Page 17 of Taken By the Dangerous Duke

The coach bounced rhythmically up and down as they traveled, and Margaret lost all sense of time. The magnitude of what she was doing had not really kicked in yet. It did not feel as if she were running away anymore, not when she was traveling in luxury in a carriage. She could have been on her way to anywhere in London—except, the outside world was beautiful countryside with no sign of life for miles in every direction.

It could have been an hour later when the duke reached into a large picnic basket and pulled out a bottle of wine. He pulled out the cork that was halfway in and poured some of the purple liquid into a small metal cup with a handle. He glanced across at Margaret with a sly smile as he sipped at it, not yet putting the cork back in.

Margaret dearly wanted some, but she could not go back on what she had said, so she turned back to the window and pretended that she had not seen the wine. She dared not look back at the duke.

“A cup for you,” said the duke.

Margaret turned back to look at him, and she took the cup that he was offering, seeing it half full with wine. She thought that maybe he was trying to get her drunk. Still, she took the wine and sipped at it, not offering him anything in return. She would not drink too much. There had been a time at one of her father’s parties when she had drank too much wine, but she had kept her wits. The duke would not trick her so easily.

When she had taken her sip, the duke did not offer to refill it, nor did he refill his own, and Margaret was both glad and sad. She would have eagerly taken more of the delicious wine, but she could also feel it affecting her. For one, the duke was becoming more handsome, and she had to constantly remind herself that she did not like the man. And, the more she thought about that, the more she wondered if she truly did not like him.

“My mother and father,” announced Margaret. She was not sure where it had come from.

“Pardon me,” replied the duke.

“That is why I am running away.” Margaret was in too deep. Her lips had betrayed her before her brain had been able to stop them. “They wanted me to wed an awful man.”

“Oh,” said the duke, a weird look crossing his face.

“I don’t want to be married. Not yet, anyway. And when I do, I want it to be for love and not because my father gets something out of it, and can you believe that! He wanted to sell me, and not to a young man either—he was old, and greasy, and hunched, and devilish, and nothing like you, and I think he wanted to lock me away in a room and have me as his slave, and I didn’t know when he was coming back, but I knew I had to get out of there, so I made a plan to run away, and here I am.”

Margaret breathed heavily after her tirade.

“Here,” said the duke, handing her a waterskin. “No more wine for you. Not until the effects of the last glass have worn off. Take some of the water. It will help.”

Margaret continued to breathe heavily, and she tried to stop the tears, she really did, but they came flowing anyway, and when she had finished drinking, they were streaming down her cheeks.

“I—I,” stammered the duke. “Is there anything I can do?” The duke looked uncomfortable.

“No, you are doing enough,” said Margaret. “My entire life! My entire life, they have treated me like I am cattle. Like an animal that they feed and house just enough to keep me alive so they can make a profit by selling me off to the highest bidder, the most disgusting bidder, and I hate them for it.

“And I don’t know if my mother is worse. I can see the woman she used to be in her eyes, but she does everything that my father wants and never stands up for herself, and it is killing her too but is that worse? She knows what he is like, and she lets it happen. And what about me? Is it wrong to hate your parents?”

“I don’t know,” admitted the duke. “I believe you can love someone and still dislike them. And, I also do not think that you need to love or respect someone until they have gained it from you. I don’t know what you have been through, but I can imagine that it has been dreadful.”

“It has,” admitted Margaret. “I have hated my life for so long, and I could not stay and marry that awful man, and I will never go back to London again as long as I live. And I have nowhere to go, and no one to turn to, and I don’t even know what I’m doing! I thought it would be easy like in the tales I read, but I didn’t know it would be like this, and now I have nothing. Nothing!”

“It is going to be fine,” said the duke. He quickly raised his hands to stop Margaret in her tracks. “I heard everything you just said, and I mean in the short term. I wonder if….”

“What?” asked Margaret.

“No, nothing. It is a foolish idea.” The duke seemed to think on it for a moment. “We will take it one day at a time. It will take three days to get back to York, and you can leave at any time, but you are welcome to come to York too, and you can figure out your life when you get there. If you need a place to stay….”

“I can do just fine on my own,” stated Margaret.

“I know,” said the duke with a smile. “Just take a breath and think about today. Enjoy the journey, and I have more food, but maybe not more wine for a while. I am sure that after a night of rest, you will be able to think more clearly in the morning.”

“I will….” Margaret did not know what to say. She was well and truly lost, and she had no idea what would come next.

She did not want to go to York with the duke—it was so far from home and she knew nothing about it. And she did not want to go back—there was nothing for her there anymore, and it was not her home now. And she could not stop anywhere in between—she knew nothing of anywhere but London, and she had found the world was a terrible place for a woman on her own.

She did not think she could cope. She was fine right here, right now, but only because she was in the safety of the carriage with the duke. What would happen when she stepped outside?

It was too much to think about. Had she made the biggest mistake of her life by venturing out? Was this any better than the life she would be forced to live at home? Margaret tried not to think about it. She became numb to it, letting the world pass her by outside as the duke handed her food and water every so often.

When the sun was starting to set in the sky, they pulled up at an inn in a small village. There was a stable attached to the side of the small tavern, and a couple of carriages were hitched there, the horses inside for the night.

“This is where we sleep tonight,” said the duke.

---