The Heart of a Duke (24 page)

J
ULIA’S
knees went weak and she sank onto the drawing room settee, too stunned to comprehend the full import of Daniel’s words. “Edmund,” she breathed aloud. She curled her arms around her waist, feeling violently ill.

Daniel held up his hands in a helpless gesture, and then let them drop. “I did not know if I should tell you, but I thought . . . I believed you had a right to know.”

“Of course you should have told me,” she insisted, his words snapping her back to the moment. “For goodness’ sake, I was engaged to the man for five years. I almost married him,” she said, a shudder seizing her.

“Good thing I ruined you.” At her chastising look, he became defensive. “Well, it is the only bit of good news.”

She sighed. “It
is
a novelty. Few women should feel gratitude for being ruined, but I am grateful.”

“It was my pleasure,” he said and grinned.

Her eyes met his and the warmth in his expression was her undoing. Particularly after their evening in the library. She tore her gaze away and swept to her feet. She couldn’t think about that now. Not after what he had told her. “But why?”

Daniel shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “I do not know. I have racked my brains trying to understand. But I cannot.”

“To hate with such passion,” she murmured, remembering the vitriol in Edmund’s expression, but also remembering his charm. The two faces of Janus. Beautiful Bedford and the Damn Duke. She shuddered
.
Another thought struck her. “You have known since yesterday. You have known and you did not tell me. You were not planning to.” She voiced the most damning accusation of all. “You do not trust me.”

He tossed her an impatient look, but seeing her pained expression, relented. “This isn’t about trust. Look, I wrestled with this all night. For God’s sake, Julia, he is my brother, but he is also a duke, one of the highest-ranking peers of the realm. I have nothing but the word of a petty, two-bit poacher who can be bribed with twopence. But I know he speaks true. I know my brother,” he said emphatically.

“And I believe you,” she said, calmly. “Or rather, Weasel.”

Her words appeared to strip the wind from his anger. “You do?”

“I do. In the future, you have to trust in me to do so, or . . .”

“Or you will not marry me?” He looked rueful.

“Well, it wouldn’t bode well for our marriage if you intend to keep things from me. If you think I cannot be trusted—”

“I told you, this isn’t about trust—”

“Then what is it about?”

“Fear,” he exclaimed, tossing his hands up, his expression incredulous, as if he could not believe she didn’t understand. “I am afraid. For you. For me. Some might call that cowardly to admit it, but I think it is smart because it makes me cautious. As a duke, Edmund has unlimited resources at his disposal. They allow him to carry out whatever nefarious schemes he damn well pleases. And it pleases him or it would please him to see me dead and buried. I should be afraid and so should you. You need to return to Taunton Court. To get as far away from me as possible. It is not safe here with me.”

“Me?” she cried, her voice rising to match his. “No one wants me dead. You are the one gallivanting about town, a hair’s breadth away from getting killed.” Her voice choked and she spun away, mortified at her loss of composure.

Silence fell.

“Julia.” His tone was soft, apologetic. He curled his hands over her shoulders, gently turning her to face him.

She tried to resist, tears blurring her eyes. He persisted until she was enfolded in his arms. Undone, she hugged his waist. She needed the touch, the warmth, and the comfort. She needed him. Her cheek rested against his heart, and the steady beat calmed her.

“My fearless warrior.”

She could hear the smile in his voice. “Not so fearless.”

“Well, this is another novel situation. You and I seem to be making a habit of tangling ourselves in them.”

“Yes,” she sniffed, half laughing, half choking. “Perhaps we should stop.”

“I agree. Why don’t you go home with your father until I—”

She stumbled back. “No, absolutely not.” If he was staying, so was she. Someone had to look after him. She crossed her arms. “You forget, we are not married—yet—so you cannot dictate my actions. I have not said yes, and at this rate, I will not be doing so if you think that I am going to run away and hide in the country while you stay here, risking your worthless hide.”

