Winning a Lady's Heart (5 page)

“What kept you, gel?”

Alexandra tried not to jump at the question barked across the Duke of Danby’s office. She took a steadying breath and entered the lair.

“Your Grace.” She prided herself on the steady way she delivered that greeting.

“Close it,” he instructed a hovering servant.

She cast one longing glance towards the exit. This had been the moment she’d dreaded since the scandal had erupted. She was alone with the dragon.

Alexandra sighed. She’d always been a bit of a coward where the duke was concerned.

“I don’t have all day, Alexandra. Take a seat.”

She dropped her eyes demurely and counted the steps it took to place her directly in front of the Duke of Danby. “Twenty.”

“Twenty what, Alexandra?”

Alexandra gave a startled shake of her head. “Nothing, Your Grace,” she murmured and slid into the seat. It was large, so large it nearly dwarfed her. She felt like a child about to be delivered a stern scolding, which, in a way, she supposed she was.

“You know why you are here.”

“Because you missed your granddaughters and Mother and desperately and wanted to see us?” She blinked at the boldness of her own cheeky retort.

Danby gave a sharp bark of laughter. “Seems you acquired a backbone during your time in London.”

And a broken heart.

“I’m getting on in age, girl. I’m not as hale as I once was.”

“You seem to be in fine health,” she countered.

“Yes, yes. You and the physician are of like mind. That isn’t the point. I’ve had enough of reading about the scandalous behaviors of my offspring. I never expected it of you, though.”

Alexandra sighed. “I never expected it of myself, Your Grace.”

He leaned forward in his chair. “So then why did you make a cake of yourself over some gentleman?”

She could give him two thousand and twenty-five reasons she’d counted in the carriage ride. She settled for one. “I loved him.”

Danby arched a brow. “Loved? Are my granddaughter’s sentiments so fleeting then?”

Alas, someone who didn’t expect her feelings for Nathan to simply vanish like a cold breath of air on a winter’s day. Who would have believed the Duke of Danby would be the one?

“No, Your Grace. I love him still.”

“I take it your sniveling father was not particularly fond of Pembroke.”

“That is putting it mildly, Your Grace,” she concurred.

“What? That your father is sniveling or that he wasn’t fond of him?”

Alexandra’s lips twitched with her first real amusement since she’d learned of Nathan’s betrayal. “Both, Your Grace.”

Danby laughed and settled back into his seat, eying her. The easy camaraderie they’d shared dissipated under his ducal regard.

She shifted in her seat.

“You said you love him?”

This again? Must he torture her?

“Yes,” she said patiently.

He drummed his fingertips on the desktop, the quiet staccato the only sound in the otherwise silent library. “My reports indicated Pembroke is a handsome chap. Is that what captured your fancy?”

Indignation swelled in Alexandra’s breast. She gritted her teeth. “I assure you I am not so empty-headed to fall in love with a gentleman simply because he is handsome.”

She tried not to be offended when Danby didn’t concur.

“You do know the previous Earl of Pembroke was a rotten bounder? I’m sure his son is not very different.”

Alexandra flew from her seat. “He is nothing like his father. Why he is hard-working and kind and—”

Danby arched an intimidating brow, bringing her words to a staggering halt as she realized she’d not only challenged the duke, but also defended a man wholly undeserving of her support.

Perhaps it was fatigue from her two and a half days of travel at a breakneck speed. Perhaps it was the presence of her grandfather. But all energy seeped from her and she slid into her seat. Alexandra closed her eyes and wished, for the thousandth time, that some mistake had been made, that Nathan was not a scoundrel, and that her father had been wrong.

“Are you finished, Alexandra?”

She nodded.

“You’ve always been something of a counter.”

She blinked. “I’m sorry?”

Danby waved his hand. “As in numbers. Certainly an odd habit, but no need to apologize for it.”

Alexandra couldn’t help it; she dropped her head into her hands and rubbed her eyes in weary consternation. Was there anything he didn’t know?

“I pride myself on knowing everything there is to know about my offspring,” he said in response to her silent question.

If she weren’t so blasted frustrated by his uncanny ability to anticipate her questions before she even vocalized them, she could admit there was something almost sweet about those words…well, minus the way he referred to them all as offspring. It put her in mind of his neatly-kept, well-organized, prized stables.

Seeing as Danby’s words were more statement than question, they didn’t merit a response. However, Alexandra chose to respond anyways. “Yes, I’m a counter.”

He placed his elbows on the desktop and leaned forwards. “Hardly a habit to be so grim about. It is not as though you are drinking and gambling like that cousin of yours.”

Alexandra passed a hand over her mouth to smother a laugh. With a vast number of cousins, Danby’s words could be applied to any one of them.

“Uh, thank you, I think, Your Grace.”

