Ten Days with a Duke: 12 Dukes of Christmas #11

by Ridley, Erica

  At this moment, one of the most respected chemists in London was awaiting Eli’s final plans for an important project. He was to have submitted them this week.

  Eli’s frustrated sigh crystallized in the winter air before being carried off by the wind.

  Botany had been his obsession for as long as he could remember. Everything he did was for the betterment of humanity as a whole.

  Father’s approval was always short-lived at best, but if Eli succeeded here with Miss Harper, the marquess had promised to fund an entire year of research. If he failed, the chance was lost forever.

  He could not let that happen.

  Eli was a hair’s breadth from an important medical breakthrough that would save countless lives.

  He would do anything to save lives. Even agree to the marquess’s terms. Any personal sacrifice was worth the cost, if the value to others was greater.

  Not that he was making much progress today. Eli had been losing sensation in his extremities for the past half an hour, and there was still no sign of Miss Harper.

  He scooped the fallen carrot bits up from the frozen ground. Perhaps not too frozen. He’d witnessed the horses bury their nostrils beneath the snow and lift their heads, chewing. Thick, resilient fronds of phleum pratense thrived despite the cold. It deserved further study. He tossed the carrot absently over the fence, and made notes in his book as he walked back to the house.

  When he entered, Miss Harper was lugging a leather trunk down the corridor.

  “There you are,” she said, as if he hadn’t been waiting outside for her since dawn. “This arrived for you.”

  He took the unfamiliar trunk from her in confusion. “It’s not mine.”

  “Of course it’s not,” she said. “It’s full of practical clothing for up to a fortnight in Cressmouth. I’m not certain the riding boots will fit, but try them on and see. Once you’re wearing something suitable, we can head out to the stables.”

  Rather than carry the trunk into his guest chamber, Eli set it down in the middle of the corridor and unlatched the lid.

  Two pairs of riding boots, with and without spurs, lay next to three tall stacks of neatly folded men’s attire.

  Unlike Eli’s normal habit of grabbing whatever would be most comfortable for a day spent crouching around plants, this treasure trove appeared to have been nicked from the wardrobe of Beau Brummel himself.

  Expensive silks of every color, buttery soft doeskin breeches, bright white shirts and neckcloths, jackets for every possible occasion. These clothes weren’t for an unassuming scholar, but for a rakish dandy.

  He unfolded the topmost item. It was a beautifully crafted waistcoat, lined with cashmere luxurious enough to keep the wearer warm in any weather.

  “Where did all of this come from?”

  “The Duke of Nottingvale.” She waved a hand as if this detail were neither here nor there.

  He dropped the waistcoat.

  “You want me to wear the Duke of Nottingvale’s clothes?” he choked out in disbelief. The more he thought about it, the less sense it made. “Why would the Duke of Nottingvale send you his clothes?”

  “They’re not his, precisely. They were prototypes for a fashion venture that will become all the crack in the spring. The hems are designed for ease of taking out or letting in, so I guessed at your size and asked the tailor to adjust the seams accordingly.”

  This explanation raised more questions than it answered.

  “You asked… the tailor?”

  “He’s betrothed to the duke’s sister.” She tilted her head and squinted at Eli. “You’re built less like an idle gentleman and more like a farmhand.”

  “Yes. Well.” Eli wasn’t any of those things. He cleared his throat. “When I was younger, I sneaked off to join the laborers. I hoped my physical exertion would build muscles like theirs. My father wanted me to race competitively, but who ever heard of a bulky jockey?” He flexed one of his arms and shrugged. “The habit stuck, though I’m now more likely to box or swim than chop down trees and dig trenches.”

  Her gaze was startled. “Do you dislike horses?”

  “I didn’t say I dislike them.” The beasts terrified him. “I would simply rather not ride one. Ever.”

  Not the thing to admit when attempting to win the favor of a celebrated horsewoman.

