For he did care.
He cared deeply for the sister he’d lost and this child who was her image in every way…and Lily Benedict. He cared about the young woman who’d arrived on his doorstep, pleading for a post, all in a bid to be free from the hell she’d been thrust into because of his treacherous, deceitful brother. And it was that very woman who’d forced him to acknowledge that for the pretense he’d put on all these years, he did care—very much.
He was saved from answering by a sudden knock at the door. Derek looked to the front of the room. “Enter.” Please!
“You did not yell,” Flora whispered at his side.
Derek started. He glanced down as Harris shoved the door open. Why…she was correct. He hadn’t cursed down the office walls for the unwanted interruption.
His butler, ashen faced as usual, sketched a bow. “Mr. Davies to see you, Your Grace.”
The uncharacteristically somber set to Davies’ features belied his usual fear around Derek.
“You should take your afternoon meal.” So he might try and pick up the pieces of his ordered world, and reassemble them into something that made sense.
A smile lit Flora’s face, staggering him once again with the innocence unveiled. “Very well, but it would be a good deal better if you were to join me.”
The muscles of his throat worked. When was the last time anyone had felt that way about him? “Yes, well…” Derek patted her awkwardly on the head and watched as she skipped off past Davies, carefully skirting the man, and then taking her leave. The door closed with a loud click. “Davies.” He gestured to the winged back chairs. “Visits on Tuesdays, now? Your visits are either a sign of your dedication or stupid—”
“It was brought to my attention that Mrs. Benedict received a suspicious missive.”
A missive. He furrowed his brow. “How—?”
With an unexpected boldness, the older man strode forward. “I make it my place to assure that your household staff is loyal. As such, it was brought to my intention.”
A memory slid in of Lily bearing that mysterious box of letters in her arms; supposed notes to her parents as she’d wandered his halls… Guilt pebbled in his belly. With all the ways in which Lily had trusted him, in everything she’d shared, he’d doubt her? Doubt her when she’d been the only one to see him as a man and not a beast. “Say what it is you’d say and be done with it,” he bit out.
“Of course,” Davies said, giving his throat a clear. “Out of respect to your late father and brother, I took it upon myself to have the young woman you’ve recently employed investigated.”
A growl rumbled in his chest and he sought the indignant fury that this man had dared question his judgment. Except, the stoic calm of this usually quaking man froze the scathing diatribe on his tongue.
“I have received news on your Mrs. Benedict. I rather think you would care to know the information, immediately.” Derek’s heart missed a beat. His man-of-affairs removed his spectacles and dusted them off with his kerchief. “I am afraid not everything is as it seems with the young woman.” Fishing around his jacket, he extracted a folded ivory note and handed it over.
Derek stared at it for a long moment and then with wooden movements, accepted the page. He unfolded it, and scanned the black scrawl. His heart thumped to a slow stop.
…I write you to warn you. The woman you’ve accepted into your home as governess intends to commit a theft. Mrs. Benedict, really Lilliana Bennett, spoke often of obtaining the Tavenier diamond and…
Oh, God. Bile burned like fire in his throat. He couldn’t read any more. Impossible. “I do not believe it.” Did that raspy denial belong to him?
Had Davies been condescending or triumphant, it would have been easier than this unexpected sadness. “Can you verify the presence of the necklace, Your Grace?”
…My father and brother had a taste for fine things. Extravagant things…
Nausea burned in his belly. It singed his throat until the harsh rise and fall of his ragged breathing distracted him so he didn’t cast the contents of his stomach upon the floor. “That will be all, Davies,” he said quietly.
The man gave a slight nod and came to his feet. He hesitated a moment, appearing as though he wished to say more. And then he did. “I made a pledge to your father when he lay dying that I would see I looked after his sons. I’ve not liked you, even feared you, since the moment you returned from war,” Davies said with a directness Derek found himself respecting him for in that moment. “I failed your brother and cannot fail your father once again.” The old man gave him a look full of such pity that Derek would have gladly traded his remaining eye to be spared the horror of that sentiment. “But I would not see you hurt in this way.” A dull flush mottled his cheeks and he yanked at the lapels of his jacket. Giving his throat another clear, he sketched a bow. “Your Grace.”
