Chapter 5
“Itrust London has not grown bored in my absence,” Alexander kept his tone mild as he stepped into the Wetherby ballroom, but he felt the immediate shift around them anyway.
Conversation dipped. Fans paused. A few heads turned too quickly, as though curiosity might be hidden by speed.
He did not need his memories to read a room; the ton sent its message with the same predictability as his dining room.
Diana stood at his side in silver, and the sight of her struck him with the same sharp certainty it had struck him since his return.
Her gown was cut to flatter without begging for attention.
Yet, it did not matter how restrained she was.
Her presence drew attention regardless. Diamonds lay at her throat majestically.
Her hair was pinned up in a way that exposed the curve of her neck, and he had to keep his expression steady, because his mind had a habit lately of tracking the line of her skin like a map he was meant to know by heart.
He set his hand at her waist before they had taken three steps farther into the room.
It was an open gesture, but it was also a private one.
Beneath the silk, she was warm. There was a tension in her that seemed to hum when he touched her, as if she were constantly restraining herself from a reaction she despised.
“You are squeezing me,” she murmured without turning her head.
“I am holding you,” he replied.
He felt a slow, dark pull of amusement in his chest. He liked the way her voice went jagged when he pushed her. He liked the way her breath hitched. He let his gaze drop to her lips, watching the way they trembled with suppressed fury.
“That is not the same thing.”
“It seems the same.”
A small, broken sound escaped her—a soft huff that wasn’t quite a laugh, but it was the first honest thing he’d heard from her all evening. Then her lips curved.
The ice broke. Diana smiled. It was a quick, irrepressible flash of genuine warmth that transformed her face, softening the sharp geometry of her beauty into something devastatingly alive.
It was a victory more intoxicating than any memory he might have lost.
They moved forward under the chandelier light.
The music was already in motion, a steady pulse behind the low roar of voices.
Everywhere Alexander looked, he saw judgment disguised as politeness.
He saw women whose eyes slid to Diana’s ring, to his hand on her waist, to the line of their bodies standing close enough to suggest unity.
He saw men who measured him with thin, careful interest, and he knew what they were all thinking.
They had had a year to invent stories. He and Diana were now expected to prove or disprove them in a single evening.
Just ahead, a cluster of ladies in over-feathered headdresses and shimmering silks had arranged themselves with the casualness of an army. Their fans fluttered like the wings of nervous birds, but their voices were pitched with a sharp clarity designed to carry over the orchestra.
“They are truly together,” one murmured, her words honed to a fine edge of disbelief. “I had begun to think the Duke of Rosewood was a myth invented by some firm of solicitors.”
“A year is a long time for a man to be traveling,” another added, her eyes raking over Diana with predatory pity. “Do you suppose the Duchess finally grew a spine and demanded her rights? Or did she simply threaten infidelity?”
A third woman laughed, a soft, tittering sound that felt like the scrape of a blade. “Or perhaps the Duke realized a wife is a far more convenient bedfellow than a series of continental mistresses. He’s returned to claim his due without the bother of being asked.”
Alexander’s jaw tightened, the muscles ticking beneath the skin as blood rushed to his head, though he kept his expression as smooth as polished marble. Beside him, Diana’s breath changed with a sharp, shallow hitch that he felt through the silk of her sleeve against his arm.
“You hear them,” she whispered. It was a ghost of a sound, colored by a year’s worth of accumulated shame.
“I hear everything,” he answered, his voice a low rumble that seemed to vibrate through his entire being.
“This is the music I have danced to in your absence.”
She didn’t look at him. Her chin was lifted at a defiant, regal angle, her mouth a frozen line of calm. She looked as though she could burn a path through the crushing crowd by sheer force of will alone.
He watched her, and for the first time, he truly understood the weight of what he had made her endure.
He admired the discipline of her performance—the way she refused to give them the satisfaction of a flinch—but he hated it even more because he could feel the frantic tension thrumming through her small frame.
