Isabelle crept closer to the pianoforte, her heart thudding in her chest. Until that moment she hadn’t thought that a man could be beautiful, but this man was. Windham was stunning, a work ofart as he committed himself to the passion of the music, stroking the keys in a bewitching manner that utterly captivated her.
The melody grew softer; a light glimmering in the deeply haunting tune, lifting him up from the depths into which he had descended.
As he struck the final key, letting the note play out into the silence, he turned his head and looked at her. His gaze was filled with a haunted, faraway look, and for several heartbeats it was as though he could not recognize her.
Ever so slowly, his consciousness returned and he came back to himself.
“What are you doing in here?” he asked, his tone low and rich in a way that she had never heard it before.
She slowly drew closer to him. “I heard the music you were playing.”
He pressed a finger down on one of the keys, the deep note ringing throughout the room. “I guess you did.”
Isabelle tried to wet her lips but her mouth remained dry. This was not the duke she was accustomed to seeing. A new and alluring layer had been unearthed before her eyes; something that simultaneously invited her in and wanted her to stay away.
Even though she knew she should leave the room she could not. She put the plate of scones on the little table beside the pianoforte before sitting beside him on the bench.
His arm brushed against hers, but he did not bother to move away and neither did she. “What are you doing?”
“You asked me that already.”
“I know.” He breathed in deeply and raked a hand through his hair. “But you did not answer me.”
“I faked a fainting spell to get away from Lord Milton. I couldn’t handle much more of his droning on about what he thinks our potentially impending marriage might be.” She took one of the scones, plucking a slice of sugar-coated orange peel from its top. “If the question you wish to ask is what am I still doing here, in this room, then I can tell you that I do not know.”
Felix studied her carefully. The searching look in his eyes that made her feel as if he was peeling back her layers and exposing her innermost soul.
A shiver trickled down her spine at the thought of him seeing everything in her heart and mind that she had wanted to keep hidden.
Isabelle wondered if he realized that she didn’t have a clue what she was doing.
Perhaps he was already aware that, each time someone tore her down with a disparaging remark, she moved one step closer to giving up. She could not imagine spending the rest of her life as an outsider.
Windham’s fingers drifted lightly over the keys as his gaze remained locked with hers. “I used to spend a lot of time playing the pianoforte when my father was alive. I thought that one day I might be permitted to go to school and study music.”
“You wanted to be a musician?”
He shrugged as he idly played the haunting melody. “I thought about it on several occasions, but deep down I knew that it would never happen. I was the son of a duke. My life was never to be my own.”
“I feel the same.”
The Duke stopped playing as curiosity and anguish illuminated his eyes. He leaned closer to her, reaching for the other scone on the plate and breaking off a piece.
He popped it into his mouth and chewed thoughtfully, allowing the silence to stretch between them. Isabelle put the remnants of her scone back on the plate and glanced at the lone candle flickering high above their heads.
When she looked back at the duke he was suddenly closer to her than she had anticipated.
She pulled her loose hair over her right shoulder, wishing now that she had worn it up. She no longer desired to make a statement or scandalize theton. She should have tried to fit in.
One of her curls escaped, trailing back to the left side. Before she could move it back into place with the rest of her hair, the duke took the strand and curled it around his finger.
He studied the strand under the light for a moment before letting it slip loose. When she moved to pull it to the side with the rest of her hair, his hand closed over hers.
She sensed the ground slip from beneath her feet as though she had been bound with him in a freefall.
“Please, do not,” he said, his voice low. He kept his light grip on her hand as she let the hair fall loose. “You are beautiful, just as you are.”
Blood rushed in her ears and her cheeks warmed.
