Page 33 of The Duke is Wicked

She stepped inside and drew a cavernous, calming breath, her eyes adjusting to the meager light. Dust specks danced in the air, a mad, tilting glimmer. The fragrance in the dense air was magic. At least to her. Horse, earth, leather and…the aroma hit her before the noise.

Puppy. A whimpering puppy.

Straw crunched beneath her boots as she crossed the broad aisle, past an enormous black and her restless bay, finally locating the source of the sound in a vacant stall at the back of the building. Her breath caught, her heart slipping to her knees before bouncing back to flutter violently in her chest.

Oh, this was not good.

The arrogant aristocrat she could easily rebuff, ignoring every strained smile he’d sent her way this morning over kippers and cinnamon toast, not a problem, but this…

She swallowed and wedged her shoulder against the stall door, her crop held limply in her hand.As her father used to say when things got rough,shit.

Sebastian was on one knee, his back to her, his hands full of puppy. There had to be at least six of them, a wondrous assortment of black, mottled brown and tan. They scrambled over his boots, sniffing and whimpering, yanking on his cuffs as he sought to give their mother, lying on her side in exhausted slumber, her meal. The duke’s dogs ate well, meat and potatoes. She recalled what Kitty had said about him loving his hounds more than her. From the looks of it, the girl might be right.

“Go on with you, little darlings, let your mama eat. If you want dinner later, that is.”

Delaney smiled, hiding her delight behind her gloved fist.Little darlings?She wondered if he’d ever used that tone with a woman, then gave her leg a punitive tap with her crop as jealousy cut a white-hot passage through her.

She sighed, releasing a hushed breath, because she wanted another moment to observe him without the argument that was sure to come once he noticed her. However cross she’d been since the League’s impromptu meeting two days ago, she’d never forget the sight of her proud, protective, supercilious duke—a man thetoncalled the ‘duke of no one’s heart’ when Delaney suspected this was not the case—laughing as he reached for a puppy who’d tumbled into the bowl of food meant for its mother.

He made it worse, damn him, by bringing the wriggling pup close to his face and giving it unnecessary life advice while she looked on, feeling like she’d taken a blow to the head.

As the duke sat there cooing to his charges, she caught a disjointed, cracked-pane view of the boy he’d been. A frightened child whose father had plunged his hands in a frigid fountain to repel a gift over which he’d had no control. An honorable man who was doing everything in his power to ensure others in their mystical world didn’t suffer as he had. A man doing his best by her when she’d planned to deceive him.

Much to her heart’s dismay, she’d found the scandalous, flame-throwing Duke of Ashcroft to be human after all. The tender look on his face as he nudged a puppy off his boot, moments before he caught her staring, made her want to crawl in her attic and never come out.

The soft glow in his eyes dimmed as he turned to find her standing there. Transforming boy instantly to man. Gaze darting away, he dragged his hand through his tumbledown hair, his signet ring flashing in the sunlight streaking through the high-set window. He had a smudge of dirt on his cheek, another on his chin, and she squeezed her hands into fists to keep from licking her thumb and wiping them away. His attire was, again, strictly for the country, buckskin trousers and a linen shirt open at the neck, revealing the sliver of dark hair she knew dipped to his waistband. No coat, no cravat, no waistcoat. Not enough to conceal his long, lean body.

“I thought to ride,” she whispered awkwardly, entangled in a web she guessed he hadn’t intended to spin.

With a languid stretch, he rose to his feet, sending the puppies yipping and tumbling. Sending his scent, tea and bergamot and leather, wafting over her. Heat flooded her body, then anger, as he glanced around her with a raised brow.

“Never fear, my wardens are waiting outside.” She directed her crop toward the stable entrance, thrilled to see her hand wasn’t trembling. “I’m lucky I’m able to bathe without them.”

He opened his mouth to reply, then shook his head and snapped it shut. “We prefer to call them guards,” he finally said, voice strained.

She gave her crop a jiggle. “Tomato, tomato.”

He grunted and knocked mud from his boot, back to looking the same way he always did, windblown and annoyed. Somewhere behind them, a horse whinnied and danced, bumping against its stall.

“They’re adorable,” she said and dropped to her haunches, unable to go another minute without touching. Sensing an additional human available to provide attention or food, the puppies raced to her, a mass of floppy ears, moist tongues and pink bellies. “A delight, oh, you sweet things! I’ve never seen such lovable babies in my life.”

The duke looked about as happy to watch her revert to a delighted child as she’d been to watch him, his unease flowing from his startling amber eyes to the hard press of his lips. But he seemed no less engrossed. Perching his shoulder against the timber beam, he stuck a piece of straw in his mouth and chewed on it. Absently, when his erect posture and forthright gaze said he was anything but. “You can take one back to London when you go. I have to find homes for at least some of them. Too many dogs around here already. They’re eating me out of house and castle.”

“Only because you’re feeding them so well! I’ve seen servants served worse meals.” Delaney giggled and pressed the puppy’s paw to her cheek, knowing she shouldn’t gossip but unable to stop herself. “Kitty said you like your hounds better than you like her.”

She expected him to deny the ludicrous statement, but he simply shrugged, his painfully long lashes sliding low to hide what he was thinking. He pointed with the straw to the wriggling pup she cradled against her chest. “That one seems to like you, Temple.”

Looking into the pup’s sparkling brown eyes, the bit of her heart she still held after this dangerous encounter slipped away. To the duke or the puppy, she couldn’t say. “I couldn’t possibly take him.” She flipped the wiggling little beast upside down and peered at his privates. “Or her.”

“Why not? Most people gladly accept gifts from a duke.”

She placed the pup gently in the straw, the illogical admission coming from a bleak place.Because I don’t want to go back.

Flustered, her cheeks began to tingle.Damn and double damn.Sebastian would see the ridiculous blush and tease her. She could just hear him: seven ways to humiliate a tomboy in one try. Gaining her feet, she rushed past him, moving into the stall housing her horse.

“You don’t ride alone. And my men haven’t been able to keep up with you thus far.” Sebastian crossed to the next stall, his mount, like hers, already saddled. He jerked on his gloves, looped the reins through his fingers and guided a gorgeous thoroughbred standing at least 18 hands down the stable’s center aisle and into the yard. His low words of encouragement to his beast, when all he’d given Delaney was a dressing-down, stung more than her cheeks.

Tugging on the buckle securing her girth, Delaney wrapped the reins around her wrist and leaped onto her mount before she’d exited the stable, her horse dancing and snorting. “If I ask you to run, Metis, please,please, make it the best race of your life,” she begged in a rough whisper.