“You will never endure them alone again,” he said.
Her lashes flickered, the dark fans of them casting a brief shadow over her eyes—the only crack in her armor she allowed him to see. For a second, the Duchess vanished, and he saw the woman beneath, startled by the sudden, heavy weight of a protector she had long ago stopped expecting.
A gentleman approached with the easy confidence of familiarity, smiling broadly. Alexander recognized nothing in him, not even an impression, and yet the man behaved as though they had shared entire seasons of clubrooms and hunting parties.
“Your Grace,” he said warmly. “Back from the dead at last.”
Alexander blinked, startled. His mind moved quickly, but there was nothing. He needed a name. Then, he felt the faintest brush at his sleeve. Diana’s fingers did not linger, yet the gesture landed like a precise instruction.
“Lord Hawthorne,” she murmured.
Alexander extended his hand at once. “Hawthorne. I see London has survived without me.”
Hawthorne barked a laugh. “Barely. You have been missed, whether you believe it or not.”
He looked to Diana then, clearly pleased to find her at Alexander’s side rather than drifting alone as gossip had claimed. “Your Grace, you look radiant. The Season has been starved of you.”
Diana inclined her head, a faint, polite smile touching her lips. “You are kind, my lord.”
Hawthorne’s grin widened. “And you, Your Grace, look positively attentive.”
Alexander tightened his hand slightly at Diana’s waist, enough to make his point. “I have been corrected,” he said calmly.
Diana’s fingers dug into her fan. It was a subtle reaction, but he felt it.
Hawthorne leaned closer, lowering his voice with the conspiratorial delight of a man discussing scandal in the safety of male friendship. “There were rumors.”
“I do not concern myself with rumors,” Alexander replied. His voice was cool, level, and held the absolute finality of a closing tomb. “I find they are usually the product of people with too much time and too little imagination.”
“No?” Hawthorne’s brows shot up, a glint of predatory interest in his eyes. “That is either admirable, Your Grace, or dangerously dishonest. In this room, rumors are the only currency that matters.”
Alexander let a faint, razor-thin smile touch his lips. “Then I am bankrupt. And I find it quite efficient. If I gave every stray word my attention, I should never have the focus required for more… substantial pursuits. I wouldn’t even last through the first course of supper.”
He let the words hang in the air, a silent reminder that a Duke’s time was far more valuable than the prattle of the ton.
Hawthorne laughed, a bark of genuine surprise and satisfaction. He clapped a hand near Alexander’s shoulder, though he didn’t quite dare to touch him.
“Efficient! God, I’d forgotten how blunt you could be. Very well, keep your secrets.” With a final, lingering look at Diana—one that Alexander met with a steady, warning heat—Hawthorne drifted away, already pivoting toward another cluster of onlookers to trade his latest observation.
Diana exhaled, a sound so soft it was barely a ghost of breath, her shoulders dropping a fraction of an inch from their rigid, defensive line.
“You handled him well,” she said.
“I handled nothing,” Alexander replied. “You did. Both me and him.”
She angled her head slightly. “Do not make a habit of admitting it.”
“It would be foolish to pretend I do not need you.”
Her shoulders went rigid for a heartbeat, then smoothed again into composure. He found himself watching her throat as she swallowed, noticing the faint pulse there, the way it betrayed her even when her face did not.
They had not gone ten paces before Diana changed.
It was so subtle that no one else would have noticed, but Alexander felt it at once beneath his hand. Her spine straightened too rigidly. Her steps shortened. The warmth in her body cooled as if a draft had slipped between them. She did not falter, did not hesitate, yet something in her recoiled.
He followed her line of sight.
A middle-aged gentleman and an elaborately dressed woman were approaching, their smiles polished to a sheen that did not reach their eyes. Alexander searched his mind automatically for recognition and found nothing. No flicker. No recollection. They were strangers to him.
Yet Diana was not reacting as though they were strangers.
