Page 40 of The Remarkable Myth of a Nameless Lady
Jacob left, uneasy and out of sorts. That his mother was so adamant had come something as a surprise. While he had known her wishes regarding his eventual marriage, the vehemence with which she spoke of leaving was entirely new.
Have I truly been so blind?
It was unsettling, to think he had known someone, only to find they were a stranger to you, after all. He left the house thoughtfully, whipping his horse to a lather and wondering if he was making a dreadful mistake in chasing down this woman who was a stranger to him, but who he still very much wished to know.
Chapter 30
The hour had grown late. True night had fallen, the stars shining so bright above her that the sky might have been a piece of cloth draped over the sun, pierced through to allow the light upon the landscape.
I am not meant for this, she thought. I do not care for conspiracies, nor do I wish to be caught in someone else’s war. I only wish to go home.But where was home now? She had no answer to that particular question. Not the cottage, and not the life that had gone before all of this—when her father had held the title of ‘Lord,’ in a distant, bygone memory that he would not allow her to forget.
“Alicia…”
The voice that spoke was not that of the waiting boy in the trees, but that of a man. The figure came into focus, too tall, too broad. Even had she not heard him call her name, she would have known him.
“Your Grace…” she whispered, and sank to her knees.
“What the devil are you doing?”
Alicia heard him as if from very far away. “I think, perhaps, it has been a very strenuous day,” she said and looked at her hands, which seemed to be resting in the mulch on the forest floor.
He was beside her in an instant, one arm around her, raising her to her feet and guiding her to a nearby stone. He helped her sit, and stepped back, his face a study of emotions in the moonlight, for indeed it had risen after all.
“I am still quite angry at you, but you are making it deuced difficult to start an argument,” he said, standing and staring down at her, his hands on his hips, obviously frustrated.
Alicia laughed, wishing her head wasn’t spinning quite so hard. “If it helps, Your Grace, I am also quite put out with you right now. I told you quite clearly that your brother was not responsible for the…man shot…”
“You said quite a bit more than that. Here.” He rummaged in his cloak and came up with a roll and a slab of cheese. “I realized that there was no way I would make it to dinner if I kept my engagement with you and thought to grab something from the kitchen on my way to the stables.”
“You do realize they would have put up an entire meal for you, had you asked,” she said, taking the roll from him and tearing it in half.
“You might have left,” he said, taking out a knife and dividing the cheese, the blade glinting dully in the moonlight.
“I was about to,” she retorted, accepting half the cheese from him, and offering him the half roll in return. “I am not your servant and am certainly not obligated to obey you.”
“There are some who might argue the matter, given that I am the Duke, and you live within the village here.”
“Are we in the days of old, where everything within your sight can be claimed as part of your demesne?”
“You seem to have little respect for your betters,” he said drawing himself up.
“You might want to ask yourself just how much your title means here. In some quarters, I would say very little, Your Grace,” she said, taking a bite of bread and cheese together and finding that she was indeed much hungrier than she had supposed.
For a moment she thought he might leave her there, so angry was he. She had pushed him too far, acted too disrespectfully. She had lost the deference she should have for him as her Duke, or even as an employer. She stared at the roll in her hand, guilt washing over her. “I am sorry, Your Grace. I have been behaving abominably. You have brought me here for a reason, and even shared with me your own food…”
“You are tired and hungry. I daresay it has been a…a trying day.”
“For Elias, as well,” she said, and for a moment felt a pang of sadness over the loss of a life, even his. “He had done me a service, and this is how I thank him. Had I found you, things would have been different…I should not have gone to my chamber…”
“What service? When you met with him in the study, you mean?”
She lifted her head to stare at him. “Whatever do you mean? He was never with me in the study. I daresay he never set so much as a foot past the kitchen. He knew his place.”
“If not him…” He got up to pace. “Your father. That makes more sense, though I had not credited him with the audacity to come within the walls of Ravencliff…”
“I think there is little my father would not dare,” she said uneasily, lifting a hand as if to stop him, then hesitating when she realized how utterly improper it would be to lay a hand upon the Duke, even in so innocent a gesture.
“Here, I am not hungry,” he said, shoving his own meal into her palm.
