“What the bloody hell are you doing?” he repeated, this time more loudly, his hands shaking at his sides and his voice cracking.
She moved out from behind his desk. “I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I shouldn’t have pried.”
He strode toward her in three long steps and stopped just before her. He made no attempt to touch her, but stared down at her, his eyes wide and wild. “No, you shouldn’t have. I have strict instructions that this room be left alone. No servant is to enter—”
“I’m not a servant, Alexander,” she interrupted, placing a hand on his forearm. He jerked it away, and tears filled her eyes at the expression of pain and betrayal on his face. “I’m…I’m your lover, aren’t I? Bargain or no.”
“I’m paying you for your time, Marianne,” he snapped, pacing away from her toward his desk, resting both hands on the top. “You are a servant.”
She flinched at both his cruel words and the harsh tone with which he said them, but she recognized his reaction for what it was. This was an attempt to push her away, and a great part of her wanted to allow just that. To turn and walk away from his harshness, from his pain, because it was so big and all-encompassing. If she explored it, she knew it would bind them even more than making love to him had.
But a bigger part of her knew she had to stay. Over the short time they’d known each other, she had begun to…care for this man. His gentleness toward her, his quiet intelligence…they drew her in. They had made her do this foolish thing of intruding upon him.
She wouldn’t walk away now.
“I would have simply asked you about your…your past, your feelings, but I knew you wouldn’t tell me anything, for you never do,” she explained.
He spun toward her, his eyes flashing. “So you invade my privacy and the privacy of my dead sister to get what you want?”
“It was wrong of me to do so, and I apologize. I only want to understand you,” she pleaded softly. “I want to understand what kind of man is so capable of gentleness and passion, of kindness to his servants and of such a broad base of knowledge, but is the same kind who locks himself away in a castle like he is a beast who must be caged.”
He shook his head. “That is the most apt description I have ever heard,” he said. “And if you were wise, you would walk away now before that beast is unleashed.”
She swallowed hard, his warning ringing in her ears and his anger making her hands shake. But then she straightened her shoulders, took a step toward him instead of away and said, “No.”
Alexander stared, his rage and pain muted momentarily by the strength Marianne presented. She stood toe to toe with him, the only indication that she was afraid was the slight tremble to her lower lip. And she shook her head slowly.
“I won’t leave you, Alexander,” she whispered. “You won’t chase me away.”
Deep inside, in a place he thought he had killed a long time ago, something in him broke. Pain spread through him, pain and heartache and desire for the connection she offered just by staying instead of running away. He had been alone for so very long and this woman…this woman made him want a different life. One he didn’t deserve, hadn’t earned, one he couldn’t have.
Could he?
“What did you read?” he asked, his voice as ragged as his emotions.
She didn’t break her stare from his as she said, “Just the last two lines your sister wrote. That she wished you would be more prudent in your affairs. That she wished you would come home and see her.”
Alexander almost buckled under the weight of those two sentences. He had read his sister’s diary a hundred times since her death, smiling at her girlish dreams and flowing descriptions of her life. Aching as she talked about the beginnings of an illness that would soon steal her away.
Breaking at those last two lines she’d ever written. They labeled him as exactly what he was: a monster. He’d carried that truth with him for years. It was the reason why he hid, far beyond the scar that marred him.
“You shouldn’t have done it,” he said, but most of the heat had gone out of his rage.
Marianne moved toward him another step, and this time when she touched him he didn’t have the ability to pull away. Her fingers closed over his forearm and she touched his cheek with her other hand.
“I shouldn’t have,” she agreed. “But I did. And I’m not sorry that I want to understand you more. Haven’t you been alone long enough?”
He flinched. “I deserve to be alone, Marianne. God, I never should have brought you here. Wanting you took me off guard and I should have known it would end like this. I shouldn’t have allowed myself…” He swallowed hard. “…you.”
“Tell me what happened,” she pressed, her fingers stroking along the ridge of his scar, gentle, just as she was gentle. “Please.”
The pain spread, like a fist opening in his chest, and he nearly buckled from it. He’d controlled it so long that now it felt overwhelming, like waves on an ocean that could no longer be repelled by a sea wall. A hurricane that would wash away all that he was and all that he had pretended to be all these years.
“She was sick,” he began, closing his eyes as tears stung there. “She was sick and I should have come home. I didn’t think it was serious, though, and I…I was doing something I shouldn’t have done.”
She was quiet a moment, then her thumb smoothed over his lower lip. He opened his eyes and her green stare held his, soothing him like a walk in a cool wood. “What were you doing?” she asked.
He held his breath. He had never spoken of his deeds. He had never said out loud what had brought him here. And yet this woman coaxed so many emotions from him. So many things he had promised himself he would never feel again.
And he found himself saying the words.
“I was engaged in an affair with a married woman,” he admitted, watching her face for a reaction of horror or anger or fear. There was none, only empathy. “Her husband found out and challenged me to a duel. I was supposed to leave for home that day, to see Anne. Instead, I faced him on the field of honor.”
