“I regard you as perfect and sharp-tongued,” he replied. “Whenever we’re together.”
Miranda sought refuge in her coffee. It was cold. But she lifted the cup and drank it anyway. “I don’t mean to be sharp-tongued or perfect.” She looked at him over the silver rim of the cup. “I try not to be—especially when I’m around you—but we seem to bring out the worst in each another.”
The look Daniel gave her was tender and knowing. “Is that what you think it is?”
Miranda set her cup down once again and nodded. “We simply rub each other the wrong way no matter how hard we try not to or how much we wish it were otherwise.”
“I think our problem is just the opposite, Miranda,” Daniel said.
“I don’t understand.” She studied the expression on his face, searching for the meaning behind his words. The opposite of rubbing each other the wrong way was rubbing each other the right way, and she and Daniel had never been in harmony …
“We didn’t r
ub each other the wrong way when I first paid a call upon you,” he said. “Nor on the other times we spent together during our courtship.”
“No,” she agreed, “I don’t suppose we did. But our courtship only lasted a few weeks …”
“What about the weeks we spent at Abernathy Manor keeping Alyssa company while Griff was away at war?” he asked. “We got along famously then.”
They had. And it had given Miranda hope for the future, but Daniel had withdrawn once again, and they had gradually resumed their old adversarial relationship.
“We got along beautifully,” Miranda replied. “But we couldn’t sustain it. One day everything was wonderful and the next day, you were gone. That was three years ago, Daniel, and except for the disaster that is your mother’s annual gala, we’ve hardly spoken.”
“We could have sustained it,” he disagreed. “If we had wanted to. If I had wanted to. Why do you think I left Abernathy Manor?”
Miranda shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve been asking myself that question for three years.”
“Then it’s time you had your answer,” Daniel replied.
“Which is?”
“I left because you and I were getting along too well,” Daniel admitted. “Because I was afraid I might come to enjoy your company too much.”
“You left because you enjoy my company?” Miranda was having a difficult time comprehending the fact that Daniel had sacrificed her companionship because he liked her.
Daniel nodded. “I left because the fact is that we don’t rub each other the wrong way. Quite the contrary. We rub each other the right way. We don’t scratch and claw because we dislike one another, we do it because we like each other too much. It’s called sexual attraction, and it’s a prelude to mating. We’re fighting our attraction to one another.”
“The question is why?” Miranda asked.
“I think you’re fighting it because I hurt you once and you’re afraid I’ll do it again.”
Miranda blinked.
“I’m fighting it because I don’t want to be encumbered with the responsibility of a wife in addition to everything else for which I’m responsible,” Daniel paused. “And more than that, I fight my attraction to you because I don’t want to hurt you again.”
Too late. Miranda inhaled sharply at the pain, but Daniel didn’t seem to notice.
“When I marry, it must be for the good of the Duchy of Sussex.”
“You consider me a poor choice for the Duchy of Sussex?”
Daniel shook his head. “It isn’t that simple.” He pinned her with his gaze, willing her to understand why he felt the way he felt. “My primary duty is to continue the Sussex line, and I need a duchess who is willing to take on the responsibility of bearing my children and of providing for the people whose survival depends upon me. It’s a job to which she must devote a lifetime.”
“I understand duty and responsibility quite well, Your Grace,” Miranda reminded him. “For I hold an ancient and honorable title of my own. Like you, I must see to the welfare of the people who rely upon the St. Germaine holdings for their livelihoods.”
“Then you should understand why I must choose with my head instead of with my …” Daniel frowned. He’d almost said his heart, but he wasn’t completely convinced he was thinking with his heart rather than his head and was fairly certain that it was another more insistent part of his anatomy. “I’m a duke and the title affords me great wealth and opportunities of which other men can only dream, but it also means that duty to the title comes before personal desires. A duke must hold a part of himself in reserve. He must practice restraint and never indulge himself overmuch.” He could hear his father’s voice repeating the tenets that had been such a large part of his childhood lessons. “A duke has few friends and fewer peers. He cannot wear his heart upon his sleeve or put his wishes above the needs of his people. He cannot shirk his duty or burden anyone else with it. The responsibilities come with the title and they must never be parceled out to others. The duty is his alone.”
“Did your father teach you those things?”