Page 20 of A Deal with the Broken Duke
The Duke would have to go and speak to her directly, he decided. This coded letter wasn’t going to suffice. He wanted to hear from her lips what she had to say about all this.
He called to his butler. “Prepare a carriage, please. I’m going out to call on someone.”
“Shall I tell the driver where you’ll be going today?”
“Halsway Manor. The home of the Viscount of Linford.”
He thought of Juliet’s letter and of how careful she had been not to indicate that she was the writer. He wanted to help her, he realized, to keep that fact a secret.
He was already colluding with her.
“I’m going to visit my old friend Daniel,” he explained.
That would be the official story if anyone were to ask him what he was doing there. But while he was there, he knew he would be able to speak to Juliet as well. If this letter was any indication of what he could expect, she would be going out of her way to talk to him.
He spent the carriage ride over trying to imagine what he would say to her when he saw her. Knowing what she was after, did it make any difference? Would he actually be willing to do it?
Didn’t I tell her I would do anything for her because of the fact that she is Daniel’s sister?
But this…
A chill ran down his spine as he remembered the last time he had entered into a courtship at the behest of someone else.
Susan.
He hadn’t loved her at first. He had never intended to marry her, and he had argued with his father when the late Duke had made the suggestion. They’d argued even more fiercely when Harry’s father had begun to insist on the marriage. Harry had spent a lot of time being angry with his father over it.
But when his father had died, suddenly the marriage to Susan had felt like the last thing, theonlything he could do to make up for the arguments he and his father had. In his grief, he’d been unable to imagine ever loving or wanting to marry anybody else. So, what could be the harm in courting Susan?
What indeed?
He hadn’t loved her then, but as their courtship had progressed, he had certainly developed a fondness for his late fiancée. And he had never wished her ill.
But it’s my fault she died.
There was no evidence for that, of course. It wasn’t something a rational person ought to believe. Harry knew that, and yet, he did believe it.
He was cursed.
That was why everyone close to him died. The world didn’t want him to have anyone too close to him. If he did, his curse would surely reach out and snatch them away.
Would that happen to Juliet if he did as she was asking and entered into this sham courtship?
Surely not… but what if it did?
That won’t happen. Not if the courtship isn’t real. It couldn’t.
It was all superstitious nonsense anyway. None of this was real.
The carriage pulled to a stop and Harry got out. He was expecting a rather long day. An exchange with Daniel, certainly, and probably one with Lord Linford as well. He thought it would likely be hours before he was able to secure a few spare minutes to speak to Juliet.
He was surprised, then, when Matilda came hurrying out the front door to meet him.
Unlike Juliet, he would have recognized her as Matilda even if he hadn’t been at her house. Her appearance hadn’t changed nearly as much. She had grown taller, and her figure had matured, but her facial features were still childlike in a way that reminded him of the nine-year-old girl who had yelled at him that day in her country home.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded.
He blinked. The resemblance really was uncanny! Were they now going to repeat the same conversation they had had all those years ago? Was she going to tell him that she knew he didn’t really like anyone in her family and that he ought to just leave?
