“And how do you know I came from a place stinking of cigar smoke and stale ale?” he asked at last into the heavy silence.
“Your jacket reeks of it,” she said. “I must retire. If you will excuse me, Your Grace.”
She knew this sort of man, had met him before: a powerful beast who had so much thrown at his feet, the chase intrigued him. He hungered for it. Indeed, the more brusque and dismissive she was with him, the more he emanated a raw, smoldering hunger.
Once, a man of his size and handsome virility would have shaken her. He was a duke who governed England’s most elite clandestine forces with so much effortless grace, it had taken years for his identity to be uncovered. But she was not the girl she had once been, and she had only two things left to lose, neither of which she was willing to give him.
She turned on her heel without curtsying, the slight deliberate. A mock she could not resist, and it was for herself rather than for him this time.
“Miss Palliser.”
Bridget almost failed to stop at the name, not recognizing it. She went a full three steps farther before halting, her skirts swishing in the suddenness of her pause. Certainly it was not the Duke of Carlisle who had caused her to forget her assumed identity. It was the newness of it, surely.
She turned about, catching her bottom lip between her teeth and studying him boldly before lowering her lashes. “Your Grace?”
Those molten eyes of his—predator eyes, like a fox’s, she thought—dipped to her lips. And for some reason she could not comprehend, her mouth burned as if he had placed his own upon it. Awareness hummed between them. She felt it, an ache in her core, and she was not supposed to. She did not want to. She wanted to be numb as she always was. As she forced herself to be. As she had to be.
“You are awake when the rest of the house is abed. Why?” His tone was innocent enough, but the undertone, one of interrogation, chilled her.
“I do not sleep well when I am establishing myself in a new circumstance,” she lied with ease. In truth, she did not sleep well at all. For with sleep came darkness, and with darkness came remembrance.
“Nor do I,” he surprised her by admitting.
The Duke of Carlisle had a weakness?
She had been told he was formidable. Untouchable. As cold as ice. Heartless in his pursuit of his enemies.
How intriguing.
She studied him. “Forgive me if I find it impossible to believe that a duke should ever have difficulty finding his rest.”
“You are a bold one for a governess, Miss Palliser.” He moved toward her with slow, purposeful strides.
With him came his heat, the reminder of how large and menacing he was. How beautiful. It seemed a sin that the Lord should have bestowed the looks of an angel upon a man with the devil’s own heart.
“I am bold when I need to be, Your Grace,” she said pointedly.
Perhaps with a bit more condemnation than she should have, for he stopped.
“I have no wish to affect your position here, Miss Palliser. I merely desire likeminded company.”
“I would not imagine we could ever be likeminded about anything,” she argued, in spite of herself once more. “Similarly plagued, perhaps. Moreover, my remaining here with you is highly improper, and we both know it. I must go.”
He continued forward until he was near enough to touch. “Must you?”
She swallowed. It was true he wore the scent of a tavern on his coat, but it was also true beneath that, there was a deeper hint of musk and wilderness, as if it had been plucked from the deepest depth of the most verdant woodland and placed lovingly upon his skin.
Lord have mercy on her soul. What ailed her?
She was not…attractedto this man. To this duke, who had by definition, been given the best of everything. Who had all the power. Who had never been taught to listen to the lowly. To hear their cries and their wants and their needs. Who thought it was his right to rule an entire nation of people simply by the nature of his birth.
Nay. Nay. Nay.
She was not.
Bridget compressed her lips as she studied him. His expression was inscrutable. He smelled of spirits, but he did not act as if he were inebriated. His speech was not slurred, his eyes were not glazed. Nor did he sway on his feet. His words made sense. But while her observations suggested otherwise, her instincts told her the Duke of Carlisle was vulnerable to her. He was in his cups, and he was attracted to her. She could take advantage of that, of him. Now, in this moment.
If she waited until tomorrow…