“Just stating a fact, gel. Definitely another skill you didn’t get from that father of yours.”

“No, you are correct, Your Grace.”

He snorted. “Of course I’m right. Your mother was always the one with a head for figures. Too bad she wasn’t born a lord.”

Alexandra’s head was beginning to spin, and not from fatigue, but rather the odd direction Danby’s course had meandered down. She couldn’t quite determine why he should make mention of her peculiar little habit.

“Tell me, Alexandra,” Danby asked, interrupting her silent musings. “Someone who counts as much as you do must have counted a host of reasons Pembroke was worthy of you.”

And that was not the direction she’d thought the duke had been taking her down. Her breath whistled between her teeth, and she clasped her hands, clutching them to her stomach to stifle the pain.

“You cannot possibly wish me to enumerate the reasons I loved—”

“Love.”

“The Earl of Pembroke,” she spoke over his interruption. Duke be damned, she’d run out of patience with the steady line of questioning from him and his
offspring
.

“I’m not asking, gel.”

I’m demanding.

She sighed. His point had been made. So be it. How much more could it hurt to tick off her list of reasons she’d fallen in love.

“I can enumerate a thousand and two reasons I love His Lordship. He knows I loathe being called Alexandra—”
and instead called me, my love
—
“
when most don’t even know I have any preferences. He taught me to play hazard because I asked it. He makes me laugh. He humors my love of poetry. He has taken to counting—”

The duke rang for a servant, interrupting her recitation. She fell silent. A short knock sounded at the door.

“Enter,” Danby barked.

The door opened and she craned her head over her shoulder to see the butler enter, bearing a silver tray with a calling card.

“Show my next guest in.”

Milne nodded and hurried off to do Danby’s bidding. Alexandra was mildly curious to know which poor relation had arrived to face the duke’s displeasure—mayhap one of the gambling and drinking ones.

She waited, like a child spared from practicing her letters, for Danby to request a continuation of her list. Instead he rubbed his jaw line.

There was another knock.

This time Alexandra didn’t turn around to see who entered.

“Come in, come in,” Danby called, jovial towards the sudden guest. He waved the individual over.

Apparently, whoever it was had earned the duke’s favor because his face was wreathed in an aberrant, wide smile.

Finally curious, Alexandra peeked over her shoulder…and nearly fell out of her seat. Standing before her was the same man who’d sent her running to Danby’s Yorkshire estate, the very same man who’d broken her heart—Nathan.

Nathan hungrily devoured Alexandra with his eyes. Since the moment she’d walked out of that card room seven days ago, he’d been filled with guilt for having hurt her and more pain that he’d ever imagined possible at losing her. A fog of emptiness had besieged him—until that summons from the Duke of Danby.

Longing for any connection to her, he’d set out at a reckless speed, uncaring it had been sent by her grandfather, one of the most powerful peers in the realm. His meeting with Danby, however, had been nothing short of staggering.

“Your Grace, my lady,” he murmured, unable to tear his eyes away from Alexandra’s stiffly held form.

Her skin was pale, and it appeared a strong winter gust of wind could knock her from the very seat she occupied. He ached to cross the room, to pull her in his arms, and erase all the hurt he saw there.

But he’d lost that right.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered.

Nathan didn’t speak. Words, in that moment, eluded him.

Alexandra seemed to emerge from the daze of confusion, for she gave a forceful shake of her head and flew from her chair. She glared at him then whipped around to face the duke.

“Order him from the grounds at once, Your Grace. Tell him…” Her words faded on a gasp.

She staggered back a step, a hand clutched tightly to her breast. She knew it had been Danby who’d summoned him. Blast it all.

“Why would you betray me like this, Your Grace?” she pleaded.

“Alexandra, I spoke to you earlier about your melodramatics.”

A harsh, bitter laugh escaped her, filled the air around him, and Nathan felt a stab of pain with the realization that it had been he who’d killed the innocent sound of joy that had first captivated him.

How had he ever allowed himself to deliberately hurt her? What kind of bastard had he been? The kind of bastard who’d thought he was saving her from himself, the voice on his shoulder nudged. The kind who had been foolishly convinced that she was better off without him.

Seeing her now, broken and hurting, he was hard-pressed to believe she was, in fact, better off.

His throat worked painfully. He held up an entreating hand towards her.

“I—I need you to know, it was never my intention to hurt you.” His words came out scratchy from three days of ill use and fatigue.

Another one of those mirthless laughs met his words, and he dropped his hand to his side.

Alexandra pointedly ignored him, choosing to direct her attention to Danby, who was watching their exchange with a hawk-like intensity.

Alexandra told herself not to look at Nathan. It was a roaring reminder, ripping through her mind with the blaring sound of a crowded ballroom in the height of the Season.