The gentleman bowed first, his posture just deferential enough to be correct. “Your Grace,” he said to Alexander, voice smooth with well-practiced respect. “What a relief it is to see you have returned. We have been most concerned.”
Alexander inclined his head with equal smoothness. “Your solicitude does you credit.”
He watched the man closely, searching for some anchor of memory. There was none. Only the faintest sense of irritation—irrational perhaps, but sharp all the same—at the way the man’s gaze skimmed past him and settled on Diana as though assessing merchandise.
“And our dear Diana,” the gentleman continued, turning fully toward her. “You have conducted yourself admirably in His Grace’s absence. London speaks very highly of you.”
Diana’s smile did not waver. “Uncle,” she said evenly. “Aunt.”
This is her family.
Alexander’s attention sharpened.
The woman stepped forward at once, her jewels catching candlelight in gaudy flashes. Her perfume was heavy, cloying. “My sweet girl,” she exclaimed, clasping her gloved hands together in theatrical affection. “You must not hide yourself from us. We have missed you dreadfully.”
Diana inclined her head with flawless courtesy. “You have been in London the entire year.”
The statement was mild. The meaning beneath it was not.
The aunt laughed too brightly. “Oh, you know what I mean. We have missed you.”
Alexander felt her words grate against something in his chest. He did not know these people. He did not remember negotiating anything with them, but something about their tone was familiar.
Diana’s body had not relaxed. If anything, she seemed more contained now, as though bracing herself.
Her uncle turned back to Alexander, smile tightening almost imperceptibly. “We were naturally anxious when you left so soon after the wedding. Family must think of such matters.”
Alexander nodded once, the motion measured. “Indeed.”
He could not afford to misstep. He did not know what history stood between them. He did not know what version of himself these people expected to see. So, he offered them the only thing he could reliably perform: composure.
“And yet,” the uncle continued smoothly, “our Diana has borne the Season with admirable dignity.”
Alexander glanced down at her briefly. Her gaze remained fixed ahead, polite and unyielding, but he could see the tension along her jaw, the way her fingers tightened around her fan.
He shifted Diana a fraction closer to him. The movement was subtle, but it was unmistakable in its meaning. He did not know what these people had done. But he knew Diana was enduring rather than enjoying it. And he felt anger rise, unfamiliar in its source.
He masked it at once. “You speak as though she required supervision,” he said mildly.
The uncle’s brows lifted in faint surprise. “Merely guidance. A young lady does not navigate London alone without assistance.”
Diana did not move. Alexander did not look at her again. If he did, he might react too quickly, and he did not yet know enough to strike cleanly.
He forced a faint smile. “My wife has never required guidance in my presence.”
The aunt laughed again, fluttering her fan. “How charmingly protective.”
“I trust,” the uncle went on, voice lowering just slightly, “that business no longer demands such prolonged absences.”
Alexander felt something cold and decisive settle in his chest.
“I have revised my priorities,” he replied.
Diana’s breath hitched faintly beside him.
The uncle’s eyes narrowed a fraction, reassessing.
“Well,” the aunt interjected brightly, “we shall expect to see you both at dinner soon. We must reclaim some semblance of familial closeness.”
Diana’s fingers flexed once.
“We shall see,” Alexander answered before she could speak. He kept his tone pleasant, but he would not promise these people anything.
Alexander finally glanced down at Diana. He felt the minute tremor in her breath, and something in him hardened with certainty.
He would not keep her here, pinned between politeness and old humiliation.
“Forgive us,” he said smoothly. “I must reclaim my wife. The next set is about to begin.”
Only once they had put several bodies and chandeliers between themselves and her relatives did he slow. The tension beneath his palm had not eased. If anything, it had hardened into something colder, quieter.
They were finally clear.
He turned toward her, angling his body so that they stood half-shielded by a column. He opened his mouth to ask what had passed between her and those two people, what history he had stepped into without knowing—
A voice cut cleanly through the moment.
“You are not escaping so easily, Alexander.”