Seducing the Duchess (22 page)
Read Seducing the Duchess Online
Authors: Ashley March
How could she have believed he thought differently of her?
It was more than obvious that she still meant nothing to him. It was laughable, even, that she could consider such a thing at all. Philip caring? About anyone?
She was only a means to an end. That was all she’d ever been, all she ever would be.
And he was . . . Philip. Not even worthy of her anger or any sadness or, if she admitted it—and she did so, but begrudgingly—her disappointment.
Yes, it was laughable. Quite. Only she did not feel like laughing anymore. Or crying.
She simply sat in the rain, her hands and feet slowly becoming lost in puddles of mud and water. She shivered, but she welcomed the cold, concentrating on the numbness of her fingers and toes, the heaviness growing in her limbs. She would welcome anything that helped her cease thinking of him.
An hour could have passed, or minutes, or even mere seconds as she sat, listening to the steady patter of rain as it rustled the few remaining leaves overhead. Watching the intermittent shadows of raindrops as they splashed against her eyelids, then slid away until only a faint grayness remained.
“I don’t understand why you are out here in the rain, when it is perfectly warm and dry inside the house.”
Her breathing stopped at the sound of his voice, and she almost smiled. His words were a near echo of her earlier thoughts.
Slowly—for she didn’t want him to think his presence affected her—she opened her eyes.
His legs filled her vision, his trousers plastered snugly against the muscled contours of his thighs. A low heat began to flow through her blood. It was as if the rain she had waited for had actually come for him, to fall upon him in loving streams, pouring down his body in a deliberate caress. The rain had always been meant to taunt and torment her, to remind her of the desire for him she tried so desperately to escape.
“Must you stand so close?” she muttered, pushing backward against the tree.
Although she refused to look up, she had no difficulty sensing his frown as he spoke. “I was only attempting to—Never mind.”
As soon as he stepped away, raindrops fell anew on her face. Rain she hadn’t even realized had disappeared as he stood over her, creating a shelter for her.
The realization made her want to curse and cry again, all at once and with no reason for either. She stood. Perhaps she was becoming sick. There was no other reason for her to be so emotional of late.
Charlotte glanced up, met his silver gaze, and pronounced, “I believe I am ill.” Turning toward the manicured lawns and civilization, she began to walk. It was a slow, hazardous affair, as her weighted skirts preferred to drag her back down to the ground, and her feet insisted on finding every hole and puddle available.
Philip, of course, did not take the hint; he strolled patiently beside her.
As she tripped over her skirts for perhaps the eighth or ninth time, his hand reached out to her shoulder and steadied her.
“I could carry you—”
His mouth closed abruptly at the force of her glare. The glare was one thing she would give him credit for; he was the best teacher in all things cruel and hostile.
She should have known he wouldn’t let her be, but still she was surprised when, instead of releasing her shoulder, he pulled her toward him and said, “Dance with me.”
Charlotte stared at him. Wayward strands of hair clung to his forehead, slicked over his brow. Tiny diamonds of raindrops glistened on the tips of his eyelashes and lingered on the edge of his bottom lip, drawing attention to its lush curve, so different from his stark, thin upper lip.
She hated the rain. She truly did.
“No,” she said, and glanced meaningfully at the place where his hand held her firmly in place.
Somehow, perhaps because the rain was so cold, the warmth of his hand seemed a hundred times hotter than it normally would have. It seared her senses, and although her mind rang a shrill warning bell, she still yearned to lean in closer.
He didn’t release her, but instead wrapped his arm around her waist and dragged his other hand down to capture hers.
Charlotte growled. It was something she’d heard him do a number of times, but somehow she didn’t think hers came out quite as effectively. Even to her own ears, it sounded like she had a wad of phlegm stuck at the back of her throat which she was trying to clear.
“Charlotte.”
She returned to glaring. It was much easier to get her point across, anyway.
His gaze didn’t waver—damn him. “If I am correct, good husbands do not leave their wives at the beginning of a dance. Is that not true?”
She shrugged. “I certainly don’t care if you are a good husband. I won’t be your wife for much longer, and you were never much of a husband to begin with.”
His arm stiffened around her waist, almost imperceptibly. She desperately wished she wasn’t so attuned to him; his reaction nearly made her regret her words. Even if they were true.
Then, he did what she least expected: he leaned toward her, his eyes holdings hers captive, and pressed his lips to the corner of her mouth.
For a second—perhaps less than a second, really—her body betrayed her and she felt herself tremble.
She knew he must have felt it, as well, for he stilled for a long moment before he finally drew away.
“Dance with me, Charlotte. Even if it doesn’t matter to you, I would like to show my sincere apology for leaving.”
Perhaps she should agree. Then when the dance was over, he would have no reason to hold her so close.
“Very well. Lead on,” she grumbled, trying to fix her eyes upon some less appealing part of him without appearing a coward.
“Of course, Your Grace,” he murmured in a droll voice, then began to hum.
Her eyes immediately locked upon his mouth. Damnation. “Must you make noise?” she asked irritably. “It is very . . . distracting.”
He halted in midstep, and she suspected he had intended for her to crash into him, for his arm tightened even further around her. “Very well,” he conceded, almost as if her contrariness pleased him greatly, and began to dance again.
“You needn’t hold me so close, either,” she said shortly. She struggled against the near embrace of his arms.
He gave a low chuckle, and she could feel the vibration of it pulsate through her own body. “Would you rather I kissed you than danced?”
