5. CHAPTER 5
T he apology, coming from a man she suspected did not apologize often, offered in a sincere if somewhat stiff manner, made her wish she had not lost her temper.
The duke appeared too formidable to be hurt.
Powerful enough to make her and everyone on this island bend to his will.
She had thought him unshakable. Yet when she spoke her words, for a few unguarded moments, his eyes had widened, his lips parted.
Then he had firmed his jaw and schooled his face to neutrality.
But she had seen it. Or sensed it. The pain she had inflicted.
That was not her intention. But God help her, she was terrified. Confused. The day had battered her from every direction.
"I apologize as well, Your Grace." She offered a small smile. "I shouldn't have spoken so sharply."
If he was her husband, how would it appear from his perspective to find her marrying another man? What did he think of her? Of Paul?
A tenderness softened his austere features. That flash of vulnerability tugged at her conscience and burned off the last of her indignation.
"Let's start over, then," he said. "I did not intend to barge into your life in such a way. I never meant to cause you any distress." He extended his hand. "I'm Valentine St Aubyn."
Valentine. What a romantic name for a man who looked anything but.
Oh, he was handsome, but not in a romantic way.
Dark hair, lightly threaded with silver, cropped in a no-nonsense style and arranged in neat layers.
The straight nose, chiseled jaw, and lean face created an almost stoic sort of beauty, while the crease between his eyebrows spoke of worry and duty.
He was not a seducer. He was a conqueror.
And right now, he was looking at her the way she imagined generals studied a territory they intended to claim.
She appreciated that he did not tell her who she was. He allowed her to introduce herself in whatever manner she saw fit.
"It is a pleasure to meet you, Your Grace. Incidentally, I have been called Grace for as long as I can remember."
She took his offered hand. Warm. Strong. It enveloped hers as he lifted it to his lips. The contact sent a shiver up her arm that had nothing to do with the cold.
"The pleasure is all mine, Grace. Please call me Valentine. That is how you used to address me."
"Valentine." The name rolled off her tongue as though she had pronounced it thousands of times before. She probably had. His gaze sharpened, fixed on her mouth as she formed the syllables.
"I would very much like for you to become reacquainted with me…
Grace." She noticed the pause, the deliberate use of her new name.
"I will answer any questions you have. Tell you anything you wish to know about me, or about yourself.
I should also like to hear about your life these past seven years. "
He looked to the rector and Paul. "Could I speak to my wife in private?"
Heat crept up her neck as she realized she had forgotten about the Reverend Carteret and Paul, who were both standing in the room. Good God, she had been about to marry Paul. No. She had married Paul. They had stood at the altar and spoken their vows before God and the congregation.
What a tangle. She had been so consumed by her own discoveries that she had failed to consider how Paul must feel. Their marriage was a practical union between friends, not a grand love affair. But there was genuine affection between them. And this had to be humiliating for him.
She needed to speak with him. But who to address first? The stranger who claimed to be her husband, or the friend who had almost become one?
The rector decided for her. "Dr. Harrison and I shall wait in my office. "
Paul looked none too happy with that, but she sent him a tremulous smile and a nod. "Please, Paul. I need to sort out the situation. We will speak later."
He nodded and filed out after the vicar.
She turned back to the duke, who still held her hand.
"Thank you." His voice was low. "I want to be clear about my intentions, Grace. I wish to recover what was once between us. My aim is to earn your trust. For that, we would need to cohabitate. I'd like to bring you to my home — our home. I want to restore you to your rightful place."
A conqueror indeed. And sure of his victory.
She stood, walked to the window, and turned her back on him.
Her rightful place. What did that even mean?
She saw herself adrift in some enormous house, dozens of servants whose identities she could not recall, rooms whose purpose she did not know.
And beyond that house — London. Society.
The Duchess of Dalton must have been a grand lady.
Sophisticated. Accomplished. Grace Harper was none of those things.
She would be the talk of every drawing room in England.
"That life you talk about. Being a duchess. It sounds very grand. But I don't think I'm capable of it anymore."
T here had been a tremor beneath her words that betrayed her fear. She was not refusing; she just needed reassurance.
He breathed out, relaxing a bit.
"Of course you are capable," he said. "I know you are. You were a wonderful duchess. It was as if you were born for the role."
She shook her head. "You are thinking of a person who does not exist anymore.
The only life I know is a simple one in a sleepy village in Guernsey, as the rector's mother's companion.
I'm just… me. A woman who keeps the household accounts and mends the curtains and takes her walks along the cliff path.
I don't understand the first thing about being a du chess.
I wouldn't know how to address my own servants, let alone the lords and ladies of your acquaintance.
Can you imagine the spectacle? A duchess who can't remember the names of her own guests? "
The fear was legitimate. She was right that society could be merciless, and the ton's appetite for scandal was bottomless. A returned duchess with no memory would feed that appetite for months.
But she had navigated those waters before. She could do it again. She needed the chance.
"At least try it before you reject it," he said, and the idea came to him whole. "A trial period. Come live with me for three months. See for yourself what your life would be like. You can do as you please. I will not make demands of you of any kind."
She turned, her eyes studying him with a directness that was so Vivienne it made his chest ache.
"And if, at the end of that period, I decide I'm not the person you think I am? If I wish to return to the life I have built here?"
He swallowed the protest. "Then I won't stand in your way. I will abide by your wishes and allow you to return."
