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To his surprise, anger flared in her typically mild brown eyes. “Your appearance is not unpleasant. And the addition of a few scars is no reason to abandon someone. Why, it’s absolutely despicable what she did.”
Once more her staunch defense of him warmed something deep inside him. And not only was she defending him, but she was also quickly working herself up into a fury. He smiled, a true one this time. “You are a rarity,” he murmured.
That seemed to stop her ranting in its tracks. “I’m only stating the obvious.”
“The obvious perhaps to you. Unfortunately, most people aren’t as kind as you.”
“Well,” she said, her embarrassment palpable. She looked about the nursery for a moment, as if lost, before motioning to the door with an odd flapping motion. “Shall we join the others?”
As they made their way from the room Daniel felt the lightening of a weight that had been pressing down on him. It had felt surprisingly cathartic to talk about Erica. Not that he was planning on making it a common occurrence, of course.
But as they made their way into the side garden and he gazed down at her sweet profile, he thought that maybe, just maybe, it would be nice to have a friend for a short while. His gaze shifted to her lips. And surely, he thought with a hard swallow as he tried not to remember the feel of them beneath his own, he could ignore his desire for her. It was only a few weeks, after all. What could possibly happen in that time?
Chapter 10
Margery reached into her desk drawer with shaking fingers, lifting out the small plain wooden box from within. When she had hidden the blackmail letter there nearly a fortnight ago, she had not wanted to touch the thing again. She felt soiled just looking at it; to pick the thing up was like branding those damning words into her flesh.
But over the past two days, since their trip to Swallowhill, she had found she was rapidly losing sight of her purpose in finding Daniel a wife.
She was still working hard at securing scenarios where he might finally make his choice of which lady on the Isle he might like to marry, of course. Not an afternoon passed that didn’t see them in town on some pretext or other, no evening where they weren’t at a dinner party or card party.
Nor was there a moment when she didn’t think about that kiss and her conversation with Lenora.
Take a lover? Certainly not. She still openly mourned her husband, after all. It would be the grossest betrayal to take another man to her bed.
Each day that passed, however, made that argument weaker and weaker. It was only physical, after all. Her heart would not be involved.
And perhaps, with her increasingly vivid thoughts of what it might feel like to have him trail his hands over her body, how it might be to have him slide between her legs, easing the ache deep inside her, which was growing stronger by the day, she could finally focus on finding him a wife. Because whether she liked it or not, the deadline to pay the blackmailer was marching closer. And Daniel was no more decided on which of the young women he wanted to marry. And if she did not stop mooning over the man and start focusing all her efforts on securing that bride for him—thereby making certain she received her fee and was able to keep Aaron’s memory protected—she would fail. She bit her lip, tension strumming through her veins as she recalled the neat black checks on the calendar in her desk, bringing her closer to October first and her day of reckoning. And she could not fail; she just couldn’t.
Before she went down the path of diving into an affair with the duke to quiet the urges inside her, however—goodness knew if she did, there would be no returning to the person she was now—she was determined to utilize every defense in her arsenal against the pull of him. Even if that meant reading once more that most disturbing, vile letter.
Dragging in a deep breath, she unfolded the parchment. It was common stock; no expensive vellum here, but neither was it rough paper. The words glared up at her, sharp and bold in their construction, the ink harsh against the white background. Disgust and fear shuddered through her, but she fought the urge to crumple the hated thing and hurl it into the fire, instead focusing on the message. Fragments of it stood out:
Your husband was not the hero you believe him to be…
…traitor to his country…
…keep this fact silent…
…one hundred pounds…
…Don’t fail me in this.
Nauseated, she felt bile rising up in her throat. She fought it back, forcing herself to read the letter again and again. She could obtain the means to pay off the evil creature who had sent it. She need only get through these last weeks and secure a wife for Daniel. Surely, she thought as she hid the letter back in its box and left her room to join the others for their trip to the Assembly Rooms and the ball that was to take place, she could manage the rest of their time together with little trouble.
As she caught sight of Daniel in the front hall with his mother and Gran, resplendent in his stark black evening wear, dread—and a kind of anticipation—churned inside her as her gaze met his and she knew, she would be lucky if she could manage an evening.
***
“And what is your opinion, Your Grace?”
Daniel started, dragging his gaze away from Margery. She looked exceedingly pretty tonight, the soft light from the glittering chandeliers catching in her upswept curls, highlighting the myriad hues within the seemingly plain brown locks. He’d been doing that with disturbing regularity this evening, finding his mind and his eyes wandering to her when he should be paying attention to whatever young woman he was supposed to be conversing with. Which, in that particular moment, was Miss Peacham. Who was waiting in patient expectation for him to answer her on whatever it was she’d been talking about.
He gave her a sickly smile. “I’m sorry, what was that?”
Annoyance flared in her eyes, there and gone in a moment. And no wonder, for it was not the first time in the past ten minutes he had lost track of the conversation. “Now that you have swum at the tide pool, what is your opinion on the effects of saltwater therapy?”
Which was the very last thing he wanted to think about just then, for it brought to mind that kiss, something he had been thinking about with disturbing frequency ever since it happened. “Ah, it was quite invigorating. That is,” he hurried to say, his face going hot, “I do believe it helped. My leg, I mean.”
