Someone was traveling.
And since that someone was not she, it could only be one person, for such a commotion to have been raised.
Her husband was preparing to take a journey, and he had not informed her of his plans. After what they had shared this morning by the lake, he was…he was…leaving.
No, she told herself.It cannot be.
But a hasty jaunt to the main hall proved otherwise.
She waylaid a passing footman and asked him who the trunks belonged to and where they were going.
“His Grace’s, Your Grace,” the young man answered. “He is leaving for London this evening, as I understand.”
There was no mistaking either the words or the ill-disguised look of pity the servant directed at her. Elysande’s husband was planning to abandon her. Likely, the realization should have given her a sense of peace. At least she would be assured she could work on her design, unimpeded. And yet, her body was still humming with the after-effects of the pleasure he had given her. She could still hear the words he had said, feel his tongue on her.
Her cheeks went hot with a combination of embarrassment and fury. “Where is His Grace?” she asked the footman.
For like her husband’s plans, his whereabouts also remained unknown to her.
“Speaking with Mr. Saunders in the study, I believe, Your Grace,” answered the man, shuffling from one foot to the other, clearly eager to return to his duties.
She thanked him and dismissed him, her feet taking her toward the study before her mind could dissuade her. The door was ajar, but she rapped on it anyway, venting some of her irritation upon the undeserving portal.
“Come,” called that low, decadent baritone she had come to know so well.
The same voice that had praised her earlier, asking her for permission to touch her body and bring her pleasure.
Tamping down all reminders of her earlier folly, she swept over the threshold.
Both men looked up at her entrance, and she steeled herself against the effect the sight of her husband had upon her. Curse him, but he was handsome. Dressed in country tweed, he might have been the consummate gentleman. Only she knew what lurked beneath the layers of his civility. The reminder of his scar and his warnings to her merged with the strange yearning she could not seem to quell.
“Duchess,” he said, unsmiling as he bowed in her direction.
“Duke,” she returned, “Mr. Saunders.”
The young steward offered her a bow and made haste in excusing himself, perhaps perceptive enough to discern from her expression that she wished to speak with Wycombe alone. She waited for the door to click closed at his back before venturing deeper into the chamber.
“You are traveling,” she said, a statement rather than a question.
An indiscernible expression passed over his face as he moved across the study to meet her halfway. “I am.”
Although his confirmation was precisely what she had expected, it nonetheless did nothing to ameliorate the sting of the discovery he intended to go. She licked her suddenly dry lips and tamped down a surge of irritation.
“When did you intend to inform me, or does everyone else in the household take precedence over your wife?”
The moment the question left her, she wished she could recall it, for she could not deny the tone of her voice was equal parts bitter and resentful. She was allowing herself to be far too vulnerable where he was concerned. One stolen moment of kissing in the grass, one morning of passion, and look at what she had become.
His generous mouth tightened into a thin line as he stopped before her. “You are vexed with me.”
Was she? Vexed seemed a mild word for the tumult of emotion churning through her. She was confused. Nettled.
Outraged.
“I am perplexed,” she said, trying to calm herself. After all, was not time and distance what she wanted? “You said nothing of your plans to leave this morning.”
He raised a brow. “As I recall, we were otherwise occupied.”
His reminder made her flush with a combination of remembrance and shame. And it also brought an unwanted pulse of awareness to the apex of her thighs. “We conducted conversation aplenty,” she said, attempting to keep her voice cool and imperturbable.
