Page 79 of Duke of Destruction
“That’s wonderful,” Percy said tonelessly without even looking at his valet. He let himself be guided through the motions of getting dressed, of putting on the accoutrements of a duke.
Just because he needed to suffer eternally didn’t mean that his poor staff deserved the same fate. He would cooperatively remove himself from the house for a bit so they could gossip about him in peace.
He deserved that, too.
The sun was weak as Percy walked toward Regent’s Park; it provided little in the way of warmth and he found himself shivering in his overcoat.
Christ alive. Even Percy was getting tired of thinking about what he did and did not deserve.
The park was, as befit the weather, nearly deserted. He meandered, not caring enough to find a proper destination or to think about the admittedly quite nice scenery around him.
He had, after all, grown up primarily in the countryside. Normally, Percy could appreciate the crunch of leaves underfoot as well as the next fellow.
But not today.
Today, he could think of nothing but the sound of his blood beating in his ears and the relentless hum of self-recrimination that coursed through every inch of him.
Realistically, he should have blamed his lack of attention for the surprise that greeted him when he wandered around the far end of the park, wondering how long he had to stay out before he could head back home without distressing his staff. He had simply been too focused inward to observe anything that was happening outside of himself. He had recognized that he was not entirely alone, of course. Nearly alone, yes, but not entirely.
And yet, it didn’t feel like anything so vague as inattention when the jolt hit him. It felt like fate.
Because of course—of course—she was there, standing in a group of people who included a young man who was a miniatureof his elder brother, and the young lady who clung to his arm adoringly.
Catherine. Standing tall behind them was—of damned course—Catherine.
MyCatherine,he thought for one terrible moment—except she wasn’t, of course she wasn’t. He had made damn certain of that, had he not?
For the span of a single breath, her eyes met his. There was half a field between them still, but he felt her eyes on his as if she was mere inches away.
It hurt. God, how ithurt. Because it wasn’t just his pain—he had already grown accustomed to feeling that—but hers, too. An accusation would have been better, but it wasn’t even there, thathow could you?
It was just sadness. Simple, pure,agonizingsadness.
Percy knew it made him a coward, but he couldn’t find the energy to care.
He turned on his heel and fled.
CHAPTER 20
“Idon’t mean to be insensitive,” David began in a tone that suggested that he wasn’t that fussed about it, actually, “but what the hell is wrong with you?”
Ah. Yes. That felt right.
Given that, on the lengthy list of things that were wrong with him, Percy also felt like being an arsehole, he took another long sip of his drink—his third? Fourth? He was well and properly soused—and said, “Nothing.”
David looked like he was considering throttling Percy. It was less satisfying than Percy might have hoped.
Maybe if he drank some more.
Why not try it? It wasn’t as though he had anything better to do until Parliament was back in session in the spring. Maybe thiswas why so many gentlemen were proper bastards. The boredom of it all got to them.
When Percy finished drinking his glass, signaling the attendant for another—he couldn’t make worse decisions drunk than the ones he had been making fully sober, could he?—he saw David’s look had taken on a slightly worried quality beneath his annoyance.
Well. Percy hated that.
“Far be it from me to interrupt your plan to indulge in the gentleman’s long-standing tradition of drinking himself into an early grave,” David drawled, his dry tone not quite enough to cover up that hint of concern, “but what in Christ’s name is going on?”
“Nothing. I said it was nothing. Didn’t I say it was nothing? I could have sworn I said that.”