  “I’ll help,” she said, her voice soft. “You’ll never win Duke’s acceptance—” Or her hand in marriage, was the implication. “—but I cannot allow you to leave here believing horses are the enemy.”

  Eli had been raised to believe the Harpers were the enemy.

  A pair of Janus-faced, manipulative, backstabbing deceivers. Father had made it a point of pride to outdo his bitter rival on each of those scores. The feud had carried on for decades.

  Until now.

  The clothes were a lovely gesture. Miss Harper had helped him despite neither trusting him nor wanting him.

  When Eli looked at Miss Harper, he didn’t see a foe to be vanquished. He saw a strong, compassionate, clever woman, talented and unforgettable.

  He didn’t want to hurt her.

  He wanted to kiss her.

  It was a terrible idea. They’d tried it before. While the kiss itself had been exquisite, it had all gone to hell thereafter.

  He’d vowed that this time, there would be no kissing unless he was certain they had a future.

  If he crossed that line, his heart was the one that would break.

  “Thank you,” he said, and reached for her hand.

  Touching her skin was almost as terrible an idea as kissing her. Luckily, Miss Harper would be intelligent enough to slap his face for this impertinence.

  Instead, she let him lift her hand.

  Now what? His blood raced hot. Holding a woman’s hand was the precursor to kissing her fingers. Or whirling her into a waltz. Or pulling her to his chest and covering her mouth with his. There was nothing he wanted more than to taste Miss Harper’s lips.

  All very, very, very bad ideas.

  But he didn’t let go.

  Her skin fascinated him. The back of her hand and the tops of her fingers were impossibly soft, the skin creamy and silken as though pampered with expensive creams.

  The pads of her fingers, less so. They were not calloused, but tough and strong, like Miss Harper herself. They warned that here was a woman not afraid to take off her gloves and vanquish problems with her bare hands.

  Eli would love to feel those bare hands skim across his naked flesh.

  “So you’ll wear the riding outfit?” Her voice was gentle, inviting.

  The words were a pail of ice.

  Eli dropped her hand.

  She wanted to help him do the one thing that terrified him most. A gentleman would say yes. Her happiness was worth his discomfort.

  “All right.” His voice was thick, his heart hammering now for a different reason. “We can try.”

  Every part of him rebelled against the idea.

  The trunk contained a week’s worth of riding wear, as well as myriad daywear options in full dress and half dress, and a three-caped greatcoat that would keep the wearer deliciously warm on an outdoor stroll.

  Eli chose a smart wool suit with quilted waistcoat to go with his buckskins, and forced himself to join Miss Harper at the stables.

  Despite the misgivings in his stomach—and the scars marring his skin—he had complete faith in her ability to command her beasts. Her fame as a trainer of horses had reached every corner of England. She would not allow harm to befall one of her prized bloods, nor would an animal she’d trained harm a rider.

  He hoped.

  “We’ll start with Rudolph,” she told him. “He pulled a sleigh, but is now retired. He’s used to the terrain and the weather, as well as maintaining a slow, plodding pace.”

  “I adore slow and plodding.”

  Thus began the most embarrassing hour and a half of recent memory. It took longer than he’d like to admit to work up the courage to mount
the beast, only for Eli to freeze once seated in the saddle.

  Rudolph, for his part, did not seem to mind the presence of a rider, if indeed one could use that term to refer to Eli.

  The sleek brown horse ambled when Miss Harper indicated, halted when she lifted a hand, and moved at a pace that could best be described as glacial. All without tossing his rider from the saddle.

  Eli felt like a warrior who had conquered new worlds.

  By the time Miss Harper declared the lesson over, Eli was almost willing to voluntarily undertake the experiment again.

  “You are incredibly patient.” He gave a lopsided grin. “I’m aware I make a poor student.”

  The corners of her lips twitched. “Have you forgot that I break horses? It’s literally my job to be patient with ill-trained beasts.”

