She stood and faced the door, dared herself to walk through it. Even more, to travel the short distance to the Duke’s Suite and her husband.
She must have been truly courageous after all, because she opened the door without hesitation.
He removed his boots, then his shirt, and finally his trousers and undergarments, walking into the bathing chamber barefooted. This room was more luxurious than the chamber at Kilmarin. He was surprised at how quickly he’d come to enjoy—and perhaps expect—luxury.
He stared at his image in the pier glass. Tonight, he looked like a workman with streaks of black across his forehead and cheeks. He washed with icy water and dried with a length of toweling, scrubbing at his head until his hair was nearly dry.
He left the bathing chamber to find Sarah standing in the middle of the Duke’s Suite.
For the longest moment, she simply stared at him, her gray eyes widening.
He looked away, not to avoid the intensity of her stare, but to mitigate its effect on him. He walked toward the bed. The maid had pulled down the counterpane and turned down the sheets.
“Are your diamonds all right?”
“Everything is fine,” he said, sitting on the mattress and draping the sheet over his lap, feeling curiously like an untried boy with randy thoughts. Or a bridegroom.
“What is this?” she asked, picking up the slender notebook he’d left on the table beside the chair.
He stilled, keeping himself from racing across theroom and pulling it from her grasp. Sooner or later, she was bound to discover it. Sooner or later, she was going to find out. Better now. Better when their marriage teetered on the brink of dissolution.
She smiled at him quizzically, but he didn’t say a word. Nor did he speak when she opened the book and began to read its contents. At first she frowned, but then she started glancing at him repeatedly, as if seeking either his reassurance or his confirmation.
“What is this, Douglas?” she asked, as prettily as if she were noticing a button loose on his shirt or inquiring as to part of the process of making diamonds.
He clasped one hand to the back of his neck and tilted his head back, his gaze on the ceiling. He breathed deeply once, then again, letting the second breath out slowly, gaining time.
“It’s where I write those things I learn. So that I don’t forget.”
“Is it so important to know how to address a duchess?” Her brow furrowed.
“I know little of the nobility,” he said.
At her silence, he knew she was waiting for more of an explanation. “I was born without anything to call my own,” he said. “I didn’t have a house like Chavensworth. I had only heard of Kilmarin in tones of awe. I made myself what I am. And I’m proud of that, but I don’t have a lineage like yours. I’m not a Tulloch of Kilmarin, and I’m not the offspring of a noble. I am simply Douglas Eston.”
She didn’t answer him. Instead, she sat and studied her hands with great deliberation, as if surprised to see them attached to her wrists.
“Chavensworth has never been mine,” she said. “It’s been my burden, my responsibility, perhaps. But I can’tinherit it because I’m a woman. I’ve always known that.”
“But you’ve also been a Herridge from Chavensworth. You grew up knowing that everything around you belonged to a family that could trace its lineage back six hundred years. You have a title that you can never lose because of your birth. Or marriage.”
She looked at him, but he didn’t allow her to speak.
“I lied to you once, when I told you I had a happy childhood. I didn’t. I was made an orphan at the age of eight. I stole and begged for enough food to eat. I was hungry as a child, for food, for knowledge, for something better than I had.” He smiled. “Do you know how I met Alano?” he asked. “I was robbing him.” He looked down at the floor. “Alano was determined to rescue me.” He glanced at her. “And he did. He taught me to read and bought me books. I couldn’t get enough of it. It’s as if someone gave me whiskey and I was drunk on learning.”
He studied the ceiling. “You think I don’t sound like a Scot? You should have heard me then. No one could understand a word I said. Alano was all for making something of me, so he taught me manners, first, then how to dress, how to act properly.”
He folded his arms, leaned one shoulder against the carved headboard. “I learned Spanish first, from Alano, then French, and a few other languages as well. The more I traveled, the less I sounded like myself, until I could talk without an accent—or much of one.”
“Why are you telling me this? Do you think I’ll be repulsed?”
He smiled again. “It’s not a repulsive story, for all that, Sarah,” he said. “It’s proof that a man can make of himself what he wants.
“I decided that I wanted to be more than an alley rat, stinking of salmon. I wagered at first, finding that my luck at the tables was better than it should have been. The first time I lost all my money, I learned that I could be as much a fool as anyone. So I began to buy from one town and sell to the next, becoming little more than a peddler, with my wagon and my wares. I learned what people wanted and gave it to them. I learned that I was fascinated with all things odd and unusual. I learned that I was better suited to the role of merchant than adventurer.”
“Is that why you hesitate when you speak, sometimes, as if you’re searching for the right word?”
“You rob the words from me, Sarah,” he said softly.
