How to Tame Your Duke (10 page)

He turned his lips to her golden hair and held them there, exerting not a single ounce of pressure.

The clock chimed, six delicate notes into the stillness.

He stepped away, and the agony of separation rent through the length of his body. He picked up the bodice and skirt from the chair, picked up the petticoats and the stays, and laid them all across the back of the sofa.

“Sir?” she asked, a little forlorn.

“Sit.” He positioned the chair just so and urged her downward. From his pocket he drew a small volume, the copy of
Jane Eyre
that Mr. Grimsby had brought out of the library cobwebs nearly a month ago. “Here you are, my dear. I will let you know when to lift the blindfold.”

“What’s this?” she asked.

“Remember, you are not to look back. You know the story of Lot’s wife, of course?”

Emily swallowed. Her fingers curled around the book. “She looked back and was turned into a pillar of salt.”

“Exactly. You are Lot’s wife, Emily.” He turned and began to walk across the room, to the armchair in the corner behind her, cast in deep shadow.

“But . . .” Her voice was bewildered, bereft, the way his own body felt in the absence of her warmth. “But I don’t understand.”

“Did your Mrs. Plimpton not explain everything clearly?” He lifted his tails and settled into the armchair. The back of Emily’s body glowed before him, prim and upright in the ladder-backed chair, unbearably seductive beneath the sheerness of her chemise. Her neck was long and sinuous, curving like a swan’s into the trim line of her collar. One sleeve of her chemise had fallen to expose her round shoulder.

“No, she . . . she did not.”

The Duke of Ashland took in a long breath and leaned his head back against the upholstery. Above him, the ceiling coffers sat in their orderly squares, their white paint turned to pale gold in the lamplight. Inch by inch, nerve by tortured nerve, he brought his seething body under control.

“You are to read, Emily,” he said softly. “You are to read to me.”

*   *   *

E
milie stood rigidly against a column of the back portico, staring straight ahead into the dark gardens of the hotel. They were bringing around a carriage for her, to convey her back to the station for her supposed train to . . . well, wherever it was. York, probably.

Her insides were still trembling; her fingers were cold inside her gloves.

He was still up in the room, the Duke of Ashland. If she looked upward, she might perhaps see a crack of light through one of the windows, the window of the room where they had sat together. Where he had undressed her to her chemise, with his broad, firm hand; where she had read to him, taking little sips of sherry to fortify herself, while he sat behind her and watched and listened.

Her skin still burned from the knowledge of his gaze. Shame, or desire?

Shame, surely. What had possessed her to stay and submit to him? Expose herself to him? He had told her she might go. She should have left without another thought, innocence intact.

Emilie looked down at her gloved hands, twined together against her shapeless black coat. He had said good-bye courteously. He had rung for Mrs. Scruton, and when the soft knock had sounded on the door, he had taken Emilie’s hand, removed her glove, and kissed the inside of her wrist. His lips, his warm, firm lips, had actually touched her skin.

She could feel his kiss still, sizzling against her sleeve.

A rattle sounded, a crisp hoofbeat. Emilie straightened herself and stepped forward.

“Madam!”

Behind her, the door opened in a hurried crash. “Madam!” came the call again, more clearly.

She turned.

Mrs. Scruton swept from the doorway, holding out her hand. “Oh, thank goodness ye’ve never left. There’s a note, from t’gentleman.”

“Thank you.” Emilie plucked the folded paper from the housekeeper’s hand. “Does he . . . does he wait for a reply?”

“He didn’t say, madam.” Mrs. Scruton’s voice was deeply respectful. A wisp of hair fell away from her cap; she looked disordered, as if she’d been put to a mad rush.

“Thank you, Mrs. Scruton. That will be all.” Emilie slipped the paper into her coat pocket. The carriage lurched to a stop before the portico, and a footboy jumped from the back to hand her in.

The carriage was unlit. Emilie waited until they reached the station; she waited until the carriage had left so she could trudge down the side streets to the Anvil and change clothes; she waited until she stood inside the dim stable while they brought her horse out from his stall for the lonely ride back to Ashland Abbey.

There, under a swinging lantern, with the wind already moaning at the windows, she reached into her pocket and drew out the contents: the folded paper and a plain white envelope.

