Page 23 of A Bride for the Wicked Duke (Claimed by Regency Devils #2)
Chapter Twenty-Three
“L ook who it is…” In the doorway to his office, Victor appeared with a mischievous grin on his face. “I did not think I would be seeing you here tonight.”
“This is my office, isn’t it.” Gerald snapped at the man. He had a glass of whiskey, half-poured, in front of him, and beside that was the bottle. He finished the glass in a single mouthful and then poured himself another. “And my establishment. I do not need permission.”
“And I did not say that you did.” Victor walked across the office and without asking took the bottle off Gerald’s desk and had himself a mouthful. He smacked his lips as he put the bottle down. “And this is our establishment. Do not forget that.”
Gerald bared his teeth at his friend. “Is there a reason you are here?”
“I was going to ask the same of you.” Victor sat down across from him. “Me? I am here every night – which you would know, if you came here half as much as you are meant to.”
“Not here,” Gerald said. “My office. What do you want?”
“Well, someone is in a mood,” Victor chuckled.
“You have that effect on me.”
He glared at Victor in warning, preying the man would leave him alone because with the mood that he was in, the last thing he wished to deal with was Victor’s sardonic sense of humor.
Was there any reason to say that his mood was caused by seeing Lady Hakwins earlier? I am past the point of pretending, as much as I might like to. Dammit! This was supposed to be done with. Cutting her off was meant to free me from this… this hold she has on me. But these last two weeks have only made things worse.
It had started the day after she had come to see him. A night still burned hot in his mind. A night he could not move on from. A night that had not meant to happen the way it did, but Gerald was weak and pathetic and unable to control himself. As was always the case where Lady Hawkins was concerned.
He could still taste her on his lips. He could still feel her mouth wrapped around his manhood. Too many times since that night, he had thought about her. And too many times he had questioned why in the name of all things was he such a fool as to let her go.
His feelings for her were only ever meant to be sexual. That certainty had been what kept him sane and focused. Yes, he wanted her more than he had ever wanted another in his life, but she and he were of two different worlds it felt like, they could never work – he did not want them to work! And when she finally found a man to marry her, that would be it for once she was no longer available, he would simply move on…
At least that had been the plan. Now, I do not know what to think.
Seeing her today had undone him once again. Never mind how good she had looked. Yes, she had lost some weight, but that was not it. It was in her eyes that Gerald had become lost. They had met, held, and he had felt his stomach turn with guilt and his manhood stiffen with attraction. Were they alone, he would have gone to her, taken her, made her his as he had thought of doing too many times these past weeks to count. But… no, even that would not have been an option.
She had spurned him. Turned from him. When their eyes had met he had seen fury in them, confirmation that even if he wanted her, she would not take him. A relief, it should have been, but here he sat, drinking, sulking, wondering to himself what it was all for. Why was he so damn insistent that she was no good for him.
“No… this is beyond your usual sour temperament,” Victor mused as he studied Gerald and the cloud which hung over him. “Now, I am trying my best to think when this attitude of yours began…” His eyes flashed wickedness.
“I have had a long day, Victor. Do not make it longer.”
“A long week by my count,” Victor said. “No, a long two weeks. Yes…” He chuckled and rubbed his chin. “Two weeks it has been. The question is, what happened two weeks ago to cause this once bastion of propriety and fakery to take a turn toward the morose.”
Gerald grimaced. He had thought he’d been more subtle than he had been. Indeed, for two weeks he had wandered about as if he was a ghost. Lamenting. Trying to instill in himself the belief he had made the right decision. Failing miserably all the same.
“Ah, that is right…” Victor chuckled knowingly. “Remind me, it was two weeks ago when Lady Hawkins became engaged, yes?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“Nothing at all,” Victor mused. “Although by my mind, this announcement should have had the opposite effect. Lord Mildenhall, as pompous as that lout is, also happens to be rather wealthy, meaning that the debt her family owes us will be paid off in good time. Good news, as it is.”
“And it is,” Gerald said, forcing a smile. “Lady Hawkins… her family does not deserve to suffer for her father’s sins.”