Derek stared at the old servant as he treaded silently across the floor. Davies pulled the door closed behind him and that faint click propelled him into movement. With his heart climbing into his throat, he jumped to his feet, clasping the edge of the desk to steady himself. He lurched toward that magnificent case and fiddled with the latch. It gave with a satisfying click and he reached a trembling hand inside—and his body went cold. Hope flickered out like the just extinguished flame of a candle as the remnants of the heart he’d recently assembled cracked and split into the millions of shards they’d once been.
No.
Chapter 22
With an eerie similarity to a moment last night, Lily crept through the empty corridors, moving purposefully to Derek’s office. Her fingers trembled around the box in her hands and she gripped it harder in a bid to calm some of the turbulent unease. Derek’s ancestors stared down their hawk-like noses, recriminating with their fierce gazes this woman who now carried the revered heirloom in her hands. “Do not be silly,” she mumbled under her breath. She picked up her pace, desperate to be free of the burden that had brought her into this home. She turned the corridor and came to an abrupt halt. Her heart thumped madly.
The duke stood with his shoulder propped against the wall and a hand braced upon his cane. The towering dark perfection of him brought her to a sudden jerky halt so that she forgot the evidence of her crime she now carried in her hands. He was a portrait of midnight and masculinity that spoke of satiny warmth to the lady fortunate to hold his heart.
I want that woman to be me… The breath froze in her chest and the filigree box in her hand trembled. She adjusted her grip on it and stared boldly back at him. The air crackled with remembered passion and sexuality and warmth.
“Hello, Lily.” The satiny edge to his greeting cut across her turbulent thoughts. From the space between them, he eyed her through those magnificent black lashes. He spoke as though they met in a ballroom and not here in the middle of his corridors in the dead of night.
“Derek,” she said softly, drifting closer to him. He thumped his cane twice in a way that had once menaced, back in a time when she’d heard the whispers and heard nothing beyond the snarls. She came to a stop before him.
His fierce blue-black eye dipped to the box in her hands. “You come bearing your box, once more.” His emotionless tone gave little indication of his thoughts.
Blinking, Lily followed his gaze and ashamed heat burned through her body as she recalled what had sent her roaming the halls of his home this evening. “And you prove that you do not sleep, once more,” she returned with a soft smile.
He reached past her and her breath caught as his powerful arm grazed her shoulder. But he merely shoved the door open. “Join me.” That old familiar icy steel underscored those words, more command than anything else, and unease turned in her belly. The recently dulled instinct of wariness learned these past years reared once more.
Lily cast a glance over her shoulder. “I-I should return to my chambers,” she murmured and turned to leave. “I—”
“I insist.” He shot his cane out, blocking her retreat.
Unbidden, her gaze went to the yellow-eyed serpent etched into his cane. An ominous chill spread slowly in her veins, icing her. Do not be silly. You do not fear this man. Not any longer.
With that false bravado, she shifted her burden and slipped inside the room. Derek entered behind her, shutting the door with a soft click. He moved past her, striding so close, his broad biceps brushed her arm. He continued walking and came to a stop on the other side of his desk, alongside that intricate revolving bookcase. Unbidden, her gaze wandered to that object and tendrils of foreboding plucked at the corner of her conscience.
“Come, Lily. Never tell me you’ve joined me on so many other evenings and now you will hover at the doorway like a thief in the night about to make off with my family’s jewels?”
The tendrils stirred all the wilder, blinding in their power. She blinked several times and gave a slow shake of her head. “N-No.”
Derek winged a black eyebrow up. “No?” he drawled.
