Page 6 of Duke of Storme (Braving the Elements #4)
The sisters contributed carefully neutral comments designed to demonstrate their acceptance of his suit, without suggesting any particular enthusiasm for it.
Through it all, Miss Brandon said virtually nothing.
She listened with apparent attention, occasionally nodding when someone addressed her directly, but offered no opinions of her own.
Her silence wasn’t awkward – indeed, it was precisely the sort of well-bred restraint one would expect from a properly educated young lady.
Yet, something about her stillness began to irritate him in ways he couldn’t name.
Was this the woman he would be taking back to Scotland? Someone so thoroughly trained in compliance that she had no thoughts of her own to offer?
The prospect should have pleased him. After all, a quiet, manageable wife who would perform her duties without challenging his authority or demanding engagement was exactly what he had requested.
But watching Miss Brandon’s careful composure, he found himself wondering what thoughts moved behind those dark eyes and what opinions she might hold if anyone just bothered to ask for them.
When the final course was cleared and the ladies prepared to withdraw, tradition demanded he request a private word with his intended.
The three husbands rose as well, but their movements were casual, settling themselves near the windows with brandy while maintaining clear lines of sight to the engaged couple.
The message was subtle, but unmistakable: privacy would be granted, but protection remained close at hand.
Miss Brandon rose gracefully when he approached, allowing him to escort her to a small alcove near the drawing room – a space where they could still be observed, but speak in relative privacy.
For a moment, they stood together in silence while the rest of her family settled themselves at a polite distance. Miss Brandon’s hands remained folded at her waist. Her expression was pleasant and utterly unreadable.
“So, ye’re the quiet one,” Finn said finally, the words emerging more bluntly than he intended. “Good. Ye’ll be a duchess who knows when to hold her tongue.”
Her head tilted slightly, and for the first time that evening, something shifted in her expression. Finn thought he saw a flash of… amusement? Annoyance? Challenge? He couldn’t tell.
“How perceptive of you, Your Grace,” she replied, her voice carrying a hint of steel beneath the silk. “Though I wonder if you mistake a preference for thoughtful silence as evidence of an empty mind? Perhaps Scottish definitions differ from English ones?”
The response caught him completely off-guard. Where he’d expected either shy protestation or demure argument, she’d offered something that managed to be both perfectly polite and utterly cutting.
His dark eyebrows rose before he could stop it. “I don’t require a clever wife,” he heard himself say, though he wasn’t entirely certain why the qualification felt necessary. “Just a competent one.”
Diana’s expression didn’t change, but something in her dark eyes seemed to sharpen like a blade finding its edge. When she spoke, her voice remained perfectly level, perfectly proper – and somehow managed to slice through his assumptions with precision.
“Then I suppose we shall both be disappointed, Your Grace.” She paused, her brown eyes softening slightly.
“I fear you’ve mistaken quietness for emptiness, while I…
” She hesitated, then lifted her chin almost imperceptibly.
“I rather think it unfortunate that neither of us bothered to clarify our expectations before making such binding arrangements.”
The words left Diana’s lips before she fully realized she intended to say them. For a heartbeat, she wondered if she’d made a terrible mistake – if her first real conversation with her intended had just destroyed any possibility of a cordial marriage.
But something in his assumption had stung deeply. The quiet one. As though being naturally reserved made her simpler, easier to manage. As though her preference for listening rather than chatting mindlessly marked her as some docile creature without any thoughts of her own.
She watched his face carefully, cataloging the way his gray-blue eyes widened slightly at her response. His expression suggested a man who’d just discovered that a piece of furniture had opinions about its placement.
“I see,” he said slowly, and she heard something new in his voice – not displeasure, exactly, but a kind of wary assessment. “And what, precisely, am I to be disappointed by?”
The question hung between them like a challenge. Diana felt her sisters’ attention focusing on their conversation from across the room, though they were too well-bred to stare openly. Her mother’s fan moved with increasingly agitated precision.
“I am not as manageable as you seem to believe, Your Grace,” Diana replied, her voice remaining soft, but carrying an edge that surprised even her.
“Though you might not think it, I have thoughts of my own and opinions I’m not inclined to abandon simply because they might prove inconvenient.
