Page 30 of Married to the Forbidden Duke
“Don’t be foolish.” He laughed again, though not out of good humor. “You would never have permitted such a thing. There is no circumstance in which this did not happen. I tried to marry Lady Penelope to restore my social standing and good reputation—something my father would have wished me to do, if he had still been around.”
That had killed him in a whole new way, to know his father died thinking him a disappointment.
“You, presuming my happiness, rode to London in order to destroy it,” he continued. “If I had not chosen Lady Penelope but a lady whom I loved, you would have done the same thing. And we would be sitting here, wondering how to make our marriage work in the face of this stranger adversity.”
She slumped back in her chair, eyes wide, as though she understood the same thing he had. This was always the destiny that had awaited them. Once his carriage crashed into hers, this had always been their fate.
“You and I were always bound together,” he said, eyes on hers, the expression on her face blank with shock. “No matter what else we did. You would have always hated me, and I would have always been eager to make reparations, and this would have been the end result. So now, where do we go from here?”
He reached out, unfastening a curl from where it had caught in her pins, letting it fall down her face. His knuckle brushed her cheek, and although she shivered, she did not pull away. Her eyes were magnetic in the candlelight. “I want a wife, Alice. I married you to help you and protect you and be whatever you needed, but I also don’t want to lose the rest of my life to hatred.”
She closed her eyes. “Do you expect me to justforgiveyou?”
“No. But I would hope that one day you can find it within yourself towantto. It is not a simple task, I know.” He let his hand drop away. “Through me, or just through this life, I want you to find something worth living for.”
He didn’t expect that something to be him. That would be too much to ask for. But one day, he did hope that she would find it within herself towantthem to share a life worth living.
He would settle for that.
“The music is starting,” he murmured before nodding to the stage. “Let us put aside our differences for now.”
“You enjoy the opera?” She spoke scathingly, as though she could imagine nothing less likely.
“Yes. I used to come here with my father also.”
She twitched, half turning toward him, her face gilded in light and bathed in shadow at once, until she appeared likesomething out of a fairytale—a creature from another world, almost frightening in her beauty, and so…soremote. He could almost sense her desire to ask more, about his relationship with his father, perhaps, or to needle his assertion he enjoyed music so she could disprove it, but as the violinists brought their bows across the strings in a shimmer of sound, she turned back to the stage.
Frederick spent more of the first half watching her than he did watching the performance. It wasFidelioby Beethoven, and he had seen it plenty of times. He suspected she had, too, but he still saw her eyes widen with wonder, then gloss with tears as the curtain came down for the intermission.
So, music touched her, did it? He hoped to find something else that would.
Before he could take her in search of refreshments, the door opened and Denshire walked in, along with his sister, whom he was accompanying to the opera.
“Langford!” he howled in greeting. “Thought I should introduce my sister to your wife.” He made a small bow in Alice’s direction. “She’s new to Town and the more friends she has here, the better.”
Frederick stood and welcomed them both into the box. “Of course. Alice, meet Helena. I hope you both can become friends.”
Alice had initially been expecting to dislike whichever person the Duke flung at her as a ‘friend’. And when the lady in question was the sister of the Duke’s personal friend, she felt a flash of irritation. But when Lady Helena sat beside her, Alice found that the girl was not someone designed to act as a spokesperson for the Duke. If anything, the girl was rather reticent.
She was pretty, Alice ascertained immediately. Soft, dark hair that clustered around her face in pretty curls, and warm brown eyes that matched those of her brother, the Earl of Denshire. She had a sweet Cupid-bow mouth, and looked as though a strong wind might blow her confidence away with it.
This was not a lady designed to bring her around to her marriage.
Could she really be designed as a friend?
Alice didn’t have it in her to be cruel to someone who looked at her with such unabashed admiration.
“Hullo,” Helena whispered. “I am Helena Everston.”
“Alice—” She hesitated for a second, but it was her name, so she might as well own it. “Alice Blackwell. But you may call me Alice. Evidently, the Duke would prefer it if we were friends.”
“And my brother.” Helena flushed as though she had said something deeply inaccurate, though from what Alice could see, she had said nothing but the truth. “I am a bit of a trial for him, I’m afraid.”
Her ire rising, Alice looked over to where Lord Denshire spoke with the Duke, lounging back in his chair as though nothing could possibly affect him.
“Is that so? Pray, why?”
“Oh, well, I am a little shy.” The poor girl mumbled the words. “And I have a large dowry, which makes me prey for fortune hunters. My brother is forever chasing away gentlemen who have shown interest in me.”
