Page 66 of How to Ruin a Duke
“Possibly.”She finished her part of the orange and wiped her fingers on the linen Emory had brought along.If she accepted Emory’s overture, she’d be embarking on an affair the duchess would have called a friendly liaison.Nothing legal or lasting, and nothing sordid either.No money changing hands, which in Edith’s circumstances was an upside-down comfort.
A year ago, even a month ago, she would have been dismayed to be the object of Emory’s intimate interest.A lady was virtuous, a duke was a gentleman.The very society that spelled out in detail what a lady must do to maintain her respectability offered not one useful suggestion about how that lady was to keep body and soul together when cast on her own resources.
Hypocrites, the lot of them, whereas Emory offered companionship, pleasure, comfort, and a respite from all woes.Better still, if Edith found she did not enjoy his attentions, she could simply say so without risking judgment from matchmakers and wallflowers.
Perhaps being a lady was over-rated, at least being a relentlessly proper lady.
“Our discussion adds more urgency to my desire to sort out that ruddy book,” Emory said, wrapping up the uneaten food.“One cannot go forward in a public sense—for a duke there is always the public sense to be considered—with such a cloud ever present over one’s head.Elsmore has suggested I look to the spares for someone with a motivation to ruin me and Jeremiah.”
“Lord Jeremiah is hardly ruined by this book, Emory.”
“Might you on occasion—when the moment is comfortable—call me Thaddeus?I have asked you to consider sharing personal intimacies with me, after all, and one hopes the undertaking will be accompanied by a certain informality when private.”He wrapped up the orange sections in tidy folds of linen, though Edith had the sense his request was anything but casual.
She did very much enjoy watching his hands.“Yes, when the moment feels comfortable.”He’d offered to become her lover, after all.The gift of his name was a privilege he’d granted to very few.That gesture suggested a friendly liaison with Emory could be enjoyable in a more than physical sense.
Edith craved the emotional surcease that intimate pleasures could provide, and quite selfishly, she wanted the fortification Emory’s regard gave her.Not a perspective she would have understood a year ago, but then, a year ago, she’d been a paid companion.
A post she’d neither wanted nor enjoyed.“Your spare is a second cousin, as I recall.”
“A pleasant enough fellow tending his acres in East Anglia.We have him to dinner when he comes up to Town, and he notifies me when his wife presents him with another child so Mama can send along a basket of comestibles and spirits.His idea of literature is an agricultural pamphlet read of a Sunday evening.I can’t see him conceiving of, much less writing, an entire book.”
“What of your uncles?”
“My uncles?”
“But for you, wouldn’t one of them have inherited the title?I’m looking for a motive, Your Grace, for a reason why somebody would cast you in such an unflattering light.”And I am watching your hands and your mouth, and the way the breeze riffles your hair.Concentrating on the book was becoming nearly impossible.
Emory leaned closer.“I appreciate your diligence more than you know, but at this very moment, at this very special moment, I am looking for a private place to take you in my arms and indulge in pleasures that makeHow to Ruin a Dukeread like an etiquette manual, assuming those pleasures interest you.”
His inflection was polite, his tone merely conversational.He rose and the birds fluttered into the boughs, much like Edith’s sense of composure had flitted off to who knew where.
She had nothing to lose.He’d be discreet, considerate, and gentlemanly.“I am interested.”
“You’re certain this is what you want?”Emory asked.“That I am who you want?I haven’t gone about the business in the manner you’re entitled to expect, but I am very sure of my choice.I make this overture to you in good faith, knowing we still have much to discuss.”
He was paying her a compliment—several compliments.Giving her the latitude to change her mind, apologizing for a blunt approach to a topic most people handled delicately, and assuring her of her desirability in his eyes.
“I am certain of my decision too, Your Grace.We have the house to ourselves for the afternoon.Let’s go inside.”She led the way.Emory gathered up the food and followed.
Edith had never envisioned that she might one day indulge in a friendly tryst with Emory.On the one hand, she was closer to destitution than she’d ever been.On the other, having been entirely forgotten by polite society, she had enormous freedom.She could think of no one with whom she’d rather share that freedom than her almost-ruined duke.
Whoever wrotethe dratted book would be furious to know that its publication had resulted in Thaddeus happening across—for the second time—the woman ideally suited to be his companion in life.Lady Edith had duchess written all over her, in her poise, her dignity, her patience, her sense of humor, her honesty, and her common sense.She even got along with Thaddeus’s mother, for heaven’s sake.
Thaddeus had kept a distance when Edith had been his mother’s companion, but thank benevolent Providence he could make a different choice now.
That he’d embark on an engagement with Lady Edith so precipitously, without the expected folderol, and then consummate the understanding immediately suggested the fictional duke and the real man had a few characteristics in common.
Boldness in the face of a challenge.
A fine appreciation for physical pleasure.
Indifference to convention when convention stood between him and somebody he cared for.
Thaddeus had no sooner set down the parcels of food than Lady Edith stepped near.“My circumstances are humble, Your Grace.”
“What do I care for circumstances when I’m about to kiss you?”
This earned him a smack on the lips.“I care.I’d like for this encounter to be the stuff of fairytales and pleasant memories.”That admission caused her to blush.