Instinctively clamping her lips together, she shook her head and relaxed as best she could, allowing him to hold her as close as he wished and lead her in slow, awkward movements around puddles and across the slick, wet grass.
Philip smiled, his gaze ever watchful and knowing. But he was silent as well, and didn’t hum again. The entire earth seemed to be silent. There was no sound but the rush of water from the heavens as they danced.
He turned, and she followed. He led, and she matched his steps. It was a medley of crushed toes and stumbles, and they nearly fell to the ground several times, but still they continued.
Slowly Charlotte calmed, and she closed her eyes. Despite the treachery of the uneven ground, Philip’s arms were strong about her.
His breath fanned across her ear as he laid his cheek against her temple, and suddenly they weren’t dancing anymore as much as they were simply swaying.
Her heart skipped inside her chest, and her eyes flew open.
Dancing in the rain with Philip was one thing, but this . . . this, whatever it was, was far too intimate.
“Well, then, you’ve done your duty. Is your conscience eased?”
She’d made her voice purposely bitter and angry, and was well rewarded when he dropped his arms and pulled away from her.
Philip bowed stiffly, his lower lip no longer as giving as it had been before. “You forget, my dear, I have no conscience.”
Why did her chest insist on aching so?
She gave a brief nod and turned away, pausing only to murmur over her shoulder, “I haven’t forgotten. I haven’t forgotten anything.”
Chapter 13
P
hilip was being haunted.
hilip was being haunted.
Not by a ghost, but by memories.
And that was even worse, in a way. If a ghost had taken to following him down the hallways, or visiting him in his bedchamber, he would have sneered and scared it away.
But the memories . . .
They came unbidden, shallow shadows of the past, unpredictable, straight from inside his head. And they would not be ignored.
They weren’t all bad memories, these recollections of his grandfather, the estimable eighth Duke of Rutherford. They simply had the unfortunate habit of reminding Philip of his responsibilities as a duke, and also that Charlotte would never be a proper duchess.
His grandfather had never liked the Sheffields. “A rotting lot of self-pretentious commoners,” he’d called them.
Sometimes, God help him, Philip couldn’t tell if he agreed with the old duke because he’d heard it so many times, or simply because it was true.
“Charlotte,” he whispered, knowing he was mad to be here while she slept, as if being near her could chase the memories away.
It must have been close to dawn. The hours had melted into one another as he contemplated his next step. Desperation cluttered his thoughts. He had tried to be nice. He had attempted to disarm her with the pretext of the lessons. But neither had worked.
He refused to consider telling her he loved her. Doing so would give her too much of an advantage over him, and though he had tried to change, he could leave only so much of his pride behind. If any glimmer of the love she’d had for him in the past remained, he hoped he would be able to fuel it once again by making her jealous.
It wasn’t the ideal plan, and admittedly, she might very well encourage him in his endeavors at courtship to ensure that he would grant her a divorce, but he had to try.
Now, though, he would steal these moments to watch her, to be with her. Though he doubted that the shadow of guilt he bore would ever fully disappear, in this moment at least there would be no bitterness and accusations. For a little while, he could pretend she had forgiven him.
The grayness of the lightening sky made her face appear even more beautiful, even more radiant than usual. Yet even in sleep, she was no innocent angel. Though her eyes were closed, still she presented a seductress, causing his body to yearn with the temptation of her parted lips, the subtle rise and fall of her breasts with each breath.
“Charlotte,” he whispered again, this time so close he could see the path of his breath as it moved over her hair.
Just once, only once, he wanted her to look at him again with the earnestness, the sincerity he’d seen in her eyes before, without any of the calculation or manipulation he had taught her so well. If she could love him, then he could tell her how much he loved her in return, without fearing her scorn or rejection.
His hand strayed toward the curve of her neck, his fingers nearly grazing the soft, supple ivory skin revealed above her nightgown. But she stirred, and he stilled, his heart pounding as he waited to see whether she would wake.
She didn’t, but only turned her head to the side, away from him.
With an unsteady exhalation, Philip drew his hand to his side, his fists clenching and unclenching with want. It wasn’t worth it. He could dream of her inviting him eagerly into her bed, but it was more likely that it would be Charlotte the temptress instead of the woman beneath, the woman he loved.
It could have been tonight. He’d seen the way she’d looked at him earlier, at the fair. They’d teased, laughed, flirted, and he knew he was making progress when at times she’d seemed almost afraid of the way she responded to him.
As Charlotte was never afraid, he could only view it as a good sign.
But then, of course, he’d ruined it.
Standing there before her, waiting for the music to begin, he’d been aware of the curious stares of the crowd around him. So many people watching him, waiting for him to make a fool of himself. One man behind Charlotte in particular had laughed, and though Philip knew it was unreasonable to think it had been at him, still he felt ashamed. Gone was his anticipation of the dance, to show Charlotte he could be a different man than what she expected. Instead he looked at the laughing man, and all he could see was his grandfather’s disapproval, reminding him that he was not one of them.
The old duke was dead, yet still Philip remembered.
Another night at the fair, long ago, when Ethan had come and stolen him from Ruthven Manor. When, after hours of eating sausages and tarts and shamelessly flirting with housemaids much too old for them, they’d returned to find the duke preparing a search party.
His grandfather hadn’t spoken to him for the remainder of the night, nor even for the week next. He hadn’t needed to, as the resulting whipping had well accomplished the task of ensuring that Philip knew his role in the world.
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