Renner nodded then turned to the ballroom. “We should return before the women come looking for us.”
Asher followed him back inside but remained in his thoughts the rest of the evening.
He was glad when Everly told him she was ready to go.
He saw that she was seated in one of his unmarked carriages before taking a seat in the one that boldly showed the family shield.
He was not surprised to find Everly waiting for him in the foyer when he arrived home.
“What did Lord Renner say?” She followed him into his office.
He ignored the flare of memories from the last time they’d been together and concentrated on the matter at hand. “There seems to be more going on than a case of missing diamonds.” He told her everything he’d discovered thus far then said, “Does Fallen had a reason to hate you, my lady?” He lit a lamp, but Everly was in the way of the other.
The fireplace had been lit, lending enough light to reach the worry on her face.
“I don’t know him,” she said.
“Perhaps, you know someone of his aquaintance?” Asher suggested as he pointed her to a chair.
She fell into the chair across from his desk with a great sigh. “I wouldn’t know.”
“It’s odd that the man who sold him the diamonds is no longer in business,” Asher said. “It would appear to me that the two are connected, but again, I could be wrong.” Instead of sitting in the chair behind his desk, he sat in the one next to her. “You must think. Is there anyone you’ve upset recently?”
She smiled at him. “I’ve upset many.” She frowned then. “Could this be a problem?”
“Not with the diamond theft. I’ll see that you are freed of those charges, but I would hate for you to find yourself in this situation again if someone is bent on hurting you.” And if anyone planned to hurt Everly, they’d have to go through Asher first.
Already, he planned to visit Fallen again and this time, he would not take the women.
He leaned back in his chair. “Why did you steal the bread?”
“Why do you ask?” Everly wrapped her arms around herself. “The two incidents are not connected.”
“I just wish to know why,” he said.
* * *
Everly kept her gaze on Asher’s. Why not tell him the truth? Unlike Lady Preshea, she knew Asher would keep her confidence. Every day, he seemed to prove himself to be the upstanding man that both Brinley and Beatrix made him out to be.
She could not forget their endless praise over how he’d assisted Beatrix out of an engagement with a dangerous duke in order to marry Hero.
Recalling that story, she asked, “Did you truly challenge Cartelle to a duel so that Beatrix could marry your brother?”
After a pause, he said, “I did.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Hero deserved Beatrix’s love. Now, answer my question,” he demanded.
She did not like demands and neither did she answer to them. “Why do you feel Hero deserved love?”
He blinked. “He’d fought for our country. He’d upheld to his duties to our family. It was only right he had his heart’s greatest desire.”
“Desires should be earned then?” Everly said, wondering if Asher still desired her and whether he thought he was owed her.
He ran a hand through his short blond curls and leaned back in his chair. “You’ll not distract me. Why did you steal the bread?”
“Why does anyone steal bread?” She swallowed but didn’t let her gaze waver.
He narrowed his own. “You mean your family…” He straightened, distress covered his features. “I didn’t know your father was having trouble providing for you. Had I known, I would have—”
Everly laughed. “My father had more money than he knew what to do with. As you know, I’m an heiress.”
He calmed. “Then I don’t understand. Why steal the bread?”
She looked down at her skirts. “I was hungry.” She’d been hungry for days.
“And there was no food to be had at your father’s table?” Asher pressed.
Her stomach turned. “I was not allowed to eat at my father’s table.”
She looked up to find him rubbing his chin. His other arm rested across his middle.
He speared her with his eyes. “Ever?”
“Sometimes,” Everly said. “I mean, clearly, I ate.” She motioned to her body. Everly was far from thin and adored her every curve.
Asher’s gaze dipped and stopped where her gown cut into her cleavage. His eyes darkened. Was it lust or anger? “He starved you?”
“Occasionally.” She tried to not make much ado, but her lips trembled. “Please, don’t tell anyone.”
Asher’s fist came down and slammed into the chair arm. She heard it crack underneath his force and was surprised when it didn’t shatter. “He starved you?” He stood and began to prowl the room like a large beast looking for something to attack.
She thought to calm him, not understanding why he was so upset. It happened years ago. “It doesn’t matter. He’s gone now.”
He swung around to her. “He hurt you. He was hurting you when I...” He ran his hand through his hair. “I didn’t know.”
She stood. “How would you have known? What would you have done had you known?” Slowly, she approached him. “Asher, there’s nothing you could have done. He was my father.”
“I could have…” He turned away and started pacing again.
“What would you have done?” she asked. “Called him out?” She meant it as a joke, but her smile died at the deadly set of his gaze.
“Allowing him a chance to live would have been too kind.”
Now she was truly nervous. “I’ll ring for coffee or do you prefer tea?”
He reeled as though offended.
“Coffee then.” She hadn’t known her story would have such an effect on him. She rang and then watched Asher as he continued to pace from one corner of the room to the other.
