Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
“What are you doing here, Your Grace?” Daisy asked.
She had retired to bed around the same time Lydia had gone to her chambers, but unlike her friend and all the other guests, Daisy had been unable to sleep. She tossed and turned until it struck her that she might as well go outside and sit for a spell.
In the garden, reclining against a stone bench, with only a silver slipper of a moon beaming overhead, was where the Duke crossed her path.
He was evidently lost in thought and quite nearly walked right by her. But at the sound of her voice, he straightened. “I thought I might come here to think with a view of the skies.”
She made to stand. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”
“No,” he blurted, then cleared his throat. “That… that isn’t necessary.”
“I wouldn’t wish to disturb you, Your Grace,” she insisted, then stood and walked hastily toward the path that would lead back to the house.
The Duke took one step to the side and blocked her way. “Daisy. Stay.” His voice was soft, far from the stoic tone he’d used when she’d tried to talk to him about their kiss.
Part of her tutted loudly, urging her to return to her room, to avoid being found alone with him there. Yet another ached to see why he’d asked her to stay.
“All right,” she said, then returned to her seat without another word.
He came over and sat by her, then looked up at the sky. “It is truly a beautiful view.”
She nodded. “It is…” She turned to look at him and found him staring straight at her instead, and her cheeks heated.
“Lady Daisy… What I said earlier. It was hurtful,” he hesitated, and she was tempted to jump in and deny it. “I wanted to say… I’m sorry.”
She blinked at him in surprise. “You wish to apologize?”
“I should not have spoken to you as I did.”
It took her a moment to answer. “You were distracted, I think.”
“I was,” he admitted, “but that is not an excuse.”
There was something in that—something steady, unwilling to soften itself—that made Daisy’s chest tighten in a way she did not quite want to examine.
“I accept your apology,” she said quietly.
He nodded once. “And now it is your turn.”
“My turn?” she parroted, utterly bewildered by this twist in the conversation.
“Yes,” he said softly. “You told Harry I would answer all his questions about his mother and…and…”
“Oh!” Daisy gasped. “Did I speak wrongly? Did you…”
“It is difficult,” he interrupted. “For me. I cannot…” He paused and cleared his throat. “It is not easy to talk about her.”
Daisy was seized by a sense of regret. “Forgive me,” she said at once. “I would never have encouraged Harry to ask you questions if I knew you were not prepared to answer them.”
He nodded again, then sighed.
“She would have liked you,” he said suddenly.
Daisy blinked. “Your late wife?”
“Yes.” He said it simply, but his gaze did not move from the garden. Daisy waited, and after a moment, he added, “Mary liked people who put others at ease. She was better at it than I ever was.”
“You loved her very much,” Daisy said before she could stop herself.
A long pause followed. Then, “Yes, I suppose I did. She was one of my closest friends.”
Daisy nodded slowly. “She sounds as though she was very special.”
“She was,” he said. “She was the one to ask me to marry her, you know.”
“Truly?” Reflexively, Daisy’s eyebrows shot up.
“Indeed,” he mumbled, then he looked straight at her, whispering this time. “Mary… well, she couldn’t love men. Not in the way wives love their husbands. She could only love women.”
Daisy nodded. She understood well enough. Her maid Amina was the same. “I see,” she said and then frowned. “But if that was so, why did she ask you to marry her?”
“I knew Mary from childhood and cared for her deeply. Her father was an Earl, and of course, she was expected to find a sensible match. But, like I told you, Mary had a secret to hide. And she felt like she couldn’t just wed any clueless bachelor.
And more importantly, she wanted to have children. To become a mother.”
Daisy nodded. “She wanted to marry you to have children, then.”
“Yes. She proposed that we wed and have a family together. We were already close friends and understood that our temperaments were compatible. More importantly, I knew her secret and would never bring a load of expectations into the union.”
“Do you mean…?” Daisy could not bring herself to ask the next question outright, but the gentle prompt was all the Duke required.
“Yes.” He scrubbed a hand over his chin, then scratched the dry layer of stubble there. “We would be free to take lovers and fulfill our carnal desires in that way.”
“Oh…” Daisy said in wonder.
The Duke shrugged. “It was a good compromise. I wasn’t too sure I wanted children, but Mary did. I wanted to help her have them. Luckily, she fell pregnant right after our wedding night.”
His gaze moved to her then, and something in it changed—subtle, but enough that she felt it more than she saw it.
“That’s why I do not speak of her often,” he said. “I do not know how to tell Harry about her,” he admitted.
