Isabella flushed delicately, and Lucy struggled to swallow the mouthful of hot tea she had just taken. The word bed was one she would have preferred not to hear coming from Sussex’s mouth. It was far too familiar, and she could not put aside her fears that when he said it, he was recalling the moment between them when he had returned the bit of lace to her, and discovered her most carefully guarded secret.
How she wanted to quit this house, to leave Sussex and his strange conversation behind. She was on tenterhooks, she realized. Disconcerted by every glance, and word. She could not endure this, not while trying to stay polite and removed.
Studying Lizzy, Lucy looked for any signs from their host that the tea was over, and they should take their leave. Unfortunately Lizzy had only managed to appear more comfortable on the settee, as if she were settling in for a much longer conversation. Even Isabella, who had looked extremely uncomfortable during their discussion of gossip now looked at ease, and was even in the process of pouring herself more tea.
Traitor, Lucy wanted to shout at her friend. Did no one understand how horrid it was to sit across from his grace and suffer through his stare? Of course they did not. Because neither Lizzy nor Isabella knew what had transpired between them. Only Sussex knew, and Lucy could not help but imagine what thoughts were running rampant in the proper duke’s mind. “Oh, yes, I adore afternoon naps,” Elizabeth said on a sigh, “especially in the rain. Just lying there, listening to the raindrops rattle against the windowpane is so soothing. Don’t you think, Lady Lucy?”
Determined to ignore Sussex, she focused her attention on answering Elizabeth. “I am afraid I am not a fan of rain, but I am rather fond of the feel of cool grass beneath my feet on a warm spring day. I like to hear the chirping of birds, and see the swelling of flower buds. I like the wind not to be cool and bracing, but warm and scented with the aromas of the sun and earth.”
Sussex met her gaze, allowed it to linger, then slowly he slid it away, down to his plate where he picked up a custard slice, and popped it into his mouth.
“Oh, I enjoy that too,” Elizabeth said wistfully. “When I was younger I could lie in the grass for hours and stare at the sky and imagine the clouds were all kinds of fanciful shapes, and animals.”
Lucy knew her expression was not one of rapture at Elizabeth’s description, and the duke noticed and said, “Do you not approve of the pastime, Lady Lucy?”
She was forced to raise her gaze from the teacup and saucer that was balanced on her lap and look at him. That stare…it made her tremble once again, and she despised how easily he could disconcert her. No one had ever had that ability, she’d made certain of it, but when the duke came into her life, he had torn down those safe walls she had erected.
Now here she was, feeling vulnerable and cornered, held hostage by eyes that bored deeply into hers as he patiently awaited her answers. And he would wait. She had learned that about Sussex, he was the most patient man on Earth—maddenly so—and she knew he would sit there all afternoon, his plate of pink sweets balanced in his palm while he watched her with his eyes that saw too much. Nothing dissuaded him when he wanted something; she had learned that much about him.
“Stonebrook wouldn’t have allowed it,” he replied for her, his gaze unwavering. “Your father is a difficult man to please, not given to gaiety or lenience.”
Yer papa will tan my hide if he finds ye getting yer ’ands dirty wit the likes o’ me. I’m yer lesser, or so Mr. Beecher says. No lady of Gov’ner Square will look at a little street urchin the likes o’ me.
Lucy recalled that day in the kitchen, as she and Gabriel sat at the table and talked. She had made it her business to be in the kitchen on Tuesdays when the butcher made his deliveries. It had been curiosity at first—the quiet, sullen boy who had accompanied Mr. Beecher had captured her interest. But after a few visits, and some shared stories, it became something more than curiosity, but infatuation. They had become friends, borne out of common circumstances, their differences ignored as they shared whatever treat Cook had left at the table for them.
“I don’t care about such trivial things such as stations in life,” she had boldly stated. “Are we not all created equal?”
“No, Miss Lucy, we ain’t. Ye were made better ’n me. And that’s why I’m to leave ye be and not look at ye. I’m beneath ye.”
