by Eva Devon
“That bad, is it?” he asked, dread pooling in his stomach.
Her lips carved into a frown. “Worse, I think.”
Well, then, there it was. Nothing could be done now but the only thing he would do…which of course, was the right thing.
But first, he’d charge up the stairs and put on a pair of his own damned breeches.
Chapter Three
“Mama, we must leave immediately,” Georgiana said, her heart racing.
Panic laced through her gut as she held herself back from grabbing her mother’s gloved hand to make a dash for the coach. Like her mother, she was made of strong stuff. She wouldn’t go to pieces. But it was difficult knowing a wave of gossip that would ruin her entire family was about to be unleashed.
How could she have been such a fool?
Her mother turned to her, the simple but well made frock of deepest rose skimming her lovely frame. Slowly, she waved her ivory painted fan, smiling strangely at her daughter’s abrupt proclamation. “Whatever can you mean, Georgiana? Don’t be absurd. Your sister is dancing with the Earl of Deptford.”
“Mama!” Georgiana exclaimed, before she gulped back a storm of words. She forced herself to mirror her mother’s composure. Everyone would be staring soon enough; she needn’t cause a scene now. “You don’t understand. We must leave immediately. I cannot tell you what catastrophe is about to unfold.”
Her mother snapped her fan shut and turned to her with fresh concern. “Catastrophe?” she echoed with veiled alarm. “I do not comprehend, what are you saying? Explain at once, Georgiana.”
“Mama, I may be ruined,” Georgiana whispered, her eyes burning as her throat tightened. Dear God, the shame of it! With one exceptionally poor, though pleasurable, decision, she had placed her mother, father, and sisters on an unalterable course.
Oh why the blazes hadn’t she just endured the ballroom? No social awkwardness she’d have encountered could compare to this irreversible mess.
“Ruined?” her mother said, her face paling with horror. “Come immediately and tell me what this is about.”
Her mother pulled her deftly but gently through the crush of people. There was a titter of gossip beginning at one end of the room, and Georgiana could barely breathe. That gossip was about her. It had to be, what else could it be?
Her mother whisked her behind a particularly tall potted tree and faced her with kind, loving eyes that had never once been filled with recrimination. Even now, they were worried, not full of anger.
That kind look nearly undid Georgiana, but there was no escaping the truth.
“Mama”—Georgiana swallowed—“I’ve done something truly terrible.”
And she hated to say it was terrible, for she had enjoyed it so much. But now it felt as if it had been an utter debacle. For what? To keep a chair? To be defiant? To tangle with an intriguing man?
That moment of boldness was going to cost her everything. More to the point, it would cost her family everything if the duke chose.
“What have you done?” her mother prompted firmly but without censure.
Georgiana licked her lips and gathered her courage. “The Duke of Thornfield and I…kissed.”
Her mother blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“I kissed the Duke of—”
“No, no, I heard you,” she said over her, “but how is that even possible, Georgiana? You have not had chance to meet him yet.”
She grimaced. “If you must know, I was in his private library. Alone.”
Her mother’s face turned deathly white. “Tell me you were not.”
This was far more painful than the judgment of any stranger.
“I know you’ve warned me about wandering off, but I couldn’t bear to be in this ballroom any longer.”
“And now you might be ruined,” her mother surmised quietly. Her brow furrowed and suddenly she rasped, “My God, your sisters. Whatever will we do?”
“I don’t know, Mama,” she replied honestly. She darted a look to the crowd that was beginning to whisper rather loudly. Georgiana’s stomach twisted; her escapades were about to be the choice gossip of the evening. She placed a hand to her forehead. Actually, she’d likely be gossip of the year and a warning to other young ladies for a decade. Gerogiana squeezed her mother’s hand. “We must leave.”
She nodded, but as she cast her gaze about, she looked at a loss. “Your father is in the next room, and your sisters are all dancing. However shall we get them off the floor before—”
“Miss Georgiana Bly?” a shrill voice cried out. “You cannot possibly be serious. She is as plain as they come.”
Georgiana cringed and closed her eyes for a brief moment, as if she could block out the nightmare of it all.
They would not be able to escape so easily. It was done unless the duke rescued her. Now she and her family would be shamed for her behavior. In that instant, she realized what it meant to be at the mercy of a man’s whim. And oh how she hated it. But she couldn’t blame him. Not entirely. She had chosen that kiss just as much as he had.
The voices continued from the other side of the plant.
“Oh, yes,” another lady said. “It is quite true. The Duke of Thornfield had his hands upon her back. His mouth upon her lips. It is going to be the scandal of the season. The girl must be an absolute trollop.”
A trollop.
Her mother clutched Georgiana’s hand tighter, her eyes widening with shock. “My God, that I should see the day when one of my daughters would be labeled thus. And it is not true. He must’ve taken advantage of you.”
She sighed. She wouldn’t lie. “He did not. I was quite a willing participant.”