“Julia, this is not some business venture.” He frowned, his expression one of strained patience. “Worthless?”

“It will be if you are tossed into the Thames, or riddled with bullets or—” She cursed her voice for cracking again.

He swore and raked his hands through his hair. “I cannot risk your life. I cannot do it, and I will not.”

“You are not. You are making the choice to risk yours, just as I am making the choice to risk mine. Besides, father said you borrowed his Manton revolver to show a friend who was interested in purchasing one. I know why you borrowed the gun, so it is good that I accompany you on your next trip.”

He looked at her as if she were speaking French, his tone a mixture of frustration and perplexity. “I would think most women would avoid a man with a gun. But what the devil does the Manton have to do with your accompanying me anywhere?”

“I happen to be a crack shot with those guns.”

Daniel looked surprised, and then he began to laugh.

She bristled. “I don’t see what is so funny.”

“No, of course not. There is nothing remotely funny about this situation.” He sobered, and before she knew what he was about, he had caught her hands and threaded his fingers through hers. He dipped to press their foreheads together. “You have to marry me. I cannot live without you.”

She smiled into his eyes. “I am considering it.”

“Still?”

“More seriously,” she conceded. “For the time being, I will pretend to be your fiancée while you visit Mr. Shaw’s sons.”

He groaned. “You have no mercy.”

“You need a lesson in trust.”

“I have told you everything. You got the better half of the bargain. I only got one kiss. Maybe we should make another bargain. For another kiss, I will let you accompany me to Mr. Shaw’s sons, with the cavalry following for protection—the cavalry being Brett and Robbie.”

“You’ve had more than enough kisses, but I can be generous.” She stood on tiptoes, and gave him a quick kiss.

He frowned. “I taught you better than that.”

“Yes, well, it is equal to your pathetic invitation to Shaw’s. To the fact that you do not want me with you. That you do not trust me—”

Daniel yanked her back into his arms, crushing her body to his, his mouth swooping down in a kiss that stole the rest of her sentence and all memory of whatever point she was trying to make. She could not find the will to resist or mind. After all, he kissed so very well. She kissed him back, using all he had taught her.

After a breathless span of time, he lifted his head, looking dazed. “That is much better. I do want you with me, all the time. Just alive, Julia, and out of danger.”

Me, too
, her heart cried. She opened her mouth to voice the words, when a throat clearing had her trying to move away, but Daniel’s arm was like a steel cable encircling her waist.

“Hmph.”

Daniel barely glanced her father’s way, his eyes on her. “Lord Taunton, you are now my witness. I have ruined your daughter. Again. I think you should intercede and demand she marry me.”

She gasped and slapped her hands against Daniel’s chest, struggling to gain her release.

“Hmph. She doesn’t look too pleased about it. You haven’t gotten her to say yes yet?”

Daniel sighed and released her. “Well, you did mention her stubbornness. It is formidable. I’ll need a hatchet to chip away at it.”

“It looks to me that you have enough weapons at your disposal. I suggest you use them sparingly until you get your acceptance.” He gave Daniel a meaningful look.

“Father,” she gasped. “I cannot accept Daniel yet, for if you have forgotten, Edmund has yet to sever our betrothal. That is not for another week, so I have time before I must give my answer.”

Her father grinned affectionately. “Always one to remember the details. But Julia, after what I witnessed here, see that your answer is yes.”

She flushed. “I am . . . I am leaning toward it. He is persuasive.”

Daniel beamed. “I have moved up in her esteem. I am beginning to think courting is like a tide, if I keep battering away, the barriers will erode.”

“There will be no further battering under my roof. None. Persuading is fine, battering is not fine. Do I make myself clear?” Her father skewered Daniel with a narrow-eyed warning.

Daniel’s smile vanished and he straightened, but at Julia’s snort of laughter he winked.

“I saw that,” her father warned.