She wanted to ask after his thoughts but feared what he would say. Already, she was struggling to accept his anger on her behalf.
At the constable’s office, she’d believed his anger to have more with finding her situation morally unjustifiable than anything having to do with her, but now a new fear gathered within her.
There was a possibility that Asher cared for her.
It made sense.
Starting with that kiss in the tree.
Yet before that, she could have sworn that he loathed her.
She was confused. She wanted to understand but feared knowing the truth.
∫ ∫ ∫
2 4
Asher was unaware that Everly remained in the room until she presented him with a cup of coffee. He didn’t care the hour. He was grateful for it and took note that she’d noticed how he liked it.
The first sip of the bold drink soothed him. The second calmed him significantly. The aroma alone had always had an effect on him.
He turned and noticed Everly had resumed her seat. She sipped from her own cup and seemed to stare out at nothing.
Was she thinking about her past?
He hadn’t known how hard life had been for her. Had he known, Asher would have married her.
He’d enjoyed his years with Mary, but still, he felt his obligation to the woman he’d turned away without her even knowing it.
Even if she’d hated him, as his wife, she’d have never gone a day without what she needed.
It was no wonder she didn’t trust men. He’d have issues trusting anyone after an experience such as that.
Her father had held back that which would keep her alive. The Earl of Ellervear had held her life in his hands and had toyed with it.
“How long?” he asked.
She looked up at him. “What?”
“How long did this go on?” Asher bit out. “When did he start starving you?”
Everly shook her head. “I don’t know. I was young.”
He closed her
eyes. “And your mother allowed this?”
She laughed, and he recognized it to be the one she used when she found nothing humorous. “My mother had no say in anything that happened to me, much less herself.”
“Really?” he asked. “I can’t see you allowing such a thing.”
She grunted. “I’m glad you can see that.”
He stared at her. “I know about your little school.”
Everly gasped. “You read the letter then.” She’d left the letter in his office.
“I did. I didn’t mean to.” He stared at her.
She grew nervous. “Well, it’s clear what you think. You’ve already called it little.”
“I call it little, because it is. You’ve only ten thinkers. Twelve now.” He folded his hands behind his back. “I’ve never met a woman interested in the cosmos.”
“She’s intelligent,” Everly said, coming to her defense. “Preshea was just saying that she’s far surpassed the other women on the subject. There are none like her.”
“Perhaps, a man,” Asher said.
She scoffed. “You would think as much.”
“Everly, I am not your enemy.” Asher narrowed his eyes. “And not every man you meet will disapprove of the school.”
“Do you disapprove?” The answer mattered more than her next breath.
“I don’t,” he said. “In fact, I’m more in favor of Jean Jacque Rousseau’s thoughts on the subject. We’d have a better society if a child was nurtured by intelligent mothers. My mother was educated. Valiant was educated. No Curbain has been brought up properly without an education.”
She grunted, made it appear as though she didn’t believe him. Did Asher truly believe anything he’d just said? What reason would he have to lie?
He narrowed his gaze at her and then shook his head. “Was your mother educated? Were you?’
“I was not formally educated, though after realizing there would be little to do in the attic whenever my father saw to put me there, I began to grab as many books as possible and store them underneath the cot I slept on.”
Her answer was clearly not the one he wanted, but he calmed himself enough to ask, “And your mother?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t know her well. She died because of him.”
Asher’s eyes widened. “You blame your father for her illness.”
“Yes.” Her face colored with anger even as her eyes filled with tears. “Yes, I blame him. He denied her sunlight for years, would have denied it to me had I not been kept in my room or somewhere worse most days. She died in the dark. Alone. Her sickness grew of sadness. Of this, I am convinced.”
“Everly, I didn’t know,” Asher said, while trying to find a way to ask forgiveness for a crime she hadn’t known he’d committed.
She seemed baffled. “You weren’t supposed to know. You can’t save everyone.”
He leaned against the wall, feeling defeated. “But I could have saved you.”
“How?” She put her cup down and approached him. “It matters not what your family legend says. You are not a god.”
No, only the man who was destined to be your husband.
A tear slid down her cheek, and she quickly wiped it away. “I don’t even recall what my mother looked like. I’d been forbidden to see her after she became ill.”
He ached to touch her, to give her the comfort she’d clearly lacked for years.
Instead, he balled his hands into fists. “I’m sorry, Everly. Had I the power to turn back the hands of time, I’d have stopped at nothing to see to your wellbeing.”
“I know.” She looked down at his chest and then took another step toward him. Their bodies nearly touched.
Asher’s pulse flew, sending blood to pound in his ears… and lower.
Everly placed her hands on his chest and then slipped them around his waist before pressing herself against him. She leaned her head against him and rested it there. “I… can’t remember the last time anyone cared so much for me.”
His body burned to respond, to do what was natural and set his arms about her. His voice was strained by the effort to hold himself back. “I care for you.” So much so that it hurts. His body felt ready to break in two.
