Least Likely to Marry a Duke (Liberated Ladies)

I can look after myself, she thought, meeting his eyes, hoping he could read the message.

‘I am keeping you ladies from your shopping,’ Will said, getting to his feet without any sign of having understood her unspoken message. ‘I look forward to tomorrow evening.’ He shook hands with Aunt Caroline, then took Verity’s right hand in his and bent to drop a chaste—very chaste, she thought resentfully—kiss on her cheek.

The butler came at the ring of the bell to show him out. ‘That was thoughtful of him to call with messages from home,’ Caroline remarked. ‘The Duke—oh, bother, he has dropped a fob from his watch chain, he must have knocked it when he stood up. See?’

Verity bent to pick up the golden disc. ‘I will see if I can catch him.’ Wethering had left the hall when she reached it. She opened the front door to find Will three strides along the pavement in the direction of Berkeley Square. ‘Your Grace!’

He turned, came back. ‘Miss Wingate?’

‘Your fob.’ She held it out on the palm of her hand and, as he came up the steps to her, she stepped back so he could enter the hallway.

‘Thank you. The hook must be weak.’ He pushed back the sides of his coat to pull out the chain.

‘Let me see, clasps are always so tricky when you fasten them yourself upside down.’ She did not think until her fingers were around the gold links, their backs pressed against the smooth silk of his waistcoat, feeling the solidity and warmth of his stomach muscles beneath, and then it was too late to pull back, not without betraying her agitation.

The clasp that must have secured the fob swung free, its hook distorted. She caught the tiny thing between thumb and forefinger, head bent, conscious of the familiar scent of him, of her pulse kicking up. ‘It is broken. You had better put the fob in your pocket.’

‘Put it with the watch.’ As she slid it

into the tight space in the little waistcoat pocket Will leaned back against the door, his shoulders pushing it shut. ‘Verity. Why did you come to London?’

‘Why?’ She looked up, confused by the question. ‘To face it out, of course. Everyone at home knows me, they are loyal, it will all die down. But it will not here, not unless they can see it is all nonsense, that I am not some seductress out to snare a duke, or some poor little victim of your wicked wiles or whatever other nonsense it amuses them to believe.’

‘Aren’t you a seductress, Verity?’ he asked, his eyes dark and intent. ‘I don’t understand this otherwise.’

‘This?’

‘What am I doing here? Your aunt knows what she is about. I have no idea whether I am making things better or worse. My head rules my emotions, it always has, it is how I have been raised. You were right, we would be a disaster together and yet I still want this.’

‘This?’ she repeated. Somehow she was in his arms, close, tight against his heart. She looked up and he kissed her.

Kissed her hungrily, angrily, as though he was fighting himself. His hands were tight on her waist, lifting her against his chest, bringing her up to rub intimately against his aroused body, and Verity knew she wanted it, this, as much as he did.

Will shifted and one arm lashed her against him while the other hand found her breast, his thumb rubbing against the nipple under its modest covering of linen and fine cloth. The darkness behind her closed lids became the fireworks at Vauxhall, explosions of light and heat against velvety blackness. It was all part of the inferno when there was a crash. Will’s head jerked up and she found she had her leg raised, her knee at his hip, her skirts sliding upwards. His hand was on her garter and hers was crushed between them at his falls—

‘Oh.’ Verity recoiled backwards and sat down on one of the hard hall chairs with a thud.

‘What—what was that bang?’ She dragged her skirts into some kind of order, tugged at her bodice.

Will looked round, picked up his hat, his gloves and cane where they lay scattered at his feet. ‘Your butler slamming a door, I think.’ He was breathing hard. ‘That was beyond apology, that was insanity.’

‘It was desire,’ Verity managed to say. Whoever had slammed the door had not opened it again to see what was happening. Yet. She didn’t know whether to fix her eyes on it or look at Will. She looked at Will. ‘Melissa says that is a natural animal instinct.’

‘I sincerely hope Melissa knows nothing about it.’ Will was still leaning back against the door, eyes closed.

‘I think it is theory,’ Verity murmured and he smiled and straightened up, tugged at his waistcoat, grimaced.

Verity glanced down at his falls and rapidly away. ‘You had better go.’

‘I had better make my apologies to your aunt,’ he said, rather grimly.

‘Goodness, no! Just go. It doesn’t matter, doesn’t mean anything...important. And we will not be alone again.’ She stood up and went upstairs, not running, not looking back. After a few moments the front door closed with a soft bang.

* * *

Verity tied her bonnet ribbons with a sharp tug. Linton, her aunt’s dresser, made a soft clucking noise with her tongue and darted forward to rescue the bow.

With Linton following them into the town coach and sitting on the seat opposite, Verity could hardly begin explaining that her aunt’s butler had found her and the Duke of Aylsham locked together and virtually...virtually rutting against the front door.