  “I choose not to be offended by your sly insult,” he informed her. “I am instead grateful to Rudolph for being even more timid than I am.”

  “Timid?” She widened her eyes. “Rudolph?”

  At the sound of his name on her lips, the horse trotted to her side and held still as a tree trunk.

  She adjusted the stirrups and launched herself into the saddle.

  Rudolph took off like a bullet, streaking over the snow with such speed he seemed capable of taking flight.

  Eli was horrified.

  That could’ve happened to him.

  With his luck, he’d have slid from the saddle and been dragged along by one foot stuck in the stirrup, his head bouncing over the snow-covered hills.

  Miss Harper made it look easy. This time, she did not disappear from view, but rather tore around the stables in a wide circle, with Rudolph leaping over logs and finishing the lap with his front two legs held rampant in the air.

  She wasn’t reckless after all, Eli realized. She was really, really good.

  His chest fluttered.

  It was difficult not to fall in love with her all over again, when he’d never actually fallen out of love to start with.

  What had begun as a schoolboy infatuation had only blossomed over the years with each new headline or gossip column mentioning her name. Father obsessively followed news of the Harpers for opposite reasons, but Eli had cherished each word as though witnessing a legend unfold before him.

  He delighted in every one of Miss Harper’s stunning accomplishments. She was on his mind from dawn to dusk. For years, he’d dreaded the day he’d spy her name in a marriage announcement, whilst simultaneously hoping for it to happen, because at least then the waiting would be over.

  Now he was here. She was not a schoolboy fantasy; some rose-colored memory whose ending had been rewritten a thousand times in his mind. She was larger than life and right in front of him. Every bit the Athena the papers proclaimed, and so much more besides.

  “I’m never riding Rudolph again,” he informed her. “His ‘plodding’ speed is appallingly inconsistent.”

  She lifted her hand to hide a smirk. “I’ve a hobby-horse you can borrow.”

  He pulled her hand away from her lips and placed it on his chest instead. Her eyes widened. He did not want her to hide her delectable mouth. He wanted to kiss it.

  He was going to kiss her. Self-preservation be damned.

  She almost let him.

  At the last moment, she jerked her hand from his chest and turned away, her beautiful mouth twisted into a snarl of disgust.

  “No.” Her voice shook. “Not a second time.”

  Her voice wasn’t the only thing shaking. Her breath shook. Her fingers shook. The goddess who feared nothing was frightened of Eli’s kiss.

  He had done this to her. He was still doing it. There did not exist a bigger cad.

  His heart twisted. “I am so—”

  She held up a palm, stopping him as effectively as she’d halted her horse.

  “You were horrid to me.” Her shoulders were curved, her voice much too small. “You, your father, all of your little friends. I did not deserve your cruelty. I did not deserve a year full of nightmares, followed by a lifetime of flinching at my own reflection.”

  His stomach twisted. “You’re right. You didn’t deserve any of that.”

  Every time Eli remembered that day, he felt like he deserved every one of his scars.

  “They whinnied at me,” she whispered. “You let them.”

  Worse than that.

  He had started it.

  When the marquess had prompted, A Harper what? Eli had known precisely what had been expected of him. He was expected to think of her as a thing to be despised, not as a person to be admired.

  Eli had not wanted to wound her.

  He also knew the price of disobedience.

  When he looked in the mirror, he had to live with the fact that he gave the punishment to him more weight than the undeserved consequences to her.

  So he’d said it. Those fateful three words. A Harper horse.

  The children whinnied and neighed.

  And Miss Harper never appeared at a competition again.

  “I beg your forgiveness.” His throat was almost too tight to force out the words.

  She shook her head. “You shan’t have it.”

  Eli knew that, of course. He didn’t deserve her forgiveness, then or now. Obeying my father’s commands excused nothing.

  After that day, he had never again made a comment so crass, but what good did that do her? No amount of turning over new leaves could erase the casual cruelty in his past.