In a quiet voice, she said, “You can… touch me.”
* * *
Everly had barely gotten the words past her lips before she felt Asher’s arms go about her. She trembled as she found herself surrounded by his strength and his scent, mixed with crisp linen and coffee. She sunk further into his chest and felt his arms tighten about her yet again.
His hold was restraining, yet Everly felt as though she could fly. In his arm, she felt an ease she never had before.
Nothing had ever felt so right.
She clung to him and they stayed as they were with only Asher speaking, whispering one assurance after another.
“I’ll never let anyone hurt you again.”
“I’ll protect you.”
“Ask what it is you would have of me and it is yours.”
She wanted nothing more than what she was gaining at this very moment.
She had to hold herself from acting like a cat and running her cheek against him. Even that seemed right to her.
With her face still against him, she opened her eyes and noticed they were not alone.
Valiant stood at the door, silently watching them. The light behind her shadowed her expression.
Everly felt Asher stiffen and then tighten his arms yet again, forbidding her to move.
Forbidding her? He didn’t have to, since she had no plans to part with the treasure that she’d found. Asher’s arms were worth more than their weight in gold.
Valiant turned away without a word, her silent steps disappearing down the hall.
Everly closed her eyes and decided she could have stayed where she was forever, but then it was hard to ignore the evidence of Asher’s arousal.
She leaned away and felt her cheeks inflamed.
“My apologies. It is natural for men to...” He was smiling, and she realized just how much she loved it. He did so far too sparingly and usually only when they were alone.
Were his smiles only for her?
“You do this to me,” he confessed. “But I’ll not ask you for more than you’ve given me tonight. I vow it.”
She touched his lips. They were soft underneath her hand. “Make no more such vows to me. I’ll no longer accept them.”
His eyes darkened. “Whatever you want.” His hands went to her hair, curling his fingers against her scalp, sending jolts of sensation down her limbs.
He was a man free of his vow, a wild beast set loose of his cage, able to stalk and claim.
She gripped his side and stepped closer.
Asher leaned over her. “What do you need of me?”
Heat curled underneath her skin. Her body seemed to vibrate with awareness.
Did she dare ask for what she wanted?
She’d never thought a man like Asher would extend a woman any sense of control, yet he did it without blinking an eye.
“Kiss me.”
Again, the words were barely past her lips before he was upon her. Hands and lips did as they pleased and elicited soft moans from the back of her throat.
This was nothing like their moment in the tree. Asher didn’t hold back. His kiss was an assault on her senses, obliterating her ability to think.
His fingers bit into her hair and forced her head back. She gasped as her mouth fell open and his tongue wandered past her lips and teeth. She tasted his coffee and thought the flavor better with his essence.
It was a kiss like none she’d ever had, and she knew it was because Asher was a man like none she’d ever known.
His every breath was labored, and she could feel small tremors leave his body. “You have no idea what you do to me.” He bit her lip and groaned.
She moaned, unable to think, much less breathe to form words. Everly had never felt more adored or more possessed by a man or his kiss.<
br />
Everly was both physically and mentally dominated by Asher, yet while it was he who took the lead, she sensed his lack of control. There was a wildness in the way he explored her. His breath was as erratic as her heartbeat.
She’d never seen the duke this way and was sure very few before her had—if ever.
He managed to pull away just before Everly gained the courage to ask for more. To beg for it.
Asher buried his face in her throat, each breath seeming pained.
She wrapped her arms around him and ran her finger through his short curls, finding the texture soft. He continued to tremble as he reined himself in and it hit her again that it was she who’d done this to him, brought this wondrous man nearly to his knees.
And he cared for her.
She smiled and kissed his throat, the only part of him she could reach, while she continued to soothe him.
He held her in a vise grip, but slowly he loosened and pulled away, though his arms never truly left her.
He was smiling, blushing actually. “Forgive me. I can never manage to be myself when I’m with you.” His eyes flashed, and he seemed surprised by the confession.
Everly felt something break within herself. Her eyes burned with an emotion she didn’t think had a name, but it felt good. Sweet. She laughed.
She realized it was the wrong thing to do when he looked away.
She pressed her fingers to her lips and found them to be swollen. “I don’t believe either of us is much ourselves around the other.”
His gaze softened. He lifted a hand and caressed her cheek. “Or perhaps…” He let his hand fall away.
His unspoken words rested between them. Everly guessed at what he’d been about to say and was glad he’d not finished.
Did he believe she showed her true self with him? And him with her? She prayed not. She was completely uncomfortable with the way she came apart in his arms. When he touched her, she became like clay in his hands, yielding to him.
She’d almost begged him not to stop, to go further.
To be her first lover.
∫ ∫ ∫
2 5
Everly had been overtaken with lust for him, though she knew it was more than that.
The Perfect Duke (Valiant Love) (A Regency Romance Book) Page 12
