Page 9 of The Duke’s Hidden Runaway Bride

His aunt knocked on his door as he was just about to retire for bed that night, the stub of a candle in the stick she carried guttering low as she glared at him above the dim flicker.

“You are laying siege to that child, Adrian. Do not trouble to lie to me. I have watched you do it for a fortnight, and I am asking you to stop. You gave me your word. Nothing at all, you said.”

“I have asked her nothing, Aunt. Not one single question about anything more personal than her opinion of the weather or whether she would like another slice from the roast. Would you have me send her to Coventry, and speak not a single word to her? I do not think even I can make my manners so poor.”

All of which was true, and he heard for himself how little it answered.

The candlelight moved on Elise’s face and showed him how tired she was. When she spoke again, the anger had gone out of her voice, which was far worse.

“There are people in this world who can afford to be found interesting, and people who cannot. You have never once in your life had to be no one, Adrian. She has.” Elise looked at him steadily. “Do not make a game of her safety, however kindly you mean it.”

She took her candle and went, leaving him alone on the dark landing with nothing to say, the cold of the stone floor climbing through his stockinged feet before he thought to move.

Chapter Six

By St. Thomas’s Day, the valley had been sealed shut for a fortnight. From her window Ophelia could see that the lane to the gatehouse had vanished, the river had shrunk to a grey scar below, and the passes beyond the near slopes had disappeared entirely under a wall of snow.

Bronwen, bringing her chocolate, confirmed it. She had a countrywoman’s certainty about weather, and she did not trouble to hide her satisfaction in being proved right.

“No one’s been in nor out this fortnight past, miss, nor will be before the New Year, my da says. He’s never wrong about snow, though he’s wrong about most things. So the duke’s caught fast with the rest of us.” She set down the cup and gave Ophelia a look far too knowing for a girl of eighteen. “Which I’d have thought would please you better than it seems to.”

It ought to have pleased her. The snow was her safety, yet she still felt the duke’s attention following her about the house, gathering up every mistake, however little she gave him.

She had tried to be stone.

She thought she had been managing it tolerably well, until the household went out for the greenery that morning and Adrian Sutton undid her resolve simply by being kind to a housemaid.

It was the custom at Plas Eira, Lady Elise declared, for the whole house to gather the Christmas greenery on St. Thomas’s Day, and no one, duke or scullery maid, was excused. They went bundled to the eyes in every wool and flannel the house could provide. Adrian was the most comic of them, for he had brought nothing fit for Wales and wore a vast, moth-eaten greatcoat belonging to the late Sir Rhys. It made him look like a bear.

They waded through the glittering snow to the copse below the chapel, carrying baskets and a billhook. Their breath smoked before them, and the cold hurt to draw, sharp enough to catch at the back of the throat.

Adrian kept his distance from Ophelia.

She noticed this, though she should not have. He did not appear at her elbow or turn her dull answers over like coins. He worked with the men cutting holly and bay, accepted Miss Pettibone’s opinions upon the proper length of ivy-vines, and left Ophelia to gather mistletoe in peace.

She told herself she was relieved.

Then she saw him take the heavy basket out of Bronwen’s arms.

He did it without thought. Bronwen was labouring up the slope beneath a load of holly, her boots slipping, and he went to her and took it. He did not glance around to see who had noticed. Markham would have looked for an audience. Adrian merely offered Bronwen his free arm.

“You’ll spoil your fine coat, Your Grace,” she said, laughing up at him.

“It is not my coat. It belonged to a far better man than I, and I cannot make it worse than the moths have.”

She took his arm and they went up the slope arguing cheerfully over whether Welsh moths were superior to English ones.

Ophelia stood in the snow with a sprig of mistletoe crushed in her fist. He had seen someone struggling and chose to help even though he need not have, and nobody would have thought less of him for it, because a duke not noticing a maid struggling was nothing to be remarked on.

Cruel men are easier to guard against.

A few minutes later, her boot slipped on a patch of packed snow. She caught herself before she fell, but Adrian had seen. He came back down the slope and stopped a careful distance from her.

“Is it the cold making you a little clumsy, Miss Jones, or the company?”

“The cold, Your Grace. Plainly the cold.”

“Plainly.” She heard the smile in his voice. “Then take my arm. I promise not to bite. I should only like you not to fall.”