Page 64 of The Feared Duke’s Found Family

“And Her Grace, looking positively breathtaking,” Davenport continued, his voice dripping with easy, practiced charm. He offered Fanny a dazzling, aristocratic smile before holding out his gloved hand. “The waltz is just beginning. It would be an honor if you would grant me the privilege of this dance.”

Lysander’s entire body snapped taut.

A sudden, violent wave of dark, possessive heat surged from his belly straight to his jaw. Before his conscious mind could even process the request, the word tore past his lips, flat and dangerously low.

“No.”

Lord Davenport froze, his gloved hand hovering in midair, a look of profound, bewildered shock flashing across his face. Fanny started, her head snapping up to stare at Lysander, her amber eyes wide with quiet, stunned surprise.

Lysander stood frozen under their combined gazes, his jaw flexing hard against his collar as his mind raced to find a logical, respectable justification for the sharp refusal. His instincts were screaming at him to grab Davenport by the lapels and hurl him into the courtyard, but the cold, disciplined aristocrat inside him scrambled for footing.

Was Fanny fatigued? No, she was practically glowing. Was there a breach of etiquette? None whatsoever; Davenport was a nobleman of high standing. There was no rational, defensible reason under the laws of polite society why his wife could not accept a simple dance.

The silence stretched, thick and suffocating.

Instead of offering a graceful lie or an excuse, Lysander felt a dark, bitter wall of pride slam down inside him. His gray eyes hardened into slate, his broad chest rising and falling in a harsh, heavy rhythm.

“No,” Lysander repeated, his baritone dropping into a thick, forcefully polite rumble that barely concealed the raw bite of it. “You must excuse us, Davenport. I am currently on my way to fetch Her Grace some refreshments from the gallery table. I shall meet her later.”

He did not wait for Davenport to reply. He did not even look back at the viscount. Instead, Lysander’s dark gaze locked onto Fanny’s face. She was looking up at him with a sharp, perceptive expression—her brows drawn slightly together, her parted lips holding a mixture of sheer disbelief and a quiet, challenge-filled heat that made his blood run hot. She knew precisely what he had just done. She saw through his thin, forced excuse in an instant.

Fanny turned back to Davenport, her tone smooth, pleasant, and entirely unfazed as she offered the viscount her hand. “His Grace is extraordinarily thoughtful, Lord Davenport. I would be delighted to join you for the waltz while he attends to the wine.”

Lysander felt as though the floorboards had given way under his boots.

He stood pinned to the spot as Davenport let out a soft, relieved laugh, taking Fanny’s gloved fingers and leading her cleanly away from him, navigating the edge of the crowd toward the center of the dance floor.

Lysander did not move toward the refreshment table. He retreated three paces into the shadow of a massive marble pillar, his long fingers curling into hard, tight fists at his sides as he watched the couple join the set.

He hated it. He hated every single second of it with a fierce, blinding intensity that shocked him to his very core.

The music swelled, the violins soaring high above the chatter of the room, and Davenport wrapped his gloved hand around Fanny’s waist.

A sharp, primal snarl almost escaped Lysander’s throat. His jaw locked so tightly the muscles along his temple throbbed. From his place in the shadows, he watched Davenport spin Fanny across the dark wood. He watched the rich emerald silk of her skirts swirl and billow against Davenport’s trousers. He watched Davenport lean down, whispering something that made Fanny tilt her head back and let out a soft, melodic laugh that Lysander could hear even over the orchestra.

Why should another man have that?

The thought roared through Lysander’s mind like a fury, burning away every last shred of his cold, stoic discipline.

Why should Davenport, or any other posturing fool in this bloated room, have the exquisite privilege of her time? Why should another man’s hand rest against the small of her back? Why should another man get to see the warm, dazzling light of her smile up close?

Regret cut through him. He should have taken her hand the second they crossed the threshold. He should have claimed her before the whole room, held her tight against his chest, and swept her across the floor until every gossip in Mayfair knew she was entirely untouchable.

He had let his pride and his clumsy armor get in the way once again, driving a wedge where he desperately wanted closeness. He had handed her away out of sheer, stubborn stubbornness, and now he was forced to stand in the dark, starving, while another man danced with the woman who held his home, his children, and his hardened heart in the palm of her hand.

Lysander’s gray eyes tracked her every movement through the crowd, dark, fierce, and possessively sharp.

She was his. His duchess, his partner, his wife. And as the waltz neared its final, sweeping chords, Lysander stepped out from the shadow of the marble pillar, his broad shoulders squared and his jaw set in a hard, dangerous line.

This dance was ending, and no other man was going to touch her for the rest of the night. He stood rigid against the edge of the ballroom, his gaze locked onto the couple gliding across the polished parquet with the sharp, unyielding focus of a hawk tracking prey.

Every muscle along his broad shoulders was pulled tight beneath his tailored black coat. His eyes never left Lord Davenport’s gloved hand where it rested against the small of Fanny’s waist.

He watched the spacing between the viscount’s fingers, measuring the distance down to the fraction of an inch, his blood boiling in a dark, terrifying rhythm. If that hand slipped even an inch lower than propriety allowed—if Sterling so much as let his thumb brush the swell of her hip—Lysander knew with lethal certainty that he would not bother with a challenge; he would snap the man’s wrist where he stood.

He had led men in cold precision, calculated estate ledgers, and buried his grief deep behind stone walls, but he had never felt this. It was a raw, primal savagery—a dark, possessive fury that clawed at his chest, demanding he tear his wife away from another man’s touch and lock the doors of Hilgrove Manor against the entire world.

His long fingers curled into tight fists at his sides, the leather of his evening gloves groaning under the pressure. He took two steps forward, his jaw set in a hard, dangerous line, fully intent on cutting through the swirling couples to wrench Fanny out of Davenport’s hold.