Page 59 of The Wrong Duke

Her father looked her over. “You might have bathed yourself first, Amelia? It’s unseemly to still be wearing the same dress you spent the night in.”

“What?” Amelia blustered, caught off guard by the comment. “What does that matter?”

“It matters because, as you should know by now, appearance is everything.” He closed the door behind him and strode through the foyer, walking right past her as if she didn’t exist. “It’s a lesson that if you had taken more seriously, you might not be in this situation right now. Something to think about.”

“I didn’t sleep with Lord Malnor!” she shouted at his back. “Not last night. Not this morning! And he knows! He knows what you did.”

“Is that what you think?” he turned about, smirking to himself.

“He won’t marry me. And when he finds out — when I tell him it was you who —”

“Who what?” he snarled, anger appearing suddenly as if from nowhere. “Who invited him to the library? Go ahead. It won’t make a difference. The damage is done, Amelia. Lord Wexley. Lord Chalmers. Their wives!” He chuckled. “Lord Malnor knows he has been caught out, and he knows what he has to do to make it right. Why, I suspect he already knows it was me.”

“I won’t marry him,” she said stupidly, not even sure what she expected. But she had to say something! She had to fight! “You can’t make me.”

Her father’s lip curled, and it wasn’t anger that he fixed on her but pure dispassion. A level of antipathy one reserves for rodents and bugs and things found on the bottom of one’s boot. “Who is it you think you’re talking to?”

“I know who I am —”

“Who is it you think you are talking to?!” he snarled and went to her; a few short strides and he was at her as if he meant to knock her down. “This isn’t a discussion. This isn’t a debate. And if you had done what I had asked, I wouldn’t have had to resort to such base measures.”

“Me? All I have done is —”

“Failed me,” he cut her off. “That’s all you’ve done. And do you know how I know it? He was seen last night with another woman. That was where he was when he should have been dancing with you. Taken by another — you can imagine my surprise!” he shouted at her, spittle flying from his mouth, striking her in the face. “But how can this be? My daughter! She is the one who has been giving him her attention. She is the one he is supposed to be chasing. No. Your efforts to seduce the Marquess were so... so hopelessly pathetic that he would rather be off with some other harlot than you. All you have done?” He chuckled coldly. “As far as I am concerned, you almost ruined everything. Thank God, I had the foresight to come up with this plan this morning, or we would have lost the marquess altogether.”

“Why?” Amelia’s body shook. She wanted to scream and shout, but her father was in such a state of apoplexy that she feared him. The way he looked at her, the venom pouring from every orifice. Earlier, she had felt like a caged lion, but now, she was little more than a housecat. “Why him? Why does it have to be —”

“I told you, already.” He groaned and rubbed her eyes. “Have you always been this daft? Lord Malnor is extremely wealthy, and I intend to exploit it. That’s all this has ever been, Amelia. A business transaction and nothing more.”

“But —” She almost mentioned the Duke. She almost said, what of the Duke? Why not ask him? It was right on the tip of her tongue... She just couldn’t form the words, knowing already what her father would say.

“But what?” he scoffed. “Oh, don’t give me that look, Amelia. If not for this, the situation you would be in would be far direr. Honestly, you should be on your hands and knees praising my senses.”

And he meant it too. He wasn’t exaggerating. He wasn’t speaking in metaphor. He truly thought he had done the most amazing thing and actually believed that his daughter should be grateful for it. There was no empathy there. No pity. No concern for one he was supposed to love.

Amelia glared at her father, the disgust she felt for him reaching new heights. All her life, all she had ever done was what he asked of her. She never denied him. She never fought him. She was the perfect daughter who stayed in line because that was what good daughters did. And what did she have to show for it? Nothing. A life of misery and pain.

“I hate you,” she said softly, unable to believe the words had left her mouth.

“What was that?”

She looked right at him and spat, “I hate you.”

His eyes widened. “I would not say such things if I was you.”

“Why?” she cackled. “What difference does it make now? You won. I lost. Nothing I say will make a difference, so you may as well know the truth. I hate you like dogs hate cats. Like worms hate birds. I hate you with such... such intensity that the summer’s sun would pale under the heat that radiates from my body whenever I think of how much I despise you.”

Shockingly, he didn’t shout at her. More shockingly, he didn’t strike her. He took a few short, sharp breaths. He closed his eyes a moment and breathed out. And then he fixed her with a look of utmost calm that was worse than anything he’d done or said so far.

“Are you finished?”

“Not even close.”

“The good news is, you’ll be done with me soon enough. I shall be seeking out Lord Malnor in the next few days, and we will finalize the details of your wedding.”

“No, I refuse to —”

“And until then, seeing as you can’t bear the sight of me, let me make it easy on you.” He grabbed Amelia by the arm and dragged her across the foyer. “You will not leave you room until I say.”

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