Viola looked astonished. “A man can’t duel his own son!”
“The only reason why he never did it. I’m just saying that I understand what happened to you and I’m sorry that you experienced it.”
“I never imagined this,” Viola said. “I feel safe with you. I suppose that is the one promise that I would like before we marry: that you would never shout at me with such livid rage.”
He cleared his throat. “As I said, I don’t like to lose my temper.”
“I don’t either.” She beamed at him.
“But I have lost my temper a few times in my life,” he confessed. “On occasion, when pressed. Particularly, when surprised.”
“As have I. I shouted at my stepfather once. No, twice.”
Devin’s eyebrow shot up, despite himself. “You shouted at the Duke of Lindow?”
She nodded cheerfully. “Completely lost my head. He said that Barty had to go back into the forest, that he should grow up and be a wild bird.”
“Barty is your crow?”
“Yes, I have to introduce you. Barty is a very good judge of character. He’ll like you immediately.”
Devin wasn’t sure of that. He hadn’t had a dog when he was a boy, because future dukes didn’t have pets, according to his father. But also, Devin had decided on observation, because dogs tended to growl and back away, even when his father was in a good mood.
“At any rate, I lost my temper and shouted at the duke about Barty’s wings and swore that I would go live in the forest before I would allow Barty to be exiled there alone.”
“And?”
Viola grinned. “He burst out laughing, because I am afraid of the dark, and I dislike being in the woods by myself, and I don’t even go to the stables because I’m wary of horses—but here I was, announcing that I was moving to a forest to take care of a baby crow?”
Devin knew what “wonder” was. It was what you felt when you saw a rainbow, or a huge waterfall, or the Thames frozen over.
Or Viola.
“Barty’s wings don’t work properly,” she said, obviously having no idea that he was in the grip of . . . something. “My stepfather didn’t understand that, but I managed to explain it and ever since, Barty has lived with us, of course.”
Who knew that wonder could flood one’s body the way rage did? Or desire, for that matter?
But now, looking at a woman to whom he’d somehow managed to get himself betrothed, who was willing to live in a dark forest to nurture a small, defenseless creature?
This—this was the luckiest thing that ever happened to him in his life, including the moment he was born into a world that considered him a duke.
Chapter Eighteen
When they reached the Lindow townhouse, Viola was startled to hear from the butler that the Duke of Lindow was waiting for them in his study. Prism had a serious look, even as he murmured congratulations to Devin.
Viola was only just beginning to get her head around what had happened.
Thanks to Miss Pettigrew, she would be a duchess?
Inconceivable.
She had thought her stepfather would want to talk to Devin alone. She had thought . . . What had she thought? This situation—marriage—had blown up in her face. It wasn’t unlike the moment when Barty fell from a pine tree, landed on her shoulder, bounced off, and lay on the ground at her feet, dazed and blinking at her.
One minute you were alone—and the next you weren’t.
When they walked into the room, Devin’s hand was warm in the middle of her back. Her stepfather was at his desk and, unusually for him, he was scowling down at his papers.
Not just “papers,” it turned out after they got through greetings, because her stepfather reached down and grabbed a broadside.
All the Wildes knew exactly what a print looked like. This one was larger than most, Viola registered with a thump of her heart.
“You opened my daughter to invidious commentary,” the duke said to Devin, in the clipped voice that was the closest he ever came to sounding enraged. “The stationer apparently received this sketch and rushed it into print an hour later. Tell me why I should trust you with my daughter!”
Devin was staring down at the sheet, his jaw clenched. Viola tucked her hand into his and gave him a squeeze.
“Which stationer?” Devin said, the words sounding like quiet gunshots.
Her father waved his hand. “It doesn’t matter who printed it. You made an exhibition of my daughter in a public street, and this is the result!”
“I was there too,” Viola said, deciding that she had to see it herself, even though her stomach was clenching. It must be terrible, or her stepfather wouldn’t be furious.
