Ollie pulled the door open and Katherine stepped outside into the swirl of snowflakes. She closed her eyes a moment and embraced the sweet silence that came from a winter snow; the rattle of carriage wheels muted by the blanket of flakes that covered the pavement.
Katherine opened her eyes and all but sprinted down the steps, into the waiting carriage. She gave a murmured thanks to the driver and settled back into the seat. The carriage lurched forward.
With the privacy of her own company, she considered her mother’s request, a request that was coming more and more frequent, and bore the strong traces of a stern command. She’d have Katherine wed Bertrand.
She folded her hands into the fabric of her taffeta skirts, wrinkling the fabric.
You’d be wise not to make designs upon my title, madam. I’d not wed you if you were the last creature in the kingdom.
The duke’s taunting words continued to dance along the edges of her musings.
With his thickly muscled, broad chest, and towering height, a man such as the duke would have no need for a padded chest, or a padded anything for that matter. Nor would he bear the stench of rotten fish and boiled eggs. Rather, he’d borne the faintest hint of mint and honey upon his breath. She stared out the window at the passing scenery. So very odd to think that one so hard and cruel should smell of anything so delicately sweet as honey.
The carriage rattled along the streets of London until it stopped in front of Fedgewick’s Bookshop. The driver pulled the door open, and helped hand Katherine down.
She waved off the footman who jumped from the top of the box. “I’ll just be a short while.”
He hesitated.
“Rest assured, there is no dangerously thin ice inside the bookshop,” she said dryly.
The young man’s lips twitched at the corners in what she suspected was amusement, and with a bow, he then climbed back into his seat.
Katherine glanced, first left down Old Bond Street, and then right. It would seem all of London had been scared away by a few snowflakes. She raised her gloved hand to the sky and caught a fat, fluffy flake between her fingers. As long as she could remember she’d loved the purity of the winter season, the hope represented at Christmastide.
Energized by the winter weather, Katherine moved with a bounce in her step up to the door of the shop. She pressed the handle and entered.
A tinny little bell jingled, to alert the shopkeeper of someone’s presence. The man hurried over, a wide smile on his face.
“Hello, my lady. I have some new selections for you.” The portly, middle-aged shopkeeper pushed his wire-rimmed spectacles back upon his nose.
“Do you?” Katherine said, with a smile. Her gaze caught upon someone at the opposite end of the small shop. “I…” The tall figure shifted. “I…” There could be no mistaking that bear of a man.
As though feeling her gaze upon him, his broad shoulders stiffened, the muscles straining the fabric of his midnight black jacket.
The Duke of Bainbridge turned. He raked his cold stare over her person from the top of her head to the tips of her toes.
Bloody hell.
~6~
Bloody hell.
Of all the blasted, rotten luck. He should venture out amongst the living, only to see her, once again?!
Jasper glared over at Lady Katherine Adamson. Surely there was no coincidence in her arrival at the bookshop, and yet, how would she have discovered his whereabouts that morning? Perhaps a disloyal servant? He’d sack the lot of them.
“Lady Katherine Adamson,” he hissed.
He expected the underlining fury that threaded those three words would have sent her fleeing. Instead, her back went up, and she tipped her chin up a notch. She glared right back at him.
“Your Grace.” It didn’t escape his notice that she failed to curtsy. She stood there, eyes blazing, with a recalcitrant tilt to her head.
The bookkeeper looked back and forth between them, and cleared his throat. “Er, uh…if you’ll e-excuse m-me,” he stammered.
At least the small, round shopkeeper had the sense to flee.
Jasper returned his attention to the volume of Wordsworth’s latest work, in his hands. The hard wood of the floors cracked and groaned in protest, indicating that Lady Katherine had at last moved from her place over the front of the shop.
He stared absently at the title, all the while considering the diminutive vixen. He’d not allowed himself to think of her in two days, had not wanted to think about her, and certainly didn’t understand why she continued to traipse through his miserable thoughts. The only rational, coherent, plausible reason he came to was the fact that she, unlike everyone else, seemed wholly unfazed by his presence.
It defied logic and reason and….