Page 97 of A Deal with the Broken Duke
She turned to leave the room.
Lord Stickland moved quickly, positioning himself between Juliet and the door. “I’m not going to let you leave. I promised not to touch you, and I’ll hold to that as long as you don’t make me.”
“As long as I don’tmake you?” Her voice trembled.
She wished heartily that she had just run out of the room the moment she had seen he was in there. Why on Earth hadn’t she?
“Iwillhave this conversation with you,” he said firmly. “I’m entitled to talk to you, Lady Juliet. You owe me that much.”
“I don’t owe you anything after the way you’ve treated me. And now I find out you’ve been spying on me after you were asked to keep away.”
“Oh, I haven’t been spying.” Lord Stickland shook his head. “But I can’t help it if certain information finds its way to me, can I?”
So someone else had been the one to see them and overhear their conversation. This didn’t make Juliet feel any better.
“If it was someone else spying, why would I even consider marrying you?” she asked. “You can’t contain this secret if someone else knows. Once I marry you, they’re likely to go on blackmailing until they have everything they could possibly want.”
“How will it be,” Lord Stickland said. “When I go to your father and tell him that there was never a real courtship between yourself and the Duke? That the two of you contrived the whole thing to trick him so that he wouldn’t force you to marry another gentleman of his choosing? He won’t like that very much, will he?”
“I don’t suppose he will.” Juliet glared. “But I’d rather face his ire than be married to you.”
“And do you think you’ll have a choice in the matter? Once I’ve told him the truth, he’ll be so thankful to me for exposing your trickery that he’ll be likely to give me anything I want. He’ll let me marry you with absolutely no argument. And if you try to suggest another arrangement, no one will take you seriously, because you’ve proven that you can’t be trusted.”
Juliet’s heart sank. Unfortunately, Lord Stickland was almost certainly completely right in what he was saying. It was very unlikely that her father would ever trust her again once he knew that the courtship had been a lie.
And he would certainly force her to marry Lord Stickland.
Juliet couldn’t allow Lord Stickland to go to her father with this. She would have to go to him first. But what could she possibly say?
Lord Stickland wouldn’t let her leave the room until she agreed to marry him, and she would never truthfully agree to do that.
There had to be a way out. There had to be.
But she couldn’t see it.
“I can’t believe you think this is love,” she whispered “This is the furthest thing from love I’ve ever seen. If you evenlikedme, you wouldn’t treat me this way.”
“I want you to be my wife,” Lord Stickland said. “It’s more than the Duke ever wanted from you, isn’t it? And I won’t give up until I have what I want.”
Juliet shivered in fear at his words.
Then, behind her, she heard the door open, and a familiar voice said, “What the devil is going on in here?”
Juliet felt as if she was going to melt with relief.
Daniel.
Her brother had arrived, and she knew that—for the moment, at least—she had been saved.
CHAPTERTHIRTY-THREE
Daniel grabbed Lord Stickland by the collar of his shirt and threw him across the room, away from Juliet. Lord Stickland tripped over his feet and went sprawling, and Daniel advanced on him.
“What happened?” he demanded.
“Nothing,” Lord Stickland replied quickly. “Nothing happened.”
“I’m not talking to you,” Daniel said. “You can’t really imagine that I would listen to anything you have to say right now. Juliet?”
