Page 5 of A Gamble with the Rakish Duke
“What were you thinking, Duchess?” he demanded as soon as they were outside Devil’s Draw. “Coming to a gambling hell without an escort? Even an escort would not dare walk through those doors!”
“I had to save my father!” Her voice was just as heated, but she could also hear how it sounded.
“Your father is beyond saving.”
His response echoed her thoughts, but she was still fuming. Her husband should not have intervened. He made her look like a damsel in distress.
“And you? Are you beyond saving, too? Do not hide the fact that your face already had bruises when you came charging in.”
“That is none of your business.”
Oliver’s face had shuttered. He was shutting her out, and it was not in the least bit surprising. They had never made the effort to get to know each other. As soon as they got married, he dumped her in a country house not too far from London but far enough away from him.
“You are right. I am your wife in name only. I should not care about your business,” Alexandra huffed bitterly.
She turned to walk away, catching sight of her carriage waiting for her across the street.
Her carriage? No, it was another of Oliver’s gifts to her, together with the lovely country house she adored despite the circumstances.
“Where did you get the money you gave to Lockwood?”
“That is not your business either.”
“It made you visit an establishment that a high-born lady like you should not venture into without any friends or a husband. I digress. It is not a place you should go to for any reason, with or without an escort.”
“Why do you care, Your Grace? You’ve barely acknowledged me since our wedding!”
“You’re my wife—that is enough reason. A wife who still has not revealed where she gets her money from.”
“Are you anxious to know how I spend the pin money you’ve left me? I have not touched the bank account, and the banknotes you gave me are still in the lockbox at home. Even if I had taken the money and added it to what I earned, it would still not be enough.”
“Not enough?”
Oliver was right to be confused. He had left her two thousand pounds. Alexandra thought one thousand pounds was more than enough, but she was wrong. Her father had bigger debts than she had expected. He was more addicted to gambling than she had initially thought, and that was a frightening thing. The man was on the road to self-destruction.
“Yes. You heard me right. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Your Grace. The carriage you have generously gifted me is waiting.”
“Let him drive home. I will take you in mine.”
“No. I cannot let your coachman wait for me in vain,” she huffed, before striding toward the carriage.
This time, Oliver did not argue or stop her. He simply followed her. She saw what he meant to do too late and gaped at the coins he placed in the coachman’s palm as he ordered him to leave.
“You can’t do that, Your Grace,” she protested.
“How did you get the money, and why did you not just use the money I left you?”
“I have my ways, too,” Alexandra blurted, suddenly flustered by the way her husband was looking at her.
His green eyes seemed to pierce through her soul, and she felt the bewildering urge to stroke his well-trimmed beard, which could not hide the scar on the seam of his lower lip or the blooming bruise on his jaw.
“What ways?” Oliver asked sharply as he handed her into his carriage.
The well-trained coachman merely nodded and duffed his hat. Then, he discreetly turned his gaze to the horses.
“Yes! Do you also think I’m a brainless chit? Of course, I have ways, too.”
As soon as the words were out, Alexandra regretted them. She didn’t want to reveal too much of her feelings—how her father’s words affected her.
