Chapter 1
One
ETTA
“What are you doing here?” Etta’s hands flew to her bodice at the intrusion.
“I’m here for you.” The unmistakably deep and familiarly reckless voice answered. It sent a thrill of pure frenzy through her body. As it always did.
“F-for me?” Her fingers fidgeted with some white lace she found hanging down her bodice between her breasts.
His eyes dropped to where her fingers were, stilling them. “Yes. Are you coming?”
“W-what?”
“Are you coming with me or do I need to throw you over my shoulder and haul you out of here?” Of course he would be direct like that.
Just showing up here and demanding that she make an impossible decision.
As if she hadn’t been faced with the same decision her whole life, only to make up her mind and then be forced to reconsider everything.
Etta’s eyes darted around the small chamber that Wilhem had snuck into. Flowers rested on the table. White lace. Pearls. They were all flashes in her mind. “I c-couldn’t possibly—” She stopped herself. He didn’t even need to interrupt her. Her own invalid thoughts couldn’t be spoken aloud.
“Couldn’t what? Abscond with me?” he scoffed before prying the door open to peer out a small gap. The muscles in his back rippled with his every move, and her eyes tracked every flex. “The way I see it, we’ve only got a few minutes, Etta. What’s your choice? Me? Or him?”
Oh God. Putting it that way, her heart fluttered inside of her chest. It would always be me. Me being Wilhem. But it wasn’t that easy. It just wasn’t done. She simply could not alter the entirety of her future on a whim. It was—
“This was a mistake,” Wilhem said, shaking his head. “I should never have listened to Tilly.”
“Tilly told you to come?”
“You know my sister wanted to be here herself, but she couldn’t leave in the middle of her art program.”
“I wouldn’t have asked her to do that,” Etta reassured him, though she wasn’t really sure why. He didn’t care what other people thought. Especially not her. Or her brother. Well, particularly especially not her brother.
“No.” He rolled his lips. “I don’t think you would have.”
They stood staring at each other. The space growing smaller.
It always did when she was in Wilhem’s presence.
Being a duke, he had an essence about him.
Domineering. Vacuous. But then again, that didn’t quite explain why she never felt this way around other men of equal or greater status.
And she didn’t even need his presence for her to grow short of breath, but imagining his presence was enough.
She knew that from experience because whenever she perused her pink leatherbound book, The One With the Wanton Woman, she imagined him as the man in the picture doing things to her.
His presence, or even the idea of his presence was enough to affect her in ways she didn’t understand.
Too curious to remain silent, she asked, “What’s the plan here?” But even asking it, she knew what his reply would be. She’d known him too long to expect anything else.
“The plan?” he shrugged. “The plan is to get you out of here. Then we’ll figure out the rest.”
“But what about this?” She pulled the sides of her skirt outward, as if showing off a new dress to her mother for approval.
“It’s…nice.”
“No. Isn’t it…obvious?”
“We’ll be discreet, Novelina.”
She coughed at the ludicrous nickname. “Everyone will know…”
“Everyone will know that you left. That’s all. No one knows I’m here.”
“Not even Leland?”
“Especially not your brother,” he snapped. “You think I want my head cut off. Nah. I’m quite attached to all my body parts.”
And she couldn’t help it, she dragged her eyes down the very body he referred to.
It was—and always had been—quite the specimen.
Probably from all his travels. Hoisting sails.
Lifting barrels. Paddling. Whatever it was that hardworking travelers did aboard a giant ship crossing oceans.
Well…probably not too much paddling then.
But his muscles always had a way of intimidating the fabric he wore into wrapping itself tightly around them.
Stretching. Coiling. About to tear open. But somehow restrained just enough.
“We should sit down and come up with a plan so that—”
“Etta.” He took one step toward her, effectively closing any and all space between them, including any and all air she needed to breathe. “You leave now with me or you stay.” He tilted his head toward the door. “You know what that means.”
And it shouldn’t have been such a hard choice. She wanted to leave. Despite all the protests and warnings in her head blaring at her as if she were about to make the biggest mistake of her life.
And worst of all, she wanted to leave precisely with him. Even though she should really leave with anyone other than him. Their history. The family tension. There were no points in his favor…except…he was here.
A knock sounded on the door.
“Oh my stars!” Etta gasped. “Hide!”
Wilhem tossed his chin up and crossed his arms. “Where exactly would you like me to hide, Readerkins? Under your skirts?”
“Etta?” A female voice called gently from the other side of the door. “Are you ready?”
Heat flared in her cheeks as if someone held up a torch to either side. “Just…” she looked desperately at Wilhem, “don’t say anything.” A noncommittal shrug was his only reply before a woman snuck into the room.
“Oh—”
“Mary, this is an old friend of m–my brother’s. The Duke of Frompton. Wilhem, this is Mary, Duchess of Wellingford.”
Mary’s glance was more curious than anything, while Wilhem saved all his attention for Etta.
“What’s it going to be, Belletrist?” Wilhem teased with another moniker.
“I-I—”
In a gentle tone, her friend asked, “You’re not coming, are you, Etta?” Etta’s eyes tracked Mary’s who followed Wilhelm, who—incidentally—was still staring at Etta.
“I..”
“I wouldn’t either, if I were you.” Mary nodded to Wilhem. “And he was him.”
The furious blush that had stolen into her cheeks was now heading south. Way far south.
“I found a good duke for myself, Etta. I know it’s worth whatever the cost. Don’t settle for less.”
Wilhem just smirked at Etta while her friend gave completely irrelevant advice. Her and Wilhem? No. Never. That would not ever happen. Not in a million years.
“You heard the wise duchess.” Wilhem extended his hand. “What’s your choice?”
And though she should have thought it through even just a little bit longer, and she probably should have made some pros and cons lists, she didn’t do either of those things.
She simply put her hand in his and ran away from her own wedding.