Daniel coughed, and struggled to adopt a more serious mien. “Right, no more battering. Absolutely. My apologies, sir.”

Her father cast Daniel another stern look, but the twitch to his lips undermined his glower. “Now then, Julia tells me that you were inquiring about the good doctor Reilly.”

Daniel exchanged a look with Julia. “Yes, sir, I was. He was my father’s physician for years, and cared for my brother and me until I moved away. I had formed a bond of sorts with him.”

Her father nodded. “I am not surprised. He was always treating you for your share of scrapes and bruises. Your father said you boys knocked heads worse than two spitting bulls. My Meg spoke to your father about it after you showed up with a broken arm. She suggested your father separate you two, but he disagreed. Believed you needed to work it out yourselves, that it built character. With your smaller size, he worried that you needed to be toughened up or he feared you would always be beaten down.” Her father fell silent, his look regretful. “I wondered if I should have said something, but then it resolved when you enrolled in a different school. You boys were no longer together as much.”

Julia’s heart twisted at the thought of that small, bruised boy, and the knowledge that her mother had noticed the abuse and had tried to intercede.
It built character. He needed to be toughened up or be beaten down
. She shuddered at the late duke’s callous parenting.

She tamped down her sadness when she saw that Daniel was battling his own emotions. The memories her father had dredged up cast a shadow across his handsome features and darkened those vibrant green eyes.

She ached to wrap him in her arms. To offer the comfort no one had given to that lonely, bruised boy. But she could not. Not yet. Or rather, not with her father standing a few feet away and curtailing any form of battering. She wished he would leave.

“Yes, well, Doctor Reilly patched me up sufficiently, for I did survive as much as I think Edmund wished it otherwise,
wishes
it otherwise,” Daniel amended.

“Yes, but that is often typical of brothers,” her father offered.

“Edmund is an atypical case,” Daniel said dryly, his eyes hard.

“Yes, I suppose being a duke makes that so.”

“Among other things,” Daniel murmured and briskly changed the topic back to the good doctor. “What did you learn of Reilly? Where is he settled these days? I would like to pay him a visit. Thank him for his kindness.”

“I am sorry, Daniel. I hate to be the bearer of bad news. However, I was at White’s yesterday and I ran into a Bedfordshire neighbor, Viscount Randall. His estate abuts Bedford Hall.”

“Yes, I remember the viscount.” The viscount was a bookish man who liked to drone on about philosophy and religion, wearing Daniel’s father’s patience thin.

“He shared Doctor Reilly’s services with Bedford, and I recalled Julia’s recent query about the doctor, so I asked if the viscount had any knowledge of him. I regret to tell you, Daniel, but the good doctor is no longer with us. What’s worse is that his demise was rather recent and I am afraid it was not of natural causes.” His gaze flicked briefly to her.

Thankfully her father was aware that she was not a woman prone to swoons or flutters, so he continued before she could beg him to do so.

“He had retired to a small cottage on the coast of Kent. Apparently, he upset a burglar in the act of robbing his home and paid too dear a price for it.”

She covered her mouth. She recalled Doctor Reilly’s booming laugh and the toffees he used to dispense to Emily and her when he was called to treat whatever ailments they had at the time. With a twinkle in his eye, he would tout their medicinal benefits.

She knew as surely as she knew her own name that his death was not a coincidence. On unsteady limbs, she walked over to the settee and sank down.

“I am sorry, Daniel.”

Daniel appeared to be grappling with his own shock. He swiped a hand down his face, shaking his head as if he could shake off the truth. “Yes, well, as am I. He was a good man.”

“Yes, he was. But he did have a grand retirement, and no thieving blackguard can steal that from him. Randall said his cottage was set on a plum piece of property along the coastline. The doctor had traveled widely over the past decade, going to the continent and even doing missionary work in India. In fact, he had only recently returned to England and purchased the acreage in Kent. Your father was a generous benefactor.”