Page 31 of A Bride for the Wicked Duke (Claimed by Regency Devils #2)

Chapter Two

“S o…” Caroline cleared her throat awkwardly. “You know the Duke of Aldworth well?”

The Duke did not respond. At least not with words. Sitting across from her in the carriage, he tilted his head and stared at her, those dark green eyes of his brimming with a silent warning that told her trying to pursue this conversation would be to her detriment.

“You must do,” she continued stupidly. “As I said, my sister Violet is his betrothed, and I am well acquainted with everyone on her side of the family.” An awkward chuckle. “Most clearly. It would be strange if I did not know who my brother and sisters are…” Another awkward chuckle and she began to sweat with discomfort. “Having said that, they did leave me behind, didn’t they? So perhaps I do not know them as well as I think,” she tried to jest.

Still, the Duke said nothing.

He appeared even larger in the confines of the carriage than he had when standing; a hulking mass of muscle and intimidation. Dark of features too, the shadows inside the carriage fell across his square face, making his expression that much harder to read. Not that she needed to try too hard to understand what was on his mind.

“I swear this is not common,” she added, feeling her tongue run away with her. “Being alone, as you found me. I am ordinarily much more well-behaved—that is not to say that what happened was my fault. Simply a misunderstanding…” Another awkward laugh, swallowed by the silence of the Duke.

I do wish he would stop glaring at me like that. Whether or not he intends to make me feel uncomfortable, that is precisely what is being achieved. I’m uncomfortable… and just a little afraid.

The carriage was moving along at a steady trot, a relief to be sure, as Caroline knew that she was far safer inside the carriage than outside of it. That wasn’t to say that she felt perfectly safe, as her thoughts could not help but wander to the Duke and what she knew of him.

The Duke of Eggleton, informally known by many as the Cruel Duke. It was said that after his father died, he stole his mother away and locked her indoors, keeping her there as a prisoner while refusing to let anyone visit her. For years, he had kept her under lock and key, until she eventually passed away, likely on account of the way he was said to have treated her. Some even said that he was the cause of her death…

Caroline was not one to give credence to rumors. And she reminded herself that this man had just saved her life. However, from the way he glared at her to how damn cold and dispassionate he was, she could not help but think that there might be more truth to what people said than she might like to admit.

For this reason, she began to feel nervous. And for this reason, her tongue continued to wag.

“You did not tell me how it is that you know the Duke of Aldworth,” she continued, feeling herself sweat. “Personally, I do not know His Grace well, having only met him a handful of times. I hope he is a kind man, as my sister deserves such a thing. Are the two of you close? How long have you?—”

“We do not need to do this,” the Duke spoke suddenly, his voice a low rumble in his chest.

“Excuse me?” She blinked in surprise.

“We do not need to do this,” he said again, before shifting to look out the window.

Well, that was rude!

Caroline supposed that she should have been grateful. At least this saved her from having to engage in small talk with a man who had said perhaps ten words to her since they met, none of which had been very nice.

Still, she could not help but look at him, unable to deny how ruggedly handsome he was. Which in itself was a problem, as such thoughts were not familiar to her. In fact, they were wrong. Yet, as he sat closer to the open window, the sun on his face, his cheekbones sharp, his nose straight, and his full lips…

No! That is wrong to think. So very wrong…

He was cruel, she decided to focus on instead, and disinterested, and the sooner they arrived, the sooner she could start avoiding him. An action she suspected he might appreciate.

They rode in silence for several minutes, Caroline shifting awkwardly, careful at the same time not to annoy him further. Silence was the aim here, to become invisible so he would forget that she?—

“Oh!” she cried out suddenly, unable to stop herself because just then, a bug of some sort flew through the window. “Oh no!” She jumped up as it came for her. “Argh!”

Despite her best efforts, Caroline thrashed wildly as the bug attacked her. She could feel it on her skin, in her hair, down her dress! She flailed her arms, crying out, jumping to her feet only to hit her head on the roof and collapse in pain.

“Get it out! Get it out! Get it out!”

The Duke said nothing. In fact, he didn’t so much as move. Eyes closed, breathing heavily, Caroline forced herself to calm down and then pried one eye open. Unsurprisingly, the bug was gone. More surprisingly than that, the Duke was smirking at her.

