Page 71 of The Duke Not Taken

They went through another long hallway, and then upstairs. Down another hallway where more lamps were unlit and more doors were shut. It seemed as if the entire wing was closed, and she assumed Miss Halsey was leading her to a storage closet. But they arrived at a large bedroom.

This room was obviously inhabited and darkly masculine. Embers glowed in the hearth, the bed was made, and a cat was lying on the foot of it, watching impassively as Miss Halsey bustled in, leading Amelia. Someone had placed a pair of Hessian boots in the corner, and an array of male toiletries was spread across the top of the bureau. A pair of trousers were tossed carelessly across a chair and a morning coat was hanging neatly from a coatrack.

“Whose room is this?”

“It is the duke’s room. The other rooms in this hall are not open, and he bid me bring you here, as the hearth is lit. Will you wait here?”

Amelia nodded, and the housekeeper disappeared through an interior door into an adjoining room. She felt conspicuous, standing in his room. It was too intimate somehow. Like she was seeing a part of him that he kept hidden from the world. She noticed a couple of books on a bedside table.Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type.

She considered her English to be excellent, but she couldn’t make sense of that title. The book beneath it wasA History of Phillip II.The only Phillip II she knew of was a long-dead Spanish king.

She looked around the room, her gaze falling on a single leather-bound chair and a table near the windows. On the table was a pocket watch and a riding crop. Amelia moved to the foot of the bed and stroked the cat’s head. At first, the cat meowed, rejecting her attention. But then it lifted its head and began to purr.

Miss Halsey appeared again with a towel and some gowns. She laid them carefully on the bed. “These belonged to the late Duchess of Marley,” she said. “I brought three for you to choose from, if you like.”

Amelia picked one up and held it up to her body. The Duchess of Marley had been considerably smaller than she. She glanced up at Miss Halsey, who was seeing the same conundrum. “I don’t think I can possibly fit into them.”

“She was such a tiny thing,” Miss Halsey agreed. She stared at the gown with a perplexed expression. “But we have no other ladies’ clothes, Your Royal Highness.”

“Perhaps then, one of the duke’s shirts and...” She glanced around the room, trying to think. Her gaze landed on the trousers. “Trousers.”

Miss Halsey looked at the trousers. Her cheeks turned red. “Oh my. I don’t...that doesn’t seem—”

“Miss Halsey, I am soaked through to the bone and freezing. Look.” She held up her hand. The tips of her fingers were blue, and she couldn’t stop shaking. “I must have something very soon. Please.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Miss Halsey curtsied and went into the adjoining room again. She returned with a pair of canvas hunting breeches, a lawn shirt, and a hunting jacket.

Amelia had never in her life donned men’s clothing, had never even dreamed of doing it, but when she’d dressed, she wondered why not. She didn’t care—as long as whatever she put on was dry and covered her, she was satisfied.

It felt strangely sensual to put her body into clothes where his body had been. The faint smell of clove and cardamom was soothing to her.

But mostly, she was relieved by the warmth of dry clothes.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

ITDIDN’TOCCURto Joshua until the princess left with Halsey that she would return in Diana’s clothes. He was slightly startled that he would feel anything about it, but his heart did a couple of pirouettes in his chest at the thought of seeing his dead wife’s clothes on an unruly princess.

He should have gotten rid of them. Given them to Mrs. Chumley’s daughter, sent them to his mother—but he’d left them languishing in her dressing room, just as he’d left everything languishing after she’d died.

He heard Halsey’s determined footfall and drew a breath to steady himself. He turned from the fire in the hearth and...and he was speechless. Truly speechless. Of all the things he could have imagined, it would never have been her wearinghisclothes.

Her wet hair was braided in one thick tail. She had donned a pair of his hunting breeches, which Halsey had secured with a cord tied around her waist. She was also wearing one of his lawn shirts. It was voluminous on her, tied in a knot at her waist, and buttoned to the neck. Over that, she wore one of his older hunting coats that hung to her knees.

He looked to Halsey, confused as to why she would do such a thing. In return, Halsey looked as if she would be ill.

The princess looked at Halsey, then at him. “Before you say anything, I must explain that your late wife was considerably smaller than me. I couldn’t fit, Your Grace. And as I didn’t think I could bear another moment of shivering as I was in my wet clothes, I asked Miss Halsey for your clothes rather than searching the grounds for a suitable gown. I hope you won’t think too ill of me.”

Joshua should have minded that she’d donned his clothes, but he didn’t. He couldn’t—he was too mesmerized by it. There was something quite alluring about a woman in men’s clothing—specifically,hisclothing—so much that it took his breath away. Thankfully, the storm raging against the windowpanes covered the sound of the actual catch in his breath.

“Thank you, Halsey. If you would be so good as to tend to her clothes?”

“Aye, Your Grace.” She gave him an awkward curtsy, and took a hasty retreat from the drawing room, probably scandalized by this turn of events.

The princess looked much smaller in his clothes. Almost meek, which was not a word he would have thought he would ever use to describe her. She walked into the middle of the room in bare feet and gazed at him curiously. “You’ve donned dry clothes, too.”

He realized he was staring. Gaping, really. He glanced down. He’d changed into dry trousers and lawn shirt and had put on a coat for some warmth. He, too, was barefoot. “Yes, I...was wet,” he said. He cleared his throat and gestured to the table. “Butler has brought some tea and biscuits.” He walked to the table and stood behind one of the chairs, intending to hold it out for her. She looked at the chair, then looked at the hearth, where the flames were blazing now. His impossibly lazy dogs had stretched out on the rug before it to warm their backsides against the heat coming from it now. “Would you mind terribly if we took tea there?”

“Where?”

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