Page 26 of Seven Nights with the Wicked Duke
"You are mistaken in that assumption, darling girl," he said in a dark quiet voice. "You are my responsibility so I get to decide. I will be damned if I lose anyone close to me again."
"What do you think will happen Magnus?" she asked softly, realizing the depth the conversation was descending into, but she was unwilling to surrender. "No one would hurt me, not when you have such murderous intent gleaming in your eyes. And I am not so stupid as to allow myself be compromised. What do you fear will happen to me? There are no dangers in the English ballroom."
"You think yourself wise enough against scandal or ruination but what if he was to force you?" he asked. "These men, no matter how harmless they look, are men, and you are a slight female. It would be all too easy to overpower you."
"That is ridiculous, Magnus, no one would risk doing that and besides I am always home and you hardly let me leave the ballrooms unsupervised. When would a gentleman find the time or place to commit such an act?"
"Mycoddling, as you so put it, protects you from such advances but I will not always be by your side to protect you," he stated. "What if you are married and he spends all your dowry and decides he needs a richer wife? Women have been murdered by their husbands for centuries."
"That hasn't happened in ages, Magnus. Your fear is unfounded," she retorted.
Now he was just being ridiculous.
"As long as there are gamblers, Cecilia, there will always be such men."
"So this is what this is all about? You are not content to leave yourself locked in the past, but you will do the same to me as well? I have spent the past decade living a life that was not mine, in the hope that it might help you but break free from the past but I see now that it is hopeless. You do not want to break free, you are comfortable there."
Cecilia was aware that her words were hurtful and unnecessarily harsh, but she was beyond caring, filled with a rage decades old that longed to be given an outlet. Magnus looked at her at her now, his eyes brimming with stubbornness. He was not going to budge.
"How are you sure that your precious Lord Finch would not hurt me?" she asked, now trying to convince her with logic, even though she could tell it was most likely a futile attempt. "Hedoesn't like me or respect me. He finds fault with everything I do. What if he ends up treating me in the manner you fear?"
"Because I had him investigated. He has no previous records of violence."
"What if you are wrong?" she asked.
"I am never wrong about people," he replied stubbornly.
"How..."
"Enough of the questions, Cecilia," he said, springing up in anger. "You will marry soon, and you will marry who I tell you to. You are lucky I give you time to at least know your suitors before I agree to the match. That is more than most are given and you will be grateful."
"You will forgive me if I do not have any gratitude towards you," she said stubbornly, folding her arms over her chest.
She knew the discussion was over and the fact she had been defeated again set an angry feeling in the pit of her stomach.
"You do not have any say in the matter, Cecilia."
With those words, he stalked away, apparently expecting that she would obey.
What he forgot was that she was no longer the timid younger sister he knew her to be. Now she was older, more mature and aware of what she wanted, and what she wanted was a way out of the suffocating cage she lived in, even if the escape was temporary.
So she swallowed her anger, walked upstairs to continue the book she was reading, as she waited for night to come and she could tick one more item off her infamous list. She had never known that a taste of the forbidden was this addicting, but it was, especially when a certain rake had offered to guide her one step after the other, on her trip down the road of forbidden pleasures.
He encouraged her to embrace dark temptation and she was slowly coming to realize that he was the greatest temptation of them all and his lure was too strong to resist. Strong enough for her to brave the chance of being caught, as she once again crept away from her family house under the inky cover of the night, climbing into the couch that would take her back into the lair of temptation. One that she was only too eager to offer herself to.
CHAPTER 9
"Take off your dress, pet," Theo commanded, his voice the silky slide of pure sin.
Perhaps Cecilia had not been fully aware of what she had signed up for when she had agreed to allow Theo lead her down the sweet road of scandal and sin, but she was slowly getting a clearer idea of what he meant and it was in no way tame. It was wild, even more so than anything the authors of her secret romance novels could concoct.
None of them would be able to capture the look in Theo's eyes accurately on paper. Even now his gaze threatened to burn the clothes off her body if she didn't shed it herself quickly.
The Theo she met on her secret night visits to his estate was vastly different from the one that walked the day as a disreputable, free spirited rake amongst nobility.
With every day she braved escape to his estate, she got even closer to seeing the man hidden beneath and she was startled with each find she made.
His gaze got even more intense as he watched her each time and when she stepped into his study, she felt as though he was appraising her although his gaze wasn't demeaning, not in the way the insufferable Lord Finch did. She very much liked his gaze.
