Reborn To Change My Fate-Chapter 85 - Eighty Five

Marissa looked down at the black, polished leather, and then back up to his face. A smile, as bright, cold, and artificial as a winter sun, touched her lips.

"There is no need to explain, Your Grace," she said, her voice a perfect, light, and utterly false sound of wifely understanding. "I do not mind Lady Senna staying in the east wing. It is, as I said, the appropriate and generous thing to do."

She leaned her shoulder against the door, a subtle, passive-aggressive pressure to remind him he was not welcome. "But," she added, her polite smile never wavering, "our grandmother clearly disapproves of the entire situation. I would only advise you not to let this... arrangement... cause any new conflict with her. She is, after all, the matriarch of this house."

She was handling him as she would any other household problem: with cool, polite, and distant logic.

But Derek was not a household problem. He was the Grand Duke. And he was not used to being handled, or being shut out. He had come here, his mind a complete, chaotic jumble. He had come because the feel of her lips on his in Senna’s room, were short-circuiting his brain. He had come because he was, for the first time in his life, utterly, maddeningly confused.

And he was not going to be dismissed.

"You’re right," he said, his voice a low, sudden rumble. "It is a conflict." And with a sudden, powerful shove, he pushed the door open, forcing Marissa to stumble backward into her own room.

He squeezed himself through the opening and entered.

Marissa stared, her mouth falling open in a small, sharp, un-Duchess-like gasp of shock. He had just forced his way into her private bedchamber.

He did not pause. He did not look at her. He strode across her room, her sanctuary, as if he owned it—which, he clearly felt he did. He walked directly to her large, four-poster bed, sat down on the edge of the mattress, and, in a gesture of absolute, unarguable intent, he bent over and began to unlace one of his heavy, black boots.

"What," Marissa said, her voice a low, dangerous, and suddenly very cold whisper, "do you think you are doing?"

"Tonight," Derek replied, his voice muffled as he grunted, pulling the boot free with a heavy thud. "I’ll sleep here."

Marissa crossed her arms over her chest, the silk of her robe rustling. She began to walk slowly towards him, not in a retreat, but in a slow, stalking, predatory advance.

"Let me be sure I understand this," she said, her voice a soft, mocking purr. "You often left this house, night after night, to be with Lady Senna in her little establishment."

She stopped, just a few feet from the bed, and looked down at him. "Now, your beloved mistress is here. She is sleeping under this very same roof. And now is the moment you decide you want to sleep with me?"

She let out a short, sharp, and utterly humorless chuckle. Her voice, when she spoke again, was not teasing. It was as cold and sharp as a dagger.

"Derek," she said, the name a deliberate, calculated, and cold-blooded insult.

He froze, his other boot halfway off. He looked up, his eyes wide with shock. She had called him by his name.

"Are you injured in the head?" she asked, her voice a soft whisper. "Or is it your mind?"

" I don’t even go there for whatever reasons that’s in your head." He said as he felt a sting sharper than any whip. "Do you truly not care at all?" he snapped, his voice rough.

"Care about what?" she asked, her eyebrows raised in perfect, innocent confusion.

"I brought someone else into our home!" he said, his voice rising, his own confusion and frustration finally boiling over. "I did it in front of the entire household, in front of you. If I am not seen in your room, what do you think people will say? They will point fingers at you. They will say you are the cold, unfeeling Duchess who has driven her husband back to his mistress! I am staying here tonight to protect you from that gossip!"

It was a good, logical, and even noble-sounding excuse. It was also, he knew, a complete lie. He wasn’t here to protect her. He was here because the thought of her, alone in this room, after her lips had touched his like that,it was... unsettling. He wanted... he didn’t know what he wanted.

Marissa, however, did not look grateful. She looked bored.

"Let them gossip," she said with a small, indifferent shrug. "I am not the one who needs to worry about my reputation. After all," she continued, her voice light, "I am not the one who set my own house on fire just to seek sympathy from a man, leaving myself homeless."

He stared at her. She knew. He had suspected it, but this was confirmation. She knew Senna had lied, that the fire was a plot. And she didn’t care.

"Go back to your beloved Senna, Your Grace," she said, her voice final. She turned her back on him, a gesture of absolute, final dismissal, and walked to her vanity. "She needs you, and your "protection," far more than I do."

She sat down on the small, plush stool, picked up her heavy silver-backed brush, and began to pull it, in long, slow, steady strokes, through her dark, damp hair.

Derek was left sitting on her bed, his boot half-on, his blood pounding in his ears, his mind reeling. He had been... dismissed. By his own wife. In her bedchamber. While he was half-undressed.

He was silent for a long, long time. The only sound in the room was the soft, repetitive, and deeply infuriating hiss of the brush pulling through her long, thick hair.

"Fine," he finally said, his voice a low, strangled growl. He yanked his boot back on, his movements sharp and angry. He stood up. "I will leave."

Marissa continued what she was doing. She didn’t look at him. She didn’t pause. She even began to hum, a soft, tuneless, and completely indifferent sound.

He was enraged. He strode across the room, his fists clenched at his sides. "I shouldn’t have come here in the first place!" he snapped at her back, his pride wounded, desperate for any kind of reaction.

He was almost at the door. He was waiting for her to stop him.

"Wait!"

Her voice, sharp and clear, cut through his anger. He stopped, his hand on the doorknob.

A small, slow, triumphant smile spread across his lips. Aha. He knew it. She did care about him.

He turned, his expression carefully composed into a smile. "What is it?"

Marissa was still at her vanity, her back to him. She didn’t even turn around.

"Close the door on your way out."

His smile did not falter. It froze, and then it shattered, his face flushing a deep, dark, humiliated red.

He stared at the back of her head, at the woman who was calmly, carefully, brushing her hair, who had just dismissed him as if he were a common, forgetful footman.

He was so utterly, speechlessly furious, that he couldn’t even form a word. He yanked the door open and stormed out into the hallway, leaving it wide open behind him, a final, petty, and childish act of defiance.

"Why should I obey you?" he muttered under his breath, his voice a low, childish growl as he stormed down the empty, silent corridor, his bootsteps echoing his rage.

Back in the bedchamber, Marissa heard his footsteps fade. She heard his pathetic, muttered words.

She just let out a long, slow, and deeply, deeply weary sigh. She dropped her hairbrush onto the vanity.

She stood up, walked across her room, and, with the tired, put-upon expression of a woman who was the only sane person in a house full of madmen, she closed the door herself. The thud of the heavy oak was a soft, final, and deeply satisfying sound.