As was the look on her lovely face that was so pained and confused. Now that he knew who she was, he did see her father in her. In her eyes, mostly. Her eyes were like Oakford’s.
“Stalwood told me that you were injured the day my father died,” she said at last. Her tone was very calm. “But he did not say that his death was your fault. I want an explanation.”
Lucas nodded. “You deserve that,” he admitted as he pushed away from her and limped across the room to a chair before the fire. With an apologetic look for the rudeness of his action, he sank into the cushions and drew a deep breath to gain some control over the pain.
She was silent as she moved to take the opposite chair from his own. Those jade eyes flitted over him, observing like the best of spies. He found himself wondering at the outcome of her assessment.
“Tell me,” she repeated. An order, not a request.
His mouth felt dry as kindling and his tongue felt thick. Somehow he managed to speak. “I was pursuing a traitor to the Crown. One within our own ranks.”
“Stalwood suggested as much,” Diana said. “And that things went wrong.”
“I was told not to pursue, but to observe,” Lucas said, bending his head as memories washed over him like a tsunami. “I didn’t listen. I should have listened. I should have requested more help. Your father wasn’t even supposed to be there. But you know him.”
A ghost of a smile crossed her face. “Yes, I do know him,” she said. “He was not one to follow orders.”
“No, but this time we should have.” Lucas scrubbed a hand over his face. “I thought something massive was about to happen. Something dangerous. I decided to go in instead of simply observe. Your father was covering me. But we were both shot, I in the leg while I was climbing up a building. I fell and was even more injured. When I turned, your father had already been hit. I was trying to help him when I was shot a second time.”
Her face was still impassive, but he saw the glitter of tears brighten her eyes as she dipped her head and stared into her clenched hands in her lap. “It does not sound as though what happened was your fault,” she said at last.
That little absolution hit Lucas in the gut for a moment, but he shook away the forgiveness he did not deserve. “I was the one who should have decided to act more prudently. I should not have asked your father to help me violate my orders. But for me he would still be with you. He died trying to protectme.”
She was silent again, and he allowed the silence, despite how much he wished to recoil from it. At last she said, “That seems like all the more reason for me to wish to help you, Your Grace.”
He wrinkled his brow. “You cannot mean that.”
She stood and looked down at him. “I certainly do. I have an obligation not to let my father’s sacrifice be for nothing. As do you. You will not leave, Your Grace. You will stay and you will allow me to help you. For my father.”
“Miss—”
She turned away. “Rest again. I have left food by the door. Tomorrow will be a better time to discuss our next course of action. Good night.”
She didn’t wait for his response this time any more than she had the last time she walked away. And he did not offer any, but just watched her depart and leave him alone with his guilt and his rage and his pain.
Chapter Three
Diana had not lived in her bedroom in London for almost exactly a year. Even when she’d come for her father’s service, she had stayed at an inn, her room paid for by Stalwood. The last time she’d been here, her heart had been broken and she’d never wanted to return to this place and all its horrible memories. Now she sat on her bed, and that same heart was broken all over again, not just by memories, but by the details the Duke of Willowby had just shared about her father’s death.
“It’s too much,” she whispered out loud into the silent darkness that offered no comfort or solace. “It’s just too much to bear.”
Grief overcame her then, and she sank against her pillows, her sobs racking her body as she relived every broken moment of the last few years of her life. All the pain, all the loss, all the shattered dreams washed over her in an unrelenting wave.
She rocked against the pillows as the grief went on and on, and then she was being lifted, turned into a broad chest as warm, strong arms came around her. She leaned into that chest, letting the strength of those arms comfort her before reality came back. She lifted her face toward the very handsome one of Lucas.
“You shouldn’t—” she began, though it was a weak refusal. In truth, it had been a very long time since someone had offered her physical comfort. Right now she wanted nothing more than to curl into him.
He shook his head. “Shh now,” he soothed, that rough, hard voice now gentle and even kind. He guided a hand up to the back of her head and tugged her back to his chest. His fingers smoothed through her hair. “Shhhh.”
She went limp, all her last resistance erased with the safety she felt in this man’s arms. Perhaps it was an illusion, actually, she could almost guarantee that it was. But in this moment, she could not pull away.
So she sobbed against him, pouring out everything she was normally too strong to share. And he said nothing. No empty platitudes, no request that she tell him what was in her heart. No demand that she erase her feelings to make him more comfortable.
He just held her until the tears had stopped and she could finally breathe again.
She shifted slightly and lifted her gaze again. He was looking down at her. They were sitting on the bed together. He had no shirt. She had changed into her night-rail long ago.
In that moment, she realized how very intimate their position was. Especially when she could feel his clean, warm breath stirring her lips. When his dark eyes bore down into hers and held her captive.
