Page 65 of The Phantom Duke

“You heard servants,” Damien said dismissively.

“Servants are not allowed to be about at that hour. I know your standing orders, you see?” Maria countered, lowering her cup. “Am I to understand the house is haunted? Or do your servants delight in disobeying you?”

“Do not be ridiculous,” Damien replied. “It was probably a voice from the servant’s quarters carried through some quirk of the architecture. This is an old house, and it has many idiosyncrasies.”

Maria looked at him, wondering how far she dared push him.

Will he decide he has had enough, even now, when I felt I was getting through to him? Do I want to stay or have Gilbert live in a house with so many secrets?

“Or perhaps you simply dreamed it. The mind plays tricks at that time of night, particularly in a strange house,” Damien said.

“It is strange but not that strange,” Maria replied. “Perhaps I should ask Doctor Hale. He seems to be your only friend.”

Damien rounded on her angrily, his face thunderous.

“I would thank you to stop your attempts to pry. Content yourself that you are here, and your orphan child will have a grand house in which to live. Is that not enough?”

Maria felt she had scored a point and immediately felt sad at the adversarial tone of the conversation.

But then I do not wish to be adversarial at all. He takes offense where none is intended and keeps secrets that I am sure must be unnecessary.

Maria tipped her chin up and gathered her courage. “I must be assured that he will be safe here.”

“He will be.”

“Not in the woods or anywhere beyond the lawn,” Damien said. “You know how dangerous it is. I will not have you risking a child just to defy me.”

“Do you think I would do that, out of spite?” Maria rose, angry herself now.

For a moment, it was as though the air crackled between them. Maria gazed into his eyes and hoped that her own were as alive with fire as his. She could melt into that gaze. There was such depth. She wanted to reach out and tear the mask away, wanted to run her hand down his cheek, show him that no harm would come to her for simply looking upon him, unmasked. Damien looked away.

“I do not want to argue with you in every conversation,” he said heatedly.

“Nor I.”

“I will have Langford make the woods safe,” Damien said.

“Thank you,” Maria smiled, “and thank you for your kindness towards the orphanage. It was very generous.”

Damien turned away as though afraid to maintain eye contact for too long.

Are you afraid of what you will concede if you continue to look into my eyes?

While he was looking away, Maria rose and went to the window, intending to open the curtains once more.

“Don’t!” Damien barked, “I dislike the brightness of day. It is irritating.”

He grabbed for the curtain to hold it in place, and his hand touched hers. Warmth jolted through her hand and all the way up her arm. Maria’s breath caught as he looked down at her from inches away. The curtains had been pulled open enough to admit a narrow spear of sunlight behind Damien.

“You came looking for me while the sun was in the sky,” she said softly. “It did not harm you.”

She pulled the gap wider, felt Damien’s hand tighten upon hers, pulling it back. Then his fingers moved down the back of her hand to her wrist. She bit her lip, wanting to close her eyes and savor the feeling of that tender touch. Could she persuade him to do more than that? What would she need to do in order to persuade Damien to finish what had begun between them in the water?

“It will not harm me,” he said. “It is irritating.”

“I imagine it is when you avoid it so assiduously. Is it not a case of becoming used to something new? Like me.”

“I have not become used to you. I will never be used to you.”