“Well, I am glad he did not harm you,” her mother said firmly. “You have always been the adventurous type, and I have liked you for it, but I worry this is going to prove an adventure too far.”
Georgiana bit the inside of her cheek, unable to reply. She knew it to be true, but there was nothing she could do about it now. She only wished…
She only wished she was not dragging her family down into the mire with her.
“Please,” Georgiana urged, “let us gather everyone and go.”
The beautiful string orchestra came to a stop.
“Now is our chance,” she hissed.
But instead of the room filling the silence with more conversation, a hushed murmur fell over the crowd, and then a voice she had only just come to know boomed out. “Ladies and gentlemen,” said the duke, “I have an announcement to make. Please lift your champagne glasses.”
Servants were making their way in an artful pattern all about the room, passing out flutes of champagne with a grace and speed that would have outdone the finest dancers at the Royal Opera, something she had only seen once as a little girl.
What could the duke possibly be celebrating after such a horrid interchange?
Her mother locked hands with her, their eyes meeting.
“You must be strong, Georgiana,” she said. “Whatever is about to happen, you must be strong. It is the only way we shall survive this.”
Georgiana gave a tight but terrified nod. Her mother was no fool and never had been. Somehow, she had survived the various machinations of their father and silliness of him over the years. Her mother had been her rock.
So now she must be just like her. A rock, unbroken in a tumultuous stream.
“Miss Georgiana Bly?” the duke called out, his voice rich and deep as it cut through the room. “My darling, please come.”
My darling?
The whole evening had taken on a tinge of madness. Surely, it was all some impossible dream? This couldn’t be happening to her, Miss Georgiana Bly from Green Crossing, who had spent her entire life in the small society of a town on the edge of a Yorkshire Dale?
The world spun into absolute stillness, as the entir
e company seemed to take a collective breath, waiting for her to appear.
Even though logically she knew this was no dream, no nightmare, she couldn’t countenance that what was about to take place was real. Her body hummed in the silence that stretched over the ballroom, a ballroom packed with Yorkshire’s finest society and the elites of the English peerage.
Her mother gave her a little nudge. “Go,” she mouthed.
Georgiana nearly jumped, and then she was walking out from behind the plant. The crowd parted like the Red Sea, and she found herself moving straight toward the towering Duke of Thornfield.
Good God, he was handsome…but austere. His eyes cut through the crowd like blades. Dark hair fell over his sharp features, a gesture that should have been boyish but made him appear rugged.
There was nothing particularly inviting about him now, but somehow she still felt drawn to him, as if being pulled by an invisible rope. He was as cold as granite, cool as steel. And he looked completely implacable. How was she not a trembling leaf of fear?
Instead she faced the danger of him head on. Once again, his mere presence turned her into someone she hardly recognized. Someone bold and daring and alive.
He held out his broad hand to her, his emerald crest ring winking in the candle light.
She forced herself to take that hand. She slid her fingers along his warm palm. He was offering her his gloved hand, which meant…
He peered down his rather striking nose at her, and whispered, “Turn and face them, if you dare.”
And she did dare.
For what else could she do?
She turned to face the staring crowd of aristocrats and wealthy county people as he held her hand.
“I would like to announce to all of you my engagement to Miss Georgiana Bly,” he declared firmly and without a hint of irony. “I find myself to be the luckiest of fellows. Miss Georgiana is a treasure.”
There was another long silence as everyone took in this news. Blank faces and disbelief so palpable she could have cut it with a knife met his words.
His aunt began applauding first, and soon everyone else had taken up the celebration.
The duke lifted his crystal champagne glass. “Three cheers for Miss Georgiana Bly.”
Everyone did as he did.
Exactly as they were told.
Simply because he had said so.
The room lifted their chargers toward her, and in unison they cried out, “Hip hip hurrah!”
Georgiana was forced to recall the importance of breathing as she took in the daunting announcement. He had not even asked her if she would marry him. He had decided it for both of them. She knew she should be deeply grateful, because, after all, if he had not done so her entire family would be destroyed by the gossip.
But marriage to the Duke of Thornfield? Her?
It was such an upsetting proposition that she couldn’t feel her feet and was certain she’d do something as inelegant as trip upon him any moment.
She forced a smile and inclined her head toward him.
“Pray, do forgive me,” she whispered, trying to imbue the words with the sincere regret she felt.
His eyes narrowed as he replied just under his breath, “Don’t bother. I know this was your plan.”
“It wasn’t,” she hissed with more force than she’d meant, her good will fading.
Dear God, trapped. He thought this her plan? The very idea that she’d attempt to trap any peer, let alone a duke, was laughable! Or at least, it should have been. She was a spinster.
How could she convince him she’d rather join a convent than marry a man of his importance? As long as the convent had a suitable library, of course.
“Please, I don’t like liars,” he warned softly. “I will take you as my wife because I’m not a cad. But your adventures in other people’s libraries will end now, do you understand?”
