Kiss of a Duke

by Erica Ridley

  Devil take it, he didn’t want two nights with this woman. He wanted all the nights. Now unto infinity.

  He dropped his head into his hands and groaned. He was in love, damn it all. And he only had two days left in Christmas. Time was disappearing fast.

  He was going to have to tell her.

  His legs shook as he jumped from the stool. Declaring himself to a woman was possibly the most terrifying undertaking he had ever attempted in his life, but Penelope was worth it. His heart thumped. They were a good match. She had to feel it, too.

  He retrieved two molds from a hidden shelf. This was his gift. He had made them for her, and this was the perfect moment to deliver them. He cracked open the molds and carefully withdrew two glass figurines.

  Turtledoves. One-of-a-kind, just like Penelope. Delicate to the eye. Stronger than they looked. The perfect gift to bring when informing a woman that one had fallen in love with her.

  He hoped.

  His muscles twitched. He’d never been in such a position. No one had ever loved him, chosen him, wanted him to stay. He knew not to expect too much.

  But Penelope was worth the risk. What they were building was real. Not some temporary distraction, but a relationship based on mutual respect, honesty, and the sheer joy of each other’s company. Only a fool would walk away without trying to make it last.

  He set the birds down just long enough to put the smithy to rights, then started for the road.

  To label himself nervous would be a gross understatement. Penelope was clever. If she returned his affection, he would be vindicated. If she didn’t… Then he supposed he really was the shallow, otherwise useless rake he had always pretended to be.

  He tilted the top of his head into the wind and strode faster. The one thing that scared him more than rejection was missing the opportunity to try.

  She was stepping onto her front stoop just as he turned up her walk.

  His insides warmed, and an involuntary smile curved his lips. The sight of her always made him happy. He could not fathom where she might have been at this hour of the morning.

  He caught up with her as she was about to shut the door.

  She did not move aside. Or invite him in. Or smile.

  “You said one night,” she stammered. “It’s daytime.”

  Not the most auspicious start. He pressed on anyway.

  “Here,” he said. “I made these for you.”

  Her hands seemed to accept his offering reflexively, rather than out of any particular desire to receive a gift. She did not even glance down to see what it was. “Nicholas—”

  “They’re turtledoves,” he blurted out. So much for his grand romantic gesture. It could not possibly go worse, and he was powerless to solve it. Or stop his mouth from babbling. “Glass figurines. They stand alone, and they can interlock. Turtledoves mate for life.”

  Splendid. Now he sounded like Virginia.

  To his horror, Penelope’s beautiful brown eyes took on a wet sheen. Not in a this-is-so-romantic-I-could-just-cry sort of way, but in a this-is-so-horrible-I-could-just-die sort of way. “Nicholas—”

  “I love you,” he announced, using his last scraps of courage. “That’s what I came to say. Even if you don’t feel the same, I thought you should know.”

  “It’s not love,” she said, her eyes tortured. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

  He tried his best to hide the tornado of disappointment within. There was his answer.

  He was not what she wanted.

  “Very well,” he said despite the swaying in his head. “There’s no need to ask why. I can well imagine.”

  “I don’t think you can. You don’t know the whole truth.” She took a deep breath. “It was me. Rather, it was Duchess. I believed I had perfected a formula that could manipulate male emotion—”

  “You what?” he stammered.

  “—but I couldn’t be certain until I proved it. I needed a test subject in order to run the trials—”

  “A what?” he repeated, taking a jerking step backwards.

  “—and I gave the trial a strict time limit in which to accomplish predetermined tasks.” Her voice cracked as she met his eyes. “The experiment worked beyond my wildest dreams.”

  “It worked?” he repeated, banging a trembling fist to his chest in anger. “You toyed with my heart to prove a theory?”

  “That wasn’t the intended goal.” Her voice cracked. “I only meant to—”

  “I was listening,” he said, not bothering to hide his bitterness. “Your intent was to manipulate my emotions in order to trick me into playing the lovesick swain for your own amusement.”

