Chapter Four
“They say he bathes in the river at midnight, stark naked beneath the moon.”
Fiona choked on her morning chocolate.
Molly, who had delivered this intelligence with the solemnity of a magistrate pronouncing sentence, thumped her briskly between the shoulders. “Are you quite well, miss?”
“Perfectly,” Fiona managed, dabbing at her chin with her napkin. “I was merely unprepared for my breakfast to include commentary upon His Grace’s bathing habits.”
“It is what the kitchen maids insist. They have seen him, apparently. Walking down toward the river in nothing but a dressing gown, and then—” Molly made a vague but expressive gesture. “Well. You may imagine the rest.”
Fiona could. That was precisely the difficulty.
Three days had passed since her arrival at Thornwick Castle, and in that time she had acquired a formidable body of knowledge regarding the Duke of Thornwick.
She knew he took his tea without sugar and his brandy without dilution.
She knew he read philosophy in the original Greek and agricultural treatises for diversion.
She knew he spoke of poetry with unexpected sensitivity and of politics with unnerving exactitude.
She had also learned—thanks to the castle’s efficient network of servants—that the birthmark extended from his throat across his chest like “spilt wine upon marble,” that he had once reduced a visiting bishop to a faint, and that no lady had ever seen him unclothed and remained wholly unaffected thereafter.
The latter claim, Fiona suspected, bore the marks of enthusiastic embroidery. Nevertheless, it had lodged itself firmly within her imagination, and it surfaced at the most inconvenient moments.
For instance: now.
She was meant to be consuming breakfast and arranging her day, not contemplating what the Duke of Thornwick might look like emerging from a river at midnight, water gliding over the breadth of his shoulders while moonlight traced every uncompromising line of him.
“The roads remain impassable,” Molly continued, blithely unaware of her mistress’s internal disarray. “Thomas—the footman—says it may be another week before the bridge is repaired. Perhaps longer.”
Another week.
Another week of afternoon tea with Christian—she had begun to think of him thus in private, though she would never dare risk the familiarity aloud.
Another week of observing the movement of his hands as he spoke, of treasuring the rare near-smiles that flickered across his face, of lying wakeful at night and wondering about birthmarks and midnight rivers and exactly how much of him remained hidden beneath those impeccably buttoned coats.
“Miss?” Molly peered at her. “You are flushed. Do you feel unwell?”
“Quite well.” Fiona set down her cup with decision. “I believe I shall take a turn about the castle today. My ankle is much improved. A cane suffices.”
“Mr Marsh advised continued rest—”
“Mr Marsh does not lie awake counting ceiling stains.” Fiona swung her legs over the side of the bed and tested her weight. The ankle protested but did not betray her. “I require movement, Molly. And novelty.”
Molly sighed in the manner of one who recognises a foregone conclusion. “At least allow me to accompany you.”
“As far as the gallery. After that, I would prefer to explore alone.” At Molly’s expression, she added dryly, “I give you my word I shall not menace anyone with fire irons. I merely require air. And thought.”
What she required—though she did not voice it—was distance.
Distance from the Duke. From the warmth that spread through her when he looked at her as though she were worth seeing. From the disconcerting flutter when their hands accidentally brushed. From the sharper ache when he retreated into formality and she glimpsed the solitude beneath.
She was developing an attachment.
An ill-advised, impractical, wholly impossible attachment to a man who had spent his life fortifying himself against precisely such entanglements.
She must remember this was temporary. That she would depart once the roads cleared. That she was meant to be assisting Adelaide in securing a respectable match—not mooning over a reclusive duke with sad eyes and enormous hands.
She needed, desperately, to think of something other than rivers and moonlight and unfastened collars.
***
The castle proved far more extensive than she had imagined.
Beyond the familiar corridors lay a maze of galleries and chambers, staircases spiralling upward into towers and downward into shadowed depths that suggested ancient cellars. She walked slowly, cane tapping lightly against stone, curiosity guiding her steps.
She passed a gallery of ancestral portraits—Hales stretching back generations, stern and dark-haired, though none possessed Christian’s particular intensity. A music room stood silent beneath dust covers. A small private chapel glowed faintly with coloured light from stained glass windows.
It was in the eastern corridor, distant from the inhabited rooms, that she heard it.