She gave a tight nod, but she knew she’d have to explain to him soon that she was not a liar, even if events suggested otherwise. Obviously, he had yet to discern her horror at their mutual doom.
“At some point, I shall have to meet your parents,” he stated, as though the very idea was as appealing as catching the plague.
He indicated for the music to begin again, and the orchestra immediately started with a sprightly waltz.
“Come, then, my dear,” he drawled. “I suppose we must show them we are of an accord.”
Without another word, he led her out onto the gleaming, polished floor. His guests stared at them even as they gossiped behind waving fans and gloved hands.
Georgiana had thought the evening couldn’t possibly get any worse, but she was vastly mistaken. For certain, the quickest path to disaster would be a dance. She’d been engaged to a duke for only minutes, and already she was about to make the newssheets for all the wrong reasons.
Chapter Four
“I don’t like to dance,” Georgiana said, eyeing the empty floor as if it might suddenly swallow her up. “I told you this.”
“No, you said you don’t like people. There’s a vast difference,” he insisted.
“I’m not particularly good at dancing, though.” She was tempted to plant her feet and hold back, lest she make a public fool of herself in an already awful situation.
“Neither am I,” he said with a dry, matter-of-fact tone, “so I suppose we shall have to hobble along together.”
She swallowed the growing lump in her suddenly parched throat. “I shall try not to tread on you.”
“Most appreciated,” he said coolly. “I shall endeavor to do the same.”
Once they reached the center of the room, the duke placed his hand on her back, just beneath her shoulder blade, and took up her other hand in his free one.
Their gloves rubbed ever so slightly against each other, a subtle friction. The duke did not look down at her, though. He stared over her head as if she did not exist at all, his face stern.
An acrid taste filled her mouth.
It was a terrible feeling to not exist.
The temptation to stomp on his shining shoe flitted through her. She refrained, of course. But only just. The Duke of Thornfield was such a remarkable human from the hallowed realms of society, and just a few minutes before they had been in the most passionate of embraces.
To have this sort of emptiness between them was bizarre. But then he swayed back and forth in time to the lilting music, and the next thing she knew, they were off around the room.
Quickly, the floor filled with other couples, and the duke led her seamlessly around them with incredible grace and ease.
Georgiana narrowed her eyes up at him, though he didn’t see it.
He was distinctly not a terrible dancer.
He had lied to her on that score, the scoundrel.
Thornfield was most definitely a capable dancer. No, not capable. Powerful. Oh, he might be more efficient than graceful, but he swept her around in huge arcs, his long legs eating up the great distance of the waxed wood floor.
And it was all she could do to catch up with him.
He did not seem to mind or to bother with the fact she was all but scampering along.
No, he simply swept her about in circling patterns, her pale skirts encompassing both their legs. “I do beg your pardon, Your Grace,” she managed as she strained on tiptoe, “but my legs are not as long as yours.”
He did not reply.
And then to her amazement, he lifted her slightly off the ground and took another large step. For one shocking moment her breasts skimmed his hard chest, and once again, that kiss came forefront to her memory.
He was in complete control of her movement.
While it was rather fascinating, the feel of his body and his strength, it was also absolutely irritating. Was this to be her life, then? A rag doll directed by another person?
<
br /> She did not think so. She, for one, would not be having it, and she immediately knew she had better start as she meant to go.
“Your Grace,” she said firmly, determined to be heard, “you are being most rude.”
“I am being rude?” he queried, his voice low.
“Yes, you.” She cocked her head back so she might see more than his cravat. “Could you be so kind as to measure your steps so I am not being whipped about?”
He snapped his crackling gaze down toward hers. Those dark eyes of his were unyielding in their assessment “Whipped about, you say? You mean like me, from bachelorhood to marriage in one moment?”
“If it’s such a hardship, you don’t have to marry me,” she replied.
After all, he had kissed her!
“Don’t I?” he returned, imperious. “If I don’t, your entire family will be ruined. And I will be named a cad. I don’t debauch innocents, you know.”
“Just wives,” she blurted, and then wanted to kick herself. If she weren’t being flung around a ballroom, she might have tried.
He gaped down at her, narrowly avoiding another couple. “I beg your pardon?”
“You debauch wives, but not young ladies,” she clarified. She had no idea why she was being as blunt with him as she was with others. He was not others. He was a duke, but it seemed she was incapable of deference. At least with him, for she could not shake the image of him, muddy breeches, wild hair, and his kiss from her mind.
He arched a dark brow. “Wives cannot be debauched. They choose their own paths.”
“So do young ladies,” she said. “But it was never my intention to let you debauch me. Or do you not recall it was you who offered to kiss me in the first place?”
“Yes, because you would not leave my room,” he ground out. He arced them in great sweeping motions down the length of the floor.
Frustration rattled through her. She would not take the blame in this, not solely. And if he thought she would, he was vastly mistaken. But how could she make herself plain? “I didn’t realize it was your room.”