Her eyes went wide. “So, you—you were shot?”
He shook his head. “No, I shot him in the shoulder, disarming him. And I was so damned cocky. Such a bastard. I strode up to that man, happy to gloat over my victory. It turned out he had a knife.”
She recoiled momentarily. “Oh, Alexander.”
“He cut me.” He turned his face so his scar faced her. “He nearly took my eye. In the end, he just managed to make me as ugly on the outside as I was inside. He was wrestled to the ground by his second and I was rushed off, bleeding and damaged. I couldn’t leave London for a week as they tended the wounds. By the time I did…”
She flinched. “She was…”
He nodded. “When I arrived home, she was no longer conscious. She died in my arms without ever knowing I’d returned. Without ever speaking another word to me or hearing my voice.”
He bent his head and a drop of water hit his hand. He stared at it, realizing for the first time that he was crying. He had never wept, not when Anne died. Not since. He hadn’t allowed himself that luxury, and yet now the tears slid down his cheeks and burned his skin.
“Alexander,” Marianne whispered as she moved to wrap her arms around him.
For a moment, he allowed that comfort, pulling his arms around her as he leaned against her, the only thing holding him up. The only person for years to crack through his mask.
“I’m so sorry,” she soothed, her hands moving gently across his back. “I’m so sorry that happened to you.”
He opened his eyes and swallowed back his tears. With great difficulty, he extracted himself from her embrace and stepped away. He stared down at her, fighting to put his mask, his façade back in place.
“Nothing happened to me, Marianne,” he said. “I created the hell I live in. I choose to stay outside of the world because I no longer merit a place in it thanks to my actions. Those actions were my fault and I dese
rve to be alone. Now I want you to go.”
Her eyes went wide and her lips parted. “Alexander,” she began.
He pointed at the door. “Please,” he said, his tone a bit too loud. “I want you to go. Now.”
He thought for a moment that she would resist. Refuse. He tensed at the idea, for if she touched him again, offered him what he didn’t deserve, he knew he would take it. He’d never let it or her go.
At last, she nodded slowly. “If that is what you need, I’ll go,” she said softly, and moved for the door. There she paused and turned back toward him. “She wouldn’t want for you to live in such pain and such loneliness. You betray her as much by the choices you make now as by what you did back then.”
Those were her last words before she stepped from his study, closing him back into the room alone. Leaving her words to hang in the air and in his heart and mind, where they tortured him.
Chapter Ten
Marianne had not seen Alexander for three days. He hadn’t joined her for supper, he hadn’t taken her to his bed, he hadn’t even come out of his office. And she had no idea what to do. He had asked her to leave and now she wondered if he meant his home and his life, not just the room where he’d confessed so much pain to her.
Leave. That word had been ringing in her ears every moment since. Her mind was a cacophony of thoughts at all times. Where would she go? How would she survive? How would she protect her sister? But most of all, loudest amongst the fray, was how would she do without what she’d found here with Alexander? She craved being near him now, not just for the physical connection they shared, but for what he hid beneath his cold exterior.
If she was forced to walk away, she knew she would leave a piece of herself behind.
With a moan, she pushed her uneaten breakfast aside and put her head in her hands.
“Pardon me.”
She lifted her face as Alexander stepped into the room. He was dressed impeccably, shaved and bathed, like their time apart had never happened. But there was something in his face, a new expression that she recognized now. Because she’d seen past the mask.
“I’ll leave you alone,” he began as he backed toward the hallway.
“No!” she said, leaping to her feet. “Oh, no, please don’t go. I haven’t seen you in so long. Won’t you…won’t you join me?”
He hesitated, his blue eyes flitting over her from head to toe, his longing for her clear in his expression, but tempered by a wariness that hadn’t been there before.
She’d put it there by her actions, by her prying.
“In truth, I’m not hungry,” he said.
She stepped forward. “Then take a walk with me,” she suggested. “I’ve done some exploring on this beautiful property, but to have a guide who has lived here all his life would be a pleasure.” He seemed to consider the suggestion a moment, and she moved even closer. “Please.”
Softness entered his expression and at last he nodded. “Very well. A walk would likely do me good. I’ve been cooped up too long.”
“Then lead the way,” she said, motioning for the door. She wanted desperately to take his hand, but resisted. He was obviously struggling with what their relationship now was after their last encounter. The last thing she wanted to do was push him too hard.
She’d done that enough.
He walked out the front door and down the steps, then turned toward the long drive. She fell into step beside him, and for a while they were silent, the only sound their footfalls and the calls of birds as Marianne and Alexander moved away from the main house and down into the wooded area that surrounded it.
“Your family has held this property a long time,” she said, searching for a safe topic. “And you obviously take a great deal of pride in your duties here.”
He cast her a side glance. “Yes, I do. How do you know that?”
She shrugged. “I see it in the way you interact with those who serve you. And I noted that the pages of the books in your study that are about the surrounding area were well-worn from use.”
