Page 83 of The Last Duke She'd Marry
If she’d hired a carriage from the inn, someone must know where she’d gone. Or perhaps she’d taken the mail coach.
He had no idea how much money she’d had when she left Afton Park. If she was short of funds, the stagecoach was the more likely choice. He loathed to think of her alone and unprotected on the road and subject to insult, as was wont to happen to unaccompanied women in public conveyances.
He’d grabbed up his shirt, ready to go roaring downstairs to interrogate the staff, when the door to the dressing room opened. Juliet stepped through, catching him mid-panic.
“Lucas? What is it?”
He drew an uneven breath to ease his galloping terror. Although what he saw didn’t cheer him up much.
She was dressed in that damned nun’s habit of a traveling ensemble. She’d tied her hair back in a simple but severe knot, and she held her bonnet in one hand.
“You weren’t here when I woke up.”
The pathetic response stung his pride. But he had a sick premonition that his pride was about to receive a drubbing, whatever he did.
“I wanted to dress. If we’re going to make London today, we’re already late leaving.” She glanced out the window. He couldn’t help thinking that she tried to avoid his gaze. “The weather’s better, but after yesterday, the roads will be a quagmire.”
She sounded bright and practical and not at all like last night’s husky-voiced siren. He’d had the occasional lover who, in the light of day, had found the excesses of the previous evening an embarrassment. While Juliet’s inexperience might make that likely, that wasn’t what he believed happened here.
He hauled his shirt over his head, obscurely feeling like he needed the extra armor. “We don’t have to travel today. The morning’s well advanced, and the roads will be a mess. Neither of us has had much sleep. We could stay.”
When she glanced at him as if he was a stranger, it cut him to the quick. “Lucas, we…we said this would be one night.”
His hand sliced through the air. “No,yousaid that.”
Her flinch confirmed that her composure was purely superficial. He wondered how many times Juliet had bluffed at control to hide her turmoil. Just so must she have taken charge of her sisters and the estate after her mother’s death. Just so must she have responded to the news of Bolton’s accident. Just so had she listened to her father cast her out into the world.
She pretended that she could handle anything, but the calmer she appeared, the harder she struggled to conceal the inner storm.
That gave Evesham hope that he might have a few weapons of his own in this fight. Because he had no doubt that this was a fight. A fight to the death.
“Yes, I said that, when I asked you to stop on the way to London.” She sounded resolute, despite the unhappy line of her lips.
He raked his hand through his hair in frustration. “It’s not enough for me. Tell me it’s not enough for you either.”
“It has to be enough. Just because the world derides me as a fallen woman doesn’t mean I’m taking up a career as a courtesan.” She swallowed, her slender throat working above the pelisse’s high collar. She was as white as milk now, and strain tightened her features. “I have all the more reason to guard my reputation. Or what’s left of it.”
He told himself to settle down. Losing his temper wouldn’t help. But when he replied, his tone carried an edge. “For pity’s sake, Juliet, if your reputation means so much to you, bloody well marry me.”
She faltered back as if he’d attacked her physically, although he hadn’t moved. “I can’t marry you.”
“Yes, you can. Easiest thing in the world. If you do, all your troubles will disappear. Society will embrace you, your father will take you back, Portia will have a duchess for a sister, and her marriage prospects will be bright. Devil take it, you’ll even have a home of your own. Several.”
She looked under siege. “I can’t say yes.”
He made a bewildered gesture. “Don’t tell me that you don’t like me. Don’t say that you don’t trust me. If you didn’t trust me not to hurt you, you’d never have come to my bed.”
“I knew you wouldn’t hurt me,” she muttered, staring at the floor. “I knew you’d be a marvelous lover. And you were.”
That should make him feel better. It didn’t. “So you spare me a single night. How generous.”
She paled under his sarcasm and raised a devastated gaze to his. All the brittle poise that she’d adopted to keep him at a distance was gone. “It didn’t seem too much to ask. One chance to find out what it’s like to desire something and reach out to grab it.”
“You make me feel cheap.”
He wasn’t exaggerating. In all his wild days, he’d never felt so crushed as he did right now. That her rebuff came after the most spectacular night of his life just added to his misery.
She recoiled. “I’m sorry. I thought you’d leap at the chance to get me into your bed.”
