Twenty-Eight
Aurora should’ve known her tearstained rejection of Apollo’s proposal would have the opposite effect she imagined, because the man never reacted to anything like a sensible person.
What other duke in the world would only grow more convinced he wanted a woman after he discovered she was a bastard, dabbled in crime and had a terribly checkered past?
The man was impossible. But no matter what he told her, or even what she told herself about his feelings for her, there was no future for them. Apollo had the possibility of making a great difference in the lives of many, of creating a different kind of legacy, and she would not interfere with it.
And now she was in Nice with him. The fact that he would not be selecting a bride like he’d promised did nothing to ease her nerves. She should’ve gone back to Paris that morning instead of boarding the train to the French Riviera. But he’d woken her up with his lips working themselves up the inside of her thighs. He’d stroked, licked and bitten her to a blinding climax before taking her from behind while he told her that her tight sex was surely better than anything the heavens could ever offer a man.
She’d taken the train to Nice.
“Are you all right?” Apollo asked for the tenth time. She nodded tightly, trying to descend from the train without being noticed by two of her brothers’ friends who were already on the platform. Vicente Reyes and Jose Maria Alva were two of the engineers who had designed the Mexican Pavilion for the exhibition. Both had attended university with her brothers Octavio and Sebastian. For all she knew, they’d been sent to keep an eye on her.
She quickly lifted the fan to her face and almost fell as she took the last step off the train. Apollo caught her before she tumbled to the ground. The man was so damned…devoted.
“Why are you covering your face like that?” She winced and then he made a sound of understanding, his thumb caressing the small of her back. “You can hardly see the bruising, Fiera.”
For an instant she felt guilty about letting him think she was self-conscious about the remnants of her encounter with Collins.
“I’m only feeling a bit warm.” She fanned herself furiously as Apollo diligently moved her along the crowd. There was a sea of brown faces here. Women in lovely gowns and gentlemen in well-appointed suits arriving on the French Riviera at the invitation of the Duke of Annan. If she weren’t in such a rush to avoid being recognized by her brothers’ potential spies, she’d stop to take it all in.
It was not like she hadn’t been in environments like this. The well-to-do families of the North Coast of the Dominican Republic and the upper crust of the Yucatán Peninsula her parents socialized with had many people who looked like her. But she hadn’t been anywhere in Europe where a gathering like this had occurred.
“This is quite an event you are hosting,” she told him, genuinely impressed with what he’d managed. It would be quite a message to the copious members of the British aristocracy who frequented the South of France at this time of year. “You’ve done well, Your Grace,” she told him, unable to help the bit of pride in her voice.
“ We have, Fiera,” he corrected, and she let him win this time.
“Leona!” The scream was unmistakably Manuela, and soon she was being pulled into an embrace and kissed by her two best friends. Instead of stopping in Provence, the two of them, with Evan, Cora, Tia Jimena and a recovering Juliana, had arrived in Nice the day before.
“He’s still alive, so I assume things went well,” Manu joked, sending an amused glance in Apollo’s direction.
“Aurorita.” They’d just reached the carriage when a man’s voice called out her name. She froze at the use of the diminutive of her name.
“Who is that?” Apollo asked with unvarnished hostility.
She suppressed a sigh and turned. As expected, Reyes and Alva headed toward her.
“They’re friends of my brothers,” she told Apollo, who narrowed his eyes at the information. Despite their truce in order to find Philip, Apollo harbored no warm feelings toward her siblings. She could not blame him.
“Senor Alva, Senor Reyes,” she said, tilting her head in their direction. “These are my friends Lady Luz Alana and Miss Caceres Galvan.” The greetings were quick and warm, then it was Apollo’s turn. “This is the Duke of Annan.” She didn’t think she imagined the growl she heard when the two men extended their hands.
“How do you know Doctora Montalban?” the duke asked with audible hostility.
“We grew up with her older brothers,” Alva explained amiably. Apollo’s eyes were all but slits by then.
“It’s a pleasure to see you again, Aurorita.” Reyes had always been somewhat of a flirt.
“I’ve been traveling,” she said, at the same time that Apollo practically barked. “She’s been saving lives.” Then he proceeded to pull her closer with an air of ownership she dearly wished she didn’t enjoy as much as she did.
“Of course.” Reyes grinned amiably, seemingly unaware he was in the sights of a dormant volcano.
“She likes to be addressed as Doctora Montalban .” Apollo bared his teeth at the two men, which finally got Reyes to back away, holding both hands up in surrender.
