Page 28 of To Dare a Duke

I believe these are happily matched pairs who show no signs of migrating south for the season. With my compliments. B

“The duke sent you those,” Sally breathed, her voice full of awe. “Oh, my lamb. Whatever will you do? He’s got his sights on you, he has.”

Prue flushed harder and returning the card to the box, and the lid back on with shaking fingers. “Well, he’ll just have to turn them elsewhere,” she said firmly, before sending the woman an anxious glance. “Don’t tell them, will you, Sally?”

Sally looked affronted at the idea. “As if I would!”

Prue smiled and gave her a quick hug. “Forgive me. I don’t know what came over me. Only that this wretched man puts me all out of sorts. What is he playing at, sending me such gifts? It’s quite inappropriate.”

“Well, he intends to marry you. That much is clear,” Sally replied, her expression dithering somewhere between wistful and apprehensive.

“Over my dead body,” Prue muttered and then blanched as she remembered his first wife’s fate. “Well, perhaps not. But it isn’t happening, and the sooner I get that across to him the better.”

She hurried about the room, determined to get the wretched man out of her mind.

“Now, where are my gloves?” she queried, looking at the top of her dresser where she thought they ought to be.

Sally rolled her eyes. “Wherever you left them, Miss,” she said dryly. “Which is to say, anywhere you’ve been.”

Prue scowled a little. “It’s not my fault. They walk off, and of their own accord, I’d swear it. How did that single glove end up on the raspberry bush before we left home, I ask you? Explain that to me.”

“You spilt your tea on one of them in your room, washed it in the basin and left it on the windowsill to dry. The wind caught it and blew it into the garden. You didn’t notice for two days.”

“Oh,” Prue said, a little deflated. “Is that how it got there?”

“Yes, Miss,” Sally returned with a long-suffering sigh. “I’ll look downstairs.”

“Thank you,” Prue called after her. “I shall be late if I don’t leave soon.”

And then they’ll think I’ve lost my nerve.

Sally paused in the doorway. “You could wear one of those lovely new pairs,” she suggested.

Prue pulled a face at her and the maid chuckled and hurried away.

***

As Prue walked the short distance to Miss Ruth Stone’s front door, she glanced down at her oldest pair of gloves and sighed. Her best pair had migrated to wherever it was her gloves took themselves off to. It would have been nice to wear one of the lovely pairs the duke had sent her, she thought wistfully, but quite inappropriate.

Despite her best intentions, her thoughts returned to their conversation of last night. It had been rather fun. She’d never have been able to hold such an odd conversation with any other man, she realised. Indeed, she’d tried, which was one reason she’d discovered herself so thoroughly unmarriageable. Men thought she was odd. As she had no intention of losing her independence, she’d grown to accept the fact. She had become used to looks of bewilderment and even concern if she dared to pursue her rather eccentric thoughts to their conclusions.

Not that she cared.

His grace had looked a little bewildered himself, but he’d gone along with her, even adding to the conversation himself, entering into the silliness with no show of discomfort.

Was he so desperate for them to marry he’d even make himself ridiculous to please her? The idea was so outrageous she laughed aloud, earning herself a look of reproach from an elderly couple who passed her.

Bedwin didn’t seem to care for her, past the fact she met certain criteria and that his uncle approved of her. She supposed she’d heard of people marrying for far worse reasons, but still. He’d just have to turn his attentions elsewhere.

For the first time, she felt a pang of something that might have been regret. Prue stopped in her tracks, earning herself a curse of reproach as a man almost ploughed into the back of her. He gave her a glare and hurried on. She watched the fellow continue on his way, startled by the sudden jolt of emotion.

Marriage had never been a part of her plan, and she’d never regretted that fact. Her mother’s existence had been illustration enough of all the reasons putting one’s entire life into a man’s power was a terrible idea. Yet she had never allowed herself to consider what it might be like with the right man, with a good man.

She almost laughed aloud again. A good man? The Duke of Bedwin? The Damned Duke himself! What nonsense. Prue might not believe him guilty of murder, but that he had spent the last years haunting the gaming hells and revelling in vice seemed to be common knowledge.

Forcing herself to move forward again, as she was attracting unwanted attention, she wondered if his character had been the same before he’d married. She’d never remembered hearing anything of him before the grand wedding which had been the talk of the ton for weeks, amongst the rumours that the man had been caught like a fish on a line. The gossip that had circulated after the wedding, via his wife, was of cruelty and abuse. Had that been retribution for ensnaring him in such a way? Could the duke be such a man?

Prue’s father had always appeared jovial, kind, and good natured in public. It was only in private that the manipulative monster raised his head. Even if her mother had protested and sought help, Prue was aware no one would have believed her. Even if they had, they would not have helped. She was her husband’s property. His to do with as he saw fit.