It was terrible.
The print showed Viola hitched up against Devin with her legs around his waist, in exactly the position that the lady had been all those years ago, at the ball. Viola was kissing Devin, her bonnet askew.
She looked . . . dissolute. That was a polite word for it. Her lips were pursed and she seemed to be attacking the duke.
She was still staring when Devin took the print, crumpled it, and dropped it. “I would be grateful for the name of the stationer.”
“What does it say at the bottom?” Viola asked. Her stomach was churning. She’d been stupid, so stupid. She knew that reporters didn’t respect her the way they did the Wildes.
They wouldn’t have dared make this sketch of Betsy.
She turned to Devin. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“You’re sorry?” Her stepfather’s tone was even more clipped. “Wynter is the gentleman here. Or supposedly so.”
“Our kiss had no resemblance to this abomination,” Devin said, the rumble in his voice matching her father’s.
Viola grabbed the sketch from the floor and pulled it open just enough to read the title at the bottom. Viola Follows Family Tradition & Lands a Duke the Old-Fashioned Way!
“That doesn’t make any sense,” she said, reading it again. And again.
“It’s rubbish,” her stepfather snapped. “It’s a veiled reference to your mother. The point is that I would have thought you, Wynter, being a duke, would show better judgment. Of all my children, Viola has avoided invidious attention, and yet you engaged in public intimacies that would shock even Betsy!”
“I assure you that our first kiss was only akin to this because it happened on the street,” Devin said evenly. “It was merely a kiss.”
It wasn’t an apology, but an explanation.
The duke folded his arms over his chest. “I’ve sent my solicitor to Doctors’ Commons for a special license.”
Devin nodded.
“What?” Viola asked. “No!”
“I’m sorry, dearest,” her stepfather said. “I gather from my sister that a similar incident at the vicarage was seen by one of the Pettigrews. They will almost certainly share their experience.”
“Not if I have anything to do with it,” Devin growled.
Viola had a flash of pride. He might not like to talk when he was angry, but at the moment he was both communicative and in control of his temper.
“The women just spent the afternoon poking their noses into every cupboard in the vicarage,” Devin continued grimly. “My vicarage.”
“Miss Pettigrew won’t say anything,” Viola said hastily, squeezing his hand tighter. “It was merely a kiss,” she told her father. “Another kiss.”
“It won’t be Miss Pettigrew,” the Duke of Lindow said, a deep weariness in his voice. “The story will be sold by her maid, or even a scullery maid, or no one will know how it got out of the household. Your aunt tells me that the two of you were in a closed room, alone, and you were interrupted at an inopportune moment.”
He stopped talking and took a deep breath. It seemed that her stepfather—who never lost his temper—was on the verge of doing so.
“I apologize,” Devin said. He looked down at Viola. “I take full responsibility for closing the door.”
Viola dropped
his hand and put her hands on her hips. “I told you to close the door!”
“No gentleman would have listened to you,” the Duke of Lindow stated.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” she cried. “We were kissing each other. We both wanted that door shut—not for the reasons you may be thinking,” she told her stepfather, “but because the Pettigrews were nosy.”
“I wanted the door shut in order to kiss you properly,” Devin said stubbornly.
Viola scowled at him, but she saw the look in his eyes. She didn’t know desire very well, but she recognized it. She smiled back.
The Duke of Lindow groaned.
The door sprang open, and her mother hurdled into the room. “Viola, dearest!” Ophelia cried, holding out her arms.
Viola flew into her embrace.
Her mother gave her a squeeze, pulled back, and cupped her face with her hands. “Do you want him? I don’t give a rat’s ass if he’s a duke or not. Nor how many prints are circulating either.” She gave her husband an exasperated look. “None of that matters.”
Viola blinked. “You never swear.”
“Profanity is a natural response to one’s children being threatened,” her mother said. She put Viola to the side and looked at Devin.
Viola looked too.
