All The Little Things

Chapter 4

"Malcolm,"

"May. I will not reconsider my decision."

"So..."

"So, what?"

"Why do you keep insisting on being like this?"

The Duke poured a draught from the decanter and downed it in one gulp. "I've invited the DuCartia's for dinner next week, their daughter is to be here as well."

"Malcolm stop this!" She cried, hating to raised her voice, but since he insisted on being unreasonable, she wasn't going to let him have his way.

Malcolm ran his palm along his face, looking thoroughly defeated and reaching in to his drawers, pulled a book. It was no larger than a diary, but he opened it and lifted a piece of paper. "Look at this."

It took her a while to recognize the person, but the aristocratic French aquiline nose was a dead give away. It was a picture of Verity DuCartia. A very good drawing of the person her husband wanted to marry his son to. "What is a drawing of Miss DuCartia doing in your study?"

"Zachariah sent it to me, and these too." He extended a bunch of papers to her as well. He watch her glance through them hastily until genuine confusion settled on her face.

"I don't understand."

"Now, come seat," he led her to the sofa and patted the space beside him, wordlessly she sat down gazing between the pictures and her husband.

"What is happening?"

Catching a whiff of her lavender scent, he pulled her closely until she was tucked under his chin and he opened the little book infront of him, "Zachariah gave this to me and asked me not to read it until his return."

Her eyes scanned through the few pages of the book, an easy task as it was filled with his pencil drawings of random things then of his family, his sisters and friends, even a couple pages for his baby brother, then at the end of the book, was a series of that of a different person, Verity DuCartia.

"They know each other?" She lifted her head to ask.

"I thought they may have met at the soiree in the embassy last year, then they would have been acquainted for over a year now."

Maybelle took a closer look at the pencil drawings. The images had been taken as though the person being drawn wasn't aware of it, but there were lines placed in generous distributions, strong enough for her to  blatantly ask. "H-he has affection for her?"

"It would seem so. I wrote him several times to make certain he was sure and whenever he replied it brought light to a lot. Apparently they have been acquainted for a while. For three years, remember when he wouldn't tell you what happened that brought about his scar. He stood up to some English three years ago."

She raised her hand to stifle her gasp. "Oh my goodness. That was when the DuCartia's had just been shifted. The scandal was said to have just happened."

He didn't stop the proud smile on his face, he had a beautiful wife, a perceptive and devastatingly beautiful wife.

"He was the one that confronted the gentlemen that had tried to take advantage of her back then and apparently, convinced the men otherwise but not without a fight."

To his surprise, she removed herself from him to stare at him in the eyes, "How long have you known this?"

This was the tricky part, "Zachariah made me promise not to tell you yet."

"Why would he do that?"

"Marc. He wouldn't have wanted to bother you beyond that."

"It's no bother at all, I certainly wouldn't have considered it..."