Page 123 of The Scandalous Love of a Duke
‘He can be domineering,’ his aunt added. ‘I know, but you have mellowed him a little already, Katherine. He is much less affected with you and he seems easier in himself. Robert says people have commented on the change in him in the Gentlemen’s club, White’s. I know it is early days but we all have great hopes for you both.’
Jane touched Katherine’s arm. ‘I know this is all new to you, but you will grow accustomed to John’s life, and his ways, I dare say. Things will settle. John is John. No matter his mood, underneath he has a heart of gold.’
‘I know,’ Katherine whispered. ‘I just wish he were not so cold in public.’
‘Defence,’ Jane answered. ‘I have done it. It is easier to pretend you do not care for anything or anyone. When you have high standing, there are people who wish to cut you down. He is very conscious of his responsibility. He wishes to prove himself capable, and if he shows any weakness he thinks he will not.’
Katherine met his aunt’s extraordinary emerald gaze.
‘Give him time to adjust – give yourself time,’ Jane concluded as John and his uncle returned. Then she briskly changed the conversation. ‘My friend Violet is holding a charity event tomorrow. She’s raising funds for an orphanage in White Chapel. Would you like to come with us?’
Katherine accepted a glass of punch from John and met his gaze, instinctively looking for him to approve her joining his aunt. ‘You need not ask me, Katherine. You may do as you will,’ he answered her question before she asked it.
Stupidly, his answer upset her. She heard it as a lack of interest in what she did. He never asked what she had done in the day. But nor did he speak of what he did. For the past week the nights had been theirs, but the days… Well, in the days, she understood now, he was the Duke of Pembroke and he wished her to be the duchess. She did not want her evenings becoming the same, if all she had of John Harding was a single hour or so when they went to bed, she would rather they had been rejected tonight.
He had given her the impression he had let her into his life. He had not. He had only put her into a niche in it.
He must have sensed her discomfort; he was watching her as he talked to his aunt and uncle. Proof, if she needed it, of how easily this duplicity came to him.
The notes of a second waltz carried on the air.
‘Shall we?’ John said, holding out his hand to take her glass.
As they walked into the open space to dance, she asked, ‘How do you spend your days, John?’
His eyes told her he thought the question absurd. ‘Reviewing estate or business aspects with Mr Harvey, in the Houses of Parliament, or visiting my club to discuss parliamentary affairs with my peers. Why?’
His father spent most days at home, but of course he did not have a seat in the House of Lords, and yet John’s uncles did, and even they occasionally called with their wives in the afternoons.
‘Does your business take all day, every day?’
‘Where is this leading?’
‘What did you do today?’
His eyebrows lifted slightly. ‘I spoke to Mr Harvey about who sent that letter to the newspaper and how to respond.’
‘How will you respond?’ she asked because she wished to know how much he would tell her.
‘I am sure you do not really want to know that.’
‘Clearly not,’ she responded coldly.
She had struck the boundary already then. He was definitely drawing lines. She was not even his duchess really, she was just the mistress he had married.
45
After supper John continued guiding Katherine to participate in conversations, ensuring she was not excluded.
She acted the model wife, smiling, talking and nodding when he gave her an opening. Yet despite her success John felt as though he were failing. She was bitterly angry with him, he knew it, though he was not sure why, and yet she hid it perfectly. She had learned how to set a smile tonight, and hide her emotions, and now he wished she could not. Her fingers held his arm, but it was a heartless touch. She was not seeking his support and there was no caress.
She looked into the men’s eyes, attentive, smiling and jovial, yet he knew beneath the smile, there was a brittle disgust of these people and him. He was forcing her to emulate what she hated, making her more like him, when he did not even like himself.
This is what he had wanted of her earlier, but now it grated on him.More fool you, John Harding. It was stupidity to bemoan it. He could hardly now tell her not to do it. Especially as he would not cease protecting his emotions; that was probably why she was angry.
Her honesty and openness were the things that had captured his heart.
Which was it to be? Which was best, to hide one’s emotions and be accepted and respected by these people, or just to be oneself and tell them all to go to hell?
