For Love of the Duke(102)

The carriage rocked forward. And still they sat there in silence.

He’d thought of no one but her since she’d walked out of his life. After Guilford’s visit to Castle Blackwood, Jasper had ordered his horse saddled, and he’d ridden like the devil himself had been at his heels. He’d raced his poor mount, working him into a fine lather.

In his mad race to London, he’d considered what words he would say to Katherine. He would profess his love, and beg her to return with him. He imagined he’d have pretty compliments and recite sweet verse to convince her that she desired a life with him.

Instead, he’d arrived at his townhouse to find her gone. And the horror of imagining her with Stanhope had become all the more real for Jasper’s sudden arrival in London.

A vitriolic, violent jealousy had filled him until he’d wanted to stalk through the London streets like an untamed beast and pull open doors until he found Stanhope and destroyed the fiend.

Jasper gnashed his teeth. “Have you taken a lover, Katherine?” He winced. The steely, angry accusation would hardly convince Katherine to set aside her feelings for Stanhope and return to Castle Blackwood.

Katherine’s brows dipped. She leaned across the carriage, and the honeysuckle scent, so boldly hers, wafted about them, and filled his senses. “I. Beg. Your. Pardon?” Cool rage underlined those clipped words.

Jasper fished into the front of his jacket and withdrew a sheet he’d neatly torn from The Times. He handed it over to her.

Katherine hesitated a long while, and then accepted the paper. She skimmed it. Her gaze narrowed. And then she wrinkled the item into a ball and threw it at his chest. She touched her hands to her chest. “Do you believe this of me?”

Jasper glanced down momentarily at the rumpled words that had turned him into the kind of Mad Duke who stormed, uninvited, into a ball and dragged his wife from the ballroom, amidst a sea of curious stares. “I…oomph,” he grunted as she stuck a finger in his chest.

“I am not your mother, Jasper,” she said, her words, flat and emotionless.

“Stanhope?” Jasper forced the bastard’s name past his suddenly dry mouth.

Katherine must have seen something in his eyes, for her mouth softened, and she shook her head back and forth slowly, sadly. “Oh, Jasper,” she said. “Harry is a friend. Nothing more.”

Harry.

She referred to Stanhope by his Christian name.

“Gentlemen do not become friends with young ladies, Katherine,” he bit out.

“This one did,” she replied. “When I desperately needed one, Jasper.” She folded her arms to her chest, as though warming herself. “Is that why you’ve come? To determine if I’ve been unfaithful to you, Jasper? I have not.” Her gaze slid to the window, and she tugged back the velvet curtains to peer into the passing streets. “If that is why you’ve come, then be assured I’ve not taken a lover. Nor do I intend to. So you can return me to the townhouse and return to Castle Blackwood.”

His stomach flipped into itself. “Is that what you want, Katherine? For me to leave?”

If she said yes, it would shatter him.

Katherine dropped the curtain and it fluttered back into place. She turned a sad smile back at him. “Do you know what is so very odd, Jasper?” She didn’t wait for him to answer, but continued. “Since the Frost Fair, since we first met, I came to know you, better than even myself, I sometimes believe. I know the manner in which you grit your teeth and square your jaw when you’re irate. I know you despise any showing of emotion.” She shook her head, unhappily. “Yet, you should know me so little. You read words in the gossip column and believe me no better than your parents.”

“No,” the denial burst from him. Katherine couldn’t be further from the mark. He well knew she was nothing like his viperous mother and dastardly father.

Katherine held her palms up, almost beseechingly, and it threatened to rend him in two, this his proud Katherine humbled herself before him. “Then, why did you come, Jasper?”

“Because I’m a bloody fool.”





~32~



Her heart cracked at Jasper’s words. Her husband considered himself a bloody fool for coming to her.

The carriage rocked to a slow stop, and she started, realizing the carriage had arrived at her…his…their townhouse.

A servant rapped on the door, and she reached for the handle.

Jasper’s large, gloveless hand settled over hers.

A thrill coursed through her in remembrance of his touch, and she closed her eyes as a wave of longing filled her.

“Katherine,” he said hoarsely. He yanked his fingers back and her skin cooled from the loss of his skin upon hers. Jasper raked his hand through his hair. “I’m blundering this quite badly. Which can of course be explained by the fact that I’m a great big, bastard. I let you go,” he said arresting her gaze with his. “I let you go because I did not allow myself to accept the truth.”