The envelope contained five crisp Bank of England ten-pound notes, still smelling faintly of printers’ ink.

Fifty pounds! That was six months’ salary for Tobias Grimsby, and a generous salary at that. What the devil was she to do with it?

Emilie thrust the envelope back in her pocket and opened the note.

Madam,

I am deeply sensible of the honor you have done me this evening. Do I ask too much, if I find insupportable the idea of waiting an entire month to have that honor renewed? You need return no reply. I shall be waiting, and hoping, Tuesday next.

In the meantime, I wish you a happy and prosperous Christmas.

Yours,

A.B.

L
ord Silverton crossed his arms, cocked his head, and studied the Christmas tree through narrow eyes. “As a work of engineering, it leaves something to be desired.”

Emilie, nineteen feet high on a ladder that might have been used to defend Ashland Abbey from the agents of Henry VIII, reached across the prickling boughs to nudge the extravagant gold star into a more dignified stance. “It’s not a work of engineering,” she said. “It’s a Christmas tree. A festive . . . symbol of . . .”

“I say, I should rather watch that ladder, if I were you . . .”

“. . . the season . . . a German tradition, in fact . . .”

“. . . rather a dodgy reputation, that ladder, truth be told . . .”

“. . . you’ve perhaps heard ‘O Tannenbaum,’ which . . . hold on, I’ve almost . . . nearly . . .”

“. . . nearly came to a bad end myself last . . . oh, mind the . . .”

The ladder tottered and fell to one side in a long and graceful arc, leaving Emilie clinging to the upper branches.

“. . . candle,” finished Freddie. “Are you all right?”

“Quite all right,” said Emilie, “if you don’t think the tree will overbalance.”

“I daresay it might, I’m afraid. Already listing.”

“Then perhaps,” Emilie said, between her teeth, which were stuck with pine needles, “you might possibly set the ladder back upright for my convenience in . . . disembarking this . . . very
festive
symbol of the season.”

“Can’t do it, I’m afraid,” Freddie called up. “It’s come all apart. Poor old thing. Deserved a better fate.”

Emilie’s sweating palms slipped along the fragile bark.
“Try.”

“No. No, it’s no good,” Freddie said cheerfully. “How’s this: I’ll just pop around to the other side of the tree, hold on like mad, and you can descend at your leisure.”

Emilie risked a peep at the white marble floor beneath her.
Far
beneath her.

The tree shifted.

“Well, then,” said Freddie, “since you’re determined to dig in for the long haul, as it were, could I perhaps send you up a cup of punch? Eggnog, perhaps?”

Emilie searched for the trunk with her feet. “Your lordship, I don’t believe you properly perceive the urgency of the situation.”

“Won’t Father Christmas have a jolly laugh when he spots you tonight! Bowl full of jelly and all that. Ha-ha!”

“Frederick . . .”

“You know, you remind me rather of a cat just now. If you would only move your limbs, Mr. Grimsby, I could guide you down, branch by branch, like a member of the fire brigade.”

“How kind.”

“Look, there’s a fine stout branch just below your left foot, and . . . Oh, steady on . . .”

The tree groaned. A splitting noise came from the branch to which Emilie’s right hand clung.

It had seemed like such a sturdy tree before. It had been brought down specially from Scotland last week, a noble, well-proportioned fir, fully twenty-five feet high and positioned right under the stained glass cupola in the center of the Ashland Abbey ballroom. It dwarfed even the magnificent trees her father had had cut down from the Schweinwald every year and placed in the castle’s audience chamber, aglow with candles and tinsel.

Surely such a tree would prove impervious to a single modestly proportioned female clinging to its upper reaches.

Emilie grabbed another branch, which gave way at once. She grabbed for the trunk, feeling more like a monkey than a cat. The odious golden star, the cause of all this mischief, tipped away from its perch and tumbled into the thicket of needles and tinsel below.

The tree swayed. It shifted. Emilie’s world began to tilt.

“
Mr. Grimsby!
” shrieked a voice from the doorway. A metallic crash followed, then the instant smash of porcelain, all of it promptly drowned out by the sirenlike wails of Lucy going into hysterics.

“Now, now,” said Freddie. “He’s quite all right, the sturdy fellow. We must simply encourage him to jump.”