  “Not amusement,” she said quickly. “Science—”

  He scoffed. “You are very amused by science. Don’t shift the blame.” His hands shook. “I believed you of all people would treat others with unfailing honesty, and you purposefully misled me.”

  “I…” She closed her eyes. “Yes. I did.”

  “It was a game to you.” His heart lurched in humiliation. “See how long it took me to exhibit whatever behaviors you’ve been marking behind my back with your little tally marks.”

  She winced.

  “I’m surprised you didn’t enter your wager in the betting book at White’s,” he said, each word scratchy and raw. “Then everyone could laugh at the silly laboratory specimen who believed he had finally unlocked his cage.”

  She shook her head, cheeks pale. “I never thought of you as a specimen.”

  “Didn’t you?” His voice was empty. “Wasn’t that how you chose me to be an unwitting part of your little experiment? You saw me as a thing instead of a person.”

  He had been such a fool. He’d believed he had found love, but he hadn’t even found a real connection. He was just a research subject. An animal, like any other. Useful for a brief moment, then dumped back in the wild.

  It had been a farce all along.

  He should have known better. Of course she didn’t love him back. Back when she’d selected him for a laboratory experiment, the one true thing she had told him was that she didn’t believe in love. His useless heart banged against his ribs.

  It didn’t matter how real the past fortnight felt to him. To her… it wasn’t. This was nothing more than the successful conclusion of a routine perfume trial. His chest tightened. She could skip back to her laboratory and concoct another potion, but he was done being part of her tests.

  “I don’t love you, then,” he said hollowly. “As it happens, I don’t even know you.”

  He spun around on stiff legs and strode as fast as he could from her door.

  Chapter 15

  Penelope hurried off her front stoop after Nicholas, but he was already heading back out in the street. Her chest ached at the damage she’d caused. He had deserved to know the truth, but she hadn’t meant to hurt him.

  “Wait,” she called out. “Nicholas, please stop! Where are you going?”

  “To fetch my belongings,” he said without turning around. “I’m done here.”

  He did not slow down.

  She forced herself not to chase him. She had no right to. Although she knew her own feelings were real, his interest had been caused by chemical compounds designed to manipulate him.

  His affection was a mirage, no matter how much Penelope might wish otherwise. He had deserved to know the truth. She just hadn’t expected it to hurt this much.

  In one single moment, Penelope had destroyed everything. The haunted look in his eyes when she’d told him it was all a farce…

  Her heart had broken along with his. She swore under her breath. Duchess had caused nothing but damage.

  No. Penelope had achieved it herself.

  She loved Nicholas, yet she had used him and hurt him. She deserved to lose him.

  Penelope trudged back out into the street, not to chase him to the castle, but to allow him free will. She turned her leaden feet in the opposite direction.

  Gloria’s maid answered her d
oor and allowed Penelope back inside without question. Less than an hour had passed. It felt as though she had spent it in a hell of her own making.

  Penelope plodded into the observatory on heavy limbs and stood out of the way of the telescope. She hadn’t come to talk. She just didn’t want to be alone right now. Her home was too full of memory of Nicholas. Back when he thought he loved her.

  Gloria was cleaning her telescope with a cotton rag. “I thought you were going to stay in your laboratory for the rest of your life.”

  “My life is over,” Penelope said wearily. “Thanks to me.”

  Gloria turned from the telescope and squinted in Penelope’s direction. “What are you carrying?”

  “Turtledoves.” Penelope clutched them to her chest. “They stand alone but fit together.”

  Gloria’s eyes widened. “May I see?”

  Penelope forced herself to relinquish the precious figurines.

  “These are incredible.” Gloria’s eyes lit with wonder. “What an ingenious way to interlock the two. Where did you buy them? I want a pair, too.”

