The Desires of a Duke: Historical Romance Collection

by Darcy Burke

  His heart skipped. “You won’t lose me. You didn’t.”

  “I can’t lose you.” She crawled into his arms and buried her face in his chest.

  He stroked her hair and held her close.

  After a long moment, she brought his hand to her lips, then sat up straight. “Your fingers are cold.”

  He raised his brows. The summer had been exceptionally cool. “Aren’t yours?”

  She slid out of bed and crossed over to his bell pull. “I’ll ring for a bath. The hot water will do you good.”

  He rubbed his temples. “I’m fine, Katherine. There’s no reason to be so concerned.”

  “Of course there is,” she said softly. “You’re everything.”

  He opened his mouth to correct her just as two footmen stepped into the room.

  She turned toward the door to give him privacy.

  “Wait,” he said. “About your opening gala—”

  “There’s no opening,” she interrupted. “I cancelled the society.”

  “You…what?” he stared at her blankly. “You are passionate about that society.”

  “I was. And I was foolish. I cannot facilitate something that ambitious whilst also doing my duty to you and my aunt. I shall stay here in Ravenwood House where I belong.”

  He blinked. Furthering the arts was not only her most cherished dream, she was truly making it happen. He couldn’t imagine someone as strong as Katherine choosing to give up what she loved most in exchange for a life she never wanted.

  “I hope I never implied that being my duchess would preclude outside hobbies,” he said. “Much less giving up your dreams.”

  “You didn’t have to imply. I learned the lesson quite vividly.” She gave him a weak smile. “I give up.”

  “But what will happen to everyone interested in the Society of the Creative and Performing Arts?”

  “Nothing will happen. They can find a new director. Or they can go back to real life.” She took a deep breath. “As will I.”

  He frowned. “You mean to do what, then? Return to your museum?”

  She shook her head. “I’m giving that up, too. I cannot be a curator of antiquities and give my full attention to my family at the same time. So I choose my family. Our family. I don’t need the museum.”

  While he couldn’t fault her logic—when first they’d met, he had been very much of the opinion that a proper duchess should not have outside interests—he had long since discovered that Katherine’s many and varied interests were what made her Katherine.

  Any woman could do a reasonable job at minding a household, or do her duty to a title and bear the requisite number of children. Not every woman could do so whilst managing an antiquities museum and planning a multi-class community to celebrate London’s creative and performing artists.

  The last thing he wished to do was to change her. He was proud of her. Katherine’s dreams and passions were not only what intrigued him most, they were the very sides of her character that had caused him to fall in love.

  He’d told her so quite clearly in the poem he’d given her just before her gala.

  “Did you already forget the words I wrote for you?” he asked softly.

  She flinched and lowered her gaze. “I am sorry. I didn’t get a chance to read them.”

  His smile faltered. Of course she had not. It had been dreadful timing. “Because you were en route to your event?”

  Her eyes met his. “Because I was angry at you and I stood too long in the rain. By the time I realized what you had given me, the ink had already washed away. It’s…gone. All of it.”

  His words of love had disappeared in the storm.

  He nodded slowly, grateful for nearly thirty years practice of keeping an expressionless mask firmly in place. It wasn’t her fault. It was his. If he had just attended the gala as promised, none of last night’s events would have happened.

  Before he could think of the right words to say, two more footmen arrived with buckets of hot water.

  “I’ll let you bathe,” Katherine said. She blew him a kiss. “Keep warm while I check on Aunt Havens. I may stay with her for a little while, but I’ll be back soon.”

  He let her go. He had no choice.

  But after his bath, he returned not to his bed but to his office. He left his book of poetry where it was. It would be a long while before he would feel inspired to write verses again. In the meantime, the rest of the world had continued to march on.

  He pulled the pile of unread correspondence toward him and began to open letters. Tonight was the Coinage Act vote in the House of Lords. Due to his intervention at White’s, Ravenwood had no doubt the motion would pass with little opposition. He doubted he even needed to be there.

  The letters that were not about impending recoinage wanted to start a pillory committee, or investigate slavery in the North African Barbary States. All were worthy causes. All wanted Ravenwood to lead the fight. None had any doubt that he was the right man for the job.

  He drew a fresh sheet of paper and dipped his pen into the ink.

  Katherine’s words came back to him.

  Time spent doing the things she loved necessarily meant time spent away from Ravenwood House. And so she’d chosen Ravenwood House.

  She’d chosen him.

  It might not have quite the same flourish as heart-wrenching lines of love poetry, but her decision was one that would never dissolve in the rain. His breath caught.

  Every time any new issue arose in the House of Lords, he had always been the one to take on more than his share. He was a duke. He’d thought it his duty.

  He set down his pen and flung the entire stack of correspondence into the fire.

  One’s duty could never be more than one’s share. He would opine. He would attend meetings. He would vote. But he would never again put his family second.

  He pushed to his feet, intending to tell Katherine right away. She didn’t need to give up everything she wanted. They would meet in the middle. Make time for each other.

