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"Why did your coachman call you 'your grace'?" she asked, smiling, and a dimple appeared in her cheek.

Jordan jerked his eyes away from the fetching little dent. "That is how dukes are generally addressed."

"Dukes?" Alexandra echoed, disappointed by the discovery that this handsome stranger obviously dwelled in a world far beyond her reach and would therefore vanish from her life forever. "Are you truly a duke?"

"I'm afraid so," he answered, noting her crestfallen reaction. "Are you disappointed?"

"A little," she floored him by replying. "What do people call you? Besides Duke, I mean?"

"At least a dozen names," he said, both amused and confused by her genuine, unguarded reactions. "Most people call me Hawthorne, or Hawk. My close friends call me by my given name, Jordan."

"Hawk suits you," she remarked, but her agile mind had already leapt ahead to an important conclusion. "Do you suppose those bandits specifically chose you to rob because you're a duke? I mean they took a terrible risk in accosting you on the road not far from an inn."

"Greed is a powerful motivation for risk," Jordan replied.

Alexandra nodded her agreement and softly quoted," 'There is no fire like passion, no shark like hatred, no torrent like greed.' "

In blank amazement, Jordan stared at her. "What did you say?"

"I didn't say that, Buddha did," Alexandra explained.

"I'm familiar with the quotation," Jordan said, recovering his composure with an effort. "I'm merely surprised that you are familiar with it." He saw a faint light coming from a shadowy house directly ahead and assumed the home was hers. "Alexandra," he said quickly and sternly as they neared the house, "you must never feel guilty about what you did tonight. You have nothing whatever to feel guilty about."

She looked at him with a soft smile, but as the coach drew up in the rutted drive of a large, run-down house, Alexandra suddenly exclaimed, "Oh no!"

Her heart sank as she beheld the squire's shiny carriage and fancy mare, which were still tied near the front door. She had so hoped they'd be well gone by now.

The duke's coachman opened the door and let down the stairs, but when Alexandra attempted to follow the duke out of the coach, he reached in and scooped her into his arms. "I'm certain I can walk," she protested.

His lazy, intimate smile made her catch her breath as he said, "It's embarrassing in the extreme for a man of my dimensions to be rescued by a slip of a girl, even one wearing a suit of armor. For the sake of my wounded ego, you'll have to permit me to be gallant now."

"Very well," Alexandra agreed with a resigned chuckle. "Who am I to crush the ego of a noble duke?"

Jordan scarcely heard her, his sweeping glance was registering the overgrown lawns surrounding the house, the broken shutters hanging askew at the windows, and all the other signs of a house that was sadly in need of repair. It was not the humble cottage he'd expected to find; instead it was an old, eerie, neglected place, which the inhabitants could obviously not afford to keep up. Shifting Alexandra's weight against his left arm and leg, he raised his right hand and knocked upon the door, noting the peeling paint.

When no one answered, Alexandra volunteered, "I'm afraid you'll have to knock more loudly. Penrose is quite deaf, you see, although he's much too proud to admit it."

"Who," Jordan said, rapping more loudly upon the heavy door, "is Penrose?"

"Our butler. When Papa died, I had to discharge the staff, but Penrose and Filbert were too old and infirm to find new employment. They had nowhere to go, so they remained here and agreed to work in return for only lodging and food. Penrose does the cooking, too, and helps with the cleaning."

"How very odd," Jordan murmured the thought aloud, waiting for the door to be opened.

In the light of the lamp above the door, her piquant face was turned up to him in laughing curiosity. "What do you find 'odd'?"

"The idea of a deaf butler."

"Then you will surely find Filbert even more of an oddity."

"I doubt that," Jordan said dryly. "Who is Filbert?"

"Our footman."

"Dare I ask what his infirmity is?"

"He's shortsighted," she provided ingenuously. "So much so that only last week he mistook a wall for a door and walked into it."

To his horror, Jordan felt laughter welling up inside him. Trying to spare her pride, he said as solemnly as possible, "A deaf butler and a blind footman… How very—ah—unconventional."

"Yes, it is, isn't it," she agreed almost proudly. "But then, I shouldn't like to be conventional." With a jaunty smile, she quoted," 'Conventionality is the refuge of a stagnant mind.' "

Jordan raised his fist and pounded so hard she could hear the sound thunder through the inside of the house, but his puzzled gaze was riveted on her laughing face. "Who said that about conventionality?" he asked blankly.

"I did," she admitted impenitently. "I made it up."

"What an impertinent little baggage you are," he said, grinning, and before he realized what he was doing, he started to press an affectionate, paternal kiss on her forehead. He checked the impulse as the door was flung open by a white-haired Penrose, who glared indignantly at Jordan and said, "There is no need to hammer on the door like you're trying to waken the dead, sir! No one in this house is deaf!"

Stunned into momentary silence by this dressing-down from a mere butler and, moreover, one whose uniform was faded and threadbare, Jordan opened his mouth to give the servant the blistering setdown he richly deserved, but the old man had just realized that it was Alexandra whom Jordan held, and that there was a bruise on her jaw. "What have you done to Miss Alexandra?!" the servant demanded in a furious hiss, and reached out his feeble arms with the obvious intention of snatching Alexandra into them.

"Take me to Mrs. Lawrence," Jordan ordered curtly, ignoring the butler's gesture. "I said," Jordan enunciated more loudly when the servant seemed not to hear, "take us to Mrs. Lawrence at once."

Penrose glowered. "I heard you the first time," he declared irately, turning to do as he was bidden. "The dead could hear you…" he muttered as he walked off.

The faces that turned to stare at them in the drawing room were beyond Alexandra's worst imaginings. Her mother jumped up with a startled scream; the stout squire and his stouter wife both leaned forward in their chairs, intent, avidly curious—staring at Alexandra's shirt, which was gaping open nearly to her breasts.