And why on earth was her heart on a mission to leap out of her chest? With her free hand she clutched her chest just as he finally came to a stop at the edge of the gardens. Not entirely hidden by the hedges that surrounded them, but not in clear view of the main house either.
Her chaperone, the servants, even her aunt, were within shouting distance, and possibly even watching her right now.
As far as decency went, she was walking a fine line. She was courting trouble.
She ought to stop this. Now, with her future at stake and spinsterhood looming if she failed to win over Mr. Benedict—this was absolutely not the time to become a rebel.
Damian’s lips curved up into that wicked grin that used to drive her mad as a child.
It still drove her mad, but this madness wasn’t the same.
Her heart went wild again, racing in her chest like she was running for her life and not standing here with her music tutor.
No, this madness wasn’t the same at all.
“Are you ready to sing for me yet?” he asked.
She blinked. He was serious. “No. I shall never be ready to sing.”
He looked around pointedly. “That nasty old crone isn’t here to watch you like a hawk, we are far from the stifling atmosphere in your aunt’s unwelcoming home.” He arched his brows. “Is it me you are uncomfortable with?”
She opened her mouth and closed it abruptly. No. The answer was no, but that was alarming. While he made her heart race and a tension seemed to fall around them whenever they were alone, this sensation wasn’t unpleasant. It wasn’t nerves or intimidation or fear that he would judge her.
It was something else entirely. And that…
That was more frightening to admit than anything else she could say.
“Ah,” he said with a knowing tone. “You are worried about what I might think, hmm?”
She pursed her lips. No. That wasn’t it at all. But before she could say as much, he was singing.
He was singing loudly and enthusiastically and...inappropriately. The song he was singing was some sort of crude tavern tune that had her cheeks burning even as she burst out in a laugh. “What are you doing?”
He took a deep breath and started on the next verse before she leaned forward and clapped a hand over his mouth. “Stop it,” she said through her laughter.
His eyes still danced with amusement and her cheeks hurt from grinning but as their laughter faded, the tension returned and she dropped her hand from his mouth as if he’d burned her.
Turning away quickly, she took a deep breath to calm the butterflies in her stomach that she knew without a doubt had nothing to do with singing and everything to do with this bizarre connection she felt whenever he was near.
Physically it was impossible to ignore or deny. Even now, when he was out of her direct sight, she could feel his body coming closer as though she had some sort of sixth sense. Emotionally, too, she felt it. Never before had she felt so seen. So exposed.
So vulnerable.
Maybe it was because he knew of her past and had been acquainted with her for so long, but not even her closest friends seemed to understand her the way that he did.
It was unnerving.
“Now it is your turn.” His low voice behind her made her stiffen.
“I-I’m too embarrassed,” she said. “Even singing that horrible song, you have a lovely voice and you know it.”
He chuckled. “Then keep your back to me if that makes you feel better, but know that I am not here to judge. And nothing you could do, say, or sing would ever make me think less of you, Pru.”
She blinked as a surge of unexpected emotions had her throat aching and her eyes stinging. That was absolutely the nicest thing anyone had ever said to her.
Ever.
The sincerity in his voice left her speechless but his hands on her shoulders made her stiffen again.
“Easy, Pru,” he soothed, his hands rubbing her shoulders, massaging the tight muscles there until she felt like hot butter, ready to melt at his feet. “There,” he said. “Just relax, and you will be fine. Like I said, as a child you knew how to hold a tune. You have a natural ear for music, you’ve just had it beaten out of you.”
She cast a quizzical glance over her shoulder. “Beaten out of me?”
He nodded, utterly serious despite her wry tone. “Your aunt turned something that should be lighthearted and joyous into something unpleasant.” His gaze roamed over her. “A punishment, I’d imagine.”
Her stomach turned at the mere memory of music lessons that ended in scoldings or bedtime without supper.
“Your aunt made music so unpleasant that you tense up at the mere mention of singing or performing. But it is impossible to play any instrument well if you are overthinking every movement at every turn.” He gently turned her head so she was staring at the garden rather than at him. “And you cannot sing at all if you are frozen with fear.”
Frozen with fear. The words resonated inside of her as if they’d just struck a bell. She had been living in fear. In some ways, she supposed she was so accustomed to this state that she forgot. She’d grown so used to it that she’d become numb to it.
But now he’d called her out on it and she found herself shaken to her core.
He moved to stand in front of her and tipped her chin up to meet his gaze. “If you let go of that fear and relax, I have no doubt that you will be amazing.”
She arched her brows dubiously.
His lips curved up. “Fine. I have no doubt you will be passable.”
A laugh slipped out before she could stop it and he smiled in return. “You should do that more often.”
“What?”
He shrugged, his hand dropping. “Smile. Laugh.”
She looked away in discomfort. Was she really so very stiff that a laugh was something to remark upon?
Yes. She could practically hear Louisa laughing as she shouted it in her ear. Yes!
