Page 68 of A Bride for the Wicked Duke

“And your insistence that I not collect on her family’s debt, even when it was well overdue. I had wondered to myself why you were protecting her.”

“I was not protecting her,” he growled in warning, anger growing now because he could see Victor was mocking him. Taking pleasure in his misery. “I just did not wish to see her family –”

“Suffer for the father’s sins, yes I know, you said that already,” Victor waved him down. “A nice enough sentiment. But a half-truth at best.”

Gerald straightened in his chair and fixed Victor with a scowl that he hoped would be enough to see the large man back down. He did not appreciate being mocked. Just as he did not appreciate having truths which burned hotter than any fire being laid bare before him.

“Whatever it is that you are saying, say it,” he snapped. “Or leave. Personally, I would prefer the latter.”

Victor rolled his eyes. “Enough with the bravado. It is obvious to anyone who pays attention – as I do, by the way. It is obvious that you have feelings for this Lady Hawkins.”

A pang stabbed through his gut. “I do… do not. That is a lie.”

“As you say,” Victor scoffed. “But do you want my advice?” He raised an eyebrow at Gerald. “Get over it. I have no doubt that she was a wild one…” He laughed to himself, and Gerald stiffened with fury. “She looks the type, to be sure. But she is one of many. Bed another. Have some fun. Sleep your way through half of London if that is what it takes. Believe me, there are plenty more Lady Hawkins to pick from, should you be so willing. All you have to do is pull yourself out of this funk because the way you have been acting lately, a blind beggar on their last shilling would rather starve than waste their time in your bed.” He cackled. “Christ man, have some dignity.”

Gerald felt a lump appear in his throat, just as he felt his stomach drop through the floor. Victor’s advice was predicated on the fact that all Gerald felt for Lady Hawkins was physical attraction, meaning that the advice to bed someone else sounded perfectly reasonable to his ears. Sadly, Gerald was starting to accept the very real fact that this was simply not the case.

There were not plenty more Lady Hawkins to pick from, as Victor had so simply put it. There was but the one, a unique type of woman whom Gerald had never before met the likes of and would never meet again. When he had first met her, he had thought her unruly and uncouth and beneath him in every way which mattered. Now, he knew, these were the qualities that he admired most.

Worse that she had come to him. Worse that she had given him a chance. And worse that he was so damn stubborn and pigheaded that he had refused to accept how he felt. That was what stung the most.

No… what stings the most is that I am too late. That is the cross I will bear for the rest of my life, a sure to be long and painful one at that.

“Thank you for the advice,” he muttered to Victor. “I will… I will consider it.”

“Please do…” Victor sighed and rose from the chair, snatching the bottle away. “And where I often besmirch you for not coming in here nearly enough, I think you not being here until you sought yourself out might be a good thing. I mean, good God man…” He stepped back, keeping the bottle. “You are a duke! Start acting like one.” And then he left, shaking his head the whole while.

A duke… all his life, Gerald had done nothing but play the part of being a duke. Proper. Regal. A perfect example of his station and a model for his peers to look upon and emulate themselves after. He had done so because he thought it right, caring not about how happy it made him because he had believed such things did not matter.

Now, he gave little care for any of it. What did it matter what people thought of you if you were not happy? What did it matter how respected you were if you were miserable?It does not matter, a lesson I am learning in real time, the hard way. In brutal fashion because it is exactly what I deserve.

It had been a long two weeks for Gerald, and the pain was only going to get worse.

ChapterTwenty-Four

“Gerald, can I speak with you for a moment?” Rosalind called for him the moment he walked through the front door. She was standing in the foyer, arms folded before her, a concerned expression on her face that told him she had been waiting for him.

“Later,” Gerald said, moving to walk around her. “Now is not a good time.”

He felt immediate guilt for dismissing her like that, and so sharply. But his mood was as sour as it had been all day, perhaps at its worst as he had spent the ride home thinking about what Victor had said as he came to realize within himself all the mistakes that he had made. Now was not the time to speak with Rosalind…

“Later will not do,” Rosalind said, moving to block him. “I wish to speak now.”

Gerald bulked when he saw the determined look his sister fixed on him. There was fire behind her eyes, a sense that she was not going to bow willingly. It might have brought a smile to his face, because the changes he had seen in her lately, while unexpected and not how he pictured his often meek little sister, told him that she was growing into herself. She was not a little girl anymore, a woman grown.

“I…” He hesitated, stumbling slightly as the drink was still in him. “Rosalind, whatever this is, it can wait.” Again, he went to walk around her.

“I said now.” She grabbed his arm.

Gerald turned stiff, his head snapping down and looking at her hand wrapped around his forearm. It was the first time he could ever remember her doing such a thing, as she knew better than to dare raise a hand to him. Indeed, the moment she touched him, she seemed to understand the mistake she had made.

“I just want to talk.” She dropped her hand quickly. “Please.”

Although Gerald was angry, he was not angry with her. The fury that burned through him was for himself, and for that reason he could not bring it upon himself to level his sweet sister with his fire. “Rosalind…”

“I am worried about you, Gerald,” she said quickly, fixing him with that same concerned expression she had held when he’d walked through the door. “Dammit, I am terrified.”

He frowned. “Terrified. “What are you… there is no need to worry after me. Rosalind…” He laughed awkwardly. “What are you saying?”

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