A pit formed in her belly. Did she imagine the contempt of that single-word utterance? Do not be a fool, Lily. It was nothing more than her own sense of guilt that caused this rapid staccato beat of her heart. She cast a hesitant glance back at the doorway, contemplating retreat. This cold, icy version of the man she’d come to love… Her thoughts skidded to a jarring halt and her breath caught painfully.
“Lily?” His harsh inquiry jarred her from the panicky thoughts. “Please,” he swung the tip of his cane to the winged back chair opposite his immaculate desk. “Sit.”
She wet her lips and glided hesitantly forward. With each step, he eyed her through a thick lid, the way a predator honed in on its prey. In a bid to protect herself from the frostiness in that once warm stare, she drew her arms close. The wood box of her youth bit sharply into her chest and she welcomed the distraction of that slight sting of discomfort.
Derek sat, then leaned back in his chair, the perfect master of his lair, and sitting stiffly before him as she was, there was an icy dread she’d never before known from him, even on that first, fearful day in this very room. Silence stretched on with her pulse pounding in her ears, deafening, punctuated by the tick-tock of his long-case clock so that she thought she was one more beat from that grand piece away from madness.
He sprawled back in his chair, elegant in repose and continued to assess her. “Open the lid,” he said without preamble.
She blinked once. Twice. And then a third time. Open…?
Then all icy indifference gone, he lunged forward in his chair and she jumped. “I said, open the lid,” he thundered. Fire snapped within the endless blue orb of his eye. Her mind screamed a protest to the frigid disdain that threatened to freeze her from the inside out.
Oh, God. Her heart climbed into her throat and she slowly shook her head back and forth. She silently pleaded with a Lord who’d proven Himself unreal too many times before. For there could be no forgiveness in this. Please no.
“Yes, madam.”
Madam? She’d spoken aloud. “Derek,” she said hoarsely. Her hands of their own volition scrabbled at her throat. “You do not understand.” Because you did not tell him all…
“Open it,” he thundered.
Lily jumped and, with shaking digits, lifted the lid. The click filled the room like a shot in the night. The silence damning. A tear slid down her cheek, then another, and another. How very close she’d been to having all she’d ever dreamed of. Him. A family with him and Flora. Foolish, foolish, woman.
The room echoed the still of quiet and their rapidly drawn breaths. Slowly, he climbed to his feet. “Derek,” she tried again past a thick throat. But there were no words. There was no explaining. There was just Lily, the harlot, now thief, and the situation so very damning in ways she, nay they, could never recover from. Wordlessly, she lifted the bauble that had brought her into his life and forever doomed their love.
The air left his lips on a hiss as he peered at the evidence clenched in her fingers. She dropped her gaze. The magnificent piece shifted in and out of focus, blurred by her tears. She let it drop to his desk. Derek stood as immobile as the stone lions that flanked the front steps of his townhouse, and for one long, horrific moment she believed he would not let her speak, that he’d turn her away just as everyone before him. She slid her eyes closed and another tear rolled down her cheek. Only he had more reason to cut her from the fabric of his life than any of the others before him.
He sat down once more and spoke, bringing her eyes open. “Who was Sir Henry Holdsworth to you?” The rough, guttural evidence bore so much pain and despair that it cleaved her heart in two. Derek continued, not allowing her to respond. “And Lucas Holdsworth? Who are they?”
Her stomach churned with nausea. There was something vile in hearing this man who held her heart utter the name of her late protector. Unable to meet the fury in his eye, she looked down at her bare feet. “Mr. Lucas Holdsworth…he is the son of Sir Henry, m-my former protector,” she said softly. She curled her hands into tight fists with such force her nails dug into the palms of her hands. It was important Derek at least knew that. “He asked me to come into your home, to take from you, and I had such hatred for all who shared George’s blood, I convinced myself I could do that.” Tears welled in her eyes and she blinked them back, despising the mementos of weakness. “But after knowing you, I could not betray you.” Her voice shook with an entreaty as she willed him to see. Willed him to see that her soul was inextricably tied to his.
