Chapter 17

17

CLARA

T he sun was beginning to set as Clara made her final rounds in the lodge. All of the tasks were now complete, the rooms tidy and ready to welcome the Yorke family in a matter of days. Mr. Yorke was eating his dinner downstairs—one of the final meals she would be obliged to bring him.

She sighed and walked down the stairs with the sinking feeling that everything was on the cusp of change. It already was changing. The duke had not come for their usual walk, and Clara had been fighting low feelings ever since.

She peeked her head into the dining room where she had left Mr. Yorke, but he was not there. The remnants of his dinner sat on the table, but rather than clearing them away, Clara walked farther along the corridor, looking into each room for any sign of him, her pulse beginning to quicken when she found one empty room after another.

After the duke's comments, she had begun to worry that one day she would arrive to find him gone.

Her shoulders sagged with relief at the sight of him lying on the chaise in the drawing room, his eyes closed and an open book on his chest.

She smiled and closed the door softly. She cleared away and cleaned the dishes he had used as quietly as possible. Once that was done, she left through the front door and locked it behind her with as little scraping as the old key would allow.

The evening air was almost unseasonably warm as she made her way to the main house. Her gaze lingered on the place where the sky met the land. The warm yellows and oranges of the setting sun were beginning to give way to cooler pinks and blues.

If change was on the horizon, the best thing she could do was to accept it. The guests' arrivals would create a natural barrier and a wider distance between the duke and herself. That was as it should be, and perhaps Mrs. Finch was right: with real distance, Clara's feelings for the duke would dissipate, and reason would return.

But love for him was not unreasonable. She could name two dozen reasons for the way she felt and the things she admired about the Duke of Rockwood. The unreasonable part was the hope that anything could come of it, and she had known that was an impossibility from the start.

The sound of hooves brought her head up, and she slowed, then blinked forcefully, but her view remained unchanged: the duke was riding toward her on the path.

"Your Grace," she said as he drew nearer. "Is everything well?"

"Yes." He pulled up, and the mare stopped, tossing her head. His gaze swept over Clara's face for a moment, and he smiled slightly. "At least, it is now." He slipped down from the saddle and looped the reins over the horse's head, then led her toward Clara.

Something about the way he was looking at her made her heart thump against her ribs. "Your brother is asleep, Your Grace."

"Good. I trust him most when he is asleep."

Clara laughed softly, for she had had the same thought herself.

"I admit, though, that it was not for Silas that I came. I hoped I might be fortunate enough to find you. May I walk with you?"

Clara nodded, unable to utter a word. There must be something particular he wished to discuss with her.

He guided the mare around so that they were walking in the direction of Rushlake. "No cart today?"

"No." Clara was annoyed to find her voice slightly breathless. "I only bring it in the mornings."

"Comet is disappointed," he said with a smile that made Clara feel warm.

She desperately needed to avoid that smile and keep her mind firmly on the duke's friends, who would begin arriving in the morning. "Do you feel ready for it all, Your Grace?"

His smile faded. "No. I was hoping I would have the opportunity to rest today—rest and prepare myself. Instead, it felt like a taste of what is to come." He looked over at her. "That is why I came to find you."

Her heart flipped, and she turned her gaze from him, fiddling with the ribbon holding her hair in a bun just below her cap. She was too afraid to ask him what he meant.

"I feel most…myself with you, Clara."

She tried to laugh, but it was breathy and strange. "Surely, you cannot mean that."

"I do, though. For months, I have been trying to act the part of the Duke of Rockwood—to be what others expect of me, to conceal the things that do not align with the title I hold. But with you, I do not have to act. And tonight, that is precisely what I need."

She swallowed, but even breathing was difficult, so it took time for her to respond. "I am glad of it, Your Grace. We agreed we would be honest with one another."

"We did."

They came to the fork in the path where they normally separated, and Clara slowed and turned to him to say goodnight. The time always passed far too quickly with him.