His mouth tightened a bit at the reminder that she’d intruded upon his space, but he didn’t draw away. Instead, he let out a long breath. “My father was a good man. Distant, but serious about his duties. I did not always follow in his footsteps, I fear. My sister encouraged me to do better, long before her death. So for the past five years, I’ve dedicated myself, and there have been dividends.”
They crested a hill, and Marianne caught her breath. Down below was a wide, green valley with a twisting creek that fed into a calm pond.
“It’s lovely,” she said. “I haven’t come this way before, so I’ve never found this.”
He smiled. “Then I’m pleased to be the first to show you. This was my favorite spot as a boy. I fished here, I swam, I laid out in the sun and dreamed.”
He took her hand at last as he helped her down the steep side of the hill toward the water. She clung to his fingers, feeling their warmth and strength and longing for more, even though she knew she couldn’t ask for it at present.
“What did you dream about?” she asked.
He released her as they reached the bottom of the hill and his frown pulled down. She had gone too far, without even meaning to and she rushed to repair the damage.
“We all have dreams, don’t we? As a girl, I had my own,” she said. “Funny how they change as one grows older.”
He led her to the edge of the lake, to a bench that had been placed beneath a tree there. As he motioned her to sit with him, he said, “What did you dream of as a girl?”
She hesitated. Pushing him on his past was one thing, but now that the tables had been turned, she felt anxiety rise in her chest. Still, as she looked at him, his expression taut and drawn, she knew that she owed him a glimpse of herself, as payment for the glimpse she had taken against his will a few days earlier.
Perhaps that was the only way to work out whatever was between them. With honesty. Stark honesty she had been avoiding for a very long time.
“I wanted the things all girls are trained to desire,” she said, looking out over the water so she wouldn’t have to see his reaction. “A marriage, a home…children. I never thought to dream of anything else.”
“But those dreams did not come true,” Alexander said. “Though I don’t know why. You’re beautiful and clever, gentle, and the kind of lady most men would be proud to call a wife. Why didn’t you get what you desired?”
She sucked in a breath. “The world is talking about my father right now. About his stealing from his peers. They love that story, it feeds their sense of self-worth, makes them feel like they climbed over him on a ladder to the top of the ton.” She shook her head. “But it isn’t the only story.”
Alexander leaned his arm on the back on the bench, his fingers gently caressing her bare neck. “What other story is there?”
She shivered with the brush of his hand and fought for focus. “My father had so many vices—the stealing is only the worst of it. He whored. He gambled too much and he was terrible at the sport. He lost far more money than he ever won. So by the time I came out I…had no dowry. Add to that the fact that I feared leaving my sister in his care and I didn’t exactly encourage any man who might have had an interest.”
Alexander shook his head. “You feared he would hurt your sister?”
“Not physically,” she rushed to say. “He loved her, just as he loved me, in his own way. He just had no capacity to protect us. I learned that long, long ago. I didn’t want Juliet to have to learn the same lesson.” She bent her head. “I failed, though. She’s learning it now, regardless of how hard I tried to avoid that.”
Alexander leaned forward, cupping her chin and tilting her face toward his. “You are sacrificing all you are, all you wanted, for her. One day she’ll recognize that and I hope she will appreciate it.” He searched her face, his expression suddenly filled with understanding. “Do you regret what you’ve done for her?”
Marianne swallowed hard. His expression was so intent, it pulled her in. They were one in that moment, two people joined not by sex, but by the pain they endured. They were linked by that and by the fact that they each wanted to ease the other’s suffering. And by being together, somehow they did.
She shivered at that thought and all it meant. “Are you asking if I regret coming here, being with you?”
He nodded. “Yes.”
She leaned up, feeling his warmth and strength surround her even before he held her in his arms. She brushed her lips against his and whispered, “No. I don’t regret it. I will never regret it, Alexander, never.”
He let out a long, shuddering sigh and then his mouth moved over hers. He was gentle at first, the kiss a balm on her wounds, perhaps a balm on his own. But as she slid her hands up his chest, wrapped her arms around his neck, the intensity of the kiss increased and the heat between them did the same.
He drew her over into his lap and she felt the evidence of his desire for her as his erection pressed hard into her hip. She smiled, for his need for her was exactly what she wanted. She needed him, too. She wanted to have him, right here, right now, and let his touch erase the rest of the pain she had brought to the surface when she spoke of her father.
His hands began to roam as he kissed her, brushing over her breasts, down her hips. He shifted her, and suddenly she was straddling him, her dress tangled between them and her sex pressed hard against his cock. She lifted into him, cupping his cheeks as the kiss between them deepened and began to spiral out of control.
He pushed at her dress, lifting it up, bunching it around her waist, and she responded by reaching between them to unfasten his trouser front. She pulled the fall away and broke the kiss to look down at his erection. She smiled as she stroked him once, twice, feeling him twitch in her hand, hearing him groan with pleasure.
He cupped her backside, which was now bared to the warm summer breeze, and lifted her, positioning her over his cock. They locked eyes, and she never broke the gaze as she lowered herself down onto him, filling her body with him. Feeling her heart and her soul filled by him, too.
Stealing The Duke Page 8
