Page 64 of Duke of Destruction
Even if Xander’s deadly glare promised that retribution would be swift and brutal.
The truth of it was, Catherine had been plagued with this…itchiness under her skin for weeks now, and encountering Percy in the street had only made it worse.
Just wait, she kept telling herself.It will fade eventually.
But it hadn’t been fading. It had been growing, becoming this hungry, eager thing that made her want to give in to insanity.
Madness, like seeking Percy out.
Except…what would she even do if she gave in to such an impulse? She had forced herself to run through it, a repeated form of self-punishment that she hoped would eventually, somehow, force her to give up on this stupid, stupid,stupidnotion.
The scenario went like this: She would seek him out. Since she hadn’t the faintest idea what kind of establishments he frequented—because shedid not know him,she would remind herself at this juncture—the only place she could reliably find him was his home. If she found his direction, something that was already a risky proposition, she could notgo there. It would be ruination.
And if she did go, did try to meet an unmarried gentleman, uninvited, in his home? Ruination.
Ruination and then gossip; Catherine knew perfectly well that there was nothing thetonliked so much as watching someone fall from grace, and she’d kept her name out of the gossip rags for too long for themnotto plaster the story on every page for months.
And then Ariadne would be ruined by association.
And her younger cousins.
And maybe even Cordelia.
Oh, well, fine. Catherine could acknowledge that perhaps this last was going a bit far. But it didn’t matter, because the other consequences were more than enough.
So. She could not go see him on purpose. And she could not expect that she would see him again by accident; twice in six and twenty years was really not that very frequently, after all.
Shehadto forget him. It was the only choice.
But her emotional mind simply failed to agree, not at all swayed by the better angels of logic and reason.
Which was why, when Percy suddenly appeared across the ballroom, so directly in Catherine’s line of vision that a director at the theater could not have placed him better, she wondered, briefly, if she hadconjuredhim by sheer force of will.
Good Lord, she hoped not. She had enough problems without finding out that she was also a witch.
She tried to make herself look away, but found she couldn’t. And when he met her eye, he began moving toward her immediately, as if he, too, was compelled by whatever had taken her over.
Perhapshewas the witch, she thought.
“Oh, Christ,” Xander muttered when he saw Percy crossing toward their group. Catherine startled. She’d frankly forgotten that the rest of her family was there.
“Don’t be difficult,” Helen scolded her husband quietly, and Catherine would have found this hilarious—Helen and Xander had been married for a while now, but it never stopped being funny to watch her implacable brother be dressed down by his diminutive, plump wife—but she was too busy looking as though she had no investment in this whatsoever.
Helen had been giving her suspicious looks ever since Catherine and Ariadne had come back from the house party, after all. There was no reason to give her anything to fuel her absurd theories.
Percy reached them, and it was as though he had to physically tear his eyes from Catherine to greet the rest of them.
“Your Grace,” he said stiffly to Xander, with the most minute bow he could manage. Then he turned to Helen. “Your Grace.” This bow was slightly more pronounced, and his tone was warmer. Ariadne got something that a generous man might even have been able to call a smile. “Lady Ariadne. Good to see you again.”
“Good evening, Your Grace,” Catherine said lightly while Helen and Ariadne murmured their greetings and Xander stared—until Helen pinched him surreptitiously, whereupon he grunted.
Percy didn’t smile at her. He didn’t bow.
He pierced her with a gaze that felt like an arrow to the chest.
“Good evening, Lady Catherine,” he said.
There was a beat in which Catherine, again, wished she could see the humor in all this, given that everyone was quickly rearranging their expectations. Xander was visibly confused that Percy wasn’t discussing political matters or being difficult,which Catherine thought fair. Percy was very good at being difficult.