He too slowed, but his gaze was fixed on the path ahead, his brow wrinkled in thought. Finally, he looked at her. "I am not ready to return just yet. Will you stay with me a while?"

Not for all the money in the world could she have naysaid him just then, despite the fact that the cool hues of twilight settled around them. She nodded her agreement, and he smiled gratefully.

"Comet could use a drink, I think. Perhaps we can take her to the stream."

They walked off the path and into the trees, where the stream wound almost parallel to the path. It was deeper at this point than at the lodge, and Comet lowered her head and drank from the melodic waters.

The duke took a seat on the log of an old felled tree a few feet away and removed his gloves, then set them beside him. He looked up at Clara. "Will you not take a seat? She likes to drink at her leisure."

Clara glanced at Comet, who stopped drinking to nibble at some grass.

Clara joined the duke on the log, choosing a seat far enough away not to seem presumptuous but near enough not to be rude. She was aware, however, of every inch that separated them. There were but a few between their hands, which rested on the log for balance .

They watched in silence as the mare moved along the stream, slowly migrating as she munched and drank in turns.

"Thank you," the duke said. "For all of your help with Silas. I know it has not been easy."

"There is no need to thank me. I have enjoyed it, Your Grace."

His dark eyes searched her face, his own inscrutable. "William," he said. "Tonight, I wish to be William."

Clara's heart thrummed. Wisdom told her to tear her eyes away and refuse to call him anything but Your Grace… but her gaze remained fixed on his. "William." Her voice was so soft, she herself could barely hear it.

His lips pulled into a soft but irrepressible smile, and he gave a laughing sigh, as though that single word from her had relieved a burden from him. "You know, most days, I feel as though you are my only friend."

Clara's heart beat so forcefully, she feared it would give out. She had felt the same thing of him. "What of your brother?"

"Silas," William said. "I love him. Dearly. I would give my life for him. But he is too impulsive to be relied upon."

"And Mr. Cartwright?" Something in Clara demanded she argue against the duke's confession. Perhaps it was because she was so desperate to believe it, to believe she was not alone in her feelings.

"Edmund is reliable," William conceded, "and he has been a longtime friend. But employing him has changed things. He wants me to succeed, and he knows what that requires, which means I have come to guard my words and actions in his presence. I hate being a disappointment."

"You could never be that," Clara said. It was impossible for her to imagine how anyone could think such a thing of him. " You are everything a duke should be and more—capable, intelligent, principled, caring."

The duke listened intently, as though he wished to believe her words about him every bit as much as she wished to believe his about her. She wanted nothing more than to assure him of that in any way she could, to let him know just how highly she esteemed him.

But he needed no confession of love.

"I have never known a man like you," Clara said simply.

"Nor I a maid like you," he replied softly.

Something grazed Clara's fingertip, and she glanced down to find their fingers nearly touching. When had they drawn nearer?

She stared at their fingers, hers calloused and dirty from a long day of work, his clean and soft. Or so she imagined. She could touch them and find out with the slightest of movements.

She imagined how it might feel to brush his skin with hers or to thread her fingers through his, but all her mind could see was the dirt that would mar his immaculate hands.

A tug on the back of her hair caught her by surprise, and she grasped at it. Her hand came into contact with something soft, and she whirled around to find the mare nipping at her cap.

"Comet," the duke chastised, taking the horse by her dragging reins and pulling her head away from Clara. She had succeeded in taking Clara's cap, however, and the duke pulled it from between her lips and let go of the reins.

"As if there was not enough food to satisfy her," the duke said, setting the cap on his leg and dusting it off. "It needs a good washing now." He offered it to Clara.

"It needed that before she got to it." Clara smoothed the cap and cringed slightly at the feel of wet fabric. She glanced up at the duke with a grimacing smile.

He reached a hand to slip an errant lock of hair behind her ear, and Clara went still. His hand slowed, his fingertips grazing her ear and his thumb the hollow below it until it came to a stop. Their eyes locked.