A steady thud. The sharp clash of steel. A breath drawn and expelled with force.
She slowed.
She ought to turn back. Whatever lay beyond the heavy oak door ahead was not her concern.
But curiosity had never been her only weakness.
There was something else now—something that had been growing quietly these past days. A restless awareness. A tightening low in her chest whenever he entered a room. A heat she had not permitted herself to examine too closely.
The door stood slightly ajar. She moved closer and looked within.
The room was vast and high-ceilinged—a training hall. Racks of weapons lined the walls. The floor bore the scuffs of long use.
And at its centre stood the Duke.
He moved with controlled precision, fencing against a practice dummy, blade flashing in swift arcs. But it was not the sword that stilled her breath.
He had removed his coat. His waistcoat. His cravat.
His shirt hung open at the throat.
The birthmark.
Wine-dark, exactly as described. Beginning just beneath his jaw, sweeping across his collarbone, disappearing beneath linen. Its edges softened into his skin like pigment absorbed by marble.
It was not monstrous.
It was not even dramatic.
It was simply… him.
And the rest of him—
She had known he was large. She had felt his strength when he carried her.
But she had not understood the full measure of it.
His shoulders were impossibly wide, his arms roped with muscle that flexed and shifted as he moved through the sword forms. His shirt, damp with exertion, clung to his back, outlining the planes and hollows of a body built for power.
His hair had come loose from its queue, spilling around his face in wild dark waves.
A strand clung to his throat, just above the birthmark, and Fiona found herself transfixed by that single detail—the contrast of dark hair against wine-stained skin, the vulnerable hollow at the base of his throat where his pulse must be beating.
She should look away.
She did not.
A warmth unfurled low in her stomach—slow, deliberate, undeniable.
It startled her less than it should have.
No one had ever spoken of such things to her. Desire was not a subject afforded to respectable women. It was assumed absent. Suppressed. Unnecessary.
And yet her body knew.
She wanted him.
Not as a curiosity. Not as a rebellion.
As a woman.
The realisation steadied her rather than shamed her.
He was beautiful.
Not in the way society defined beauty—not delicate, not refined, not anything so tame. He was beautiful the way a storm was beautiful, the way a cliff face was beautiful, the way wild things were beautiful when you glimpsed them in their element.
She must have made some small sound, for his head turned sharply toward the door.
Their eyes met.
Shock crossed his face. Then alarm. Then something far more dangerous—exposure.
His hand rose instinctively to his throat, as though he might conceal what she had already seen.
“Miss Hart.” His voice was roughened by exertion. “You should not be here.”
She did not retreat.
“I was exploring.” Her own voice betrayed more breath than she intended. “I heard the noise. I did not mean to intrude.”
“You are seeing—” He faltered. His hand remained at his open collar, fingers pressing against skin as though he might conceal it. “You should go.”
“Why?”
The word left her before caution could intervene.
She did not advance yet. She simply stood there, meeting his gaze.
“Because I have seen your birthmark?” she asked more quietly. “I was aware of it already. The servants ensure no one remains ignorant.”
“Knowing and seeing are not the same.” His jaw tightened. “Now you understand why they name me what they do. Why my own mother could scarcely—”
He broke off.
Something inside her hardened at the shame in his voice.
“I do not understand it at all,” she said.
His eyes flicked to hers.
“I think it is beautiful.”
The silence that followed felt different now. Not shocked. Not explosive.
Weighted.
Christian stared at her as though he were attempting to detect mockery—and finding none.
“You cannot mean that.”
“It is like a painting—rich colour against pale stone. It is also part of you.” Her voice did not waver. “And I have seen nothing in you thus far that is monstrous.”
His chest rose and fell more slowly now—but deeper. The hand at his throat lowered a fraction.
“Miss Hart. You should not speak so carelessly.”
“I am not careless.” Her tone softened. “I am observant.”
He looked away first.
That small surrender altered something between them.
She took one step forward.
“Miss Hart,” he said again, but there was less command in it now. More warning. “This is not a spectacle for your curiosity.”
“It is not curiosity.”
Her voice dropped—steadier now, not reckless but resolved.
“It is… admiration.”
His breath caught at that.
She saw it. The precise moment the word struck.
“You do not know what you say.”