  Of course she would. The only thing Gloria loved more than the stars were mechanical puzzles. When the heavens were too cloudy for sky gazing, she spent long hours with her grand orrery, a mechanical device rotating a model of all eight planets. Gloria claimed she used it to unlock the mysteries in the sky.

  Unfortunately, Penelope could offer no puzzle to solve. Everything was devastatingly, humiliatingly clear.

  “The doves were a gift from Nicholas.” Right before she’d informed him he was an unwilling participant in a chemistry experiment. She was surprised he hadn’t taken them back and smashed them.

  Gloria set down her cleaning rag. “If you still refuse to believe in love because ‘it’s not visible to the naked eye,’ I’d say these doves are indisputably tangible evidence.”

  “I made a mistake.” Penelope’s shoulders slumped. “Duchess inflated my confidence, and I used misplaced pride to cause nothing but harm.”

  “‘Misplaced’ is right.” Gloria put a hand on her hip. “Your perfume didn’t help your confidence at all. Your only faith was in chemical compounds, when you should have had it in yourself.”

  “I am now incredibly confident in my ability to destroy the best thing that ever happened to me,” Penelope assured her. “I interrupted a declaration of love to tell him it wasn’t real. Now he’s gone.”

  “Do you remember why you two argued when you first met?” Gloria asked after a moment. “What did you tell me?”

  “That Saint Nick was on a mission to stop Duke,” Penelope said with a bitter smile. She’d been so sanctimonious. “That the gallant rake feared confused, hapless women would find themselves leg-shackled to all the wrong men.”

  Gloria crossed her arms. “And what did you say to that argument?”

  Penelope sighed. “I told him women aren’t hapless. Duke starts the conversation. Women decide where it goes.”

  “Listen close,” Gloria said. “Men aren’t hapless either. He chose you. Not your scent. The whole package.”

  Hope pricked Penelope’s heart. Might it be true? Could Duchess have worked as designed, yet not have manipulated the final outcome?

  “You have to trust,” Gloria said softly. “Have faith that what you feel is right. All sorts of non-verifiable things exist. If a rake can choose love, surely a lady chemist is capable of the same.”

  “I want to believe more than anything,” Penelope whispered. “But it would truly be a miracle. The chemical compounds used in Duchess—”

  “Are you wearing it?” Gloria asked, coming closer.

  Penelope took a step backward. “What?”

  “Are you wearing it right now?” Gloria sniffed behind Penelope’s ears. “You don’t smell like anything but Penelope.”

  Penelope pushed her away. “I washed it off as soon as I realized it had been a mistake. The trial is over. I’ll never wear perfume again.”

  “When did you get rid of it?” Gloria insisted. “Did you pause to have a quick wash-up between accepting his gift and breaking his heart?”

  “Of course not,” Penelope said, exasperated. “If you must have every detail, I scrubbed it off last night before curling into a ball and failing to sleep.”

  Gloria grinned. “Then you weren’t wearing it.”

  “What?” Penelope stammered.

  “You weren’t contaminated with your evil perfume.” Gloria lifted her chin in triumph. “When he declared himself to you, Duchess was out of smell range. You were talking to the real Nicholas.”

  Penelope sniffed both wrists, then stared at Gloria.

  “Duchess started the conversation,” Gloria reminded her. “You had the power to finish it.”

  The power to ruin it, rather.

  “It happened too fast. This was my first kiss, my first sexual encounter, my first—”

  “Your first time glancing up from your notes,” Gloria put in dryly. “You never came out of your laboratory. Not completely. Eligible gentlemen could leer at you all day long and you wouldn’t notice. Until Duchess gave you a reason to start.”

  That… sounded uncomfortably accurate.

  Penelope had done everything in her power to block herself off from the outside world. She hadn’t realized just how well she had succeeded.

  “He said he doesn’t love me.” Penelope’s chest tightened with shame. “That he didn’t know me at all. He’s already gone.”

  Her heart cracked. She’d managed to realize both her worst fears at once.

  Love was real.