“What?”

“It flew away,” he said.

“Oh…” She blinked, her cheeks flushing red with embarrassment. “G-Good.”

“Lucky that it did,” he continued, that smirk still on his lips. “It is said that each year, ten ladies die from bug attacks. I would hate for you to become a victim.”

“Excuse me?”

He shrugged, still smirking, and then turned back to look out the window.

Her cheeks were still flushed red, although now the cause was anger.

He is mocking me! The man has strung barely a sentence together since we started this trip, and now he has the gall to make fun of me!

“It is not funny,” she snapped.

A stupid thing to do, but Caroline hadn’t exactly been making smart decisions today, so what was one more bad one?

“Are you sure about that?”

“I thought you were a gentleman,” she said. “And from my experience, gentlemen are not in the habit of mocking young ladies.”

“Is that your experience?”

“It is.”

He shrugged, still looking out the window. “And in my experience, young ladies are not in the habit of having heart attacks at the sight of a mere beetle.”

“I did not have a heart attack!”

“Lucky you did not. I have been delayed once today already, and I would not appreciate another stop.”

Her eyes flashed with anger, and she sat up. “My apologies, Your Grace. I do not know what I was thinking. Upsetting you with my fright. Shame on me.”

“Upsetting me?” He turned finally, the amusement gone, the frustration he had carried with him since they first met returned in full. “Your little panic attack right now did not upset me.”

“It was not?—”

“What has upset me is having to save you from a situation in which you should not have found yourself in the first place. Were you a stray, that might have been understandable, as they do not know any better. You, however, are not so lucky to have that same excuse.”

“Did you just compare me to a stray dog?”

“In a fashion,” he said dryly. “Albeit a stray might be better company. They at least do as they are told.”

“I will have you know that what happened earlier was not my fault, and the fact that you seem to think it is…” She folded her arms and glared at him. “It tells me all I need to know about you. A gentleman? Ha! I would have done better to have taken my chances with those brigands.”

“Careful, my pet?—”

“I am not?—”

“—you are dangerously close to proving my point for me. You wish to know what kind of man I am? I am a man who appreciates peace and quiet. Now, do I need to be clearer, or are you going to behave as even the lamest of strays do?”

Caroline was not the argumentative type. Having grown up as the middle child, just about invisible to her mother, she was always careful not to cause a fuss where one was not needed, as she found that there rarely was any point in being confrontational.

However, this duke brought out a side of her that she could not control, and she found that all she wanted to do was make it known that she was not one to be walked all over so effortlessly and rudely.

“I will say one final thing and leave it at that.” She raised her eyebrows at him in warning, and he looked at her blankly. “When we arrive, as I hope we do soon, the first thing I plan on doing is putting as much space between me and you as possible, from which point I plan on never seeing or speaking to you again. Which, by my estimation, will still be far too much for my liking.”

The Duke eyed her curiously, as if he was surprised that she had spoken to him the way she had just done. There was a hint of a smile behind his eyes, maybe even the sense that he was impressed. But rather than saying as much, he shook his head, sighed, and then looked back out of the window.

Caroline felt herself shaking, but she kept her tongue and turned her head away, content to count the minutes until they arrived. Silence was what she wished for now. Silence and better company than this duke could ever be.

Unfortunately—as was the case for today, it seemed—luck wasn’t on her side.

The carriage lurched suddenly, the coachman cried out, and she felt them draw to a grinding halt.

“What was that?” she asked, moving to the door.

“Wait here,” the Duke ordered, throwing the door open. “Mr. Gulliver!” he barked. “What is going on!”

“Your Grace…” Mr. Gulliver appeared by the open door, a grimace on his face as he fiddled nervously with his hands. “I am afraid that we have a problem…”

* * *

“I promise you, as soon as we arrive, my family will pay you back,” Caroline insisted as she and the Duke wandered through the foyer of the small inn.

“It is fine,” he grumbled.

“We repay our debts,” she insisted. “And this is the second time that I find myself in your debt. Again, I promise that as soon as we arrive, my family will?—”

“I said, it is fine.” He stalked past her, his shoulders hunched, each step heavy, shaking the wooden floorboards of the inn.