She pursed her lips with a scowl and made a mental note to tell Delilah how Louisa had become her own personal spectre, haunting her in broad daylight.
“Right. Before you can overthink it, let us do this.” He spun her around abruptly so her back was to his chest. His arm wrapped around her waist until his hand was covering her belly.
She froze.
No, she melted at the touch. Heat seemed to sear her insides as he held her close, his voice a low murmur in her ear. “Take a deep breath in so you can see my hand rise and fall.”
She did as she was told, too stunned by the intimacy to protest.
“Good,” he murmured. “Now sing.”
She blinked at the shrubbery before her. “Sing what?”
She could feel his shrug. “Anything. Whatever is familiar.”
Shifting a bit she wracked her brain for something that she knew well and settled on an old-fashioned song that her first nurse used to sing to her as a lullaby. She opened her mouth, her throat threatened to choke her.
“Relax. Be yourself,” he whispered in her ear, his arm closing tighter around her in an odd sort of comforting embrace. “I’ve got you.”
With a sigh she began, and the sound of her own voice filling the silence startled her. How long had it been since she’d heard herself sing?
Too long.
Not long enough.
The act of singing awoke a myriad of emotions she couldn’t quite name. While trying to remember the words and stay on key, it was difficult to dwell on these sensations, the old feelings she’d thought she’d buried.
She’d thought she’d killed.
They weren’t dead and they weren’t even gone. They were right here, just under the surface, it seemed. They came to life as she sang and…they were overwhelming. She found herself grateful for Damian’s tight grip, and when he turned her around as her voice trailed off, she was stunned to discover she’d been crying.
It wasn’t until he lifted a hand and wiped away her tears that she realized it.
“Pru�
�” The tenderness in his eyes was nearly her undoing.
She shook her head quickly with a sniff. “I’m all right.”
“You’re better than all right,” he said with a grin that helped to wipe away the heaviness of the moment. “You were perfect.”
She snorted in disbelief and that made his grin widen. “I mean it. You sounded lovely when you forgot to be a stuck-up goody two shoes.”
Choking on a laugh, she swatted his arm away when he went to brush more tears from her cheeks. “Perhaps I am a bit of a goody two shoes, but I hardly see how that’s a bad thing.”
He laughed. “Don’t you?”
“No.”
He tilted his head to the side to study her. “Tell me, Pru, haven’t you ever once wanted to rebel?”
She opened her mouth to say ‘no’ but it wouldn’t come out. The question threw her more than she wanted to admit. Instead, she sniffed. “You do enough rebelling for the both of us.”
He laughed and she caught a whiff of understanding. He knew what she was doing, he knew that she was deflecting, and he wasn’t going to push her. “You’re probably right. I do like to push the boundaries.”
She looked around at their current secluded surroundings and shook her head with a mix of awe and horror. “What is it about being with you that has me wanting to break the rules, too?”
She felt the change in him. A stiffening or a tension as he gazed down at her. “Do I do that to you?”
She nodded, unable to meet his searching gaze. “You do.”
She wasn’t entirely certain what she was admitting to, but she felt certain that he knew. There was some undercurrent here that made her feel as if she was on shaky ground while he seemed to be more confident than ever.
“You make me want to do the right thing,” he said, so quietly she almost missed it. She glanced up quickly and saw the dark swirl of emotions in his eyes and it took her breath away.
“You make me want to…” He shook his head, tearing his gaze away as he took a deep breath, a familiar teasing smile curving his lips. “You make me want to play the role of savior.”
She blinked in surprise, torn between this impossibly sweet sensation that made her chest ache and a sinking sensation in the pit of her belly as his words registered. “You feel so sorry for me that you wish to play knight in shining armor, is that it?”
Surprise flared in his eyes but he caught himself quickly. “That wasn’t what I meant.”
Now she was the one to look away. Of course he felt sorry for her. She’d seen the way he’d looked at her hands where her aunt had struck her as though she were still a child. She’d seen the way he’d been looking at her ever since she’d fainted at his feet.
As though she were pitiable.
And perhaps she was.
The thought made her more irritated than sad. She hated being pitied. It wasn’t as though she’d been given such a terrible lot in life. Just one without many options.
And that was something a gentleman like him would never understand.
So perhaps it stood to reason that he would feel sorry for her. Maybe to such an extent that he’d feel compelled to help her, to do right by her…
The thought had her fighting tears all over again and this time she definitely could not explain why. “We should head back before my chaperone tells my aunt we have gone missing.”
She headed toward the music room doors without waiting for a response.
10
Damian hurried after her, his head spinning from the moment that had just occurred.
He had the unnerving sensation that in one afternoon his life had been flipped upside down and he no longer knew which way was up and which was down.
Or no, perhaps it hadn’t happened in an instant. Maybe this sensation had been taking root for days now, ever since he’d spotted the now-grown Prudence in her aunt’s drawing room. Maybe it had taken root and been growing slowly but surely this entire time.