She had glared in the direction of the butcher, then. “Never mind him,” she’d ordered. “We’re friends, are we not?”
“I ain’t never ’ad a friend.”
“I ain’t never, either.”
They had dissolved into a fit of laughter, which had died as suddenly as it sprung up when a dark shadow emerged in the kitchen…
“He would have had you kept inside the schoolroom,” his grace continued on, pulling her from her memories, making her confront a reality she had no wish to contemplate. “A young lady meant to remain pale and unmarred, her mind filled with useful information, her days occupied with learning tasks that would set up her future. He would have frowned upon frivolous pursuits such as daydreaming and cloud watching.”
She swallowed, and he followed the action of her throat, his long, dark lashes shielding the expression in his eyes and the thoughts behind them. How Lucy wanted to rail at him for it.
“Is my brother right?” Elizabeth asked sympathetically. “He paints a rather bleak picture of your childhood.”
“Yer just as lonely as me,” her friend had once told her. “I guess it don’t make no difference if you live on a pallet of straw before a fire, or in a great big palace like this one. I’m a prisoner of St. Giles parish, and yer a prisoner of this world. We are what we are, so different because ye have money, I have nothin’…but that’s just the outside. Inside I think we’re more alike than any two people could be.”
That was when their connection had been made, when she realized there was someone else like her, who felt the same way, who was trapped in a world they did not want, and did not choose.
“Promise me, then,” she had pleaded with him, “that you’ll always think this way of me. That when we’re grown you’ll come back and rescue me from this life.”
“All right, then, after I own me own butchery and get meself set up. I’ll come back for ye, and ye can be me wife.”
In her innocence she had believed it possible. That was, until her father had shown her just how impossible it truly was. How futile it was for her to believe a world where young girls’ dreams might one day become reality—where the world and everything was treated equally.
Bristling, Lucy set her cup and saucer aside, struggling to shield the emotion she knew would be brimming in her eyes. She loathed talking of her past, and especially her parents. She especially despised speaking of it knowing it was the privileged Duke of Sussex who had brought it up.
“Well?” Elizabeth gently prodded. “Is Sussex correct in his estimation?”
“My parents held particular views when it came to child rearing,” she said carefully. “Neither of them was possessed of a frivolous personality.”
“In other words,” Sussex drawled as he finished another custard square, “they were all work and duty, and no play.”
Lucy felt herself sneering, the memories of her lonely, isolated childhood tasting like acid in her mouth. “Succinctly put, your grace. Indeed, my parents found not much in life amusing. My mother lived to advance my father’s goals, and to uphold his hallowed title. My father existed, and still does, in the sanctity of his very male domain. As an only child, and a female at that, my parents’ goal for me was simple—to marry well, and to manage my husband’s home with dignity, decorum and efficiency, while providing him with the requisite heir. An heir that would not only inherit his father’s title, but my father’s as well. I was always very conscious of my role, and the inferiority—and disappointment—of my sex.”
“And that did not sit well with you,” he said, his voice dropping to a husky whisper. “I can see the truth in your eyes. You can hide noth
ing beyond those emerald depths, Lady Lucy.”
Nervously she glanced over and noticed how Isabella was trying her best to study the painted flowers on the delicate china cup. The air was quite thick with a new intimacy that was completely inappropriate. Such intimate discussions were not to be borne at tea, and Lucy tried her best to deflect the conversation to a more tactful and less revealing place.
Casting a gaze about the room, she sought an appropriately benign topic, and remembered that she had wanted to invite Elizabeth to an evening out.
“Before your untimely arrival, your grace, I was about to ask Elizabeth if she was interested in accompanying me to the Sumners’ musicale this evening.”
There was a flicker of amusement in his eyes, before he sat back against the settee, his plate in his lap, his long fingers wrapped around the rim of the teacup. He thought her a coward, she knew, but she didn’t care. He touched too close to the truth, and she would run from it. No one came to know her so intimately. Isabella was possibly the only person in the world who had ever come close, but even still, her cousin did not know all.