The two dukes were wide-shouldered, muscled, and glowering at each other.
“My goodness,” her mother said quietly, her breath brushing Viola’s ear.
“They’re both large,” Viola said. “And we’re small.” Her mother was the only woman in the family who didn’t make her feel like a tree stump next to willows.
She glanced at Ophelia and saw her mother’s eyes were on her husband with a slightly dreamy emotion in them.
“Mother,” she said, nudging her.
Ophelia shed her bemused air. “Do you want Wynter, poppet? Because if you don’t, your father will send him off with a flea in his ear.”
Viola didn’t think it would be quite that easy to get rid of Devin, but more importantly . . . she didn’t want to.
“Devin makes me feel safe,” she said. “I can eat around him.”
Her mother’s mouth eased into a smile. “One wants to eat.”
“You know what I mean.”
Ophelia’s arms closed around her again in a tight squeeze. “Dearest, if I could have made the last few years easier for you somehow, I would have. But you solved it by yourself!”
“With some help,” Viola said.
Her mother’s brows drew together. “Ah, yes, Mr. Marlowe.”
“I was thinking of Joan,” Viola said.
“Excellent!”
Devin advanced and made an elegant bow. “Good afternoon, Your Grace. I apologize for the occasion that spurred the wretched print. But I will never regret my first kiss with Viola.”
Viola felt a little smile curling her lips. Her heart was beating quickly, and she could hear it in her ears. Was she really going to do this? Become a duchess?
“I request the honor of your daughter’s hand in marriage.”
Ophelia looked back at him with her direct gaze. “My husband and I do not consider ourselves the most important people in that regard. Have you asked my daughter the same question?”
“There has been little time,” Devin said. He walked to Viola and caught up her hands. He looked down at her, and his expression made a rush of blood rise in her cheeks.
He wasn’t beautiful, and he wasn’t particularly interested in orphans, or animals—she had the sense that he wouldn’t know what to do with a pet cat or dog—but he was . . . dear. What’s more, she only had to meet his eyes to feel a surge of sensual longing coursing through her whole body.
“Will you marry me?” Devin asked. “Will you be mine, Viola, for better and worse, in sickness and in health? I know you aren’t in love with me, but I believe that we will be happy together.”
Viola forgot that her parents were in the room. She turned her hands until she was holding his as well. “I may not be a very good duchess.” She had to say it. She had to give him one more chance to come to his senses and realize that he could have a diamond of the first water, a paragon, the most ladylike lady in polite society.
“I don’t want a good duchess,” Devin said, his voice deepening. “You’ll be a wonderful Duchess of Wynter. My duchess.”
Behind them, the sound of a door quietly closing startled Viola. She looked around and discovered that her parents had left the room.
“Your father nodded to me,” Devin said. He gave her a gentle tug and led her to a sofa. “I believe that constitutes consent.”
As they sat down, he kept one of her hands, running his fingers over her knuckles before bringing it to his mouth for a kiss. “We needn’t use the special license. I will tear apart the printmaker who created that abomination. I’ll do the same for any printer who issues a depiction of our kiss in the vicarage.”
Viola looked into his eyes and saw certainty there. More than certainty: ferocity.
“I will always protect my family,” he said, a growl in his voice.
She gathered all her courage. “Yes,” she said, her voice coming out in a rasp. She cleared her throat: “Yes, I will marry you, Devin.”
He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then they moved together, their bodies leaning toward each other in perfect unison. One of Viola’s arms curved around his neck just as their lips met.
They kissed slowly, their lips moving gently, until desire built up between them and turned to greed, and Viola’s tongue slipped between his lips. She felt Devin shudder, as his tongue twined about hers, sending streaks of heat through her body.
His hand flattened on her back, pulling her closer. “May I hold you more closely?”
“Mmmm,” she said, putting her other arm around his neck.
With a smooth motion, he drew her into his lap until her back rested against one of his strong arms. He bent his head and she eagerly opened her mouth, reveling in a kiss that felt right.