They stared at one another for a few long, heart-stopping moments, then his gaze slipped to her lips. Clara's stubbornly followed suit until they settled on his. She had never allowed herself to think what it would be like to feel them on hers, but now she could think of nothing else.

The duke's hand shifted until his thumb touched the edge of her lips. His eyes swept back to hers, within them the same desire that pulsed in every vein of her body. He wanted her.

"I am only a maid, Your Grace," Clara argued feebly, trying to hold to whatever shreds of reality still remained. Like the light, they were fast slipping away.

"And I only a man trying to act the part of a duke." His thumb grazed her lips, and she shut her eyes, but the world only spun all the more. "Clara…"

She forced her eyes open slowly, and the sight of him so near stole her breath. Her lips begged to be let nearer his. But she could not kiss a duke. "Yes, Your Grace?"

He shook his head slowly. "We agreed that tonight I am simply William."

William .

She could not kiss a duke, but William…surely, she could allow herself to kiss William.

"William," she repeated in a whisper.

A moment later, his lips covered hers.

Bliss as she had never known consumed her, filling the spaces in her lungs left by the breath he had stolen, quieting every doubt she had harbored about the wisdom of kissing him.

Doubt, fear, wisdom…none of it existed. William was the entire world. Nothing else mattered but the way his mouth fit to hers, the press of his fingers into her waist, the roughness of the evening stubble on his jaw, the subtle taste of brandy on his lips.

She had never been held with such gentle firmness, as though he wanted her as near as the laws governing matter would allow, but would release her at the merest hint she wished for it.

But Clara did not wish for it. The thought he might make such an assumption brought her hands to his chest. He covered them with his, his fingers wrapping around hers as he pulled her to her feet along with him.

One hand kept its grasp on hers, while the other circled around her waist. His palm pressed into her back, and she heeded it until her body pressed against his as fully as her lips. For weeks, Clara had needed constant reminders of the proper distance that should be kept between them. That distance existed no longer, and nothing had ever felt so right.

He pulled away suddenly, and Clara blinked. But for the soft light of the moon that glowed in the sky above, the world was almost entirely dark. She looked up at William just as his hands released her and took a step back.

Clara's heart plummeted as quickly as it had soared.

"Forgive me," the duke said, covering his mouth with a hand. "It is late. We should go."

She nodded, her heart wrung. He was already regretting the kiss, already eager to put it behind him. "I will follow presently."

His brows pulled together. "It is dark. I will walk with you to ensure your safety. "

Clara hesitated. She was not afraid of the dark. She was far more afraid of whatever had just caused him to break away from her. There were a dozen reasons she could think of, however.

"I insist," he said, though his voice was kind.

"Thank you," Clara said softly.

They walked in silence, and Clara forced her eyes to remain ahead, though every bit of her burned to know what was in his thoughts. He had stopped things so suddenly, she couldn't imagine the reason was anything but a sudden realization of his mistake.

The light of a fixed lantern glowed ahead, and they slowed, for a groom stood on the side of the stables.

"They are waiting for me." The duke stopped in the shadows the edge of the path afforded. "For Comet."

Clara nodded, fixing her focus on the man ahead. He was too short to be the groom and too old to be any of the stable boys, who were all small or lanky. Neither was he dressed in the habit of Rushlake's stable hands, for he wore a flat-brimmed hat.

The man's head turned toward them, and he went still.

Had he seen them?

He stood straight and began walking toward them purposefully.

Clara looked up at the duke, whose gaze was fixed intently ahead.

"He has seen us," she whispered, taking a step back. She looked around for a place to hide.

"Clara," he said, never moving the focus of his gaze.

There were plenty of trees, and the dark would be a friend. She grasped her skirts, but the duke took her by the arm. "Clara. "

She looked up at him, eyes wide at his uncharacteristically sharp tone.

"It is your husband."