“Pardon me, Your Grace.” Both men shared an amused look and Aurora knew without a shadow of a doubt her brothers almost certainly would hear about this.
“Gentlemen, will we see you at the Promenade des Anglais this afternoon?” Luz Alana chimed in, clearly aware of the tension. Aurora groaned internally at the reminder of what was on the agenda for the afternoon.
“We will see you on the paseo, then,” Alva said with a nod, as Apollo helped her into the carriage after sending both men more pugnacious glares.
“That was uncalled-for,” she said, when he finally settled beside her, not caring that the Leonas could hear.
“You’re much too self-possessed to be addressed with diminutives,” he countered, as if that was a justification. “What do you think, ladies?” She scoffed at his appeal to her two friends, who were apparently elated over his behavior.
“It’s what her brothers used to call her,” Manuela explained, amused.
“Were either of those two pendejos her siblings?” he asked pleasantly, even as he directed daggers with his eyes in the direction where they’d left Alva and Reyes.
Manuela and Luz Alana, who were absolutely no help, only laughed at his insults to the two men. “They’re not my siblings, but they’ve known me for a long time.”
“Well, they’ll have to learn they can’t be so familiar to future duchesses.” This, as expected, prompted a series of oohs and aahs from her friends.
“He’s not being serious,” she told them, nipping that line of conversation in the bud.
“I’m perfectly serious,” Apollo returned, taking her hand and placing it on his knee.
“Aurora,” Manuela exhaled with bright eyes.
“Don’t start, Manuela,” she groaned, covering her ears. “I’m not the future duchess. I’m certain you will have your pick of lovely debutantes from respectable families from the Americas throwing themselves at your feet.”
“I don’t want debutantes,” he told her, with a stubborn set of his jaw. “I want pugnacious physicians who threaten me with scalpels.”
Manuela and Luz Alana could barely contain themselves, but they managed to not react to Apollo’s claims.
“I’m not duchess material, Apollo,” she declared, looking out the window, and for once, Apollo left it alone.
* * *
An hour later she found herself in one of the lavish bedrooms overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, draped in an excessive amount of yellow silk.
“This is too much,” she balked, staring at her reflection in the mirror.
“No, it’s exactly enough,” Manuela shot back, bending down to adjust the hem of the gown she’d bullied Aurora into.
In truth, it was not one of the ridiculous designs with those atrocious bustles. The skirt was wide, but not so much that she looked like a wedding cake. The raw silk felt lovely to the touch, and the filigree embroidery in a slightly darker shade of yellow on the collar and sleeves were the exact amount of embellishment she approved of. The delicate pleats under the breast enhanced her shape and brought attention to her bosom. Her face heated at the thought of what Apollo would say. Then it heated further when her brain answered the question with alarming detail.
She still could not make sense of the night before. Of the certainty in his eyes when he asked her to marry him. She knew he believed it when he told her he didn’t care about her past. But he couldn’t know what it would be like. And though giving him up would be hard, she thought she could survive it. What she knew she couldn’t was to see his love for her turn into resentment and regret.
“Why can’t I wear that?” she asked, waving at the suit she’d been wearing when she left Paris two nights earlier. Knowing it would at least provoke enough of an argument with her friends to serve as a distraction.
“Aurora, you will be on the arm of the duke at the promenade.”
“Oh, stop calling him The Duke ,” she snapped with irritation. “I don’t know what’s gotten into the two of you.”
Luz Alana rolled her eyes and Manuela threw herself on the chaise.
“He cares for you, Leona,” Luz Alana said in a gentle tone, as though she feared the words would set Aurora on fire. “It’s evident. Evan said he’s canceled this bride selection business—”
“No.” Aurora could not hear any of it. It would only make things worse. “He knows everything, even about my real mother.” That day they’d come to the den of iniquity while Apollo went looking for Ackworth and Philip, she’d told the Leonas that Dona Jimena’s beau was the same man who had almost ruined her.
“Leona,” Manuela said, her voice brimming with emotion.
“He insists he doesn’t care,” she rushed to say. “But he will. Eventually he will.” Just like her father had. He’d tolerated her presence as a condition to having the woman he loved with him, but in the end, his position and his reputation were more important.
“Apollo doesn’t care about any of that,” Luz Alana told her, her hands gripping Aurora’s shoulder in the reflection. “He repudiates all that snobbery and hypocrisy.”
That didn’t change the world he was part of now. Their opinions would matter. Even for the families who were here in Nice, eager to make alliances with him, it would matter.
