Page 25 of The Duke and the Unwanted Bride

He scoffed. “I do not require strength to resist kissing you.”

“How about touching?” she shot back. “From what I recall, your hands were all over me just now. How very bad of you.”

His face dropped. “That—that hardly counts.”

She shrugged, a satisfied smirk tugging at her lips. “It is a slippery slope, Your Grace, and you are standing right on its precipice.”

“Is that a challenge?”

“A statement of fact.”

They glared at one another. Frederick, feeling annoyed because he sensed that she was mocking him. And Lady Hannah, looking a little too pleased with herself, as if she had won something here today. Which she most certainly had not! He had come here to confirm with her the boundaries of this marriage, and he had done that. Hadn’t he?

The words were spoken well enough, but Frederick got the sense they were ignored. Also, the way he could not stop looking at her, from her curves to her pouty lips, he almost hoped they had been.

“There you are!” Lord Ramsbury’s voice called from across the garden. “Your Grace! Hannah! We were looking everywhere for you!”

“Father!” Hannah called back, waving them over.

“What are you doing out here?” Lord Ramsbury hurried toward them. “And why were you not in your room?”

“Oh, we were just talking…” Hannah smirked at him. “About the wedding. Your Grace…” She turned to the Duke, her smile still triumphant. “Shall we go back inside? To discuss the upcoming wedding, I mean.”

Frederick looked at her flatly. “Sounds like a wonderful idea…”

That did not go as well as he had planned. It went so poorly, in fact, that he realized that to even be alone with Lady Hannah was dangerous.

But they were to marry! How could he possibly avoid being alone with her? For now, he knew, the best thing he could do was avoid her until he came up with a solution. Their wedding was in two weeks—more than enough time to do so.

Although as he watched her walk back to the house, her wide hips swaying suggestively, his mouth salivating at the sight, he wondered truly if this was not the worst idea he had ever had. Or, conversely, the best.

Chapter Seven

It was Hannah’s wedding day, and as expected, it was as confusing as it was unsettling.

Confusing because despite two weeks of preparation and mental readiness for the day that would come to define the rest of her life, Hannah felt that she knew her husband as well as she had known him the first day she met him. That was to say, not at all. It was a stranger whom she was set to marry, and a man who had been at pains to keep his distance, as if the idea of getting to know her frightened him.

And unsettling because with two weeks to consider how she felt about this marriage, and what she wanted from it, she had decided that a marriage of convenience to a man who wanted to be little more than friends with her wasn’t at all appealing.

This marriage was happening whether she wanted it or not, so why not at leasttryfor something more than what he had offered her? Why commit herself to a life of loneliness when,from what she could see, there was no good reason that her pairing with the Duke would not work?

Two weeks ago, when they had spoken in the garden, he had agreed to at least be friendly with her, as if that was an olive branch that she should have been grateful to accept. And yet, in the two weeks that had followed, she had hardly even seen the man. He had avoided her purposefully, but there was little she could do about it.

Oh, and she knew why that was too. Therealreason. Of that, she had no doubt.

Today, all that would change. Due to marry any minute now, he would have no choice but to see her, speak with her,bewith her. Surely, even he was aware of such a thing?

And it was after this realization that a plan took shape in Hannah’s mind.

“You look beautiful,” Charlotte crooned. She was standing right behind Hannah, taking her in for a final time before the ceremony started.

“Agreed,” Beatrice said. “Breathtaking.”

Standing next to each other, the two sisters looked on the verge of tears. Never had Hannah seen them both so happy—certainly not on their own wedding days. Although she supposed there had been a good reason for that.

“You do not think it is too much?” Hannah asked, keeping her focus on her reflection in the full-length mirror. “Mother was not at all pleased with how much skin is showing.”

Beatrice blew through her lips. “Mother is far too prim.”

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