For Love of the Duke(84)

His heart slowed, slowed, and then thudded to a stop as her words crept around the hopes he’d not known he carried.

No, he couldn’t…she couldn’t…

Love destroyed.

As much as he longed to be selfish and reach out and grasp with his greedy hands all that she offered, he could not be responsible for extinguishing Katherine’s effervescent glow. It would destroy him in ways that even Lydia’s death hadn’t managed to do.

Oh, God, what have I done?





~26~



Katherine dipped her spoon into the small dish of plum pudding and polished off the holiday dessert. She sat back in her seat, deliciously warmed by the roaring fire that blazed within the hearth.

She studied her sister and Michael a long moment. The two of them eyed one another as though there was not another soul present, the way Jasper gazed upon his wife in their blissful portrait. Odd, how such a thought brought her pain just that morning, and now, after Jasper’s loving a short while ago, she should feel nothing but this…this…sense of fulfillment.

She loved him.

And it mattered not that he’d not spoken the words in return. For he’d tossed aside his vow of a marriage of convenience, and made her his wife in all sense of the words.

Heat raced up her neck and flooded her cheeks. She stole a sideways peek at her husband.

Seated at the head of the table in his midnight black evening jacket and expertly folded white cravat, one would never gather from the hard glint in his inscrutable expression that a short while ago he’d been…been…

She fanned her cheeks. Making love to her.

I’m no longer a virgin.

She smiled. With the exception of a slight soreness betwixt her thighs, there remained little evidence of Jasper’s passionate loving.

“I must say I’m surprised at the evening’s course,” Aldora called from the opposite end of the table, jerking Katherine uncomfortably back to the moment.

Katherine frowned. “You did not care for the meal?” She spent the previous morning with Cook discussing and planning all the details for the Christmas Eve feast.

Aldora waved her hand. “I just know you’ve never cared for roast quail.”

She detected the slight stiffening of Jasper’s broad shoulders, the one tell-tale indication he’d been following any of the discourse that evening. Until the near, imperceptible stiffening he’d appeared wholly unaffected by her family, and the Christmas Eve dinner, and…Katherine, herself.

“Everything has been splendid,” Michael intoned.

Aldora frowned. “Of course, dinner could not have been more wonderful. Your Cook did a magnificent job with the fare. I merely meant I always believed you’d detested roa…”

Katherine shook her head, with her eyes imploring her sister to silence.

Aldora’s eyes widened a bit, and then she snapped her lips closed. She picked up her spoon and dipped it into her cup of plum pudding.

Lizzie slid out of her seat.

“Lizzie,” Michael called.

The little girl ignored him, and wandered down the edge of the table.

Katherine held her breath as she paused at the arm of Jasper’s chair.

He picked up his glass of red wine and took a sip. His jaw taut.

“Bear,” Lizzie whispered.

His seat slid backward along the wood floor, as though he were a moment away from leaping from his seat, and fleeing the room like the hounds of hell were after him. The muscle in the corner of Jasper’s eye ticked.

Lizzie reached for his free hand and tugged. “Bear,” she said, a bit louder this time.

“Lizzie, come here,” Aldora called, shooting an apologetic glance at Jasper, who remained stoically silent through the exchange.

He finally dropped his gaze to Lizzie.

She jabbed a finger at his plate. “I have your cake.”

Jasper’s frown deepened, and Katherine made to rise and go to the girl. But Jasper reached for his Shrewsbury cake and handed it over.

Lizzie accepted the sugary dessert with a wide-toothed smile. “Thank you,” she said, and proceeded to scramble onto Jasper’s lap.

Aldora gasped. “I am so sorry, Your Grace.” She rose, and hurried to retrieve her daughter but Lizzie burrowed against Jasper’s chest She smattered flaky white bits of crumb onto his immaculate black jacket. Aldora shot a questioning glance between Michael and Katherine, and then back to Jasper. “Lizzie, come here.”

The little girl took another bite of Shrewsbury cake. She shook her head, and a brown curl fell over her eye. “No. Bear,” she insisted.

Jasper sat immobile, as though he’d been turned to granite. His hand came up, hovered about Lizzie, and Katherine thought he intended to turn the girl over to Aldora’s care.