Page 27 of The Duke of Kisses
“You promised your father you’d marry her.” Graham paused before continuing. “I know how much you loved him, how much you miss him, but that was a promise you never should have made.”
A bitter taste vaulted into David’s throat. “That’s easy for you to say. Your father is still among the living.”
Graham’s dark eyes narrowed. “My father wouldn’t have asked me to marry someone I’d never met.”
Anger roiled in David’s chest. “No, he’d just browbeat you into taking a position you never wanted.”
Graham picked up his glass and took a leisurely sip, but his gaze glittered with suppressed irritation. “If I didn’t want to be here, I wouldn’t.”
“If you had somewhere else to go.”
Graham slammed his glass onto the desk, causing whisky to slosh up over the edge and send droplets across the ledger he’d been reading. “Don’t direct your frustration at me. This is your mess to untangle, not mine.”
David sat up straight and glared at his best friend. “Then help me bloody untangle it!” He rarely raised his voice. In fact, he had rarely surrendered to any emotion until the grief of his father’s sudden death had overtaken him. Since then he’d been a bit more volatile—prone to things such as raising his voice or kissing young women he shouldn’t.
One young woman.
Fanny.
He fell back against the chair and took another drink. “I’m being a prick.”
Graham’s black brows slanted up. “Yes.”
“I want to honor my father—you know I do. No one was more important to me than him.” His voice was low and nearly cracked. He swallowed and wetted his suddenly dry mouth with more whisky.
“Of course I know that. Just as I know that marriage should not be entered into lightly.” Graham spoke from experience, given that his mother had left his father and abandoned Graham when he’d been just four. She’d claimed she hated being married and simply left.
“I’ve no plans to marry anyone.”
Graham looked at him over the rim of his glass. “Not yet, but you will.”
Feeling perhaps more irritated than when he’d arrived, David stood and left the study. He took the back stairs to his chamber on the second floor rather than chance meeting his mother or uncle. He still held his whisky and finished it as he entered his room.
Setting the glass down on a table, he pulled at his cravat to expose his throat. He took a deep breath in an effort to still the conflict in his mind. He wanted to court Fanny. He felt beholden to at least meet Miss Stoke. Perhaps she’d be vapid or cruel, and he could dismiss her immediately.
He doubted she was either of those things. If Father had liked her and thought her worthy of marrying his son, she was likely a model young woman. He ought to at least meet her.
And if he liked her?
Cursing, he strode into his dressing chamber and poured water from the ewer into the basin. He splashed the tepid liquid over his face, mindless of it trickling down his neck.
He couldn’t torture himself like this. He’d made no promises to Fanny and hadn’t made any directly to Miss Stoke or her father. He would make his own choices.
Why, then, did he feel as if he were trapped in a cage?
* * *
Fanny surveyed the arranged seating in the drawing room. In a few minutes, guests would start arriving to hear Fanny’s proposal for a workhouse. She’d extended invitations to listen to a “new charitable endeavor” and looked forward to discussing her idea in detail. She was a bit nervous wondering if they’d support her.
Ivy came into the drawing room, her hand resting on the curve of her stomach. “Leah is with her nurse, so I am yours to command. Has anyone arrived yet?”
“No, but I expect them at any moment.” Fanny was prepared for ten or so guests, including Sarah and Lavinia and their friend Miss Jane Pemberton, as well as Ivy’s friends, Lucy, the Countess of Dartford, Aquilla, the Countess of Sutton, Emmaline, the Marchioness of Axbridge, and Nora, the Duchess of Kendal. Nora’s mother-in-law, the Countess of Satterfield, was also expected and was perhaps bringing some other ladies.
Aquilla arrived first. Fanny knew her well and wasn’t at all bothered when she and Ivy bent their heads together and exchanged stories of motherhood. Sarah came next with her mother, and Fanny went to greet them.
Mrs. Tabersham and Jane came in right after Sarah and Lady Colton, and after exchanging a few pleasantries, the younger women separated from the mothers.
“How was the Newcastle ball?” Fanny asked. She hadn’t seen Sarah since the dinner party they’d both attended Friday night.
