Page 33 of Matters of a Duke's Heart
At that, Spencer’s face flooded with an embarrassed heat as he whipped his head around to stare at her, incredulous that she was being so bold. “Admittedly once, yes,” he said. His mind provided a reminder of their first kiss, not entirely chaste, and one he had apologized for. “It has—it has been some time, Lady Helena. I do not wish to compromise—"
“Do not apologize. Do I appear disgruntled?”
Her eyes had batted at him, her smile perfectly enticing, and Spencer had chased that, desperate for a taste of affection again.
Now, he felt nothing when he looked at his former mistress. He should not have walked away from Felicity. How could he have left her on the dancefloor so suddenly? He had spent so long watching her with other men, only to squander his own chance. Their first proper dance.
“What changed?” Lady Helena asked, not quite an immature demand, and not quite the helpless, scorned lover. At least he did not think so. “What changed for you to dismiss me so quickly, only to marry Lady Felicity?”
“She is good to Alexander,” he told her firmly. “I trust her with him, and she already proved to be excellent duchess material, as well as an ideal mother figure.”
Lady Helena reared back, utterly offended, but Spencer didn’t care to smooth over his brusque implication. No, he had to find his wife. He had to apologize for leaving her. Heavens, he should not have, and especially not because of his own fear of his guilt.
Without another word, and without waiting to hear Lady Helena’s own response, Spencer stalked off. When he found her once more, it was in the arms of another suitor, but the easy smile from earlier had disappeared.
Now there was something distant in his wife’s gaze, and when her eyes caught on his, his stomach fluttered.
Neither of them looked away, not even as she was danced around the floor, a thousand unspoken words between the two of them.
Chapter 11
“Must you remain so close?” Felicity hissed to the duke several days later when they were seated for a dinner party.
Her husband turned a narrowed gaze on her. “I am your husband, and I am seated next to you. What do you expect me to do?”
Their voices had pitched low, avoiding detection of others. Felicity glowered at him.
“It is not so much what you are doing now,” she stressed, “but the fact that unless required you cannot bear to be around me.”
The duke gave a cursory glance around them. His blue eyes turned colder. He reached for her hand, and she did not take it. Their first course had been cleared away, and there had been a problem in the kitchen, so there was a slight delay in the next course.
“Come with me,” he muttered under his breath.
“Why?” she challenged. “So you may demand more from me now, emboldened by being in public, only to ignore—”
“No,” he hissed. “It is so we may speak more privately. Heavens’ sake, Felicity.”
Her annoyance flared at the ire lacing through his voice, but the way his muscles tightened, the way his eyes raked over her face, insistent and full of demand, only sent a curl of desire through her—something she was not prepared for.
She shoved such a mortifying thing down. She did not desire her husband, nor would she.
Finally, she followed his lead. They left the dining room of their hosts, Lord and Lady Sanford.
The older man had been one of Felicity’s own suitors during her first Season and had now found himself an older lady who had been on the brink of spinsterhood, but the two seemed to be very content with one another.
The duke led her out to a terrace that branched off the main hallway. Crickets and fireflies flew through the dark, fluttering around Felicity’s hair.
Her husband tracked the movement of one of the fireflies, his expression slack and entranced, somewhat. She could not work out why he suddenly looked softer.
He reached forward, but she batted his hand away.
“I am cross with you,” she snapped.
“You had a firefly caught in your hair,” he countered. “So be it, then. Duchess, what is your grievance? We have been dancing around one another for days ever since Lord and Lady Barrendon’s ball. I know I upset you, but I have tried to approach you.”
“That is the thing,” she insisted. “You did not upset me! Not with words, at least. I tried to speak with you regarding my former Seasons, and how suitors made me feel, but you simply walked away. That is what you do! I feel comfortable in some moments to get closer and begin to open up to you, only for you to grow scared about something and then leave me behind. What are you so afraid of, Spencer?”
His Christian name snapped out of her in the heat of the moment, and Felicity gasped, startling. She pressed a gloved hand to her mouth. “I—I am sorry, I should not have overstepped, I—”