  Then he remembered she was in the sickroom with her aunt. Not precisely the proper venue for discussing marital compromises. He would wait until she was free.

  He quit the office, intending to walk out to his garden, but instead found himself entering the east wing of Ravenwood House. Toward the old family parlor.

  It had been weeks since he’d ventured into these corridors. Weeks since his only connection to family was a cracked painting upon a wall.

  As he approached the parlor, fading sunlight from the windows cast the room in an otherworldly pink glow. He stopped. His heart pounded in disbelief. The parlor was no longer empty.

  He stared at the impossible transformation. The painting not only still hung upon the wall, it had been brought to life before his eyes.

  He stepped forward slowly, scarcely daring to believe any of it was real. The tips of his fingers grazed the back of his mother’s chaise, the arm of his father’s hand-carved chair. He threw himself onto the floor as he’d done as a child when he would lay his head against his mother’s cushion to listen to his father read.

  Everything was exactly how it had been. Joy filled him. It was wonderful. It was perfect. He could hardly wait to tell Katherine—

  But of course there could be no one else who could have wrought such a miracle. She did this for him. He didn’t know how, but he knew she had done it.

  Every cushion, every candelabra, every slope of the painstakingly carved furniture were her words of poetry. Her lyrics and stanzas. Her way of showing him that he, too, was loved.

  He needed to find her right now. Heart light, he strode from the room in search of his wife.

  She was not with her aunt. The sickroom was quiet and dark. Evening had fallen. Katherine must have gone to bed. Light flickered in the crack beneath their adjoining door.

  He knocked softly.

  She didn’t answer.

  Frowning, he turned the handle and eased the door open a crack.

  Kather
ine lay in the center of her bed, asleep. A forgotten taper still burned at her bedside.

  He stepped inside and crossed the room as quietly as he could in order to blow out the candle. He halted just before he reached the bedside table when he spied the stained edge of a scrap of parchment protruding from beneath her pillow.

  His poem.

  He slipped it free.

  She was right. It was nothing more than a blurry mess.

  Yet she slept with it beneath her pillow. The rain-crinkled parchment was worn smooth from frequent handling, the crease lines transparent from being folded and unfolded so many times.

  He swallowed. Even though it was ruined, she’d still tried to read it. She loved him too much to throw it away.

  He slipped it back beneath her pillow and blew out the candle. But instead of returning to his bedroom, he strode back to his office.

  Perhaps he was inspired to write poetry after all.

  Chapter 28

  Kate awoke to a cold, empty room.

  She’d fallen asleep thinking about Ravenwood. The look on his face when she’d confessed to never even reading his poem… Her throat thickened.

  She had been so focused on instilling greater understanding and appreciation for the beautiful, artistic world around her that she’d failed to apply the same dedication to her marriage.

  Not anymore. She was Duchess of Ravenwood. From this day forward, she would embody that role with the same passion she held for antiquities and the arts.

  No—with more passion. She would give her husband a real reason to be proud of her. Theatre was a fictional world. She lived in this one. Antiquities would not keep her warm at night or write poetry for her.

  Only Ravenwood did that. With luck, he would someday do so again.

  She rolled to her side and slid her hand beneath the pillow to retrieve the poem he’d written her. What was left of it, anyway.

  The parchment crinkled and nicked the pad of her finger.

  She frowned. The parchment was no longer stiff enough to crinkle. She’d handled it too much, straining by candlelight to try and make out any words from the blurred soup. The paper was almost soft as linen.

  Until now.

  She shot upright and flung the pillow from the bed. It was not the same parchment at all. It was a fresh sheet, not torn from a journal or ravaged by rain. Folded into crisp thirds, it lay perfect and innocent right where the ruined poem had lain the night before.

  She glanced at the closed connecting door separating her bedchamber from her husband’s, then unfolded the parchment with trembling fingers.

  A Second Poem For My Wife was printed in a now-familiar hand across the top of the page.

  Her breath caught.

  I once believed my heart an empty plain

  And seeded it with hope and loss and pain

  Flowers grew, and bristles, too

  But still the endless emptiness remained

  Until the day I looked into your eyes

  And saw that sun was more than just the sky

  You made me whole, a balm to my soul

  With you my heart could finally learn to fly

  Her fingers shook. He wasn’t furious at her for letting the rain destroy his poem after all. That wonderful, gallant, unpredictable man had written her a new one—and delivered it while she slept.

  Pulse racing, she trembled as she read the rest of the romantic words filling both sides of the paper. Every verse filled her heart even more. She read the lines again and again.

  He loved her. Not for her beauty or grace, but for the enthusiasm she held for everything around her. He loved her passion for antiquities, her fervent dream to unite artists and aficionados of all types.

  But mostly, he loved how she loved. How she opened herself wholeheartedly, no matter how much it might hurt. How to be loved by her meant something true, deep, and unconditional.

  How with her, he’d found his future…and lost his heart.

  She gasped and pressed the poem to her chest. Her pulse pounded. She loved him so much she thought her heart might burst from the intensity.

