My Scoundrel Husband

Celine Veldenrose

“The duke, captivated by the lady’s heart and her trembling confession of love, could help himself no longer. Their embrace was tender, a rapture of entwined souls—”

I blink.

That’s it?

Two hundred pages, three duels, one scandal, and at least five brooding stares across moonlit balconies—and their great moment of passion ends in... a rapture?

I sit up, the candle beside my bed giving a little flicker, as if it too were baffled.

Marie promised me this novel would leave me breathless, cheeks flushed, heart pounding. I expected to be fanning myself under the covers, not rereading a metaphor about “souls colliding.”

I mean—what did the Duke of Noir actually do with Felicia once their souls finished colliding?

I flip back a page, hoping I missed something. A hint. A clue. A finger tracing a collarbone, at least.

But no.

Just longing gazes and emotional declarations and an awful lot of restraint.

Which is noble, I suppose. But I was hoping for at least one button to come undone.

Is that terribly improper?

Perhaps it is.

Perhaps I’m not as elegant as Felicia with her gloved hands and breathless sighs and all those delicate, well-timed blushes.

Still... I just wanted to know what it feels like.

To be wanted like that.

Not with poetry, but with hands that tremble just to hold you.

With a kiss that makes the world tip a little sideways.

I know it’s not quite ladylike of me, but Solaris be kind—I’m starting to accept I’ll likely die a spinster.

Not in some crumbling manor or sunlit abbey, but in a perfectly fine townhouse in the capital, with wide windows and a cat, perhaps. And plenty of my father’s coin.

It’s not that I’m horrid to look at—at least, I hope I’m not.

But I’ve always been unfortunate in one way. Since birth, my left leg has been... wrong.

From the knee down, it’s small and shriveled. The bone too brittle.

My toes and ankle never moved, not once. Whatever took my mother in childbirth left this behind, too.

And it’s fine, really.

If you’re already married.

If you’re a widow, or a matron with grown children and a soft chair by the fire.

Not if you’re nineteen and still pretending the Season will change something.

I don’t even know why I still go to the soirées.

None of the gentlemen look at me like the Duke looked at Felicia.

They smile, yes. Some are even kind enough to take my arm or wait patiently as I limp my way up a staircase.

But in their eyes, I’m always the same.

Poor Celine Veldenrose.

The lame daughter of that rich merchant-turned-Baron.

The girl with no noble blood.

The crippled one.

No mother.

And a future no one wants to speak aloud.

I used to pretend I didn’t hear it. The whispers behind silk fans. The way the other girls glance once—and never again.

But I do. I always do.

I’ve learned to read a room quicker than most. Not because I’m clever, but because I’ve had to be. It takes half a heartbeat to tell if someone sees me… or just the limp. Most only see the limp.

Papa says I shouldn’t care. He says I have more fortune than half the nobility combined, and he’s not wrong. But I’d trade every gilded coin for a single gaze like the one the Duke gave Felicia. Full of hunger and reverence. Like she was something to be worshipped.

I’ve never been looked at like that. I’ve been pitied. I’ve been tolerated. But never wanted.

And the worst part is— Sometimes, late at night, when the candle burns low and my leg aches in that dull, deep way it always does— I wonder if it’s my fault. If I hadn’t limped. If I hadn’t been born wrong. If I had been born whole.

But that’s foolish, isn’t it?

Solaris made me this way. Or fate. Or bad luck. And no wishing has ever changed it. I’ve tried. Gods know I’ve tried.

Once, I prayed under the winter moon, barefoot in the garden. I thought perhaps, just once, if I showed devotion… if I was brave enough, barefoot in the snow, the gods might take pity on me.

They didn’t. But the fever did.

Papa was furious. And I never tried again.

Now I pretend not to care. I hold my chin up. I wear the finest fabrics coin can buy. And I smile through every introduction at every gathering, waiting for the moment it shifts—when their eyes flick to my cane. They always do.

Still… I read these novels. Still, I let my heart flutter for paper men and women spun from ink and longing. Still, I imagine what it might be like—to be kissed softly. To be wanted with the kind of desperation poets can’t quite put into words.

Still, I let myself hope.

That maybe one day… one of my gown’s buttons will be popped open.

Or nearly.

Maybe not in some grand, sweeping moment of passion like the ones in Marie’s books. But perhaps something quieter. Slower. The kind of moment that comes when no one else is watching. Where nothing is performed, or practiced, or polished. Where someone sees me—not the limp, not the title, not the gossip whispered behind their gloves—but just me.

I think about that sometimes.

How it might feel if someone reached for me not out of obligation or politeness, but because they simply couldn’t not. If their fingers brushed mine in a way that lingered longer than it should. If their breath caught when I laughed—not because I’m terribly funny, but because I was there, right there, and somehow that mattered.

I know it’s foolish.

Papa says I live too much in my imagination, and I suppose that’s true. But the world in my head is softer. Kinder. Less cruel than marble staircases and perfect posture and women with names like Lady Veremere who never trip on their hems or breathe through their mouths when they laugh.

In my world, it wouldn’t matter that I’m not built for waltzing. Or that I carry a cane with a silver tip instead of a fan with ivory lace.

In my world, someone would look at me like I was the moon. Not distant and cold, but luminous. Magnetic. Beautiful because I shine despite the dark spots.

I don’t need the Duke of Noir.

But I wouldn’t mind someone like him.

Someone with steady hands and storm-gray eyes and a voice that could make a girl forget her name for a moment.

Not to sweep me off my feet—though I suppose that’s still possible, just not in the literal sense.

No, I’d be content with something gentler.

A moment in a garden, perhaps. After the guests have all gone. When the lanterns are still lit and the air smells like jasmine.

Where someone might pause beside me. Noticing me, not missing me in a crowd.

Maybe his voice would be low, uncertain at first.

“You’re always the last to leave.”

And I’d say something terribly clever, like, “I like the quiet,” even though my heart would be rattling in my chest like a runaway carriage.

And then maybe he’d reach out—just a little. As if he wasn’t sure he was allowed.

And I’d let him.

Just a hand. Just a thumb brushing my knuckles.

And even that would be enough to make me feel it—somewhere deep, deep down, where no pain ever quite reaches.

The simple miracle of being wanted.

Not despite everything.

But maybe even because of it.

It’s silly. I know it is.

But sometimes, when the candlelight dances on the wallpaper and the whole house feels like it’s breathing in its sleep, I imagine that hand.

Warm. Real.

And it makes the ache in my leg hurt just a little less.