Page 9 of Ruby in the Rough (Heiress #4)

Chapter

Nine

T he duke was utterly maddening. How dare he chastise her, let alone drag them—quite literally—out of the Greenwich as if they were errant schoolchildren?

They had been there for all of five minutes. Five minutes! All that effort, all that daring, just for him to swoop in like some grim executioner and ruin everything.

Not that she hadn’t seen him almost at once. She had. The moment she’d stepped into the crowd, her eyes had sought him out, almost instinctively, though she would rather bite her tongue than admit to it.

There he had been—tall, composed, with his mistress hanging off him like a silken scarf.

A beautiful creature, certainly, all sultry smiles and curves that would make any man look twice.

Cordelia had thought of her own blonde locks, so different, so—she didn’t know what—plain?

Perhaps this dark, alluring type was his preference.

And perchance that explained why he always looked at her with such cool disdain, as though she were an inconvenience.

The thought alone was enough to set her teeth on edge. She told herself she didn’t care what the Duke of Walpole thought of her. Yet here she was, bristling at his scolding, and annoyed beyond reason at the way he’d hauled them to the docks.

An hour later, the boat finally docked across the river where the duke’s carriage was waiting for them.

Cordelia climbed inside, an easy feat when one wore breeches.

She sat rigidly on one side of the vehicle and fought to ignore his presence as it filled the carriage beyond endurance.

He sat opposite, his expression carved from stone, his dark eyes fixed on her with such severity that she could feel it on her skin like heat.

She refused to look away.

“Peter,” he called out, his voice cutting through the tense silence. “Ravensmere’s mews and quickly, mind,” he added to the driver. The carriage lurched forward, wheels rattling over the cobbles.

Cordelia turned to the window, determined to ignore him. The city stretched dark and quiet beyond the glass, the glimmer of dockside lanterns fading as they rattled closer to Mayfair and away from the seedier parts of town.

“If you promise never to attend such an event again,” he said suddenly, his voice low and sharp, “I will not tell Ravensmere.”

Her lips curled. “Oh? Am I to be grateful for such mercy?”

“Once, I can forgive. Twice—” He leaned forward, his gaze cutting like steel. “Twice, and I shall see you packed off to a convent before your twenty-third birthday.”

She laughed. “A convent? You forget yourself, Your Grace. I am the daughter of a duke and an heiress in my own right. I do not need to marry, let alone be banished to some nunnery. If you think such a threat frightens me, you are sadly mistaken. I would happily live in ruined solitude if it meant I no longer had to endure being bossed around by you.”

He sat back, regarding her as though she had just announced she planned to scale the Tower of London for sport. “I do not order you about for my own amusement.” His tone was glacial. “What on earth were you thinking, attending such a place?”

Cordelia kept her eyes fixed on the window, unwilling to incriminate her friend. She would not tell him that Lady Jane had found the invitation on his desk.

“My sister put you up to this, did she not?” His voice hardened. “No doubt she was rifling through my papers again. That is how you learned of it. Ravensmere is not invited anymore, now that he is married—happily, I might add—and I would wager my sister’s curiosity led you into this foolishness.”

She did not reply.

“I see,” he said flatly.

After a moment, Cordelia turned, her voice deceptively calm. “Tell me, what is so offensive about a few women seeking a bit of fun? We were together. We were in no danger.”

He snorted, the sound sharp and humorless.

“No danger? Do you know what could have happened to you in a place like that? You could have been cornered by men twice your size, with no one to protect you. They would not have cared that you were daughters of dukes. They would have—” He broke off, his jaw tightening.

“They would have what?” she pressed.

He leaned forward, his gaze suddenly fierce.

“They would have torn that pathetic shirt off your back,” he said, his voice low and dangerous, “wrenched those breeches down your legs, and taken you—roughly, brutally—in a way that would have left you ruined for life. That is what awaited you. That is why I dragged you out before it was too late.”

Her breath caught. His words, though coarse, chilled her to the bone. But worse than the fear was the strange, fluttering heat that rose in her chest at the way he spoke, the way his eyes burned as they locked with hers.

She swallowed, looking away.

He continued, softer now. “You are fortunate I recognized you before anyone else did. If anyone from our social circle had seen through your disguise, you would have been ruined. As for my sister—” He shook his head, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “She will feel my full wrath come morning.”

Cordelia clenched her fists in her lap. She wanted to be angry, but part of her could not shake the truth in his words. There had been men at that ball—rough-looking men—whose gazes had lingered too long, whose smiles had been sharp and sly.

Still, she was not about to let the duke win this argument so easily.

“Well, nothing happened,” she said stubbornly. “And now we are on our way back to Mayfair, where all will be well. We will return to our dull, proper lives and marry the gentlemen deemed acceptable and harmless, and that will be that.”

His gaze drifted down her form, slow and deliberate, and she felt it like a physical touch. A shiver slipped over her skin, and she became acutely aware of how small the carriage appeared to be.

“Men,” he said quietly, “are not as harmless as you think.”

She stared at him, her cheeks warming under his scrutiny. “I do not need your lectures,” she said, forcing bravado she did not quite feel.

He didn’t answer immediately. His eyes lingered on her mouth, her throat, the curve of her figure beneath the ridiculous men’s attire, and for a fleeting, shocking second, she wondered what it would be like if he were to touch her.

The thought made her pulse jump.

She quickly turned back to the window, heart hammering.

He sighed. “I tell you this not to frighten you, but so you understand. A woman’s reputation is fragile. One slip, one whisper, and everything you are—everything you could be—is shattered.”

Cordelia bit her lip. “Perhaps. But can you not understand how frustrating it is for us? Men have their clubs, their mistresses, their freedoms. We are expected to sit prettily, waiting for marriage, as if perfection and purity are the only things we can offer. It is not possible to bare so easily without sometimes wanting to burst free of those restraints. No one is perfect.”

“I understand your frustrations,” he said, though his tone suggested otherwise. “But I cannot change the society in which we live.”

She tilted her head, narrowing her gaze. “Will you keep your mistress once you are married?”

He paused, a muscle working in his jaw. “Of course.”

Cordelia glared, overcome with rage at his answer. “Then you are as bad as any man who violates a woman. Do you not see the hypocrisy? What if your mistress is unfaithful? What if she gives you the pox? And then you bring it home to your innocent, perfect wife—what then?”

He stared at her, clearly taken aback by her boldness.

“My mistress is loyal to me,” he said, though his words lacked conviction.

“You mean to say you hope she is loyal,” Cordelia retorted. “But you cannot know for certain. I, for one, would not tolerate such deceit. If my husband ever gave me such a disease, he would not live long enough to see the outcome of it.”

“You cannot threaten people, Cordelia,” he said, forgetting her honorific.

For a moment the sound of her name on his lips pulled all sensible thoughts from her mind. “Oh, I can—and I would,” she promised when she reconciled her brain.

The carriage jolted sharply as it rounded a corner, and Cordelia lurched sideways with a startled gasp. The duke’s hand shot out to catch her, steadying her. The sudden nearness of him—the warmth of his hand on her arm, the way his face hovered only inches from hers—stole her breath.

His gaze dipped to her lips.

Something hot and unbidden flared between them.

Before she could think better of it, she leaned forward and brushed her lips against his. A fleeting, featherlight kiss.

He jerked back as though burned, his eyes wide. “What are you doing?”

Cordelia smiled, feeling her pulse race. “Just provoking you more, Your Grace.”

He stared at her, utterly confounded.

“I find,” she added softly, “that I enjoy it rather a lot since you also seem so accomplished to aggravate me.”