Page 87 of Never Dare a Duke
Her mouth quirked as she looked up at him. “Your actual haste was rather exciting.”
He gave a low laugh, amazed at how she eased him, how understanding she was. He tried to draw a counterpane up over her, but she sat up, sliding off his body.
“I should leave. Someone might come.”
He drew her back. “I told my valet I did not need him this night.”
She braced her hand on his chest, her hair wild about her shoulders and breasts. “Confident, were you?”
“Determined.”
She smiled as he sat up, bracing himself with pillows, then pulling her against him where she nestled beneath his arm.
Abigail lay still, heated by his big body, feeling so at peace it was as if the rest of the world didn’t exist. But their silence began to confuse her, made her think of things that had no place in his bed. Softly, she said, “I do not know what people are supposed to talk about after…”
“Lovemaking?”
She nodded, tucking her hair back behind one ear.
“What do you want to talk about?” he asked.
She glanced up at him, felt amused by her idea, but tried to be serious. “How did you know you wanted to write? From when you were a child, as I did?”
“No, nothing so simple.” He leaned his head back and looked up at the canopy, as if he were thinking back. “Even when I was a child, I felt the need for constant activity. Being confined at Eton with boys who thought I did not fit in kept me far too busy truly to immerse myself in my studies.”
“How could you, a future duke, not fit in?”
“You might not have noticed, but I have darker skin than most.” He grinned, flashing his white teeth. “And the fact that my mother wasn’t English made them all think of me as a half-breed. My status as a marquess mattered less than my ability to defend myself. And I relished the chance to prove what I could do.”
She watched his face, saw the troubles that passed through his eyes. She had not meant to make him relive whatever scandal he’d been a part of, but she thought it best to let him simply speak.
“I took too many risks,” he said with a sigh, “all for the amusement of my friends and my pride in my prowess. I was too quick to respond with my fists.”
A spasm of old grief passed so swiftly over his face she wasn’t sure she saw it. She knew he was not going to talk about it, and she did not ask it of him.
“I earned a terrible reputation. They said I had ‘wild Spanish blood,’ as if it were a disease. And then my father died when I was eighteen, and I realized he must have thought I would further ruin the family name with my uncontrollable temper.”
She tried to lighten his sadness. “I cannot imagine you with such a temper. You seem impervious to everything.”
He arched a brow and smiled. “Only through great practice. I quickly realized I had given Society another reason to disparage my mother. It shamed me. After that, I changed. I was responsible for the entire family and took the heavy weight of it seriously. I educated myself in land management, business, and politics, listening to the experience of my skeptical elders. I could not attend Cambridge because of the ducal responsibilities.”
“Did you get to the Continent? I heard young men of your class always take a grand trip.”
“My father did,” he said with a grin. “It was where he met my mother. But I couldn’t, not then, although I have been there a time or two more recently. I closed off every wild emotion, determined to be the perfect duke.”
“The perfect duke?” she echoed. “I did not know there could be such a thing.”
“Didn’t you? Isn’t that why you chose me from the beginning?”
Gently she caressed his chest, snuggled closer. “I guess so.”
“I stayed away from Society at night, far too busy for pleasure. I felt that everybody was waiting for my old temperament to surface. And I wasn’t yet in the market for a wife. Staying home was easier. But the nights were sometimes too quiet, and the restlessness I tamped down all day threatened to surface.”
He hesitated, and she held her breath, wanting his confidence yet knowing she didn’t deserve it.
“I was proud of what I’d done, but there was still an…emptiness inside me. I found myself drawn to the library, reading the books I’d never had time for at Eton. I discovered plays and regularly attended the theater. And then I realized that late at night, as my mind emptied, I began to hear my own stories.”
“Yes, oh yes, I understand,” she whispered.