She had not known the Duke for long enough to properly ascertain his moods or the reasons for them, so she found herself wondering if his sour temperament was triggered by their new situation or the lie she had just told.

The truth was that Caroline’s family was broke. Worse than broke, they were destitute. It was her late father’s fault, although blaming him now felt petty and pointless. What mattered was rectifying this ailment, a task her mother was working tirelessly toward and the main reason her older sister was getting married. A marriage that she doubted her sister was excited about—as she said, she had met the Duke of Aldworth a handful of times, and he was not exactly friendly—but knew to commit fully to for the sake of their family.

If the Duke of Eggleton knew the Duke of Aldworth as well as he seemed to, there was a good chance that he also knew of her family’s situation, which meant that he knew she was lying to him. And, if that was the case, his current foul mood was perfectly justifiable.

On the other hand, maybe he was just annoyed because, once again, they had been delayed and this time he had no one to blame.

The Duke stalked to the front counter, which was empty. She heard him groan with vexation.

“Is anyone there?” he called. “Innkeeper!” Still, the counter remained empty, and he groaned further as he muttered to himself, “This is unbelievable…”

Was it so wrong that she took pleasure in seeing the Duke upset?

Even a duke, it seems, is not beyond bad luck.

The carriage had broken down a mile up the road. One of the spokes of the wheel was cracked, Mr. Gulliver had said, and would require the night to fix. A most inconvenient situation, forcing Caroline and the Duke to trudge into the nearby town and find an inn to bed down in for the night. It was the only inn in town, a humble little cottage which she assumed a man of the Duke’s status would rather be dead than seen in.

Again, a smile curved her lips at the thought.

That smile faded just as quickly when a new realization dawned on her. Then, her stomach dropped, and her face paled, and she started to shiver as if the flu had just taken her because she heard voices whispering from across the room, coming closer, the conversation one that struck fear in her being.

“I don’t know what she looks like,” one of the voices said. “Just that she is the daughter of a countess, left behind as they told it.”

“And they think she is here?”

“They don’t know where she is,” the first voice explained. “A rider was sent back to where they left her, but she was gone. Could be halfway to Wales, for all anyone knows.”

“What’s her name?”

“Lady Caroline Hawkins. Word is being spread between here and London to look out for her. Her family is worried half to death, they say.”

The second voice snorted. “Not worried enough to not leave her behind.”

“True, true.”

The voices were coming from the foyer and heading in their direction. Caroline turned quickly to find them, hopeful at first because she was grateful to hear that her mother had at least noticed she was missing and had the good sense to send for help in finding her. She saw immediately who it was that was speaking—two men, one young and one old. The innkeeper, was her guess, and his son. They had not seen her yet, nor the Duke, as they were too busy gossiping.

It was only once Caroline considered the situation a little more closely, her eyes falling on the Duke’s back, that she realized how unfortunate her circumstances were. If these men were to learn who she was, she did not doubt that word would reach her mother that she had been found traveling alone with a male companion. It did not matter that he was a duke and that he had saved her. All that would matter was that she was found in an inn, trying to book a room for the night, with a man who was not her husband.

She felt her brow begin to sweat, her stomach churning as the implications mounted. Her reputation would be ruined. Her mother’s reputation would be ruined. Even her sister, who was set to marry, would likely have to deal with the fallout. It might even give the Duke of Aldworth an excuse not to marry her!

Panic now. The room spun. Her throat ran dry. Her tongue became heavy. And all she could do was stand there stupidly as the two men appeared behind the counter, finally finding the Duke waiting for them.

“Oh, no!” the elderly innkeeper gasped. “Didn’t see you there! It’s me eyesight—the reason I keep this one around.” He nudged his son.

“It is quite alright,” the Duke said, the growl in his voice suggesting it was not alright. “I will be requiring a room for the night.”

“Just the one room…” The son peered around him and looked at Caroline.

The Duke turned back, frowning at her, likely wondering why her face had suddenly taken on the expression of utmost horror. She widened her eyes at him, praying he would understand the situation. If she wasn’t so frozen, she might have cried out that they were together.

“Yes,” he said, turning back. “A single room for me and my wife, if there is one available.”

“Your wife?” the elderly innkeeper asked.

“Is there a problem?” the Duke said warningly.