“Jump!” wailed Lucy.

“
Jump!
” squeaked Emilie.

“Jump,” Freddie said decisively. “Far better than letting the tree come down on top of you.”

The tree tilted another foot or two. “But the floor’s
marble
!” said Emilie.

“All the more reason to jump first, before the tree jolly well falls on top of you, crushing you mercilessly into all that marble. Come on, now. Buck up.”

“Ooh! Ooh! I can’t never look!” said Lucy.

Emilie glanced back down at the endless blue-veined marble below, gleaming in the light from the two magnificent ballroom chandeliers. “I’d like to see you
buck up
, if you were perched up here.”

“Come along, then, Mr. Grimsby! Nothing to it. You’ll land on your feet, likely as not.”

Lucy’s shrieks reached an entirely new register of panic. “Ooh! I shall die! Ooh, Mr. Grimsby! I’m sure I can’t never look. His poor brains are being to be scrambled. Who will be cleaning it all up?”

The tree moved again. Emilie swung backward; the branches now loomed above her as she clung with arms and legs. Rather like a hammock on a summer’s day, she told herself. Except that hammocks did not have stomachs.

“Ooh, t’Lord save us all! He shall be kilt!”

“Perhaps a pleasant, well-padded sofa might persuade you to take the plunge, so to speak. Lucy, would you mind giving that delightfully impressive caterwauling an instant’s pause, and help me . . .”

“What the
devil’s
going on in here?” thundered the Duke of Ashland, from the doorway.

Lucy’s shrieks stopped dead in her throat.

If the marble floor had, at that instant, opened up to expose the flaming pits of hell, Emilie would have loosened her grip and fallen into the Devil’s own hands with pleasure.

“I’m afraid Mr. Grimsby’s got himself into a bit of a fix,” said Freddie. “You perceive the situation is rather dire, at present. I thought I might drag over one of the sofas to break his fall.”

The tree staggered. A few candles fell off, blazing into the marble.

“For God’s sake,” said Ashland. His boots clacked briskly across the floor. “Lucy, put out those damned candles. Mr. Grimsby, detach yourself from that tree at once.”

Emilie’s face was flaming, her hands slipping with sweat. A piece of tinsel tickled her nose. Every muscle strained with the effort of clinging to the thin upper trunk of the festive Ashland Christmas tree. “Sir, I . . .”

“I’m right below you, never fear.”

Freddie coughed. “Do you think that’s wise, Pater? I should hate to lose you both.”

Another candle toppled.

“Freddie, for the love of God, hold your bloody tongue.” Ashland’s voice was calm and steady. “Mr. Grimsby, when you’re ready.”

Emilie squeezed her eyes shut. The lights of the chandelier burned through her lids.

“I shall catch you, Mr. Grimsby. Never fear.”

Emilie released her feet from the trunk. She was dangling now, her damp hands sliding down the needles.

“That’s it. I’m right here.”

Right here.

The fall seemed to last forever. The air rushed along her burning cheeks; her body coasted endlessly downward.
Well, that was easy
, Emilie thought.
I wonder when I shall hit bottom.

Then something hit her back and folded itself around her. For a long instant she was staggering, toppling slowly, rather like the tree.

“That’s it,” said Ashland, enclosing her snugly in his arms, just before falling on his arse.

*   *   *

W
ell! This is a Christmas Eve we’ll likely never forget,” said Freddie cheerfully, setting down his wineglass with a satisfied clink. “Nothing like a spot of mortal terror to get the blood moving in the old veins.”

“Mortal terror? I thought your approach to the situation rather casual. Lighthearted, even.” Emilie drained the rest of her own wine, and in the next instant Lionel the footman was hovering behind her, refilling the glass. She had been invited to dine with the family tonight; a kind gesture, though she suspected it had something to do with imbuing the cavernous dining room with a little more Christmas spirit by the addition of a third body. She and Freddie sat across from each other, separated by a wide iceberg of ancient white linen and an uninhibited display of the ducal silver. The Duke of Ashland anchored the end of the table with massive and silent dignity.

“Oh, that! I was only trying to stop you from panicking. I was absolutely crucified with fear, actually.” He made a signal for Lionel to refill his wineglass; Lionel, with a glance at Ashland’s face, ignored him. “For one thing, we should have had to find another tutor, and I’ll be dashed if we could locate another one half so amusing as you, Grimsby.”

