“What do you think you are doing, Westmorland?” she demanded, gritting her teeth as she attempted to move him with all her might.
Almost impossible to believe she was finally referring to him as Westmorland rather than Your Grace when he was all but breaking down her chamber door. This was not the manner in which he had ever anticipated such a victory to unfold.
“I am attempting to speak with you,” he growled. “An audience, damn you, Isabella. That is all I ask.”
“I will not be your mistress,” she snapped. “My answer remains unchanged.”
“I do not want you as my mistress.” He maintained steady pressure on the door, knowing he would have no need to force his way inside. Sooner or later, her persistence would succumb to his, one way or another.
A frown marred her brow. “You do not?”
Of course he still wanted free reign of her gorgeous body. He wanted to unleash her sensual nature. To introduce her to the heights of pleasure. Or, at least, to the heights of pleasure which her ardent Lambert had not already introduced her.
It served as a bitter reminder of why he was here and what he must do.
“No,” he bit out. “I have come because I require a typewriter. Quite desperately.”
The duke hadcome for her.
But not for the reason she had supposed.
How lowering. She should be pleased. Instead, part of her—the wicked part, to be sure—knew a surge of disappointment as she preceded him into the salon they had so recently vacated. She would meet with him after all, but there was no way she would meet with him in her chamber. Not only was it highly improper for a man to be within her private rooms, but her practical nature recognized that she could not trust herself alone with him in a bedchamber. After all, she had nearly allowed him to make love to her in an orangery.
Heat stung her cheeks as she spun about to face him. It was then that she belatedly realized he was holding a book. Her book, it would appear. The book of verse Henry had given her, years and seemingly another lifetime ago. She had been leafing through it in morose fashion, missing Westmorland.
Feeling foolish. As foolish as she felt now.
She raised a brow, attempting to maintain her composure in whatever fashion possible. “What are you doing with my book, Your Grace? I thought you despised poetry.”
His jaw hardened. “I was passing the time while I waited for your arrival. It seemed more entertaining than declining tea every five minutes.”
She ignored his pointed jibe at Betsy, who she could well imagine had been at sixes and sevens with a duke sitting in the salon. Thankfully, the loyal maid-of-all-work had disappeared back into the kitchen following Isabella’s ignominious flight through the household.
“Do you intend to keep the book, or may I have it back?” she asked acidly, clinging to whatever shreds of pride she yet possessed when it came to this man.
Seeing him again after the moonlit encounter that had changed her forever was uncomfortable. More so because she had assumed he was here to pester her about becoming his mistress, and he had dismissed her concern as if it were ludicrous. Had he forgotten her already? Worse, had it not meant as much to him as it had to her?
He sauntered toward her in that ducal manner of his, as if all the world were his to conquer with a mere look, holding out the volume of poems. “Here you are, my dear. Never let it be said that I parted a lady from the lovesick verse sent her by anardent and affectionate friend.”
She snatched the book from him, nettled by his derision. “You had no right to make free with my possessions.”
A small smile curved his sensual lips. “I am able to make free with your body, but not with the books from lovers you keep strewn about?”
The book seemed to scald her fingers. She deposited it on the table at her side. “You are not able to make free with my person or my books. Henry was not my lover. He was my friend.”
He had wanted to be more, however. For a brief, fanciful period of time, she had persuaded herself hecouldbe more, and that likewise, she could be more to him. But reality had intruded, as always. She was thankful for the lesson she had learned. If only she had remembered it before allowing the Duke of Westmorland to kiss her senseless two nights ago. And eight days before that…
“Henry.” Westmorland’s lip curled. “How is it you are on such familiar terms with a useless fribble like Lord Lambert and yet you can scarcely bear to refer to me by my title?”
She had been young and naïve when Viscount Lambert had wooed her at a country house party, one of her rare forays into the world her mother had left behind when she had married her father. But what she had felt for Henry was pallid compared to the brilliance of what she felt for the Duke of Westmorland. She was wise enough, in spite of all her failings, to note the difference. And to understand that if she had not been good enough for a viscount, she would never bring a duke up to scratch.
“He is an old friend,” she said softly, guardedly. “I have since learned the necessity of recalling the difference in stations between myself and peers of the realm. And for good reason. But enough of my past acquaintances. Let us return to the reason for your visit, which was not to pilfer my library. I daresay you have books enough to occupy you in Westmorland House.”
“Just who are you, Isabella Hilgrove?” he asked, studying her in a way she could not like.
It was far too familiar, and, she feared, saw far too much. No one had ever looked upon her in the way Westmorland did. Not even Henry. And it shook her resolve.
She put some distance between them, moving to the window, needing to remove herself from his space. “What manner of question is that? You know who I am.”
