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“Whatever I have read, none of it is my sister’s fault.” She stared up at him in defiance, cursing his towering height, for it made her feel rather small. Her shoulders were just at the height of his chest.

He took a half step forward, bringing himself as close as he had been a moment ago when he had caught her. “But you are not your sister, are you? You would not run from me.” He nodded toward the door. “You proved that just now.”

Perhaps it would have been better if shehadbolted.

There was something about Lady Lydia that felt like a dream, the details dancing just out of reach of William’s memory. He vaguely remembered her from the day he was jilted at the altar, but that was not it—there was a more recent encounter, he was certain of it, though the memory refused to come to him.

“Maybe I am more like her than people think!” Lydia insisted, retreating from him in a vain attempt to prove her point. If she had been able to quell the blush in her cheeks and hold his gaze, he might have believed her.

William resisted the urge to smile. “Allow me to be frank, Lady Lydia. I do understand your sister’s reasons for fleeing. She wanted to marry for love, and she has done so. That does not mean I find her actions acceptable.”

“Were you not pitied by the scandal sheets shortly after it happened?” she replied, her tone more polite, as if she had remembered that she was speaking with a duke. “In the seven years between that day and the day she married Silas, were you not shown sympathy?”

He stared at her, surprised. “Pity is no substitute for what I lost.”

“But you could have used it advantageously, had you not… um… resorted to… uh… your former ways.” Her cheeks were red now,her eyes flitting around the room as if she were following a dust mote.

“You will not persuade me to change my mind, Lady Lydia,” he said coolly, unwilling to admit that her argument was a clever one. “Iamowed.”

Lydia shook her head. “You cannot be owed aperson, Your Grace. Indeed, if I may say so, you sound very… bitter. Bitter that you did not use those seven years to find a love of your own.” She jutted her chin insolently. “Orwasthat why you were in the scandal sheets so often?”

“Careful,” he warned, his fingers itching to take hold of her chin, to see how deep that streak of disobedience ran.

She stood straight and defiant still, just the ragged draw of her breaths giving away the nerves trembling beneath. A scintillating sound that he could not concentrate on if he wished to get anything done, any agreement in place.

“I never had any such expectations of love, Lady Lydia, and you should not either,” he said. “But Iwillmake you a duchess with all the freedoms that entails. I should say that is a fair price for a lack of love. A lady rarely gets both. And do not say that your sister has, for she is an exception to the rule. Truly, her luck warrants studying.”

If he had thought to ease her nerves with what he thought was an amusing jest, he was to be sorely disappointed.

“Freedom?” she scoffed, firing up that nagging recognition in the back of his mind. “Emma always said that you represented and offered the absolute opposite. You meant to trap her in a marriage where she would have to become what you wanted, no better than a doll.”

William rolled his eyes, holding back a grim laugh. “Your sister had a flair for the dramatic back then as evidenced—I am sure you will agree—by her theatrical exeunt from our wedding.”

He moved closer and watched with intrigue as she stiffened like a statue. “But I shall set this straight for you, once and for all, in a way that your sister clearly misunderstood in her wayward youth. I do not care what you do after we are wed, as long as you do not appear in the scandal sheets. In truth, it will be a rarity if you see me at all. I ask for discretion in your freedom, nothing more.”

“Nothing more?” She narrowed her eyes. “I know dukes, Your Grace. I know thereareexpectations, despite you saying that I should have none.”

“Heirs, you mean?”

A strangled sound grumbled in the back of her throat, as if she had forgotten she was holding her breath, and her lungs were desperately fighting for air. The redness rushing up from her neck to her forehead certainly suggested that might be the problem.

“Breathe, Lady Lydia,” he told her. “You are not a child, do not throw a tantrum.”

Her pretty blue eyes flared with such rage that William nearly laughed. So much fight in one so small. So much fire in one so seemingly delicate.

She was actually of average height, but to him, everyone seemed small. And there was something about the suggestion of her soft curves, those big blue eyes, her porcelain skin, and the warmth of her strawberry-blonde hair that, no doubt, inspired a protectiveness in many a gentleman. As if shewerea doll that could be broken with too firm a touch.

He noticed that a few freckles dotted that smooth, pale complexion. He doubted he had ever seen them look more becoming on a woman, emphasizing her youthful prettiness. Nor had he ever seen a more transformative blush, that dusting of pink making her somehow radiant, even in her obvious embarrassment.

It took a healthy dose of willpower for him not to trace the pink with his gaze.

“I know I am not a child, and I should say thatyouare the one throwing a tantrum because no other lady will have you,” she shot back, breathless. “You are sulking because my sister is happy and you are not.”

He ignored her remark. “We will probably have to produce an heir at some juncture, but at present, that is not my priority. Taking care of my estate is.”

“And there we have it, ladies and gentlemen!” She began to applaud him very slowly in a manner that he ordinarily would not have tolerated from anyone. “The source of His Grace’s desperation—his estate is crumbling, he has made himself so infamous that no lady will have him, and so he is using his last card to claw back his losses! But will it be a winning hand?”

Heknewthat mocking tone. He hadfeltthat fierce fire before.