“
Mr.
Grimsby,” rumbled Ashland, his first words in the past quarter hour.

“
Mr.
Grimsby. Of course. Ha-ha!
Dashed
, I said. When of course,
you
were the one about to be
dashed
on the floor . . .”

“Frederick, for God’s sake. Have you no other topic of conversation tonight?”

“Pater, you must admit, we haven’t had anything half so interesting happen at the Abbey in years. The same old placid, humdrum existence.” Freddie picked up his wineglass, discovered an overlooked drop or two, and tilted the vessel nearly vertical into his mouth. “Of course, they say these sorts of disasters happen in threes. Only imagine the excitement that awaits us!”

Lionel and one of the other footmen were clearing the course from the table. Emilie sat rigidly while her plate was removed in an expert swipe. “Since there
was
no disaster, Lord Silverton, due to the swift action of your father, I believe we can sleep easily.”

She didn’t look at Ashland as she said this. She hadn’t been able to look at him at all in the past twenty-four hours. Each time her glance had fallen on him—today in the hallways and in the schoolroom, last night when he had stopped by the library for a few minutes of polite conversation—she had remembered the brush of his knuckles against her breast, his warm breath on the nape of her neck, his lips on the tender skin of her wrist.

She had remembered how she sat in her chemise, all but naked before him, and read Miss Brontë’s passionate words in her softest voice, hoping he wouldn’t recognize the timbre as belonging to that of his son’s bewhiskered tutor. How he had sat, silent and unseen, in the armchair behind her; how she could feel his presence nonetheless, could somehow sense every slow breath in his lungs, every caress of his gaze on her body. How her skin had tingled, how her breasts had tightened, how the juncture of her legs had grown damp and aching.

How was it possible to meet his arctic eye after that?

Last night, when she heard the pause in his footsteps outside the library door, she had cursed herself. She should never have lingered there, where Ashland might tread. When he had entered and tossed her an oddly cheerful greeting, she had mumbled a reply and risen to her feet.

“There’s no need to leave on my account, Mr. Grimsby,” he had said, and at once she had blushed, her blood rising up in reflex at the remembered intimacy of his words at the hotel, the alluring rumble in his voice when he pronounced her given name.

Emilie.

She had told him she was on the point of going upstairs anyway, that she was quite done in. She had left in a rush, avoiding his massive body as if he had some virulently infectious disease: typhoid or diphtheria, an influenza of the senses. God, what if he had recognized her somehow? Her hair, or her figure, or her hands?

What had she been doing in that hotel room to begin with?

She was mad. Madly infatuated, madly obsessed with his person.

Mad.

She should not have come to dinner tonight. She should have pleaded indisposition after her fall and taken a tray in her room. But she hadn’t been able to resist, had she? As much as she dreaded the proximity of the Duke of Ashland, she longed for it.

“Mr. Grimsby,” the duke said, and at once she felt his arms around her again, felt Emilie and Ashland crash together to the marble floor. A metaphor, if there ever were one. “Mr. Grimsby, do you attend me?”

Emilie’s head shot up. “Yes, Your Grace! I beg your pardon. Woolgathering.”

“Appropriate enough, for Yorkshire,” put in Freddie.

“I only wished to inquire whether you were having a happy Christmas. Mortal danger notwithstanding, of course.”

Good Lord, was that a
twinkle
in the duke’s blue eye?

She pushed up her spectacles. “Yes, sir. Though perhaps I might suggest the duchy invest in a sturdier ladder, next year.”

“I shall, of course, take your suggestion under the most serious consideration.” The duke looked as if he might actually smile, but he drank his wine instead. “I daresay it must be rather grim for you, spending Christmas without your loved ones, in such a remote and rather forbidding corner of England.”

“Not at all, sir. I feel quite at home here.”

Ashland was studying her, she knew. She fought to keep the blood from rising again in her cheeks. The footmen had returned with the next course: the dessert, she saw with relief. A traditional plum pudding, fairly drowning in its brandy sauce. It reminded her, with an unexpected pang, of her childhood Christmases, before her mother died. Mother had always insisted on her English rituals.