“Are you well, My Lady? You look distressed,” he said, reaching out and taking her hand. He lifted it to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to her palm.
The touch of his lips to her skin sent shivers all down her spine. It also gave Sophia the strangest urge to rush forward and beg for a kiss to her lips. She had been longing to know what such a sensation would feel like, and now, after knowing how truly wonderful just his lips on her hand could feel, her curiosity was ignited.
But you can’t. It isn’t proper.
Of course, nothing that had occurred in the last quarter of an hour could, in any dictionary definition of the word, be considered proper.
Sophia had walked into the library upon her return from the park to find the Duke browsing the shelves. She had lingered in the doorway a moment, watching the way his body turned this way and that as he walked from one shelf to another, his head bent over to read the titles.
She had found herself enchanted by the sight of him. She hadn’t realized that she was walking into the room and toward his person until she was nearly right behind him, her breath mere inches away from his neck.
Then he had turned, and some force, whether cosmic or from God himself, had drawn them together in an embrace.
An embrace that had been witnessed by both Lord Montrose and the butler.
No doubt the butler would spread the news to the rest of the staff, and by nightfall Erin would be berating Sophia for being so foolish.
At least Father won’t notice the chatter.
That was a small blessing.
“Lady Sophia?” the Duke said again, his thumb running over the skin of her fingers. “You did not answer me.”
“Oh.” She gave a sheepish laugh. “I…I was lost in thought.”
“Regretful thought?” he asked, looking like he was goading himself for an answer he didn’t quite want to hear.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I could never regret any time spent with you.”
“I feel the same,” he said, the anxiety disappearing from his face with a relieved sigh. “I know I must have endangered your assignation with Lord Montrose, and for that I am sorry. But I must tell you, Lady Sophia. I do not want you to marry him.”
“And why is that?” she asked, hope springing anew within her. Was this it? Was this the moment she had been waiting for these past few weeks? Was he finally going to make his feelings known to her?
“Because I want you to marry me,” he told her with a smile overtaking his face. “I have been infatuated with you from the moment we first met.”
“But you ignored me. For weeks, after that night at Lord Stilton’s,” she said. She was overjoyed with his proclamation, but before she could accept his proposal, she needed answers. She needed to know why he hadn’t sought her out since then, why he had given her the cut direct at the ball the week before.
The Duke winced in response. “Please accept my apologies for my actions these last few weeks. I simply didn’t know what to do. I wanted you so much, My Lady, but I knew you were courting another. And you seemed to be enjoying the Earl’s company. I thought, I thought perhaps you loved him.”
At this, Sophia had to laugh.
“Loved him? I felt nothing of the sort. I simply realized that I was doomed to marry him, and ought to try and make the best of things, since you had not come for me. I can assure you I never felt anything for the Earl. Not even friendship, if I am honest with you. He is a silly gentleman, and was chosen for me by my father. Ours was not to be a romantic partnership, but rather one of fortune and advanced connections.”
The Duke laughed, a laugh that made him look lighter, somehow, as though a weight had been lifted from atop his shoulders.
“I cannot tell you how happy I am to hear that.”
“I am equally happy to tell it,” Sophia said, reaching out and cupping his cheek. “I love you, Your Grace. I want to marry you and no one else.”
“Then it is settled,” he said, taking her hands and pressing them both to his lips. “I will go and speak to your Father. And no more of ‘Your Grace,’ please. If we are to be married, you must call me Wesley.”
“No!” she said, or rather, shrieked.
The Duke looked surprised. “You do not want to call me by my Christian name?”
“No, not that,” she said, shaking her head. “Of course I will call you Wesley, and you may call me Sophia. My objection was to your speaking to my father today. Please, let me talk to him first. This will come as something of a shock to him, and you know him well enough to know that he prizes order above all else. I need to convince him that this deviation of his plan is the right thing to do. Please, give me the afternoon to speak to him. Then, I will send a card to Lord Montrose, explaining things, releasing him from our courtship. And then I can send for you, on the morrow.”
She did not think of how she would address the scandal or her father. All she thought of in that moment was a future, with Wesley. It was rather hard to be worried when she was thinking about that.
“As you wish, my lovely Sophia,” he said, and then he leaned down and kissed her cheek. His lips were warm and made her tingle where they touched her skin. Sophia could feel them on her long after he left, feel the remnants of Wesley’s love. It was this what gave her the confidence to walk down the hall and confront her father.
Chapter 13
Sophia had to wait for over an hour before her father was free to speak with her. He was in a meeting and had gruffly told her that whatever she had would simply have to wait.
She had wanted to scream that, “Matters of the heart could not wait!” but she did not think it prudent.