“But it will be of importance to everyone else. You should know that better than anyone, Manuela.” Her friend, who had turned her back on society and the world she’d known, to openly live with her beloved, had to understand what Aurora could cost Apollo.
“It’s his choice to make, Aurora. You can’t decide what you are to him.” She knew they would say this. Now that they each had found love, they were convinced everyone should have it. That nothing was high enough of a price. But they weren’t her. They hadn’t done the things she had.
“Eventually I will become a burden.” She said it while looking in the mirror. Already changing for the sake of this fantasy that could never be for her.
What did she think she was doing in Nice? In frilly walking dresses, going on promenades? This was not the life she’d chosen. She preferred her independence above everything. A life where no one cared where she came from as long as she could do the job at hand. This impostor she was looking at would end up with a broken heart or much worse.
“You don’t know that,” Manuela insisted, frustration clear in her voice.
“Yes, I do!” she volleyed back. “I’m trying to be sensible.”
“Sensible like you were running around putting yourself in danger?” Luz Alana scolded her. The accusation stung, but she knew her friends were hurt by all the secrets she’d kept from them.
“Sensible like I don’t want my heart shattered.” She kept her focus on her sleeves, which she tugged on so roughly she thought she heard a tear on the seam of the cuff.
“He’s mad about you, Leona,” Manuela pushed. “You must see that.”
“He asked me to marry him last night,” she confessed. Unable to keep the bewilderment from her voice.
“Do you want to marry him?” Manuela asked carefully, then quickly added, “Please don’t attempt to lie to me, I have seen you look at the man. You’re worse than Luz Alana is with the Great Scot.”
“You practically dissolve into a puddle whenever your duchess walks into the room,” Luz Alana protested. Manuela offered a wordless grin around the hairpins between her lips. “And stop calling my husband the Great Scot.”
“He likes that nickname, and we’re talking about Aurora,” Manuela argued. “The duke is going to choke when he sees you in this.”
Aurora rolled her eyes and took herself in. She didn’t look like herself, sucked into all this silk and fine thread. She didn’t look like the woman who worked nights on end. Who was chased by police and helped women escape their violent husbands. She didn’t look like a woman with roughened hands and a wary heart.
“This isn’t me,” she pointed out, turning this way and that.
“I don’t think any of us are exactly as we were when we arrived in Paris five months ago.” Manuela and her irritating wisdom was beginning to grate.
Her friend had become so self-assured in these past few months. For Manuela, peculiar soul that she was, love had brought out her more sober, judicious side. While everyone else seemed to lose their heads for love, Manuela had gained the temperament of Solomon.
“Has it only been five months?” Luz Alana asked, looking heavenward.
It was unbelievable.
Their lives had changed so much in such a short amount of time. She’d arrived here still attempting to atone for her mistakes. Striving to be outwardly perfect in the present, so people forgot her past. But that had made her miserable, her life small. Despite everything, she liked this Aurora better. This Aurora had a purpose, had learned to be resourceful, to ask for help. Had a community of colleagues as dedicated as she was to their cause. This Aurora had risked her heart and been rewarded grandly, even if only fleetingly.
“I don’t want to change.” Both women widened their eyes at her impassioned tone. “I want to be a doctor, I want to be independent.”
“Apollo won’t take those things from you,” Manuela insisted. And perhaps he wouldn’t do it on purpose, but his position required a kind of woman she simply could not be.
A knock on the door offered Aurora a much-needed escape from a conversation she knew would not end with any kind of resolution.
“Come in,” Luz Alana called, and the Duke of Annan’s head appeared in the doorway.
“The men are becoming restless,” he told Luz Alana with a grin, then he looked at Aurora. For a second, he seemed almost dumbstruck, but then he focused on her and his gaze ran hot. “Muy bella, Doctora.” He did nothing to cull the lust in his voice, he did even less to conceal the possession in his gaze. The hunger she saw there made the already-tight clothing constricting. “I will be the most envied man at the promenade.”
The way he looked at her. Like a dragon with his treasure.
It was so tempting to believe that she could have what her head and heart wanted, but she had never lied to herself. It was a rule that had served her well, but Apollo came into her life to make her want to break it.
“We will be there in a moment, Your Grace,” Aurora said, ignoring her friends’ little gasps at what they’d seen pass between her and Apollo. With one last incendiary look, he left, leaving her with a thumping heart and a fire under her skin.
“It does seem like she has it all under control, doesn’t it?”
Aurora grabbed her parasol and pointed it at her friend like a saber. “Manuela Caceres, you do not want to be the one to snap the last of my nerves.”