“Can you get them off? I shall put them by the door to dry.” She stooped to take the boots as he removed them. “And that jacket, too, whilst you are at it. I believe there is a vacant peg on the coatrack.”
The duke stripped off his sack coat and handed it over. Cassandra dared not stop to contemplate that the Duke of Wadebridge sat half-dressed in her family cottage. A firmly muscled man lurked beneath those expensive trappings.
She hung his jacket to dry and placed his boots by the door. He used the towel to scrub his hair, which was thick, black, and neatly trimmed. A lock fell over his forehead, and he flexed his fingers to rake it back into place.
The sitting room smelled of wet earth, trampled grass, and costly shaving lotion. She imagined this flood of the senses would be a common occurrence if he were her husband.
Thankfully, the kettle beckoned. Cassandra rushed to prepare the tea tray, and then carried it into the sitting room to serve him. Wadebridge took a cup. He held it in his large hand and regarded her over the rim.
“You’re tired today.”
She shrugged. “I am often tired—a symptom of my ‘mysterious woman’s troubles’, I believe you called it.”
“I am not the cause of what’s plagued you?”
Cassandra would not tell His Grace of her sleepless night, or how he had troubled her mind all morning, and caused a row with Honoria this afternoon. “On the contrary. I had quite written you off.”
Wade sat forward on the sofa. “Tell me, when you opened the door just now, were you happy to see me or disappointed?”
She took a sip of her tea. There was no reason to lie, no excuse for artifice. She was terribly glad he had come. “Happy.”
Cassandra wanted so badly for him to be better than the gentlemen who’d come before him.
Hewas.
A ghost of a smile played at his mouth. “I confess I spent a sleepless night fretting about you—and I never fret. After breakfast, I went in search of a gift worthy of you. I remembered that wildflower meadow from my summers spent at Caswell Hall. Those were happy times.”
He had brought her something that reminded him of his boyhood? “Why buttercups, Wadebridge?”
“Because they are beautiful, they grow untamed on the dales, and are just a little bit dangerous.”
Cassandra laughed. Children were taught to pluck the hardy flowers, but to never eat them, as they were poisonous. “I am very fond of the color yellow.”
“I chose well, then?”
“You could not have pleased me more.”
He fairly glowed. She almost did not recognize the man sitting in front of her. “I’ve never brought a woman flowers,” he said. “The ladies of my acquaintance typically prefer jewels or gifts of…”
“Money?”
He sighed and slumped back in his seat. “I really must learn to quit whilst I am ahead.”
She laughed. She supposed she ought to have been scandalized, but there were parts of him that inevitably must live up to his black reputation.
“I hope to give up that part of my past,” Wade confessed. “I mean, Ihavegiven it up. Debauchery no longer holds appeal. I’ve lately turned my eye toward monogamy.”
Hence his appearance here in Longstone. His courteous wooing. The gift of buttercups. The Duke of Wadebridge was on the hunt for a wife and Cassandra Staunton had been his first choice.
Perhaps he truly was in love with her.
“Why not jewels, Your Grace? Can you not offermesuch treasures?”
He furrowed his dark brow. “Is that what you want?”
“I’ve never owned anything dearer than a length of old Honiton that once belonged to my mother. Upon Mama’s death, Octavia was left the hair combs, Honoria took a brooch, and I tucked lace into the bottom of my wardrobe chest. I am sure I wouldn’t know what to do with a bauble.”
“I’ve a vault full of diamonds,” he said, sipping his tea, “but when I picked the flowers for you, I was trying to do something that I’d never done for anyone before. I am endeavoring to make myself worthy of you.”