Instead, she had walked to the morning room. The midday light was slanting down through the windows, making the room feel warm and inviting.
Sophia stationed herself in a chair near one of the windows and set herself to the task of finding the words she would need when speaking with her father. Words that could accurately convey how much she loved Wesley, and how little she wanted to marry the Lord Montrose.
This proved rather more difficult than she thought, however. It was easy enough to talk of her feelings for Wesley, but much harder to explain why that should be reason enough for her to give up her courtship with Lord Montrose.
This was partly due to the fact that Sophia did not know very much about Wesley’s standing in society. She did not know anything of his fortune or landholdings, nor of his influence in Parliament, all factors that had helped her father decide on the Earl as the most favorable of suitors.
She needed concrete evidence of Wesley’s superiority to the Earl, but so far, all she could come up with was that she simply loved one and not the other. And this would not sway her father, a gentleman who placed little stock in feelings. He liked facts and rational thought and reasoning.
When the footman’s knock finally did sound on the morning room’s door, signaling that Sophia could now enter her father’s study, she was armed with no concrete reasoning to persuade her father to see her side of things.
Indeed, her mind had gone off on a tangent shortly after she sat down at the window, thinking about Wesley and how lovely their wedding would be. She had picked out the flowers, the color of her gown, and three of the dishes in the wedding breakfast. It had been a very productive hour in that sense. But not in the sense that she had any idea what to say to her father when she entered his study.
Which was why, as she entered the room, which always smelled like peppermint and pipe tobacco, she was not properly armed before her father started hurling questions her way.
“Why did I hear that Lord Montrose was seen storming out of the house earlier this morning? What happened? Did he propose to you and you refused? Because I do not mind telling you, my dear Sophia, how utterly foolish a refusal to him would be. He is by far the most suitable gentleman for you. I spent months trying to find the perfect husband for you, and I truly do believe that he is it. If only you did not put such stock in those stories you
read, then maybe—”
“Papa!” Sophia finally said, and though she did not raise her voice, her tone stopped her father abruptly. The tirade of her father’s words was overwhelming, but despite this, she knew she could not let it drown her. She had things she needed to say, and she could not say them if he continued to berate her.
“Papa, please, listen to me,” she repeated, tentatively looking at her father and seeing the shocked expression on his face. And it was not a facsimile of shock, either. His eyes were bugged, his mouth was open, his cheeks slack. It was in fact the most emotive she had ever seen him. But then, she supposed that made some sense, since this was the most vehement he had ever seen her.
“Lord Montrose did not propose. He left the house in a hurry because he walked into the library to find the Duke of Bersard and I embracing.”
If it were possible, her father’s eyes seemed to widen further, and he began to sputter, his mouth opening and closing but no words coming out.
As there was only more shocking news to come, she knew she needed to sit him down, lest he eventually fell over from the surprise of it all. Therefore, she took him by the arm and slowly walked him, or rather, pushed him, around his desk. She helped him lower himself into his chair, and retrieved a pipe for him, as she knew, or at least hoped, it would calm him down.
Once the pipe was secured in his mouth, his lips clamping onto the wood instinctively, Sophia breathed out a relieved sigh and took the seat across from her father’s.
“Now, the Duke and I were just embracing, Papa. Nothing more untoward than that. And we were doing so because we are in love. We have been for some time now, ever since Lord Stilton’s ball, in fact. I tried to explain all this to Lord Montrose, but as you can imagine, he did not take it well. Hence his swift exit from the house.”
Her father cleared his throat, took a deep puff of his pipe, and then, as the smoke escaped his mouth in swirls of grey vapor, asked, “And what happened at Lord Stilton’s ball to instigate this romance of yours?”
Sophia blushed, she could not help it. Every time she thought of that night, heat raced throughout her body remembering the Duke’s hands on her.
Looking up, she saw that her father was thinking. He was sucking on his pipe with fierce determination, his face slowly reddening from lack of air. It was clear that he was interpreting her blush as evidence of something far more intimate than a simple brush of hand on ankle. She had to set him straight, before he inhaled so much smoke that he fainted.
“The Duke and I merely realized that we are of the same mind. We both enjoy the same books, have the same hopes and dreams. We realized that night that we had a connection that was undeniable. A romantic connection that is rare, indeed, in our world.”
“Hmph,” her father responded, letting the smoke out through the side of his mouth.
“We did not see each other for weeks after the ball. I think we were both trying to convince ourselves that we were mistaken. It is overwhelming, to feel so strongly for someone one has only just met,” she said with an uneasy laugh. She thought it best not to tell her father that she had known she was not mistaken, that she was merely waiting for the Duke to make the next move.
Her father would not look kindly on the Duke making her wait. It was ungentlemanly in the extreme.
