Page 51 of The Untamed Duke
“Sweet with a sting,” Nicholas chuckled, helping her into a chair. “Relax. While last night was for your pleasure, tonight is for mine. Anticipation is a heady, delicious thing, and right now it pleases me to wait.”
Chapter 19
Softness
Wetness
Silkiness
These parts of her do not belong to me
Or any man
~Nicholas August Harris March
Ninth Earl of Richefort
Nicholas held her elbow,his fingers gentle and firm and somehow caressing even though they were motionless upon her skin. There was so much he felt with this girl, so many sensations capable of knocking the breath from his lungs. The silk of her skin, the softness of her hair. The gold of her eyes. Nicholas wanted possession of all of it.
She was a strange little creature, his sweet, practical Grace. All soft edges and hard determination, wrapped in a beautiful package that made the blood in his veins sing. She liked being mastered, but it must be a delicate undertaking on his part. Grace would never be completely tamed, and that in itself held tremendous appeal.
He dished out the meal onto the ducal, gold-edged dinner plates emblazoned with the Richeforte crest and trimmed in flourishes resembling pearls. Neither spoke as they enjoyed the roasted capon served over creamed spinach. A side dish of braised carrots rounded out the simple meal. They shared a bottle of the finest wine from his cellars, and after her second glass, Grace twirled the stem of the glass between her fingers.
“May I ask a question, Your Grace?” Her eyes were bright with ill-concealed curiosity.
“Do I stand a chance of stopping you?”
She had the decency to blush before shaking her head.
“Do your worst,” he invited with a slight frown. His displeasure didn't deter her in the least.
“It’s rather impertinent,” Grace warned.
“I expect nothing less.”
She regarded him for a long moment, as if the words were having difficulty forming in her mouth. Nicholas thought she’d ask about his former lovers. The baroness who’d only recently shared his bed. Hell, even questions regarding his blood feud with Ravenswood would not have surprised him. Her quiet inquiry shocked him.
“It’s said, on the night your father died, the duchess took all of the duke’s one hundred-year-old brandy, started a fire with it, and she, along with every servant in this house, feasted on oysters and champagne until dawn in celebration.”
“Who told you that?” He couldn’t keep the fury from his voice.Goddamn gossips.
Grace dropped her gaze, almost guiltily. “Sara, Lord Bentley’s wife.”
Nicholas didn’t know whether he should be stunned or incensed. First, news of that night would not have escaped Oakmont’s confines unless his own mother was the culprit. The servants would keep such secrets until death in order to please her. And to avoid his wrath.
A hint of a smile broke across Nicholas’s face. He remembered the time he and Alan helped themselves to a cask of that same brandy when they were merely thirteen years old. He recalled the liquor’s sweet bitterness. How it slid down his throat, smooth, like a ribbon of silk. Just one bottle gifted the opportunity of forgetting the emptiness inside him—if only for a short time.
He also remembered the brutal thrashing his father administered upon discovering the transgression.
“I’ve heard that rumor as well. Only, my mother did not throw all the brandy into the fire.”
Grace’s jaw dropped at the confirmation. Nicholas continued. “She gifted several bottles to the staff. As well as gold in compensation for the duke’s miserly tendencies and petty cruelty over the years. And the oysters were gone within an hour, so no, they did not dine on those all night. But it is true the sun had rose before many of them fell into their beds.”
“Your father must have been a difficult man,” Grace said quietly, taking another sip of her wine.
“That is a kind way of saying it.” Nicholas knew his growl was harsh. Speaking of his father in any capacity brought out the worst in him.
“Were you sad at all when he died?”