  And she’d lost it.

  Chapter 16

  Nicholas attempted to enter his guest chamber without being spotted. In his current mood, he had no wish to converse with anyone, much less pretend to feel carefree and flirtatious.

  Unfortunately, the door to his brother’s chamber across the corridor was ajar, and Nicholas’s arrival did not go unnoticed.

  Before Nicholas even had a chance to ring for a footman to load his trunks into his carriage, Chris was standing in the doorway.

  “Have you been to the roof of the castle?” he asked. “I have to fix my telescope. The view is astonishing.”

  “I’m leaving,” Nicholas said. There was no sense keeping it from his brother. Nicholas’s accelerated departure worked out in Chris’s favor.

  His brother frowned. “You have until tomorrow. Why would you leave early? This village is positively brimming with comely young ladies.”

  “I don’t care about them,” Nicholas muttered.

  His brother stepped into the room and lowered his voice. “Is it the lady chemist?”

  Nicholas did not respond.

  His brother’s mouth fell open. “Never say you’ve developed an infatuation!”

  “It doesn’t matter what I feel.” Nicholas shrugged. “She was never interested in a lasting relationship. I was a convenient subject upon which to test the efficacy of her new perfume.”

  Chris raised his brows. “How exactly did the lady test you?”

  Nicholas glared back at him stonily.

  “Let me see if I understand.” Chris came closer, stroking his chin as if deep in thought. “The individual in question slept with a willing partner, on precisely one occasion, with no inclination or promise, spoken or otherwise, to continue interaction after the deed was done?”

  Nicholas crossed his arms.

  “You got raked and don’t like it.” Chris’s eyes lit with mirth. “She ‘Saint Penelope’ed you.”

  Sometimes, Nicholas wanted nothing more than to throttle his brother.

  “You cannot possibly be angry with her over it,” Chris said in disbelief. “Do unto others, and all that. Weren’t you always worried that someday a woman would agree to one night and not really mean it? Penelope meant it. Huzzah.”

  “It’s worse than that. One night was what I wanted, too.” Nicholas sighed. “Until I didn’t.”

  Chris stared at him for a long moment, all humor
gone. “You fell in love?”

  Nicholas shrugged. “She didn’t. So, it doesn’t matter.”

  Chris stepped forward, his initial humor now replaced by wonder. “Good God. I never thought you’d fall before me.”

  “I never thought I’d fall at all.” Nicholas scowled. “The landing is hell.”

  Chris reached out. “Nick, I’m sorry. Do you want me to—”

  “No.” Nicholas clenched his jaw tight and turned away before his brother could touch him.

  He didn’t want Chris’s pity. He wanted to be as far away as possible.

  It wasn’t the village of Christmas he was running from, but stacks of warm biscuits placed by the fire. Afternoons side-by-side on stools in her laboratory or in the kitchen. Laughing at private jokes. Their hands touching as they kneaded a bowl of dough. Heated kisses that tasted of spice and sugar. The scent of her skin. The softness of her hair.

  The finality in her tone when she admitted his time with her had been a test trial that had now concluded. She didn’t need him anymore.

  “Where will you go?” his brother asked, his voice concerned. “Home?”

  “My workshop,” Nicholas answered.

  “What about London?” his brother insisted. “Parties. Dancing. Other women.”

  Nicholas shook his head. “You warned me one day I would become too old to be a rake, and now that day is here.”

  “I said that two weeks ago,” Chris pointed out. “You’ve barely aged a fortnight. I understand that rejection hurts. You don’t have to be a rake, but you’re too young to become a hermit.”

  Nicholas lifted his head with interest. “What is the minimum age? I hear the Weld family constructed a lovely hermitage on their country pile.”

  “You shall not take a post as a garden hermit,” Chris said firmly. “You do realize the position requires you not just to live alone, but to avoid all contact with others.”

  “Exactly.” Nicholas nodded. “The answer to a prayer.”