Chapter 4
“Must you position yourself so far away, Diana, or have you decided to conduct breakfast like a diplomatic summit?” Lady Salford’s question was crisp with amusement, but the underlying command was unmistakable.
Diana had barely crossed the threshold of the breakfast room when the observation landed.
She had chosen the seat at the far end instinctively—the one bathed in morning light, removed from the solid, masculine presence already occupying the head of the table.
She had not realized the movement was so transparent.
She did not look at her husband.
“I find distance improves civility,” she replied calmly, though her fingers tightened faintly around the back of the chair. “It prevents unnecessary collisions.”
Lady Salford’s silver brows lifted. “Collisions are the privilege of marriage, my dear. You will sit beside your husband. I refuse to be the cause of estrangement.”
If only the old woman understood how layered their estrangement truly was.
Diana forced her feet to move. Each step toward him felt like approaching a hearth she had once stood too near and been burned by.
The breakfast room was bright with early sun; the tall windows cast pale gold across linen and polished silver.
The scent of tea and toasted bread mingled with the faint, clean trace of him, all clean linen, soap, and something musky.
He was already seated, posture relaxed, one hand resting idly near his cup. He looked entirely at home.
As though he never left.
He rose the moment she approached.
His coat was dark and cut impeccably across his frame, the linen of his shirt crisp against bronzed skin. There was something unstudied about him this morning, a faint looseness in his hair that softened the hard geometry of his jaw.
He pulled the chair back for her, the gesture smooth. She lowered herself carefully, aware of the proximity of his body. She averted her eyes from him because she didn’t know how she could calm her pounding heartbeat otherwise.
As she adjusted her skirts, his fingers brushed hers. The contact lingered just long enough to register—the pad of his thumb grazing the sensitive inside of her wrist before retreating.
Her breath faltered.
She told herself it was nothing but a courtesy, a performance for Lady Salford. Yet her skin felt branded where he had touched her.
“Thank you,” she said, though she did not look at him as she spoke.
If she had, she feared he would see the way her pulse had leapt at so slight a contact.
“My pleasure,” he murmured when she thanked him, the words low enough that only she heard the subtle edge beneath them.
Lady Salford watched them both with thinly veiled delight.
“There,” she said approvingly. “No stiffness. I will not have it. Affection must not shrink under observation.”
Diana reached for her teacup before her face said something it shouldn’t. Affection had not existed in this house for a year. And yet now, seated so near that the line of his thigh nearly brushed her own, she could not deny the undercurrent thrumming beneath her ribs.
“You must tell me,” Lady Salford continued, spreading marmalade with brisk authority, “how your courtship began. I have been denied every charming detail.”
Diana’s spine straightened almost imperceptibly. Beside her, she felt Alexander shift with a kind of alert readiness, as though he sensed the trap before she did.
“At my uncle’s townhouse,” Diana said smoothly, but Alexander also answered simultaneously, “At a ball.”
The words landed together and broke apart in the air.
Silence followed. Lady Salford looked from one to the other, her brows lifting in polite curiosity.
Diana felt the faint warmth of Alexander’s knee press against hers beneath the table, the subtle reminder that whatever this was, they were in it together.
She turned her head slowly toward him and saw that he looked faintly entertained. A corner of his mouth curved, and somehow she could almost hear the laughter he was stifling.
“At my uncle’s townhouse,” she repeated calmly, aware that her pulse had begun to thrum at her throat. “There was a ball held there that evening.”
She heard the lie as she spoke it and felt it settle between them like a thin sheet of ice.
There had been no ball. There had been a formal negotiation, stiff chairs, her uncle’s calculating smile, and Alexander’s cool appraisal. But Lady Salford did not need that version.
“There was music,” Diana continued evenly, lifting her teacup to disguise the slight dryness in her mouth. “Dancing. Quite crowded, if I recall.”
Alexander watched her the entire time. Then, slowly, he inclined his head as though confirming her memory.
“Yes,” he said smoothly. “Quite crowded.”
His eyes flickered with unmistakable amusement. And then, he flashed her a smile. It was as though he recognized exactly what she had done and approved of it.
He was enjoying this far too much.
Lady Salford clasped her hands together. “A ball at the start of it all. How perfectly traditional.”
“It was hardly romantic,” Diana added quickly, attempting to reclaim her footing. “The evening was rather… practical.”