“My heart is thumping,” she whispered sometime later. She could feel the flex of strong legs beneath her, and the warmth of his arm, strong as a curving steel bar, at her back.
She took an arm down from his neck, flattened her hand on his chest, and smiled because his heart thundered under her fingers. It made her breathless, as if she’d caught a wild beast.
He made a husky sound—amusement or agreement, she didn’t know—and sealed his mouth to hers again. He kissed her fiercely, nipping her lip, returning to her mouth, until they were both gasping.
“You can have all the time you want before we marry,” he said throatily, “but bloody hell, Viola, I hope you don’t take months. I want you more than I’ve ever wanted a woman, though I feel guilty saying it.”
She drew back and whispered, “Why?”
“I’m a cold bastard, and you’re so—I have the idea that you’re the kindest person I’ve ever met.” His hands tightened on her. “I don’t want to be married out of pity, Viola. I’m not one of your rescues. You’re ideal, an idealist—and I’m not.”
Her eyes met his fierce gaze and she understood that although he would never say it, and probably didn’t even know it, she wasn’t the only one who was afraid. Which meant he wasn’t the only one who had power in their relationship. He didn’t wish to be found wanting either.
Yet she couldn’t imagine that the day would come when she would want to be anywhere but at his side. This wasn’t like falling in love with an unfamiliar vicar who happened by for tea.
She didn’t revere Devin’s eyes or his chin—though now she realized that a square chin was far better than a gently sloped one. She didn’t want to help him in his life’s work, because she didn’t understand mathematics.
But she wanted to talk to him and get to know him. Find out more about his terrible father. What about his mother? Why was he so protective?
And the relentless sensual urge that made her knees tremble told her something else: She wanted him profoundly, to
the very center of her being. That, more than anything, meant she should marry him.
“Do you think desire is enough?” she asked.
Somewhat to her surprise, he took a moment to think about it.
“I desire you. But I also admire you, Viola. The idea of marrying you is exhilarating, as if I’d solved Fermat’s Conjecture, the most complicated mathematical theorem that exists.”
“Oh,” Viola breathed.
“Otis says that I’m cold-blooded, and I expect he’s right. But I will try. I will try to be a good father to our children.”
“You’ll be a wonderful father,” she said.
“I don’t know how to do it, other than not to shout at them.”
“I’ll teach our daughters how to fence, in case you challenge them to a duel,” Viola said, laughter gurgling in her throat.
But he shook his head, eyes dark. “I’m serious, Viola. You were terrified by seeing a husband and wife argue, do you remember?”
She blinked, and remembered in a fit of embarrassment that she’d told him the copulating pair at the ball were married. She nodded.
“That was my childhood,” Devin said. “My father didn’t want me to attend Eton, so I was kept at home. He liked having an audience, and I was often summoned from the nursery to learn an important lesson about being a duke—which generally consisted of watching my father howl with rage.”
“He didn’t hurt you, did he?” Viola whispered, seeing that Devin’s eyes were tight and his jaw firm.
“No. He sometimes threw vases and shoes, but even as a young boy, I was nimble.”
Viola wound her arms around him and put her cheek against his chest. “I am sorry.”
“I don’t want you to marry me out of sympathy or pity, Viola. I’m not Barty. Or Mr. Marlowe.”
She wrinkled her nose at him. “You are very emotional. Luckily for you, I’m used to drama from growing up with the Wildes.”
He physically recoiled. “I am not dramatic. Or emotional.”
Viola smiled. “As for treating you like a wounded bird, why would I? You’re a duke. You’re the highest in the land, exquisitely dressed, wealthy, powerful, and self-sufficient. I don’t feel sorry for you in the slightest. After all, your father didn’t challenge you to a duel, and Sir Reginald obviously loves you, as do Otis and Hazel.”
Say Yes to the Duke EPB Page 18