Page 11 of Duke of Myste
That unexpected flash of humor—dry and subtle as it was—caught Jane entirely off guard. She found herself reconsidering her initial assessment of the Duke yet again, adding another layer of complexity to the man she had previously dismissed as merely rigid and unyielding.
“Well then,” she said, trying to regain her mental footing, “shall we consider this the official beginning of our… acquaintance period?”
The Duke inclined his head, his expression once more inscrutable. “Indeed, Miss Brandon. Though I believe a proper courtship requires more formal activities than clandestine conversations in morning rooms.”
“What did you have in mind?”
“A promenade in Hyde Park tomorrow afternoon would be an appropriate first step,” he suggested. “Visible enough to satisfy societal expectations, yet public enough to ensure propriety.”
Jane nodded, finding the suggestion reasonable. “Two o’clock?”
“I shall call on you at half past one,” he confirmed, just as the door opened to admit Lord Drownshire, whose expression suggested that Lady Drownshire had already informed him of the unexpected turn of events.
“Your Grace,” he began without preamble, “my wife informs me that you and Jane have reached some sort of… agreement.”
The Duke turned to face him, his posture straightening imperceptibly. “Indeed, Lord Drownshire. Miss Brandon has wisely suggested we take time to become better acquainted before finalizing our commitment. I have agreed to a fortnight of formal courtship, after which she shall give me her answer.”
Lord Drownshire’s bushy eyebrows drew together. “A fortnight? But the scandal?—”
“Will be addressed by our association,” the Duke interrupted smoothly. “Society will understand that an offer has been made and is being considered. This is not an unusual procedure, even in more… conventional circumstances.”
Jane watched with grudging admiration as her father’s objections were systematically dismantled by the Duke’s logical arguments and authoritative manner.
Within minutes, Lord Drownshire had been reduced from blustering opposition to reluctant acceptance—a feat she had rarely witnessed in all her years of argumentative engagement with her father.
“Very well,” he conceded finally. “A fortnight. But not a day more, you understand? This family’s reputation has suffered enough of late.”
“Perfectly understood,” the Duke replied with dignified confidence. “And now, I believe I have taken enough of your time this morning. Miss Brandon—” He turned to Jane once more. “I shall call on you tomorrow at half past one.”
“I look forward to it, Your Grace,” Jane returned, the words leaving her lips automatically, though she was not entirely certain of their truth.
As the Duke took his leave with impeccable courtesy, Jane found herself watching his departure with emotions she could not immediately identify. Relief, certainly, that she had bought herself some time to consider her position more carefully. Apprehension about the courtship that lay ahead. But beneath all those emotions lurked something else entirely—a curious spark of… something she could not quite name.
She shook her head. The Duke of Myste represented everything she had spent years arguing against—rigid adherence to tradition, unyielding propriety, the embodiment of societal constraints she had long chafed against.
And yet…
There had been those moments—brief flashes of humor, of genuine engagement with her ideas, rather than outright dismissal of them. And then there was the surprising reasonableness with which he had accepted her counter-proposal.
She thought of the intensity of his gaze when he had looked at her directly, as though truly seeingherrather than merely the scandal she represented.
As Jane stood in the morning room, absently touching the spot on her wrist that his fingers had briefly brushed during their farewells, she acknowledged a disconcerting possibility: perhaps the Duke of Myste was not the man she had assumed him to be.
And somehow that realization was the most unsettling development of all.
CHAPTER 5
“Did you hear what Mama has done? She’s sent announcements to every printer’s shop in London before the Duke had even reached the end of our street!” Jane exclaimed, pacing the small sitting room where Diana had retreated after the morning’s events.
The soft afternoon light filtering through the curtains cast a warm glow over the sisters, belying the tumult of emotions that churned beneath Jane’s carefully maintained composure.
Diana looked up from the botanical journal she had been pretending to read, her expression a combination of guilt and concern. “Papa insisted on it. He said that promptly announcing the engagement was the only way to ‘guide the ton’s understanding of the situation,’ as he put it.”
“Engagement,” Jane echoed, the word tasting strange on her tongue despite the hours that had passed since the Duke’s visit. “A fortnight of acquaintance before any formal acceptance,and yet they’re already ordering wedding breakfast menus and debating the merits of orange blossoms versus roses!”
She sank onto the window seat beside her sister, the nervous energy that had propelled her around the room suddenly deserting her. Outside, London continued its usual afternoon bustle, oblivious to the way her entire future had been irrevocably altered in the space of a single spin around the sun.
“Jane,” Diana began hesitantly, setting her journal aside to take her twin’s hands in her own. “I haven’t properly thanked you for what you did. Were it not for your intervention?—”
