Page 20 of Trapped with her Cruel Duke

“I can understand not wishing to lie with me until we get to know one another better, but a year seems excessive,” he continued. “Does the Ice Queen perhaps hate children?”

“On the contrary, Your Grace?—”

“Christian!” She started as he slammed his knife on his plate, his gaze dark and ominous. “I will not ask again.”

She clenched her teeth, watching a vein bulge in the center of his forehead, but his eyes were smoldering with desire.

“Ch-Christian,” she stammered, jutting her chin as though in protest. To her surprise, his shoulders relaxed. “On the contrary—Christian—I adore children, but I have something that I wish to finish before embracing motherhood.” She glanced again at the servants as she lowered her voice. “Were you serious about not taking lovers?”

Christian’s lips quirked up as he took a bite of his toast. “Despite my animosity toward your father, I am not planning topunishyou for his sins, whatever you may think about the subject. I will not disrespect you, and I expect the same courtesy in return.”

He leaned back in his chair and dabbed his lips with his napkin before placing it beside him and rising from his seat. Louise looked up at him in astonishment.

He couldn’t have waited so long for me to come down. Has he finished already?

The door on the other side of the room opened, and his mother walked in. Now, it was his turn to look surprised as she came to the table and sat across from Louise.

“Good morning, Mother,” Christian said dutifully. “At the risk of sounding indelicate, why are you here?”

The Dowager Duchess scoffed. “It is breakfast time, is it not?”

“Indeed, and I can count on the fingers of one hand the last time we broke our fast together.”

“Well, perhaps I merely wish to spend some time with your wife. Is that so hard to believe?”

Christian rolled his eyes and walked out of the room without another word.

Louise watched him go, noting the tension in his shoulders that had not been present when they were alone. Something about his mother displeased him a great deal.

“Good morning, my dear,” the Dowager Duchess said as she helped herself to a cup of tea.

Louise smiled at her. “Good morning. Did you sleep well?”

“I did. And you?”

“Fitfully, I confess, but I am in a new home, sleeping on a new mattress. I suppose that must be the reason.”

“Indeed, it must be,” the Dowager Duchess agreed, giving her a knowing look. “What do you think of your new husband?” she asked.

Louise frowned at her. “He is not what I expected,” she admitted.

The Dowager Duchess gave another little smile that Louise found hard to decipher.

“I know you were close to my youngest son.” The Dowager Duchess’s eyes became sad as she spoke of Marcus. “Do you have any notion of where he is? Christian believed that marrying you might lead to a clue, but I cannot understand how.”

Louise sighed heavily. “I cared for Marcus greatly, Your Grace, and I wish I could give you the information you seek. But I do not know where he is. I simply pray that he is safe and well.”

“He always spoke fondly of you. He was at your house so often when you were younger. I wondered if you might… but no matter. You have chosen myotherson, who is rather different from Marcus.”

Louise remained silent, unsure how to respond to that comment.

“He can be a hard man to know,” the Dowager Duchess continued softly. “But do not despair. The kind man I raised exists somewhere behind the façade he presents to the world.”

Louise pondered that statement as she considered the Duke’s cold façade. There was certainly more to him than she had expected, but she knew him to be arrogant and self-conceited—no assurances from his mother would change that.

But perhaps his cold façade is just as false as my own.

“Thank you, Your Grace,” she said gently. “I hope to meet that man someday.”

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