Even Thomas, through their shared encounter of passion had never known her so well. She shared her body with him, but nothing else.
“Oh, I would love to,” Elizabeth said. “I haven’t been to a musicale in years. Adrian despises them.”
“You mistake me, Lizzy,” he said silkily as he rested his cup on the arm of the settee. He met Lucy’s gaze, and she noticed the coolness was back in his eyes. “I am inclined to enjoy them, if the company is agreeable. I would be delighted to escort you ladies.”
Like a fish out of water, Lucy floundered for a way to deny the duke. She did not want him with her this evening, did not want to sit in a carriage, or make conversation with him. She didn’t want him looking at her, and seeing her, seeing the things she tried so hard to hide.
Thankfully she hit on something that Sussex would not be able to refute. “But what of your lodge meeting tonight?” she inquired. Thank heavens her father had thought to remind her of his Freemasonry meeting. As part of the Grand Lodge, Sussex would be obliged to attend, thereby forcing him to forgo his attendance to the musicale.
Lucy gave a small smile of triumph, which faded as the duke perused her slowly.
“I think your friend would like it if I were not to attend,” he drawled, making Lucy’s face flame.
“Oh, Adrian, do not tease. Lady Lucy means nothing of the sort…she only seeks to remind you of the obvious. Tonight is lodge night.”
“Ah, yes, but one only has these special opportunities arise so infrequently. The lodge can wait, I believe. Yes,” he murmured thoughtfully as he watched her. “I think I shall send word around to Mrs. Sumner that the three of us shall be attending. If you’ll excuse me, ladies.”
And that was the end of it. Of course, Mrs. Sumner would be ecstatic to receive the Duke of Sussex. The man was a paragon in society, and every matron swooned at the thought of having the duke attend their gathering. There was no possible hope for it now. She was committed to an evening out with Sussex. And she knew very well what everyone in the ton would be speculating come the morning—that she and Sussex had an understanding.
Blast him for so easily commanding the upper hand!
“You are in for it now,” Isabella whispered into her ear. “Here is the end of your avoidance of his grace.”
Refusing to acknowledge Isabella’s outrageous, but truthful, claim, Lucy stared out the window, wondering what dreadful illness she might concoct to relieve her of the night’s invitation.
“I cannot say how excited I am,” Lizzy said with a smile that was beaming. “I adore music. One doesn’t need the gift of sight to enjoy it. And it’s been such an age since I left the house to do more than shop, or visit Isabella. Thank you, Lucy, for inviting me. What wonderful friends you and Isabella have become.”
How could she do this, deny Elizabeth an outing? Lizzy was a good friend, and Lucy was being a poor one, thinking of nothing else but her own discomfort. No, she could not do this, hurt Elizabeth. One insufferable night with his grace. She could tolerate it, if for nothing else but the enjoyment of her friend.
“Lucy and I feel very much the same, Lizzy,” Isabella added.
“Well, then,” she said, while checking the door. His grace had left for his study, and Lucy wanted to be far, far away if he decided to return to the salon. “Shall we go upstairs and choose your gown for the evening?”
“Oh, yes, yes, of course. You and Isabella have such a way with descriptions. I can almost see when you two are around.”
Lucy dearly wished her knack with descriptions worked with words of denial. Because she truly wished she would have found the right words to say to make the duke leave before their conversation had even started.
“But first, Lucy, I think you must take a few minutes to peruse the conservatory. We had planned on it during your last visit, and time got away from us, if I recall.”
The idea of a few stolen moments of silence and solitude lured her to agree. That was what she needed, a moment or two to gather her spiraling thoughts, and set herself to rights.
“If that would be agreeable, I would love to. There was a beautiful, bright pink flower that needs further investigation, I believe.”
“Oh, the lily. Yes, yes.” Lizzy nodded. “And wait till you smell them. Gorgeous scent—heady and exotic. I’ve asked Sussex for an accurate description, but I shan’t bore you with what he told me.”
