Page 66 of The Duke of Daring (The Untouchables)
Yes, they had. “I don’t regret staying, however. And if that makes me a scandalous hussy, then so be it.”
He threw her a half smile. “How I adore your intrepid streak.”
How she adored hearing him say he adored anything about her. She wanted to be angry with him, but he was making it deuced difficult what with his charming apologies, demonstrations of common sense, and willingness to open up to her.
“What are your nightmares about?” she asked.
“Is it enough for me to say they’re terrifying and I don’t wish to discuss them?” He stared straight ahead. “I hate to admit that even talking about them can threaten to send me into an attack.”
She squeezed his arm. “I’m so sorry.” She’d thought about that morning a great deal over the past week and thought she’d come up with a reasonable explanation. She only wanted to know if she was right—not for her own edification but because she wanted to know him. “Was it to do with losing your family?”
He snapped his head toward her, but only briefly. “Did Mrs. Alder tell you about them?”
“Yes. Don’t be upset with her.” She’d fawned all over Lucy when she’d helped her back into her Smitty costume, apologizing for Andrew and saying that he wasn’t himself and that she hoped Lucy wouldn’t hold his behavior against him. “She cares about you like a mother.”
“She’s not my mother.” The words came fast and hard.
Lucy winced, realizing that had been the absolute wrong thing to say. “No, she’s not. But she’s still like family, isn’t she?”
“No.”
They walked in silence for a bit, almost to Devonshire House. He finally said, “I don’t have a family, and I like it that way. You and I—we prefer to be alone, independent. I think it’s why we formed a…connection.”
She agreed, but when you liked being with someone more than you liked being alone, what then? Especially when the person you liked being with more than being alone didn’t feel the same. Lucy tugged on his arm, turning them since they’d arrived in front of Devonshire House.
He followed her lead. “I’ve been thinking about that connection.”
She wasn’t sure she wanted to hear what was coming. “I have too.” He’d occupied too many of her thoughts of late.
“Since you can no longer continue as Smitty—”
“Not since you made him a physician and ruined the entire scheme.” It was rude of her to cut him off, but she thought he deserved it.
“I apologize for that as well.” Again, he sounded earnest and truly remorseful. Lucy appreciated that, but it didn’t change the fact that she now had to readjust everything. “I should like to make amends. I have several ideas about how to provide you the money you need to take your grandmother to Bath.”
Provide her? Her skin prickled as she tried to imagine what he was going to propose. “What do you have in mind?”
“First, if you have any items of value, I’d be happy to sell them. Although, you really don’t need to. I’d be delighted to give you a sum, which I will invest on your behalf.”
She stopped again, her mind processing what he’d said. “You want to just give me money?” There was only one reason a man gave money to a woman who wasn’t his wife.
Wife. If she was his wife, he could give her all the money she needed. But she didn’t want to be his wife. She didn’t want to be anyone’s wife.
Liar.
The whispered voice in the back of her mind echoed through her, turning her insides into knots. She could marry him. In fact, shewould—if he asked. Despite what she’d thought earlier in her anger, hewasa good man, just troubled. And she could help him work through that. She could be the family he didn’t have. She wanted to be.
Oh God, shewasfalling in love with him.
And she didn’t want to. She didn’t want to marry him. She didn’t want to want him, not when he didn’t want her.
She let go of his arm and started walking again, passing Judith who’d stopped when they’d turned at Devonshire House.
He walked beside her. “What are you thinking?”
“That I don’t want your money. It’s offensive that you would even make the offer.”
“I realize it’s scandalous, but no one has to know. We’re rather good at keeping secrets.”