  Back then, he’d been forbidden to speak to her. That was the command Eli should have heeded. After yet another humiliating loss in the boys’ races, he’d hidden behind the stables to escape his father’s inevitable wrath, if only for a few moments.

  And then she was there. His opposite in every way. The girl he was supposed to hate.

  It was love at first sight.

  She was so talented, so clever, so funny. Everything about her was perfect. He couldn’t believe she was standing there, talking to him. When he realized the only logical reason was because she didn’t know who he was... he knew it was his only chance.

  And so he’d kissed her.

  That he should not have was obvious in retrospect, and yet he could not regret it. He would kiss her every day for the rest of their lives if such a choice was his to make.

  But that wasn’t the only time his actions had been unforgivable.

  Chapter 6

  “I’m sorry,” Weston said again.

  Olive believed he was. It changed nothing.

  She didn’t trust him. Perhaps would never trust him. She certainly wouldn’t forget what he’d done.

  Heaven knew, she’d tried.

  “If it had just been that day...” No. That day was bad enough. “I adored competing. After winning that medallion, I would have dedicated my life to racing. But I dared not show my face again to that crowd. Literally. I knew what they thought of me. How ugly I was.”

  He winced.

  “Papa didn’t know what was said. He told me children were foolish and cruel. By the time I was older, it would all be forgotten. But it wasn’t, was it?” Her chest tightened. She gripped the fence for comfort. “I was blackballed from Society at the age of eighteen because of the horrid appellation you and your father put on me. Mocked by thousands because of the contours of my face. Can you imagine...”

  Her voice broke. She couldn’t continue.

  “I have some idea,” he said quietly. “And I’m sorry. When I saw the caricatures, I tried to stop them.”

  She snorted tonelessly. “Don’t add lies to your crimes. I’ve no doubt your father paid to put them there and chortled with glee when they gained a life of their own.”

  “He might have.” Weston was silent for a moment. “He probably did.”

  There. She’d wrested that much of an admission out of him. It didn’t make her feel the least bit better.

  Weston was being so... nice.

  She knew it was a lie. It must be a manipulation. He’d seemed nice
the first time, and look how that had turned out. She could not let him erode her shields. A second rejection from the same rotter would prove her a horse’s arse on top of horse-faced. He’d humiliated her before and was more than capable of doing it again.

  Her only defense was not to forgive.

  “There’s something I want to show you,” he said. “In my bedchamber.”

  She slanted him a quelling look. “There’s nothing I want from you in a bedchamber.”

  “I’ll bring it out,” he said quickly. “Just... wait in the corridor for a moment.”

  Of course he wasn’t trying to seduce her. That the thought had crossed her mind was laughable. Ho, ho, ho. Olive’s cheeks heated at her mistake.

  “Very well.” She gestured toward the empty house. “Show me what you’ve got in your bedchamber.”

  The servants were gone. Her father was up at the castle. But Olive had no need for a chaperone.

  She followed him into the house.

  Only once had a man shown a modicum of interest. A local matchmaker had brought him over. He was handsome and charming.

  After meeting Olive, he’d married the matchmaker instead.

  There had been no one since. Not romantically. People came from far and wide, but their interest was in the horses, not her.

  “It’s in here.” Weston dropped to his knees before a leather valise. “I know it won’t make up for anything I’ve done, but you’re the one who deserves to have it.”

  He rose and held out his fist, palm down.

  She held out her hand. Her fingers trembled. The air was charged, as if she were setting herself up for a fool in yet another trick.

  The weight that dropped into her palm was heavy. Metallic. Cool to the touch.

  He took his hand away.

  She stared at hers. At the brass medallion a euphoric young girl had won a decade ago, only to lose it in the mud and the muck while fleeing her persecutors.

  It looked brand new. Freshly buffed and impossibly shiny.

  There was the torch in the middle; a symbol of competition. The year, just beneath. It was hers. He’d brought it back.