Page 50 of The Seductive Love of a Lady
Drew looked at Peter.
‘Go,’ Peter said. ‘This is what you want; to have her back. My horses will have to manage without you.’
Drew looked at the Duchess. ‘I will fetch my bag.’
An hour later, his bag stored in the box, Drew was in a carriage barrelling along the main road from London toCanterbury. Pembroke was seated beside him, with the Duchess seated opposite. It was the same road he had travelled with Caro.
With his arms folded over his chest and the brim of his hat tipped low to hide his eyes, Drew lounged in his seat, the sole of one boot resting on the far seat, the other on the floor, to prevent himself from rocking and sliding with each bump in the road.
Apart from acknowledging Drew as he had handed the Duchess up into the carriage, Pembroke had not said a word. But his eyes had studied Drew as though he were an absurdity. Drew had resisted the urge to stare back, and tilted the rim of his hat down.
Mary used to look at him like that sometimes, when she was trying to understand him. He did not like Pembroke doing it.
Hope breathed, as they travelled, that silent quiet beast of an emotion.
Does she love me?
His whole body was tense with the longing to see her.
The Duchess had attempted to open conversations on bland subjects such as, ‘I hope you are comfortable? This carriage is usually used by the servants.’ ‘At least the weather has held. I hope it will only take a couple of hours to reach Pembroke Place’ and ‘The parkland there is beautiful.’ Eventually her well of obsequious conversation ran dry.
Pembroke coughed. It was an odd sound, half cough, half chuckle. ‘Mary knows you fairly well, does she not, Framlington?’
Drew’s fingers tilted the brim of his hat up. ‘In what way, Your Grace?’
‘When I told her our uncle’s account of the incident with Kilbride, she said you would not run but tell them to go to hell. I had not told her yet that you said those words to our uncle. Are you sitting here wishing me to hell too?’
Drew held Pembroke’s penetrating blue gaze. ‘I am doing my best not to, Your Grace, as you are helping me.’
Pembroke’s lips lifted in a brief smile. ‘Have I judged you wrong, Lord Framlington?’
‘You will have to decide that.’ Drew tipped his hat back down and looked out the window.
‘Mary also said you will not defend yourself.’
Mary ought to keep her mouth shut.Drew did not answer, or look back, but a humorous sound broke from Pembroke’s throat.
Drew shut his eyes and pretended to sleep.
26
Pembroke tapped Drew’s arm. ‘We are here, Framlington.’
Drew must have fallen asleep.
He straightened up, both feet settling on the floor, his heart thumping as hope breathed heavily inside him.
The carriage raced along a broad avenue, and as the avenue swung to the right Drew caught his first glimpse of Pembroke Place. The Palladian property sat like a beast on a ridge in the landscape, dominating the land about it.
He knew Pembroke was wealthy but he had not imagined this. Drew had housed Mary in a two-room apartment in St James. He would lay odds on the fact her bedchamber here was the size of his whole apartment.
The horses’ hooves and the carriage wheels crunched in the gravel as the carriage stopped in front of the ostentatious mansion. A broad portico, with long shallow steps and tall stone columns, fronted the property. A set of doors suitable for giants opened inwards.
Drew’s stomach dropped and his heartbeat became erratic.
A dozen men in Pembroke’s livery hurried towards the carriage. They must have seen the carriage coming from a distance.
A flutter of pink muslin caught his eye. Mary had run from the house.