“Well, then I am convinced that I shall give you a better description, Lizzy. I won’t be long, however.”
Together they rose, and Lucy watched as her cousin escorted Lizzy from the room, grateful for a few minutes of peace to gather her thoughts.
CHAPTER SEVEN
SILENTLY, LUCY ALL but tiptoed past the duke’s study and entered the room that was designed in the shape of an octagon. With its glass walls and ceiling, Lucy could see the gardens outside from every angle. Inside, the room was filled with a dizzying array of colors and scents, from miniature orange trees, to exotic palms. A water fountain, with its gentle cascade of water upon stones lured her, and she sat down on a rock as she trailed her fingers through the cool water, while capturing a delicate pink water lily in her palm.
Despite the gentle patter of rain against the glass ceiling, and the melancholy sky, the room was bright and uplifting—and smelled like a warm, sunny spring day. With a little sigh, Lucy allowed the quiet to blanket her, and soothe her jangled nerves.
It was the perfect place for contemplation, and she decided that if she were ever fortunate enough to be mistress of her own place, she would build such a room as this.
“You look like a woodland nymph sitting beside an enchanted pool.”
The lily dropped with a little splash, and Lucy found herself gasping in surprise, and jumping up all at once.
“I didn’t mean to frighten you.” Sussex stood against the wall, his legs crossed as he studied her with his disconcerting gaze.
“I didn’t hear you come in.”
“That’s because I was already here when you arrived.”
Glancing away, she watched the cascade of water stream over the stones, and into the fountain base. “You should have said, should have announced your presence. I…I would have left you to your privacy.”
Shrugging, he glanced away and plucked a brilliant pink lily from its stem. “It is not an unwelcome presence.”
Their gazes met across the room, through the display of flowers and shrubs and gently waving palm fronds.
Waving his hand, he indicated the room. “What do you think? A labor of love that was the pride of the previous duchess.”
“I think it lovely,” she answered truthfully. “If I had a room such as this, very little would tempt me from it.”
He smiled, and Lucy found herself momentarily disarmed by the beauty of that smile—of him.
“Perhaps one shouldn’t be tempted from this room, but tempted in it.”
This did not sound like the duke. It did not look like the duke, either. His cravat was loosened, and his hair was rumpled, as if he had been running his fingers through it. He was still wearing his dark jacket, and silver waistcoat, but she could see the wrinkles in the fine wool, the way it hung not quite as immaculately as it had when she had first seen him.
She had never seen Sussex looking anything less than immaculately groomed and dressed. Standing before her like this, he was no longer the lofty Duke of Sussex, but just a man. While she took in his dishabille, he studied her. His gaze swept over her, taking in the pink-colored dress, the dusty rose velvet edging that swept the dark floorboards, and up, to her hair, her face. Resisting the urge to run a self-conscious hand along her body and hair, Lucy instead fisted her hands, and hid them in the folds of her full skirts. “You look lovely today. But then, you always do.”
She blinked at the compliment, immediately felt her cheeks heat with embarrassment and discomfort. “Your grace—”
Stiffening, he pushed away from the wall, and began to slowly walk the perimeter of the room. “There is no need for such formality between us, is there?”
“I think it best, do you not? We are not exactly…friends.”
Cocking his head, he studied her. “Ah, you refer to that afternoon between us, then?”
“Have you forgotten our last private meeting?”
His expression turned dark. “I have not.”
“You didn’t tell anyone what you had found. Why not?”
“How do you know I haven’t?”
“Because Isabella would have mentioned it, would have alluded to the fact Black was looking for the man who carried my handkerchief.”
He paused, half turned and looked at her queerly, which made her pause, made her stare back at him. “Does Isabella know all your secrets, then? Have you shared them all?”
Stiffening, she decided to be prudent and stand confidently before the duke. “Not all, but she knows of Thomas. And she’s said nothing of you searching for him, or the fact that you found him carrying my token. She would not betray Black or your order, but she would tell me if she thought you knew something that might damage my reputation.”
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