Page 43 of The Duke
She had to be his enemy, lest he start desiring her to be something else.
Desiring… her.
“Sarah. Nowshewas the epitome of a lady.” He quite literally looked down his nose as he said this.
“As opposed to me, you mean?” She arched a brow up at him, but it accompanied a dry smirk.
“Take it how you like, but try not to be too offended. I am a man of diverse faults and deficient merits. A right proper ass, really, and most of the people I ever held in high esteem are either dead or… missing. Conversely, Lord and Lady Anstruther were kind people. I ardently regret their passing.”
Her gaze was soft the next time she looked up at him, and a pleased little smile toyed at the corner of her lips. He had the oddest notion that she resembled a woman who’d found something she thought lost to her.
“I miss Edward every day.” Her confession stunned him, and for a moment, he almost believed her. With a delicate sound of victory, she freed the buckle and was able to pull the prosthesis away. While she set it aside, Cole covered the abrupt end to his forearm with his shirt, the empty cuff a stark reminder of what wasn’t there. He couldn’t, however, hide his utterly relieved sigh.
If she noticed, she didn’t convey it. “He seemed to recover a little toward the end.” She went on as he rubbed at the tender places made raw by the tight straps. “He would sit here in the garden with me and watch me paint when he was up to it. And once I was able to take him to the museum in his wheelchair and show him some sculptures he was so keen to see… It was the loveliest day I can remember.”
His gut twisted again with that odd and discomfiting sensation. Cole slammed a door on it, summoning all the cool disdain he possibly could. There was simply no possible way he was jealous of a dead man. The ache he felt had to be something else. His face contorted into a grimace of distaste. “You’re not asking me to believe that you…lovedthe old codger, are you?”
“And why not?” she asked hotly. “Of course I loved him. Not as a proper wife to her husband, granted, but like… like a dear friend. Perhaps a daughter to her father.”
“That’s disgusting.”
“Don’t you dare,” she admonished him, the almost imperceptible register of her words lending them a great deal of gravitas. “Don’t youdarecontaminate the companionship my husband and I had, or turn it into anything perverse. It was innocent.”
“Innocent?” Cole echoed. “Are you saying the marriage was never… consummated?”
“I don’t see what business that is of yours.” Though her voice conveyed indignation, her eyes darted away.
He had her. Perhaps if he frightened her enough, she would cease her dreadful schemes. “You are aware that if you’re a virgin, your marriage could very well be annulled.”
Her eyes widened. “Certainly not posthumously.”
Sensing her fear, he struck. “I might look into it. I wield a great deal of influence, or hadn’t you noticed?”
“Why—why would you do such a thing?” she whispered, as though he’d wounded her.
“Because it’d be what you deserve. Shame on you, beguiling a decent old man on his deathbed, turning his ancestral home into little better than a brothel, and not even a useful one at that.”
Her features hardened, lips drawing into a tight line. “It should be beneath you to bully me thus.” She stood, obliging him to do the same. “I’ll have you know that I’mnota virgin, so you’ll not be able to carry through with your threats.”
Not a virgin? Some foreign, dark emotion drew the corners of his lips down. “Why does that not surprise me?”
The look she gave him brimmed with an irony he didn’t comprehend, but now he was too irritated to consider it. She made a caustic, brittle sound, wrapping her arms around herself as she did so, hunching against the evening breeze as though the world had become too cold.
“I’m not going to let you stop me, you know,” she said archly. “This charity is my purpose, my passion. I may not be able to save every unfortunate, but it won’t stop me from doing what I can.”
She had spirit, he’d give her that. But perhaps if logic and adversity wouldn’t dissuade her, dread might.
Cole stepped toward her, using his height to crowd her, forcing her to take a step back toward the doors. “You are such a little thing in a big, cruel world,” he murmured menacingly. “How will you manage all this, alone and defenseless?”
She took another step backward as he stalked her, but thrust her chin to a haughty angle. “I’ll manage quite well,” she said tartly. “We all have our impediments, don’t we?” Her eyes flicked to his empty cuff, and Cole felt the beast stir within him.
It wanted at her with a violence he’d never before felt.
His hand found its way to her throat. Her startled gasp both shamed and inflamed him. It was the only way he could make her see, the only possible way for him to force her to comprehend the mortal danger she was putting herself in.
“I will spoil you at every turn,” he snarled.
“I would expect no less from you.” By now, she had to tilt her head back rather far to look up at him, pressing the column of her throat against his hand.
