Page 84 of The Duke Says I Do
“I decided I wanted to marry you when you pulled out your pistol and threatened to shoot that ruffian.”
While she should be happy to hear this, it didn’t fit with what she knew to be true. “But…but you didn’t like me then.”
“It seems I did.”
“You’ve never mentioned marriage.”
“The moment you agreed to come away with me, marriage was inevitable. Credit me with a little honor. You’re a gentlewoman. You were a virgin. If I debauched you, I owed you a wedding ring.”
She hadn’t been as daring and free as she’d thought. That was disappointing, although she shouldn’t be surprised. From the start, she’d recognized Alaric’s ironclad ethics. Usually she admired them, but right now, she couldn’t help feeling that he’d been less than candid. He might be a gentleman, but it was clear that he’d manipulated her.
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because you told me in no uncertain terms that you didn’t want a husband.”
“So you’d bed me until we got caught and had to marry?” Bitterness edged her tone. “A third Frain sister rushed to the altar in a hail of scandal?”
“No. On my soul, no. It would be easy enough to spark a scandal, if I was unprincipled enough to engineer one. You know how I’ve tried to hide our affair.”
To be fair, she did. “Why?”
“I didn’t want to force your hand.”
That was something, she supposed, still feeling at a disadvantage. “You were giving me time to decide to marry you?”
His answer held a hint of apology. “I hoped you might warm to the idea.”
“Thanks to your fatal charm?” She didn’t soften the irony in her question.
“You like me. Or at least you did.” He stopped, as if waiting for her to agree, but she remained silent. He went on in a more subdued tone. “And we’re tremendous in bed together. That has to count for something.”
Tremendous in bed. And against trees and walls and doors. And on tables and chairs and carpets. “It means I want you,” she said flatly.
“And I want you.”
That was no comfort. Desire didn’t solve the problems between them. “I’d make a dreadful duchess.”
“You’re perfect for me.”
He sounded so sure, she almost believed him. “What about my animals? I’d turn your life upside down. You’d hate that.”
Alaric sighed again. “Portia, you can empty the Royal Menagerie and move the exhibits into my back garden, if that’s what it takes to accept my proposal. Dogs and cats and lions and tigers and…hell, dragons are welcome, as long as you say yes.”
She wanted to say yes. She wanted to believe him. But she couldn’t. Not yet, anyway. “That’s all very well to say, but you require a respectable, biddable woman who never sets a foot wrong. My feet are wrong all the time. So is the rest of me.”
She thought he might laugh at that, but clearly he was at such an extremity that his sense of humor abandoned him. “You’re right for me. The question is whether you think I’m right for you.”
“None of this is like you, Alaric.” He wouldn’t see her bewildered gesture. “You’re the most gentlemanly gentleman in the ton. If you wanted to marry me, why not court me in the accepted manner or ask Papa for my hand? He’d love me to marry a duke, especially without a scandal forcing the groom’s hand.”
“Portia, darling…”
The anguished “darling” went some way to smoothing her ruffled feathers. “Yes?”
“I’d already conducted two conventional courtships. Both came to disaster. This time, I’d found a woman I really wanted. A public wooing always led to the wrong outcome. A different strategy was called for.”
“At least I couldn’t run off with Evesham, now that he’s married to Juliet,” she said drily.
This time, a faint huff of laughter rewarded her. “That’s something, I suppose.”