“But when we ran into each other today, in the library, we realized that we were not mistaken. That we do in fact love one another, and that we can no longer bear to be apart.”
Sophia braced herself, knowing that the next words she spoke would be the most shocking yet. “The Duke has asked me to marry him, Papa. He knows he needs your permission, but I told him that I wanted to speak to you first, to explain the situation, so that you might help me end things with Lord Montrose. And then, hopefully, you could give us your blessing.”
She paused, staring at her father and waiting for his reaction. She was not sure what to expect. For a gentleman who usually operated almost without emotions, he had been rather excitable today.
Will he shout? Stand up and slam his fists down on the desk?
Or would he just continue puffing at his pipe, letting smoke exhale out his mouth at he stared at her?
Of all the reactions, this was the most concerning, because he was silent while doing so. His eyes, his face, gave nothing away save contemplation. Sophia did not know what to do, so she simply sat there, stiff as a board, and waited.
Finally, after what seemed an eternity, her father set the pipe down, cleared his throat, and spoke.
“No.”
“No?” she asked. What is he saying no to? Her speaking to him? The engagement?
“No, I will not give you my blessing. I will not give the Duke permission to offer for you. I will not allow you to marry him.”
“But Papa—” she started, but he held up a hand.
“No, child, you will listen to me now. I am your father. I am the Duke of Wellingson, master of this house and all its occupants, including you. The people who live under my roof must follow my rules, and this is my ruling. You will not marry the Duke of Bersard. He is not the suitor I chose for you. He is a good gentleman, but he is young—nearly ten years the Earl’s junior—and inexperienced. He is not the husband you need, and I am quite certain that you are not the wife he requires.”
Sophia tried not to let these insults smart, but she found herself feeling their hits like they were physical blows upon her person.
She knew she needed to defend herself, to defend her position, but her confidence had dropped, her belief in herself and her feelings diminishing with each passing second. Her father was beating her, and she was letting him.
“Marriage is not about love, Sophia. I do not know why I must keep repeating this to you, but please listen, for I will not repeat myself again: ladies and gentleman of our set do not marry for love. They marry to unite advantageous bloodlines, they marry to increase their fortunes, they marry to increase their standing in society, or to gain influence in Parliament. They do not marry for such childish reasons as romance. You will not marry for those reasons, either. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, I do, Papa,” Sophia said, sitting up straighter.
You can do this. You can disagree with him, you can persuade him. You are strong enough.
“I understand that these are your positions, your opinions. But they are not mine. And as the future heir to this estate, to the family fortune and all our unentailed landholdings, my opinions do carry weight. And my opinion is that I will be useless if I am not happy. And I know in my heart and mind that I will not be happy with Lord Montrose. He is a kind gentleman, but a silly one, far more interested in himself than anyone else.”
Her father opened his mouth to object, but in a rare show of impertinence, she ignored him and continued, knowing that the moment she let him interrupt was the moment she lost the battle. And it was a battle she needed to win. For the Duke, but first and foremost, for herself.
“I do not want a gentleman filled with hubris, a gentleman who lies so easily to his future betrothed, a gentleman who disrespects his mother. All of which are qualities that describe the Lord Montrose. I want a gentleman who is good and kind and generous, one who is honest with me, who respects his family. I want a gentleman who loves me and shows me the deference I deserve. That gentleman is the Duke of Bersard, Papa. I want him for my husband, and no other. I want him, and I will not be swayed.”
Sophia huffed a deep breath when she finished, feeling like she had been walking uphill for ages and only just reached the peak. Her heart was beating so fast she could feel the blood pulsing at the tips of her fingers as she clasped them tightly in her lap.
She stared across the desk at her father, waiting for his reply. He was mirroring her position, his hands folded atop the desk, his brow furrowed in contemplation.
Sophia couldn’t help feeling that no matter what happened, she would feel good about the outcome. Because finally, she had spoken out to her father. She had not let him sile
nce her, not let him erase her opinions and write over them with his own. She was standing up for herself. As a future Duchess ought to.
“My dear,” her father said, unclasping his hands and reaching one out to her across the table.
Sophia tentatively raised a hand toward him, uncertain.
Is he really about to hold my hand?
He had never done that, not even when she was a child.
But hold it he did, grasped it, in fact, his grip tight as he spoke. “I understand. You are different from me, but not in a bad way. You think with your heart then your mind, whereas my heart never even enters the equation. I believe you when you say you will be happy with the Duke, but think first, my dear, of what the ton will say when they see you have hopped from one gentleman to another. How do we explain you suddenly ending your courtship with Lord Montrose? It will cause a scandal. There will be gossip, and not in your favor.”
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