keep the worst of her counter back.
Because I have had to rely on myself for four years to survive my stepfamily, because nobody has ever seen their cruelty. Because survival has been a lonely road, and I expect nothing.
“Answer me,” he said, his voice softer. Finally, he set down his spoon. “Help me understand, so I can help.”
“I do not need you to,” she muttered, turning her face away, but at that moment, more thunder rumbled outside, and she startled again.
“See? You want to fight to leave, but you are scared,” Lucien observed. “Why would you put yourself through thatfor them? Because I guess that returning to that townhouse is not for your own benefit.”
“It is,” she answered, “in a way. It is for my own safety.”