Page 100 of A Duke Changes Everything
“You may depart as soon as you decide to get to your feet, Lyle.”
When he opened his mouth to protest, Lady Claxton snapped, “Be gone, young man, and be glad I don’t inform your father of your tomfoolery here tonight.”
Finally, she turned her attention toward Mina.
“You were not invited, Miss Thorne, but you may join the other Enderley staff downstairs, if your assistance is required.”
Mina looked at the older woman, but all she could see was Nick’s eyes filled with anger and pain. She needed to speak to him.
“Actually, Lady Claxton, I’ll be departing too.” She bobbed a curtsy, lifted the edge of her skirt to take one long step over Gregory’s outstretched legs, and rushed for the front door.
The chilly air stung her cheeks and her eyes watered. Somewhere inside the Claxtons’ kitchen, she’d laid aside a wrap she’d worn. It didn’t matter. Finding Nick did.
She started down the steps, scanning the line of carriages. Some had been moved toward the Claxton stables, but the Tremayne carriage still stood at the ready, awaiting Nick’s departure. Where would he have gone?
Boots crunching on gravel, she rushed down the carriage drive, wondering whether he’d decided to walk the several miles back to Enderley. He was entirely stubborn enough to make such a reckless decision.
Bracing her hands on her hips, she drew in a few drams of cool air and glanced back toward the brightly lit windows of Claxton Hall. She spotted him crossing a terrace along the side of the house, striding quickly toward the open field.
Mina lifted the front of her skirt a few inches and sprinted toward him, slowing to a quick hobble when her ankle began to twinge. “Slow down,” she called.
He stopped and swung to face her, but said nothing. They’d reached a patch of grass beyond the house’s glowing windows. His face was all shadows and sharp angles in the moonlight.
“Will you speak to me? Or do you wish to continue avoiding me?” Her corset was unbearably tight and she struggled to catch her breath.
“I thought you were avoiding me.”
“Not avoiding you.” It felt so good to hear his voice, the softer, warmer one he used just with her, that she almost smiled. “I was taking time to think, as you asked me to.”
“And what have you decided?” He started toward her, a slow but purposeful prowl that made her pulse thrum.
“You want an answer now? Here? In the cold outside of Lady Claxton’s home?”
“Take this.” He immediately flicked back the edges of his coat and slipped it from his shoulders. Coming close enough for the buttons of his shirt to brush her bodice, he settled the garment around her. His heat and scent surrounded her. “Warmer?”
“Yes.” Unbearably so, and not just where his coat covered her. When he was this close, she couldn’t think of the future and practicalities, only that she wanted him closer, to feel his skin against hers, to sink against him and forget everything else.
But as soon as he’d wrapped the coat around her shoulders, he retreated. He pushed his hands behind his back. She felt his gaze on her and the weight of expectation.
He wanted her answer.
She wished desperately that she could simply say yes and trust that the rest would fall into place. But the incident with Gregory only served to heighten the impossible chasm between them. Mina knew what Lady Claxton and her guests thought of her. Perhaps a step above a domestic servant, but nothing more. She couldn’t imagine them ever accepting her as a guest at their soirees. Or addressing her as the Duchess of Tremayne.
“I saw you dancing,” she told Nick impulsively. “You’re wrong. You’re a fine dancer.”
“I would have tried harder if you’d been in my arms.”
He spoke of impossibilities. For that single moment with Lady Lillian, he’d been a part of Barrowmere society. Fitting in seamlessly, doing exactly what everyone expected a duke to do.
And then Gregory, her mistake, intruded to create a scandal Lady Claxton’s guests would chew over for weeks.
“Mina, I need an answer.”
“Can’t you see that I cause you nothing but trouble?” Taking a step so that she could get a view inside a long ballroom window, she watched as ladies in fine gowns and gentlemen in crisp white gloves and black tails danced around the floor in a waltz. If not for her, Nick would still be inside.
“Do you wish you were in there dancing with the rest of them?” he asked.
In two strides, he was in front of her, crowding her back against the cold stones of Claxton Hall. He braced a gloved hand on the wall beside her head.