  She leapt up from the bed and burst through their adjoining door into his bedchamber.

  It was empty.

  She spun back to her dressing room and rang for her maid to help button her into a day dress as quickly as possible.

  The moment she was presentable, she dashed from her chamber and raced straight for his office.

  It was empty.

  Frustrated, she tried the library, the dining rooms, then finally found him in her aunt’s sickroom, reading aloud to Aunt Havens from an Ann Radcliffe gothic novel. Her heart swelled.

  He rose to his feet the moment he saw her.

  She flew across the room and into his arms. “I’ll make you the best possible duchess Ravenwood House has ever seen.”

  “I have the perfect duchess,” he said in his low voice as he held her tight. “I saw the family room. I have no idea how you did it, but…thank you. You’re amazing.”

  Warmth spread through her. “I wanted you to have more than memories. I wanted you to have a piece of your family.”

  “You are my family,” he told her. “You, Aunt Havens, Jasper… We are a family. Together. That parlor is more than a miracle. It’s meant to be enjoyed. By all of us. We’ll fill it with new memories.”

  She smiled into his cravat and snuggled close. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too.” He lifted up her chin with his knuckle. “And I’d like you to rethink your resignation from the Society of the Creative and Performing Arts.”

  She rose on her toes to kiss him. “I can’t go anywhere. Perhaps, once Ravenwood House once again runs smooth as clockwork…”

  He arched his brows. “And perhaps you don’t have to go anywhere at all.”

  She frowned up at him in confusion.

  His grin was slow and wicked.

  “Your grace?” The butler appeared in the doorway. “Guests are beginning to arrive.”

  “Guests?” she asked, baffled. He’d invited people over while she slept?

  “Send them to the ballroom,” Ravenwood ordered. “I believe they’ll all fit.”

  “Ballroom?” she repeated. “At ten o’clock in the morning?”

  The last time the Ravenwood ballroom had been used was seven months ago, when Lady Amelia had requisitioned it as a replacement venue for the seventy-fifth annual Sheffield Christmastide ball. Kate was certain her husband had only attended because it was his sister and his house.

  “What on earth is happening?” she demanded.

  He lifted a shoulder. “Your gala was cut short when you didn’t return after intermission. The performers and the patrons never received their promised opportunity to meet as equals, nor to discuss the arts or potential sponsorship.”

  “You invited them here?” Giddiness made her lightheaded. “To the Ravenwood ballroom?”

  “Our ballroom,” he corrected. “It should be large enough to serve as a monthly gathering point until you are ready to organize a supplementary gala for the second half of the performance. If the post is any indication, it will be an even worse crush than the opening night.”

  “You’re helping with the gala?” She stared at him in befuddlement.

  He shook his head. “Not just the gala. I am offering my services in any capacity you might need. There’s no reason to give up your dream. We can work on it together. You’ll just have to show me how.” He narrowed his eyes. “But please don’t make me memorize any journals.”

  “Done.” Laughing, she pressed her lips to his.

  The Society for Creative and Performing Arts wouldn’t just be a success for others—it would ensure she and her husband had even more reasons to spend time together. A mutual passion. They would be a team.

  She laced her arms about his neck. “Have I mentioned how much I love you?”

  “How fortuitous.” He swung her into his arms. “After the meeting, you can show me.”

  Sh
e laughed and smacked his shoulder. “I intend to show you how much I love you every single day.”

  He kissed her back. “As do I, my love. As do I.”

  Chapter 29

  Kate awoke to a cold, empty room.

  She’d fallen asleep thinking about Ravenwood. The look on his face when she’d confessed to never even reading his poem… Her throat thickened.

  She had been so focused on instilling greater understanding and appreciation for the beautiful, artistic world around her that she’d failed to apply the same dedication to her marriage.

  Not anymore. She was Duchess of Ravenwood. From this day forward, she would embody that role with the same passion she held for antiquities and the arts.

  No—with more passion. She would give her husband a real reason to be proud of her. Theatre was a fictional world. She lived in this one. Antiquities would not keep her warm at night or write poetry for her.

  Only Ravenwood did that. With luck, he would someday do so again.

  She rolled to her side and slid her hand beneath the pillow to retrieve the poem he’d written her. What was left of it, anyway.

  The parchment crinkled and nicked the pad of her finger.

  She frowned. The parchment was no longer stiff enough to crinkle. She’d handled it too much, straining by candlelight to try and make out any words from the blurred soup. The paper was almost soft as linen.

  Until now.

  She shot upright and flung the pillow from the bed. It was not the same parchment at all. It was a fresh sheet, not torn from a journal or ravaged by rain. Folded into crisp thirds, it lay perfect and innocent right where the ruined poem had lain the night before.

  She glanced at the closed connecting door separating her bedchamber from her husband’s, then unfolded the parchment with trembling fingers.

  A Second Poem For My Wife was printed in a now-familiar hand across the top of the page.

  Her breath caught.

  I once believed my heart an empty plain

  And seeded it with hope and loss and pain