The Duke who caught my eye

Chapter 13

The next morning.

Leo was stumbling back home.

It seemed like he had fallen asleep in his inebriated state. He'd woken up with a splitting headache and he smelt of the stables and whiskey.

Not a pleasant combination.

Why hadn't anyone come to find him?

As he was walking towards the stairway, the events of last night came back to him.

He recalled his conversation with Clara.

Damn.

He made his way to her room to apologise. He knocked on their connecting door.

No one answered.

He opened the door, it wasn't locked.

The room was empty, all the tiny portraits she kept by her bedside were gone. He walked in and opened her closet, only to find it empty.

It was like she was never here.

Except for that elusive scent of lemons.

Leo ran down the stairs, beyond agitated.

"Thomas!" he bellowed.

"What is it, your grace?" he appeared out of nowhere.

"Where is my wife?"

"Wherever you chased her off to."

Leo was speechless.

His butler had the gall to speak to him like that?

"You do know that you're under my employment, do you not?" he asked in a deadly, low voice that usually scared his peers.

But Thomas was unmoved.

"Of course I do. But I have known you long before you were a Duke, I have known you long before you turned into this untrusting beast."

Leo was at a complete loss of words. He didn't know what to say, it was like he was a helpless child again.

"I kept quiet all these years, you were pushing everyone away from you, you never let any woman come close to you. And now that you're married, you had to go and ruin the only good thing that has
ever happened to you."

"You know she loves you, don't you?" he asked.

"She said she did, but I don't really know," Leo replied, not understanding why he was even tolerating this.

"How can you not know? She has stars in her eyes every time she looks at you. And in case you don't know by now, you love her too."

"That's rubbish."

Thomas just walked off without saying anything.

Leo couldn't believe what had just happened.

His butler of all people had just given him a set down- his silent and compliant butler.

But he had other stuff to think about right now. So Clara was gone. She'd left him. Just like that.

Had she taken Isabelle with her too?

No.

He made his way to the nursery to check on Isabelle.

As soon as he entered, Lana, Isabelle's governess gasped in relief.

"Oh heavens! Thank God you're finally here, my lord. Isabelle is out of control. She has refused to eat and she isn't cooperating with me at all."

So she hadn't taken Isabelle with her.