Page 25 of A Rakish Duke's Rules for Love

“It is your duty.”

“Duties change.”

“And what if you should fall in love?”

“It’s a myth.”

She swallowed. “Why are you against the concept of love so fiercely?”

Gabriel’s lips pressed as the music began to draw to its ending. Was he ready to explain the deepest secret, the darkest, sordid reason to why he had committed himself to a life of unattachment and debauchery? Gazing into her guileless eyes, he decided, maybe it was time.

“Take your maid and meet me in the drawing room upstairs,” he suggested. “I’ll tell you why.”

Standing before him, Anastasia touched his cheek briefly. “Do you want to tell me?”

His chest tightened. “With anyone else, no, but with you, yes; just promise me not to hate me.”

CHAPTER9

Rule Nine: Secrets are the best weapon of seduction

A woman is drawn to a mystery more than gold— use mystery to your advantage, never be forthcoming.

—Gabriel Williams

A Rake’s Rules

Seated in a beige couch, Anastasia looked around; the room was well lit with a roaring fire and gas scones on the walls, and if she concentrated just so, she could hear the music from the ballroom, even two stories above it.

“Beg your pardon, Miss,” Marianne inquired, “what do you think he’ll say?”

“I haven’t the faintest inkling,” Ana replied as she stood and went to the window. They had been there for almost a quarter of an hour, and Anastasia wondered if something was holding Gabriel from seeing them. Then, as she wondered if it was best to go find him, the door opened with the barest whisper, and she turned to see him walk in, grim-faced.

Bathed in golden light, Gabriel looked like a warrior prince, ready to avenge a wrong. “Gabriel,” she said, rushing to him, “if you do not want to tell me, you needn’t. I had no business—”

He grasped her shoulders and slanted his lips over her, effectively cutting her worry off with a brief, closed-mouth kiss. “Shhh, Ana, its fine. I want to tell you.”

“Your Grace—” Marianne started, her tone warning, but Anastasia stopped her.

“Thank you but its fine, Marianne,” she said, “I don’t mind.”

Gently seating them, he turned so he could meet her eyes. “I’ve long believed that the marriage of convenience is the worst of evils in our society, but I now know the marriage based on love is the wickedest. When I was a child, I could not understand why my parents would do what they did to each other as my mother had told me they had fallen in love—it was a lie.”

His fingers reached to brush the errant curl from her cheek while a battle waged on his face. “My parents showed the loving, caring, committed partnership when we were among company, doting on each other, smiling and being kind, but at home, they were never in love or even kind.

“My father had one affair that capitulated us into turmoil. My mother took his affair to mean he didn’t care for her and kept bad-mouthing him to me, calling him all sorts of names and derogations. She used every opportunity to throw fits of hysterics, constantly accused him of infidelity, and was jealous of every female who crossed his path, from a maid to the neighbor’s daughter,” he explained tonelessly.

“Finally, she decided to take up the trade herself, inviting her lovers over in the day when father was gone at work and playing the bereft, love-stricken lady, using her feminine wiles to get father to pay her attention. I suppose guilt made him return to her bed, but he soon caught on when he found his name was being ridiculed as the worst cuckold in London.”

“He gave as good as he got,” Anastasia replied, feeling sickened.

“Yes, and I was in the crossfire, watching them play each other like fiddles, or I should say chess. When one made a devastating move, the other would do the best to make a crushing blow—how does that come from love, Ana?”

His voice—and eyes— were empty and cold as an abyss. “By the age of fourteen, I’d vowed to never marry.”

Like a veil, her naiveté to his pain was ripped away.It is not that he does not want to marry; it is that he does not want to give his heart and have it returned broken.

Having no words to adequately reply to such a heartbreaking tale, Anastasia gently wrapped her arms around him, giving what comfort she could. Slowly, his arms came around her, and she breathed in the spicy-woodsy scent of his cologne.

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