Daisy considered him for a moment. “You do not need to tell him everything.”
His brow tightened slightly.
“He only needs to know her,” she said. “Not every detail. Not how she died, or the difficult parts. Just… who she was to you. That she loved him. That she wanted to have a child. That she was happy he existed.”
His expression shifted at that, though he did not speak immediately.
“She did,” he said finally. “Love him.”
“I’m sure she did, Your Grace,” Daisy replied gently.
“Edmund,” he whispered.
Daisy stiffened as the Duke turned to look at her squarely.
“Please,” he breathed. “Call me Edmund.”
“Very well.” Daisy licked her lips. “I know that your wife loved Harry, even before he was born. And I can see that you cherish every moment you get to spend with him still…Edmund.”
The Duke leaned back slightly. His gaze drifted toward the moon. “You listen well,” he said after a while. “Has anyone told you that?”
Heat rose in Daisy’s cheeks before she could help it. “Not particularly. Perhaps it is the hour. Everything feels more significant at night.”
His mouth curved faintly. “Or perhaps it is simply that people speak more freely when they are not watched so closely.”
“That may be true,” she said.
He did not look away from her this time.
The silence stretched out, growing heavier with every passing second. Daisy could hear the steady rhythm of Edmund’s breathing, deep and slightly uneven.
He shifted his weight, turning his torso more fully toward her. The formal, rigid posture he usually maintained seemed to have completely vanished.
“It is not just the hour, Daisy,” Edmund said, his voice dropping to a low, gravelly tone that vibrated straight through her chest.
Daisy swallowed hard, her fingers tightening into the fabric of her skirts. “No?”
“No.” He leaned in closer, his broad shoulder brushing against hers.
The scent of him, that sandalwood cologne, wrapped around her senses.
“I find myself speaking freely because it is you who sits beside me. I have spent weeks trying not to think about you… about the kiss we once shared. Yet I cannot seem to stop.”
A heavy tremor of heat rippled down Daisy’s spine.
He has thought about our kiss.
Her heart began to hammer against her ribs, loud enough that she feared he might hear it in the quietude. “Your Grace—”
“Edmund,” he corrected softly, his gaze dropping to her lips before rising back to her eyes; the intensity in his honey-warm stare was scorching.
“Edmund,” she breathed, the name feeling like a forbidden secret on her tongue.
He let out a low, ragged breath at the sound of his name. He reached out then. His large, warm hand hovered over hers for a fraction of a second before he covered her fingers, pressing them gently against the cold stone bench. His skin was incredibly hot against her cool hands.
“I should be a gentleman,” he murmured, his face moving closer, tilting down toward hers. “I should send you back to your room. But I have been standing next to you at events, sitting across from you at dinner, watching the way you smile, and it has been tormenting.”
Daisy’s breath hitched. Her body felt flushed. A heavy, liquid warmth pooled in her belly.
She lifted her chin slightly; her eyes locked on his. “A torment?”
“Yes,” he groaned softly. His fingers slid up from her hand to grasp her wrist. His other hand rose, and his knuckles brushed down the sensitive line of her neck, leaving a trail of fire in their wake.
“I want to feel your mouth on mine. I want to pull you onto my lap, wrap my arms around you so tight it hurts, and finally find out how sweet you taste when you let go.”
The raw honesty of his words made Daisy’s head spin. The heat between them was suffocatingly sweet now, thick with a mutual hunger that had been building beneath the surface for weeks.
She licked her dry lips, a purely instinctive gesture, and saw Edmund’s eyes darken almost to black as his focus locked entirely onto her mouth.
“Daisy,” he breathed, his voice a ragged plea.
She didn’t answer with words. She simply nodded, her body aching for the distance between them to disappear.
Edmund let out a low growl, then leaned in and closed the final distance between them. His mouth swooped down, taking hers in a searing kiss.
Heavens.
It was a kiss that wiped her mind blank of all thought. She arched into him, kissing him back as well as she could. His hand reached out to cup her cheek, and he inclined his head, the better to plunder her mouth with ease.
She moaned into his mouth, her hand coming up to lie over his, clutching onto him as he kissed her thoroughly, painstakingly, and exhaustively.
She pressed her lips harder against Edmund’s, trapping the moan in his mouth.
His tongue flicked, running against her bottom lip before plunging into her mouth as his hands pulled her close. Daisy’s shawl slipped off her shoulders, and her breasts pressed against his chest. It was only then that she realized his shirt was half open, and he wore no coat.