“Practical,” Alexander repeated softly, still looking at her.
There was something in his tone that made the word feel like provocation. She refused to meet his gaze.
“And yet,” he continued, leaning back slightly in his chair, his voice carrying just enough warmth to make Lady Salford beam, “I remember noticing her immediately.”
Her fingers tightened around her cup.
“Alexander,” she said quietly, warning threaded beneath the syllables.
But he did not look away.
“There was admiration,” he finished. “Immediate admiration.”
Her pulse betrayed her with a sharp, humiliating leap. And beneath the table, his knee pressed just slightly firmer against hers and she was thankful for the chair she was sitting on, or else she would have stumbled.
Lady Salford’s keen eyes moved between them, sharp as a hawk assessing prey.
“And how long,” she asked briskly, adjusting the lace at her cuff, “did it take you to decide she was to be your Duchess, Alexander? A Rosewood does not dither when selecting his wife.”
Diana felt the question like a hand at her back, pushing her toward the edge of a precipice.
“Three weeks,” Diana answered, her voice tight, a split-second too fast.
“Three days,” Alexander countered at the exact same moment.
Lady Salford clasped her hands together, her eyes dancing with delight. “How decisive! A husband and wife in such spirited disagreement! It shows there is still fire in the hearth!”
Diana nearly choked on her tea, the swallow burning her throat.
Alexander’s knee pressed harder against hers, his muscled thigh rubbing against hers with a slow, rhythmic pressure that felt like an ultimatum.
Her spine snapped straight. She shifted subtly, trying to find an inch of neutral ground, but he followed her instantly. There was no escape.
Diana inhaled a shallow, trembling breath, fighting the sudden, violent rush of heat that surged upward from that single point of contact. It felt as though he was claiming her through her skirts.
“If you would kindly refrain,” she whispered, her lips barely moving as she kept her gaze fixed on the teapot.
“From what?” he asked mildly. He sounded perfectly composed, the picture of a doting husband, giving Lady Salford no reason to suspect the silent war occurring beneath the table.
“From this… impropriety.”
“If I am to be a convincing husband, Duchess,” he replied, leaning in just enough that his shadow fell over her. His voice was a dark velvet rasp against her ear, his breath a faint, hot brush that made the hair on her arms stand at attention. “I must be thorough.”
Her fingers whitened around the delicate porcelain of her teacup. He did not withdraw. Instead, he leaned harder into her, the subtle friction of his wool trousers against her silk sending a slow pulse of desire through her body.
Lady Salford sighed dramatically, shaking her head. “I was scandalized, Alexander. Truly. To abandon your bride so soon after the wedding breakfast. Business can wait. A wife cannot.”
“I was a fool,” he said calmly.
Diana’s head turned sharply toward him. “A fool?” she repeated, her tone deceptively light. “How generously you summarize the matter.”
Lady Salford made a small, shocked sound.
“Grandmother,” Diana said gently, though her gaze never left Alexander’s face. “His Grace is merely being modest in his self-assessment.” There was steel beneath the civility now. “You did not consider yourself a fool then,” she added quietly to him. “You considered yourself efficient.”
The air grew heavy and hot with the scent of beeswax and the bitter dregs of tea.
Alexander held her stare with a burning focus, his emerald eyes dark and unreadable. Then, he moved. He reached for Diana’s hand, an open, deliberate claim in the full light of the morning.
His fingers enclosed hers with a slow, controlled assurance that made her heart jolt.
His skin was rough, his palm a steady furnace against her cold, trembling fingers.
His thumb began to move, brushing lightly, agonizingly, across her knuckles as though he were reacquainting himself with the delicate map of her skin, memorizing the hollows and the ridges he had once discarded.
Diana’s breath thinned until it was a shallow ache in her chest. She wanted to pull away, to preserve the safety of her anger, but the contact was like a live wire, both terrifying and impossible to break.
“I intend to make amends,” he said.
The words were almost a vow, delivered with a low, vibrating resonance that settled deep in her abdomen. The warmth of his palm felt almost unbearable, a searing reminder of everything she had lacked for twelve months.
“And how shall you do that?” Lady Salford asked approvingly.
He did not look away from Diana when he answered. “By ensuring she never doubts her place at my side again.”
Her throat tightened painfully. He was too convincing of an actor.