The evening she’d abandoned her efforts to help Holdsworth, she’d convinced herself this part she could withhold. She’d deceived herself into believing that in disassociating herself from him, she could be free of the crime that had driven her into this household. What a horrible moment to realize how foolish she’d been with such a hope.
At his silence, she raised her head. A muscle jumped at the corner of his eye-patch, in that telltale sign of the tension in his tightly leashed frame. Please do not shut me out. She wetted her lips. “My protector pledged to see me cared for so I’d never have to warm another man’s bed.” Shame turned her neck hot. “And it was a pledge he broke.” Just as all men gave those broken promises. A spasm of agony racked her heart. Except Derek. He’d never been anything but honorable, believing in her when no one else had. And in the end, she’d betrayed him.
“Why did you come here?” he asked, harshly.
“Mr. Holdsworth…I-I was never his lover.” Her teeth clattered loudly and her body shook with the force of her trembling. “S-surely you see that I could not betray you.” Her words shook with an entreaty as she willed him to see.
When in his silence it became apparent that he’d say nothing else, Lily continued to shake. “There is no excuse to pardon what brought me here,” she said, not knowing where she found the courage to speak the words spilling forth. “There is no justification, Derek,” she managed hoarsely, pressing her eyes closed. “Don’t you see? I could not do it.” A tear slid down her cheek, then another, and another. “I could not do it,” she whispered. He is everything I’ve ever wanted and I’m going to lose him. The inevitability of that truth knifed at her slowly breaking heart.
He leveled her with such a frigid black stare; all warmth left her so she thought she’d be cold forever. “And yet, it would seem you already have, madam.”
Her legs trembled under the force of loathing in his eyes. She could not lose him. He was everything she’d never known she needed. He completed her in ways she’d not known her life had been incomplete. “Don’t you see, I am still here? I’d already resolved to not go through with the theft, when you came upon me…”
A wry, mirthless grin formed on his hard lips. “So that is why you were so quick to defy my orders and explore my corridors.” A black curse slipped from his lips and she flinched.
“That was true, but only at first.”
He surged to his feet once more. “When did everything change, Lily? Did you see the poor, scarred, lonely monster and realize you could warm my
bed and easily have whatever jewels your heart desired?”
His words speared her. “No,” the raspy word tore from her lungs. He was deserving of that ill-opinion and, yet, his words had the same effect as if he knifed her heart with a dull blade. “I only saw you,” she whispered. “That is why I could not do what he wished me to do.” Lily folded her hands and stared at the interlocked digits. “I convinced myself I could do this horrible thing. I was here but a handful of days before I realized I could not.”
He stood silent, unmoving for so long, that hope fanned in her breast. But then, his expression grew shuttered and, with wooden steps, he crossed the room and poured himself a brandy.
He was at sea, amidst a different battlefield, no less horrifying and painful than the ones of Toulouse. Unable to look at Lily, Derek fixed his gaze on the satin wallpaper. He could not stare at the face of the woman who’d made him love and laugh and believe again, only to yank his world apart with her deception. In one quick movement, he finished his drink in a single swallow, welcoming the fiery trail it blazed down his throat. He reached for the crystal decanter when she spoke, freezing him mid-movement. “Please, do not send me away.” Not like the others. The words were as true as if she’d roared them into existence. “I love you.”
Ah, God. The hope she’d stirred to life, fanned once more; powerful under her seductive pull. With every shred of the person he was, Derek wanted to cling to her words as truth. Nausea turned in his belly. She’d been the only person since his return who’d truly looked at him. One utterance away from becoming the snapping, snarling beast he’d been accused of being these years, Derek grabbed the nearest decanter and poured himself another glass. The muscles of his stomach clenched. Why would a beautiful, spirited woman like Lily Benedict come into his home? Why would she take him in her arms, the scarred ogre he was, if it hadn’t been born of another reason…
The floorboards creaked and the flutter of fabric filled the room, indicating Lily had moved. “Will you not say something?”
Lords of Honor-The Collection Page 76