Victor chuckled sardonically. “No matter, for you are doing enough suffering for the lot of them.”
“What does that mean?”
“Oh, please, Gerald…” Victor took the bottle and had another swig. “Do you think me a fool? A blind fool, at that. I know you do not hold me in high respects where my intelligence is concerned, but you should know that there is little I do not see.”
“There is nothing to see.”
“So, the way you were looking at Lady Hawkins that night at your home was nothing?” He made sure to be watching Gerald, whose eyes opened in surprise, which had Victor chuckling further. “As I said.”
“I… I do not know what you are –”
“And your insistence that I not collect on her family’s debt, even when it was well overdue. I had wondered to myself why you were protecting her.”
“I was not protecting her,” he growled in warning, anger growing now because he could see Victor was mocking him. Taking pleasure in his misery. “I just did not wish to see her family –”
“Suffer for the father’s sins, yes I know, you said that already,” Victor waved him down. “A nice enough sentiment. But a half-truth at best.”
Gerald straightened in his chair and fixed Victor with a scowl that he hoped would be enough to see the large man back down. He did not appreciate being mocked. Just as he did not appreciate having truths which burned hotter than any fire being laid bare before him.
“Whatever it is that you are saying, say it,” he snapped. “Or leave. Personally, I would prefer the latter.”
Victor rolled his eyes. “Enough with the bravado. It is obvious to anyone who pays attention – as I do, by the way. It is obvious that you have feelings for this Lady Hawkins.”
A pang stabbed through his gut. “I do… do not. That is a lie.”
“As you say,” Victor scoffed. “But do you want my advice?” He raised an eyebrow at Gerald. “Get over it. I have no doubt that she was a wild one…” He laughed to himself, and Gerald stiffened with fury. “She looks the type, to be sure. But she is one of many. Bed another. Have some fun. Sleep your way through half of London if that is what it takes. Believe me, there are plenty more Lady Hawkins to pick from, should you be so willing. All you have to do is pull yourself out of this funk because the way you have been acting lately, a blind beggar on their last shilling would rather starve than waste their time in your bed.” He cackled. “Christ man, have some dignity.”
Gerald felt a lump appear in his throat, just as he felt his stomach drop through the floor. Victor’s advice was predicated on the fact that all Gerald felt for Lady Hawkins was physical attraction, meaning that the advice to bed someone else sounded perfectly reasonable to his ears. Sadly, Gerald was starting to accept the very real fact that this was simply not the case.
There were not plenty more Lady Hawkins to pick from, as Victor had so simply put it. There was but the one, a unique type of woman whom Gerald had never before met the likes of and would never meet again. When he had first met her, he had thought her unruly and uncouth and beneath him in every way which mattered. Now, he knew, these were the qualities that he admired most.
Worse that she had come to him. Worse that she had given him a chance. And worse that he was so damn stubborn and pigheaded that he had refused to accept how he felt. That was what stung the most.
No… what stings the most is that I am too late. That is the cross I will bear for the rest of my life, a sure to be long and painful one at that.
“Thank you for the advice,” he muttered to Victor. “I will… I will consider it.”
“Please do…” Victor sighed and rose from the chair, snatching the bottle away. “And where I often besmirch you for not coming in here nearly enough, I think you not being here until you sought yourself out might be a good thing. I mean, good God man…” He stepped back, keeping the bottle. “You are a duke! Start acting like one.” And then he left, shaking his head the whole while.
A duke… all his life, Gerald had done nothing but play the part of being a duke. Proper. Regal. A perfect example of his station and a model for his peers to look upon and emulate themselves after. He had done so because he thought it right, caring not about how happy it made him because he had believed such things did not matter.
Now, he gave little care for any of it. What did it matter what people thought of you if you were not happy? What did it matter how respected you were if you were miserable? It does not matter, a lesson I am learning in real time, the hard way. In brutal fashion because it is exactly what I deserve.
It had been a long two weeks for Gerald, and the pain was only going to get worse.