Page 48 of The Duke's Forbidden Bride
For a moment, all he could do was hold the rest of the cake, gazing at her.
He could not look away, and he was not prepared for what his heart did at the sight of her smile. He had not been prepared for any reaction, really.
He cleared his throat, nodding at her. “These are excellent,” he said.
Her smile faltered ever so slightly, as if she had expected a longer compliment.
“I must return to my work.”
“Of course,” Eleanor mumbled.
She retreated to the door and hovered on the threshold, her smile gone. Spencer already missed it, already wondered what would bring it back.
His reaction had broken through layers of pain and trauma from years at the convent and made her smile again. He could not just ignore that.
“And just so you are aware, I really enjoy baking. Perhaps I can bring more desserts when your work stretches into the late hours?”
“Perhaps,” he answered in a tight voice.
And then she was gone.
Yet Spencer could swear he smelled jasmine in the air even long after she had left.
Even when his study fell silent, he could not stop looking at the honey cakes, imagining her delicate hands kneading the dough, drizzling the honey, and preparing the filling.
Shaking his head, he forced himself to return to his work, to turn his focus back to all the information he had collected about Southgate Dockyard.
Over the following week, Spencer discarded three notes from Theodore, asking when he would meet the new Duchess.
Each time a new one came in, more sharply worded than the last, Spencer swore he would answer back, but then Eleanor wouldenter his study with another cake, another coin-sized treat, and he would forget everything as soon as he tasted her next creation.
Heavens above, she made the most heavenly desserts.
It happened so often that week that he started waiting for them, and he felt irritated at the realization.
But the week after, he noticed that she did not appear at her usual time, just before dinner.
He let another half hour pass, albeit distractedly, before he rose from his chair and left the study.
The convent, he realized, had instilled a routine in Eleanor.
He noticed that she arrived at breakfast at the same minute and began her day at the same hour, and if she was ever late, it ate away at her. So, it was not like her to break that routine.
Spencer then wondered how he allowed himself to think that he knew her so intimately. Regardless, he had come to look forward to those visits she made to his study. Not just for the treats, but because she smiled more freely every time he tasted what she offered.
And he had grown to crave it.
When she was not in her chamber, or the library—which, amusedly, he had noticed she avoided—or the dining room, he realized there was only one place she would be. But the sky was dark with a storm that had been raging for the last couple of days.
One of Theodore’s notes had said as much, hinting that he should visit themjust before the storm hit, lest he conveniently be stuck there, with nothing to do but get to know Eleanor.
Spencer’s heart rate quickened as he made his way to the entrance Eleanor usually used to get to the garden, finding her flowerbeds already waterlogged by the battering rain.
As soon as he went deeper into the garden, the wind picked up, almost throwing him to the side. He hurried down the pathway to the infernal greenhouse she adored, only to hear the sound of shattering glass above the howling wind.
“Eleanor!” he shouted, running for the greenhouse.
He heard a grunt of pain, and he rounded the corner to find the door swinging wildly on its hinges while his wife stood in the doorway, teetering on a step ladder as she checked the broken window above the door.