If you’re seeking a wife who will nod pleasantly at everything you say and never trouble you with her own perspective, then I’m afraid you’ve chosen rather poorly. ”
His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. “I see. And you, Miss Brandon? What disappointment awaits you in this arrangement?”
The question surprised her – not because of its directness, but because it was the first time all evening he had actually asked her for her thoughts, her feelings about their arrangement.
For all its challenging tone, it was the closest thing to genuine curiosity about her perspective that he had shown.
The irony wasn’t lost on her that his first real attempt to understand her mind came in the form of a challenge.
But Diana had spent years watching her sisters navigate the treacherous waters of marriage and Society.
She’d observed the careful balance between duty and desire and knew the sacrifices required as well as the compensations offered.
She’d learned that honesty, delivered at the right moment and in the right tone, could be much more powerful than any amount of strategic compliance.
“I had hoped,” she said quietly, “for a husband who might value intelligence in a wife rather than merely tolerating it. Someone who would see conversation as an opportunity for connection rather than a test of my tractability.” She paused, letting her gaze meet his directly.
“It appears, I, too, made assumptions about this arrangement that might prove…optimistic.”
The silence that followed felt charged, like the air before a thunderstorm. Diana could practically feel her family’s collective held breath as they waited to see how the Duke would respond to such unprecedented directness.
For a long moment, he simply stared at her wearing an unreadable expression. Then, unexpectedly, one corner of his mouth twitched in what might have been the beginnings of a smile.
“Ye’re most certainly no’ what I expected, Miss Brandon.”
“Nor are you, Your Grace.”
“Is that meant to be reassurin’?”
Another silence ensued, though this one felt different – less hostile, more…
considering. Diana became acutely aware of the soft patter of rain against the windows, the distant murmur of her family’s carefully neutral conversation, and the steady tick-tick of the mantel clock marking time toward an uncertain future.
“We should rejoin yer family,” the Duke said finally. “They might think I’m browbeatin’ my intended bride.”
“Aren’t you?”
This time, his smile was unmistakable, though it held no warmth. “No’ yet, Miss Brandon. Though the evening is still young.”
They returned to the drawing room where her family waited with expressions of carefully controlled curiosity.
After a few moments of punctuated silence, Lord Brandon cleared his throat with the deliberate authority of a man broaching necessary business.
“Your Grace, we should surely discuss the wedding arrangements. Lady Brandon has begun preliminary planning, but naturally, we defer to your preferences.”
The Duke’s posture, already rigid, seemed to grow more military. “I prefer simplicity, my lord. A quiet ceremony, immediate family only. No grand celebrations or lengthy preparations.”
“Of course,” Lady Brandon interjected smoothly, though Diana caught the flash of disappointment in her mother’s eyes. “A tasteful, intimate affair. We were thinking perhaps six weeks hence? That would allow proper time for the banns to be read, as well as other–”
“No.” The Duke interrupted. His voice carried the finality of a man accustomed to having his orders followed without question. “Next week.”
The stunned silence that followed was deafening and Diana felt the ground shift beneath her feet. Next week?
She noticed the sharp look that passed between Richard and Nicholas, while Elias’s expression darkened considerably.
“Your Grace,” Lydia ventured carefully, “surely you might allow a few additional weeks for more appropriate preparations? Diana’s trousseau–”
“Miss Brandon will be provided with everythin’ she requires at my ancestral home,” he replied curtly. “I see no benefit in prolongin’ the inevitable.”
Jane’s eyes flashed with indignation. “The inevitable? How romantic of you, Your Grace.”
Richard’s voice cut through the tension. “Perhaps Your Grace might explain the urgency? Such haste seems… unusual for arrangements of this nature.”
The Duke’s gaze shifted to Richard, recognizing the challenge beneath polite inquiry. “My estate requires immediate attention, and I see no advantage in delay.”
“No advantage,” Nicholas repeated quietly, his tone carrying subtle warning, “to allowing a young lady proper time to prepare for such a significant change in her circumstances?”
If the Duke noticed the sarcasm, he gave no indication. “We shall depart for Scotland immediately following the ceremony.”