But that did not change the fact that this afternoon the new sensations had hit him upside the head. His skull still felt like it was ringing after the intimate moment when he’d held her in his arms, when she’d relaxed enough to sing, when her voice had carried more emotions than she could ever realize. She’d laid herself bare in that moment, and the way he’d felt about her…
It had been painful.
Crushing.
The wave of emotion had been so intense it had shifted something inside of him forever.
And now she was running away.
“Pru, please wait,” he said, finally catching up to her as she reached the veranda outside the music room doors. “Don’t walk away from me just yet.”
She paused with her back to him and for a moment he scrambled with what to say.
“Please,” he said.
She turned slowly, her gaze wary. “What is it that you want, Damian?”
His breath caught at the searching look in her eyes as much as at the unexpectedness of her question. He suspected she didn’t just mean right now at this very moment. But what did he want, in the long run?
“I want to forge my own path, I suppose.” He stepped closer, grateful when she didn’t rush away from him again. “If I had my way, my uncle would remarry, he’d sire an heir and I could be free to live how I wished.”
He expected the sort of pursed-lip scowl he was used to from her whenever he spoke about stepping outside of her precious society and its rules. Instead he caught a flicker of yearning. Perhaps even desire.
But it was tampered by something sad. Regret, maybe, or longing for something she could not have.
“What would you do if you were no longer the heir presumptive?” she asked.
He licked his lips, oddly nervous. He’d never spoken about this to anyone before but after the way she’d opened up to him—knowingly or not—he couldn’t keep it from her.
“This,” he said with a rueful smile, gesturing vaguely to the two of them. “I’d love to pursue music as a career. Perhaps make it something more meaningful, maybe…” He cleared his throat and glanced away. “Maybe open a conservatory one day.”
His gaze darted back and he snuck a peek at her expression, waiting to see amusement or criticism...but what he found was a thoughtful look as she thought it over. “Yes, I could see that,” she said.
He laughed in surprise. “You could?”
She shrugged. “Of course. You’re passionate about music and you have the connections to make it a success, not to mention the wealth to fund such a venture.”
His eyes widened in shock. “You actually think it could work. That I…” He cleared his throat, resisting the urge to tug on his suddenly too-tight cravat as a bewildering surge of nerves made him fidget like a schoolboy. “You truly think that I could do such a thing?”
Her brows came down, her expression so serious it made him want to hug her. She was oddly adorable when she was so serious like this.
“Of course you could,” she said.
“I don’t know. I don’t have much experience managing something like that or running a business of any sort.”
Her lips quirked up in an endearing smile. “I always thought I’d be rather good at running a business.”
He grinned. “Oh really?”
Now it was her turn to squirm and he delighted in her discomfort. She looked to the ground, her arms crossing defensively. “I’ve always been good with numbers and my friends at the finishing school are forever teasing me about my managing ways.” She peeked up at him. “Silly, isn’t it?”
“Not at all,” he said quickly. “I could easily imagine it.”
“You could?” She sounded so surprised but before he could continue, she added, “Yes, well, I suppose my skills will be an asset as a wealthy merchant’s wife.”
The sudden reminder of her arrangement made his throat feel parched and his chest hollow. And then she looked at him and he knew his chest wasn’t hollow at all.
It was full.
It was
aching.
And his heart felt like it might burst with feeling.
She looked away first and he had to wonder. Did she feel it, too?
She must. But she was shifting toward the doors, her expression already hardening, her chin setting with determination, or perhaps resignation.
He moved toward her before he could stop himself. He didn’t want to let her go, he didn’t want this moment to end, and that… That was alarming. “Pru,” he said before he stopped to think. He had no idea what he was going to say.
He felt like he had everything to say and nothing all at once. He wanted to tell her she did not need to live up to her aunt’s impossible standards, but she would not believe him. He wanted to tell her that this gentleman ought to appreciate her for the woman she was, because who she was was perfect. He had this desire to make her see that she deserved so much more than her great aunt could ever know.
He also had the strangest desire to tell her more of his own wishes, to hear her thoughts, to know her opinions, but this wasn’t the time or the place.
He reached for her, grasping her arms and tugging her close. The flicker of shock and heat in her eyes the only giveaway that she felt it too, whatever it was that flowed between them.
He wanted to close the distance, to touch his lips to hers, to feel her breath against his skin.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her eyes wide.
He fought the urge to pull her closer still, because yes, he wanted to hold her but more than anything he ached to know what it was that she wanted. What she desired when she forgot about her duties and obligations. What she dreamt of when no one else was around and her imagination was free to roam.
He wanted to know her deepest desires, but he was too afraid to ask. Because right now, with that little tip of her chin, he knew that she was readying herself for the life she thought she was destined for.
You deserve so much more.
But the moment from before was gone. The vulnerable young lady he’d caught a glimpse of was once more tucked away beneath the prim and proper prig persona that he knew now was mostly an act.
The Misgivings About Miss Prudence: A Sweet Regency Romance (School of Charm Book 4) Page 8