She nodded. "That seems fair. But three months is too long."
"Too long? After seven years apart? Three months is nothing by comparison."
"One month," she countered.
"Seven weeks. One for each year we lost. A symbolic gesture, not a demand. Seven weeks, and at the end, you decide your future. Without pressure. Without duty. Will you give me that?"
He could see the struggle in her face. The willingness warring with the uncertainty. At least he could still read her. That was something.
"I need to think about it. This has all been a great shock. I don't feel capable of deciding anything at the moment."
"Of course." He stepped closer. The desire to touch her was overwhelming. To hold her. Confirm that she was real, that this was not some fever dream born of seven years of grief.
But she drew in on herself, arms wrapping around her torso .
He stopped.
He could be patient. For seven years, he had waited without hope. Now that he had found her, he would win her back. If she granted him the seven weeks.
If she didn't, he would find another way. He had not come this far to lose her again.
S he had so many questions that she could not sort them. She seized the nearest.
"How old am I?" Something so simple. Even children knew their age. But she couldn't even remember her birthday. For seven years she had guessed her age, and added one more year on the anniversary of her arrival at Guernsey.
"You turned thirty-five two weeks ago."
"Two weeks ago… I always wondered…" But before she could dwell on that discovery, her curiosity jumped to the next burning question. "Do I have any other family? Who are my parents? Do I have siblings?"
"You are an only child. Your parents are Lord and Lady Kilbrannan."
"Kilbrannan." She turned the word over. "That sounds Scottish."
"It is."
"I didn't know I was Scottish." A strange, almost absurd thing to say. She had lived thirty-five years and didn't know where she came from. "I once met a Scottish merchant who passed through town. I don't speak the way he did. Do you think I lost my accent along with my memory?"
He smiled. Just the corners of his mouth, but it changed his face. Made him warm. Made him someone she could imagine knowing. "No. You sound as you always did. You spent many years in England."
"I sound like you," she said.
"Yes. "
A tiny reassurance, but a reassurance nonetheless. She had always noticed that she spoke differently from the people in Guernsey. One more thing that marked her as an outsider here, and brought her closer to the duke.
"Was I close to my parents?"
"Very. They visited us at least once a year, and we visited them often too. The news of your disappearance at sea devastated them. I can imagine their joy when they learn you are alive."
The panic rose before she understood its source. She stepped back, wrapping her arms about herself.
"Could you not tell them yet?"
He frowned.
"I cannot face them. Not now." She pressed her hand to her breastbone, where the tightness had settled. "I am still struggling to comprehend that I may be married to you. To have more people looking at me expecting an emotion, a response I cannot give…" She shook her head. "It would overwhelm me."
His jaw tightened. She watched him wrestle with it.
"It will be as you wish," he said.
She exhaled. Her shoulders dropped.
Another question. This one she had been circling since the beginning, afraid to land on it. But she had to know.
"Do we have children?"
Something rippled across his face. A tightening of the mouth, a narrowing of his eyes. It was fast. An emotion surfaced, and he shut it away immediately.
"No children," he said.
Two words. Flat. Final.
She opened her mouth to ask why, but the look on his face stopped her. Whatever lived beneath those two words, it cost him to be even this close to it.
"I see. "
She would broach the subject again when they became better acquainted. When she had the courage to hear the answer.
"Your home. Is it far?"
He breathed out. The smallest sound.
"Not at all. My seat is in Cornwall. It's called Penrose Castle, on the coast near Falmouth." His voice steadied, returning to the measured tone she was beginning to recognize as his natural register. "You have been close to home all these years."
"At the opposite end of Great Britain from my Scottish family," she said, half to herself. "And yet just across the Channel from here."
"Yes." There was pain behind the admission.
A silence settled between them. Not hostile. Almost companionable.
"I haven't agreed to go," she reminded him. "To the seven weeks."
"I know."
"I must speak with Paul first. And with the rector. This is not a decision I can make in a quarter of an hour."
"I would not ask you to." He inclined his head. "Take whatever time you need. I shall be at the inn. I believe there is one in the village?"
"The Crown. But it is modest."
"I'm certain it will suffice." His tone was dry. She suspected that the Crown's offer would not meet the Duke of Dalton's usual expectations.
She almost smiled.
"I shall send word tomorrow," she said, and extended her hand.
He took it. This time the contact was not a shiver but a warmth. His thumb traced across her knuckles, perhaps without thinking. Despite his self-control, his hands betrayed him.
"Tomorrow, then."
"Until tomorrow, Valentine."
She used his name deliberately and saw in his eyes what she had seen before — hope so fierce it looked like pain. It frightened her. Not because she thought he would hurt her. But because she might not be up to fulfilling it .
He turned and walked out. His footsteps measured. As composed as if he had concluded a business meeting rather than the most extraordinary encounter of his life.
The door closed behind him, and she pressed both hands to her face. Her fingers trembled.
She was married to a duke. She had parents in Scotland and a life in Cornwall and a name that was not Grace. She had been someone else, a woman this man had loved. Still loved, if the anguish in his eyes was any measure. And she could not remember a single thing about her.
Not one thing.
Except the way his name felt in her mouth. As though some part of her had never stopped saying it.
She lowered her hands. Straightened her spine. She had survived seven years without a past. She could survive one more night.
Tomorrow, she would decide.