It was futile. Her eyes found him. Damn her for being a weak creature; the sight of him made her breath quicken.

Why did he have to be so blasted beautiful? Why must he be over six feet tall and have whipcord strength? His dark hair, with the faintest curl, would have been soft on most men, but Nathan had the look of a fallen angel. His eyes were the color of those same azure blue clouds the cherubs up in heaven danced upon with regular frequency.

And at the moment, those eyes were trained intently on her.

He gave the faintest nod in the duke’s direction, alerting her to the fact that Danby had directed a question her way. Or statement. She hadn’t been listening.

“I beg your pardon, Your Grace?” she snapped.

Danby smiled with amusement.

“I’m glad my displeasure so pleases you,” she said, surprised by her audacity.

“Your recently acquired backbone pleases me.” He tipped his head over at Nathan. “Whether you like it or not, gel, he’s to be my guest. My suggestion is you put aside some of that Whitton fury and open those eyes. I know you have a brain in your head.”

Somehow it sounded like an insult.

Danby motioned from Alexandra to Nathan. “Off with you now,” he ordered as though speaking to two young children. “Continue this talk somewhere else. I’ve done my piece.”

Alexandra’s lips tightened.
Yes, he certainly had.

Nathan was the only one who seemed to remember his manners. He bowed deeply. “Your Grace.”

Alexandra gritted her teeth so tightly the pain radiated up her jaw and pierced the flesh at her temples. Without so much as a curtsey or further word uttered, she turned on her heel and stalked past Nathan. The faint musky sandalwood that always seemed to cling to him wafted by, its pull a seductive reminder of the embraces they’d stolen.

She made to shove the door open, but damn him, he was there, intercepting her efforts. Ever the gentleman was Nathan. She laughed almost manically at the ridiculousness of such a thought.

A gentleman would never lay a wager in the book at White’s about a lady he loved.

He fell into step behind her, and then his long strides closed the distance, and he was beside her, marching down the long, long corridor towards—well she hadn’t considered exactly where she was going. She’d just known she’d needed to get away from the Duke of Danby and his hellish office.

“Surely you have something to say to me?”

Alexandra laughed and faltered. He gripped her arm gently, righting her.

She shrugged his touch off, trying not to feel the longing for his heated skin on her flesh.

“Oh, I have a million things to say to you, my lord.”

A small smile tilted his lips. “I’m sure you’ve counted more.”

Damn him for knowing all the intimate things about her. Alexandra looked left and then right, confirming they were in fact alone.

“Does it amuse you to continue to make light of all that I shared with you? Perhaps there is a current wager you’ve placed as to how many days it would take for me to forgive you for being an utter cad? Well, here is the answer I’d jot in that book at White’s. Never.”

“Never is not a number.”

“You know what I mean.” Her voice had risen to a near shout.

He seemed far too amused for Alexandra. She jabbed a finger at his chest. “Must you come here at Christmastime after humiliating me to thoroughly ruin my holiday season? What joy do you find in my misery? And furthermore, how dare you arrive and appear so bloody well rested. Why, you look as though you arrived a whole evening—”

His eyes flashed the confirmation to her statement.

“You arrived before I did?” She thought of Danby’s lack of questions for Nathan. He hadn’t needed to ask any questions because he already had.

And here was Alexandra, caught off-guard and looking thoroughly rumpled. Danby’s betrayal was now complete.

“Your grandfather summoned me,” Nathan said quietly.

“Why did you come?” she asked on an angry whisper.

“Because I needed to see you, needed your forgiveness. And as much as I’ve told myself I don’t deserve you, I need to explain.”

Alexandra took a step away from him. “Explain what, my lord? What could you possibly say? And you were correct, you were never deserving of me.”

A stark flash of pain twisted his features and she hated herself for inflicting that hurt on him. It had been his greatest worry, something he’d frequently spoken to her about, turning out to be the same ruthless man his father had been. He’d told her so many times he didn’t deserve her, she’d ceased keeping count—which was, of course, a great effort for Alexandra.

“You are right,” he said, at last breaking the silence. “But I still need you to know the whole story.”

She swallowed past a ball of emotion. “Well, what is the story?”

Nathan looked around the hall and dragged a hand through tousled, dark hair.

“Not here.”

“Oh, where then?”

“Walk with me?”

Indecision flared and she silently waged a war with her inner desires; the desire to know the truth, the desire to be with him, and her pride.

“I-I only just arrived.”

“Come with me, Alex. Join me. Listen to what I have to say and if at the end, you feel the same way you do now, then I will get in my carriage and make the long journey back to London.”

Her eyes studied his face, seeming to search for the sincerity of his promise.

“Do you promise? Or is this another lie?”

He flinched. “Just a walk. Meet me by the stables.”