My Darling Duke

Alexander arched an incredulous brow. “I am aware you ordered the maids to spray my room with lavender. And the drawing rooms. Music room. And the hallway. Now leave me be!”

The man had the grace to flush, but he made no reply to Alexander’s annoyance at their incessant meddling. Hoyt bowed and left the room silently, closing the door behind him, and Alexander released an irritable grunt before smiling.

They hovered around him as if he were a babe, and while it irked him, a peculiar warmth also filled his chest. They did more than just serve him—they cared for him, and for the first time in a long while, he acknowledged his relationship with his staff was more than a master servant exchange.

They, as much as Penny, were his family.

They hadn’t given up on him; they had cried when he cried and felt anguish when he did.

Now they felt the loss of his Katherine and did everything within the bounds of propriety to urge him to think of her, and he knew for what they hungered. A mistress of McMullen Castle, a duchess, the pitter-patter of little lords and ladies in the nursery.

Alexander tugged the heavy drapes open even wider and nudged the window up. A biting chill slipped into the room, but he did not tug the pane back down. The sky was overcast, with all the stars hidden, and the weather dreary although they were now slipping into the high point of the summer season.

Katherine was gone, and Eugene and Penny would depart in the morning. Only the memories of family, passion, love, and laughter would linger within Alexander, and he cursed himself a thousand times for not chasing after her, even if he had barely been able to walk.

Most days, he couldn’t bear to think of the manner in which he had hurt her. And yet he could think of nothing else. It had been weeks since he had ordered flowers delivered to her daily. Only a simple note had accompanied the blooms, for he had not known what to say, how to express his regret and his uncertainties. A man once lauded as an orator in parliament for his speeches championing the indigent found himself bereft of words.

I am so damn sorry, my darling Katherine seemed inadequate to express the pain and embarrassment he had caused. Her replies were even more succinct than his and bereft of any warmth or sentiments or an inkling of where he stood with her.

And he deserved her insouciance.

He jerked away from the windows and ambled carefully over to his bed. Resting the cane on top of the plush comforter, he climbed onto the bed with a soft groan of relief. He thought of what the doctor had advised and what it might mean if he successfully roused his cock to life.

He might be able to give Katherine a life that was not so empty.

Alexander stared at the Renaissance-painted ceiling for several minutes, clearing his mind from all the doubts that lingered within. He filled his mind with Katherine. Her warm scent, the sweet shyness of her smile that could so easily bloom to that of a wicked vixen. The way she tossed her head when she laughed, that soft, hungry moan she’d made when he had touched his tongue to hers that very first time.

A kiss of heat coasted over him, and he closed his eyes, allowing only Katherine in his mind. He imagined tracing her spine downward to that delicious curve of her buttocks, then upward again, caressing the delicate softness of her bare shoulders, trailing his fingers along her collarbone and over her rosy nipples. His heart jerked, and desire warmed his body.

Alexander gripped his flaccid cock in his palm and slowly rubbed his hand over the length. With each stroke, he pictured Katherine flushed with passion, remembered the hot, sweet taste of her quim on his tongue, felt the tight clasp of her cunny as she had squeezed his fingers. His gut clenched, his heart raced, and a hiss escaped him as urgent need coiled through him. Yet, as expected, his cock remained limp.

He shifted closer to the edge of the bed and reached for the jar of lavender-scented oil on the bedside chest. Bringing it just below his nose, he inhaled deeply, stirring his senses by recalling Katherine’s subtle and arousing smell. Alexander pried the lid open and dipped three of his fingers in the oil before stretching to place the open jar on his chest. He allowed the oil to trail between his knuckles down to his palm. Using his oil-slicked hand, he reclaimed his cock once more and began a slow massage.

Alexander stroked from the base of his manhood up to the tip several times to no avail. He tugged and even jerked harshly a few times before he released his manhood, placing his hand across his forehead with a groan of frustration. There was no pain to distract him, yet he could not rouse his body.

His breath puffed harshly in the stillness of the room, and it shocked him utterly to feel tears sting his eyes. With a snarl of frustration and determination, he freed his mind once more and clasped his cock, and after several minutes of trying to rouse himself with chaotic thoughts and images of a well-pleasured Katherine crowding his senses, he accepted defeat.

Alexander acknowledged then that this was the very reason he had waited almost two weeks after Dr. Grant’s suggestion of self-ministration to tempt his cock to rise. Fear of failure.

Alexander ached, quite desperately, to bring into existence the future he envisioned with K

atherine—traveling the world, making love with her, but most of all, the laughter…the sweet way she smiled, her bold vivacity for life…that would sweep away the emptiness he had lived with for so long.

But more than anything else, he wanted to fulfill her happiness and dreams.

His heart was lost to Katherine Danvers, and every prudent consideration as to why their match would be ill judged scattered like ashes to the winds.

He would go for her…and explain that while she had his heart, his love—everything else he could give her as a man…as a husband had been lost. The promise of pleasure that had been rekindled had vanished, and it might never be regained. His heart, his title, and his wealth would be hers, but her body would never know the fulfillment of pleasure, and she would not have a child to cradle against her bosom.

You are a flame that has no end, and it would be such a damn pity to see your spark dim…

Words he meant with his entire being. And damn his selfish soul, he could not let her go. He loved her too much. Hungered for her too much.

But once he took her, it was inevitable that burning passion and sweet flame would eventually die. And even knowing that, he closed his eyes, damning himself and Katherine, for tomorrow he would prepare to travel to London for her and, if she would have him, never would he let her go.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Kitty had not supposed a well-rumored courtesan and wicked lady of society would live in one of the newer and far more elegant townhomes in Mayfair. Perhaps Soho or a less respectable part of town she had assumed, to her shame. Nor would she have thought Princess Cosima Wagner to be so beautiful, charming, kind, and just lovely. Ophelia and Kitty had called upon the princess at her invitation that morning and had been escorted by a chirpy young maid to an attached sitting room in her private boudoir, which was lavishly and charmingly decorated in peach and with artful touches of pink.