The innkeeper looked between him and Caroline, frowning as if trying to decide something. Then, he shrugged and smiled. “Not at all. One room it is.”

Caroline breathed a sigh of relief. She tried to catch the Duke’s eyes to offer him a silent thank you, but he busied himself with paying for the room, purposefully so.

It wasn’t until the innkeeper led them up the stairs and then down the hallway toward their room that she realized her mistake.

Oh no…

The walk down the hallway was short, but it felt like a mile. The walls, too, were wide, and the ceiling was high, but it felt as if they were slowly closing in on her. She walked silently behind the Duke and the innkeeper, her legs beginning to shake, her heart beginning to race, her breathing turning ragged with panic the closer they got to the room… the closer they got to a situation that was perhaps even worse than being found out.

“Here we are,” the innkeeper said. He unlocked the room and pushed the door open. “It’s a modest room, but I think you will find it to your liking.”

“I am sure it will be fine.”

The innkeeper wore a smile on his face as he looked between them expectantly. Rocking back on his heels, hands behind his back, he waited for them to enter the room.

“Is there anything else?” the Duke asked.

“Oh!” The innkeeper’s eyes went wide. “No, no, just, ah… making sure everything is to your liking.”

“As I said, it is fine.” The Duke glared at him in warning.

“Right…” The innkeeper cleared his throat. “I will just… leave you to it.”

He gave a nervous smile, looking between them again, and frowning as if unsure, only to shake his head and then scurry away.

Caroline stood frozen in the hallway. Before her was the open door, leading into the little room. Before it stood the Duke, his expression impassive, past the point of caring, clearly wishing to be done with this day so he could put it behind him once and for all.

“Well?” he prompted, gesturing into the room.

“I…” Her tongue turned thick inside her mouth. “I…” She glanced into the room, all too aware of the circumstances.

Is he serious? Surely, he can see how inappropriate this is! There is no way he can expect me to… to…

Caroline felt the color drain from her face, a real fear seizing her as the darkest thought crossed her mind, very nearly making her scream.

“I am not sleeping in the same room as you!” she blurted.

The Duke suppressed a groan. “Shall I ask for another? I am certain the innkeeper will be happy to accommodate.”

“You can’t!” she cried.

He rubbed his eyes with his fingers. “I swear that your purpose on this earth is to frustrate me.”

“But… but… but…” she stammered. “It is not right. You and me… alone… in the same room…”

Another smirk curved his lips, and he strode toward her. She stood frozen, craning her neck to look at his hulking mass as he towered over her. He was just so big, taking up the entire breadth of the hallway, a monster from her nightmares that made her knees shake.

“You have nothing to fear from me,” he growled deeply as he leaned in close. So close that she felt the warmth of his breath on her ear. It made her break out in goosebumps, shuddering in ways that suggested fear, but she wasn’t quite sure that was the cause. “That is unless you give me a good reason.”

“A g-good reason?”

“Curb that tongue, behave yourself, and a good night’s sleep will be your reward.”

Again, she felt the urge to argue, which only the Duke seemed to inspire in her. “And if I don’t?”

He chuckled deeply. “Let us hope it does not come to that.”

And with that, he turned and stalked back down the hallway, into the room.

Caroline stood frozen. Her eyes were wide. Her mouth was dry. Her entire body shook. She peered into the darkness, unable to see the Duke but knowing he was there, like a monster in the shadows, waiting for her to step into his lair.

She was not afraid of him like one might think because, despite him being a truly terrifying specimen, he had saved her life and had since done nothing to suggest that he meant her any harm. Rather, the fear that trickled through her body was at her rebellious thoughts and dark desires, those she was at pains to ignore but simply could not stop picturing and considering and wondering if the Duke was thinking the same…

These dark thoughts were ones that she had spent a lifetime fighting against, knowing that they were wrong, wishing she did not have them, yet enraptured at the same time by the way they made her feel. Rare as they were, today had seen them pummel her with relentless ferocity because every time she looked at the Duke…

No! Please, Caroline. Keep your wicked mind away from such wicked thoughts!

She would try. She had to! Yet she peered into the dark depths of the room, inside of which the Duke waited for her, and she was forced to consider the very real fact that she wasn’t nearly as strong-willed as she had spent her entire life convincing herself she was.

Not even close.