He hesitated for a moment.
"Just go ahead and tell me what's wrong, will you?" her voice came at him again.
He jerked his head and looked at her, his eyes revealing but a glimpse of the turmoil within.
“You never did know how to lie.” Prudence, undeterred by his silence, pressed on with unwavering resolve, "I know when something is wrong with you, boy, tell me everything."
“It's my wife,” he finally answered.
“Of course it is,” she said, smiling.
“It is not amusing, grandmother,” he said to her.
“Oh, but it always is when it comes to couples— that is you, my dear Colin; you're always so serious,” came her reply.
“I am the Duke of Montford, I am supposed to be serious,” he said.
“Not with your wife, you're not,” she responded keenly, forcing him to go silent for a minute.
“In all sincerity, I really thought that it'd take a lot longer than this before Jane would grow weary of you given how daring she is,” the sound of her voice revealed her liking for the woman.
Colin's brows furrowed at the statement. Deep down, he had known it was risky coming here, knowing how perceptive she was.
“Jane is different, Colin. Why haven't you realized that until now?” she inquired.
“I know she's different— but that is in fact the reason we're…” he swallowed his words and continued. “Grandmother, she is everything I want and more.”
“Then what is the problem?”
“The problem is…no matter how hard I try, I just always somehow mess things up,” he confessed. “For instance, she's not speaking to me at the moment.”
“Ohh. Why is that?”
He paused, contemplating the content of his reply. “It's embarrassing and somewhat personal.”
“Well.” She let out a sigh. “Do you know what I think?”
He shook his head.
“I think that you are holding back, Colin. I think you're afraid.”
“That's preposterous,” he said defensively. “I am everything but afraid.”
“The most dangerous lie in the world, Colin, is the one you tell yourself,” she replied. “How do you expect to solve a problem when you have refused to accept the problem?”
He stared at her knowing she was telling the truth that he didn't want to hear, or perhaps he did and that was why he came here.
“You're afraid that you do not deserve her, that you're no good for her. You believe that you're too broken for Jane.”
Her words cut deeper than a knife and the truth he had long run away from had finally caught up with him.
Colin's voice quivered with raw emotion as he spoke, his words heavy with self-doubt and pain, “I am damaged, grandmother. I'm haunted from the war."
As he had begun, everything came tumbling out; he laid bare his deepest fears and insecurities, "I’ve never been the good kind of man. The kind one. I don't think I would ever be able to love Jane as she deserves."
She stared at him in silence.
“She's better off without me. I have tried to be that man but, grandmother, I simply can't. With me, Jane cannot find the happiness that she wants, the happiness that she deserves.”
