Page 19 of The Duke and the Spinster

Chapter Seven

Garrett had moved through the various rooms, chatting to people, but had felt Lady Juliana’s presence like something pulling at him, drawing him back to the main parlour, where she had been circulating amongst the guests at her mother’s side. All the while he was puzzling over the look she had given him, just after she had arrived – it had been full of anger, and something that looked, to him, almost like despair. He did not understand what he had done to deserve such a look. Surely, his small smile of greeting was not the cause?

He stepped back into the parlour and paused, scanning the room. Her mother and sister stood with a large group, deep in conversation. But Lady Juliana was not with them. His heart beat a little faster – where had she gone? His mind returned to the previous evening, in the library, to the feel of her lips against his, her softness in his arms. Dare he hope? If she had, again, taken refuge from the crowd in the library…

He was moving before he thought about it, through the door and down the hallway.

As his hand touched the library door, faint sounds reached him from inside. Voices. He eased the door in with great care, until it stood open just enough for him to see inside. It took every bit of strength he had to stop himself from charging instantly into the room. For there, before the fireplace, stood Lady Juliana, caught in Fondleton’s arms. He could not believe it of her. Surely not…

Fondleton was speaking, although Garrett was not able to determine the words. The voice stopped. Then she moved, pulling away from him desperately but unsuccessfully, a small stifled scream escaping her as she did. Fondleton hauled her back against him, and laughed.

Garrett needed to see no more – it was, from that interaction, profoundly obvious that Lady Juliana was not in Fondleton’s arms by choice. He stepped into the room, closing the door behind him, the sound of his movement disguised by Fondleton’s laughter.

In four strides, he was behind Fondleton. Garrett grasped both of Fondleton’s arms, a sharp pull causing the man to release Lady Juliana, who stumbled back. He spun Fondleton around, and landed a solid punch to his jaw, every part of the intense anger he felt fuelling its force. Fondleton dropped to the floor, unconscious. Garrett lifted his finger to his lips, and Lady Juliana nodded, still standing, frozen with the shock of the last few moments.

He bent and scooped Fondleton up, carrying him to the door. Once he was sure that the hallway was empty, he took the man out, and carried him as far as the servants’ stairs, and left him there.

Garrett hoped that whoever found him would think him passed out from drink – for Fondleton certainly smelled as if he had consumed enough of it. Garrett quickly slipped back into the library, closing the door again. Lady Juliana still stood in the same spot, but she was shaking.

He went to her immediately.

“My Lady, are you unharmed? Did he…?”

She brought her eyes to his, and her shaking eased a little.

“No. He forced a kiss upon me, but nothing worse.”

“That is bad enough. He is no gentleman, to force a Lady to anything.”

Her eyes held his, full of uncertainty, and what looked to him like fear. Instinctively, he wanted to draw her to him, to hold her and protect her. He reached out, unaware of his action. Her eyes snapped down to his hands, and she scurried backwards a few unsteady steps, putting a chair between them. Garrett stilled completely, his heart aching, hurt beyond words that she should fear him. Fondleton deserved far worse than the blow he had given him.

“Lady Juliana… why do you back away from me? Have I given you any reason to fear me?”

She looked down a moment, her breathing ragged, then raised her face again. He saw the echo of that look she had given him upon her arrival – anger and despair mixed. It made no more sense to him now than then.

She countered his question with one of her own.

“Why do you expect me to trust you? How can I know that you are not as bad as Lord Fondleton? For surely your flattering words have been just to cozen me, for your amusement – I see no other reason why you should treat me so differently from all other men before.”

“I had hoped that my behaviour might have spoken for me, spoken to my honour and my sincerity. It seems that is not enough to convince you. Why? What makes you doubt me so?”

She glared at him, as if he had somehow done wrong by her – could it be the previous evening’s kiss? Perhaps… but he felt that there was far more to this. He waited.

“I have never been beautiful, graceful or elegant,” she almost spat the words at him, “but you have spoken all of those words to me. I struggled to believe you for, fool that I am, I wanted someone, anyone, to see me that way. I should have known better – my failed Season taught me that much. But then I was given some ‘helpful’ information. It was discreetly pointed out to me that perhaps you are a bit of a rake, although quiet about it. That perhaps I was simply a passing amusement, a woman so in need of being noticed that she would fall for any flattery. But that, equally, there was a longstanding arrangement between you and another, soon to be made formal. Suddenly, everything made more sense. It was a reason that, indeed, a man might flatter me falsely, and was easier to believe than that I had magically transformed overnight.”

Garrett felt as if he had been the one to receive a ferocious punch. The air left his lungs. It seemed that the vicious gossip was not only directed at Lady Juliana. And her words left him with a quiet certainty about who might have spoken so.

“Lady Juliana, who told you these things? For they are, in their entirety, untrue.”

“Oh? Then why would the Lady tell me, if not to warn me away from someone she regards as her own, someone with whom she has an arrangement?”

“If the Lady in question is who I suspect it is, she would do so precisely because there is no arrangement, except as a hopeful daydream she has nourished for years, no matter what I have done to dissuade her.”

“Who do you think told me these things?”

“Lady Prudence Baggington.”

He heard the revulsion in his own voice as he spoke the name. Lady Juliana considered him, thinking, but relaxed a little more.