Chapter 2 #2
“I’ll tell you anyway,” he continued, glancing down at the floor before meeting her eyes.
“I think that a cornered woman will resort to remarkable logic to justify an insane plan. I am not a man who trades in gossip, Miss Vane, but even I could not escape the whispers at the ball last night. Everyone was talking about it. I know you are ruined. I know about Lord Finch, and I know you find yourself in an incredibly desperate position. But trying to trap a man of my standing in a scandal to force a marriage? It is a cruel thing to do.”
He took a slow step toward her, looking down at her like a strict schoolmaster addressing a particularly disappointing pupil.
“No matter how desperate your circumstances are, no matter how much the world has backed you into a corner, one does not use these tactics. It is low. It is a thoroughly unprincipled way to navigate society.”
Euphemia stood entirely bewildered. What could she possibly say to defend herself? To an outside observer… to a judge as severe as him, the evidence was damning.
Yet, the absolute arrogance of his lecture made something fierce snap inside her. Desperate? Yes. Clumsy with directions? Clearly. But she was raised by Lady Byron, and she would not be lectured on morality by a man who looked at her as if she were a common thief.
“A low thing to do?” she echoed, her voice dropping as she took a step toward him, matching his stare.
“How comforting it must be, Sir, to view the world from a height where a simple wrong turn is elevated to a malicious conspiracy. I assure you, if I were going to compromise a man of the ton for his fortune, I would have been more strategic with my pick. You would most certainly not be on the list.”
Before he could even process the remark, Euphemia snatched up her stray slippers from the floor, turned sharply on her bare heel, and marched directly toward the door.
She reached the heavy oak paneling, her fingers wrapping around the cold brass handle, desperate for the hallway and the sanity it promised. But right as she began to turn it, a sudden movement cut off her escape.
A hand clamped gently but firmly around her forearm.
The touch was a shock to her system. After the biting winter chill of his words, his skin was incredibly, inexplicably warm through the thin fabric of her sleeve.
Euphemia held her breath as his fingers closed around her arm.
The heat of him sent a violent shiver straight up her spine.
It was a tremor so pronounced she knew for certain he must have felt it vibrate against his palm.
Panic flared in her chest. She turned her head sharply, ready to demand her release, but the words died instantly on her tongue. Up close, without the room’s vastness separating them, she was forced to peer directly into his eyes.
They were green. A striking, dark, but vivid green, flecked with brilliant amber patterns that seemed to catch the morning sun like crushed emeralds. She found herself studying the fine, sharp lines around his mouth, the dark sweep of his lashes, and the nearly perfect symmetry of his face.
He didn’t look like a real person. He looked like an illustration brought to life.
She had read, in the novels she kept on the highest shelf so that Seraphina could not raise her eyebrows at them, about heroes who looked like this.
She had thought those descriptions fanciful.
She had thought the authors were performing.
Specifically, he looked like the brooding, tempestuous anti-heroes found within the pages of Mrs. Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho or the dark, magnetic figures in Lady Caroline Lamb’s Glenarvon, the very books she had devoured in the quiet libraries of the country, dreaming of a world filled with grand, tragic passions.
He had that same dangerous, poetic beauty, the kind that popular writers used to ruin the senses of sensible young women.
For a terrifying second, she simply stared, entirely paralyzed by the sheer aesthetic perfection of the man holding her captive.
Then, the absurdity of the moment rushed back, shattering the spell. Her jaw tightened, and she wrenched her mind back from the dangerous territory of romantic poetry.
“What do you think you are doing?” she demanded, her voice shaking as she tried to pull her arm from his grasp. “Release me at once!”
“So you could do what?” he asked.
“Leave,” said Euphemia. “Which is what a person does when they wish to no longer be somewhere.”
“You would be executing a social suicide,” he revealed.
He didn’t let go of her hand, almost as if he didn’t trust her not to bolt the second he released her.
The proximity between them was absurd, she was practically pinned between his chest and the door, the sharp scent of his sandalwood soap warring with the lingering aroma of the disastrous wine.
“Are you still intoxicated? Perhaps that’s the reason you’re not thinking properly. ”
“I am thinking!” she hissed, though her eyes were still traitorously darting to the flecks in his emerald gaze. “I am thinking that you are incredibly rude!”
“Well, I am thinking of my own peace of mind,” Nathaniel countered. “Do not think I am stopping you to be nice, Miss Vane or that I have fallen for your schemes. If you want to ruin your own life, that is your choice. But you will not drag my name into the mess with you.”
Euphemia’s anger paused, replaced by shock. “Your name?”
“My name,” he repeated, his jaw tightening as he looked down at her.
“If anyone sees you leaving my bed chamber looking like this, society will not just blame you. I would be forced to be involved. High society loves nothing more than forcing a duke into marriage over a scandal. By tonight, I would have your family knocking on my door, demanding that I marry you just because you took a wrong turn after too much wine. If that is truly what happened.”
He leaned a bit closer, using his height to keep her from moving. “Or perhaps, this is your end goal?” he asked, looking at her suspiciously. “You want people to see you leave my bedchamber?”
“You are delusional,” she retorted, fuming.
“I have spent years avoiding women who scheme, Miss Vane. You will stay right here until I tell you it is safe to leave. If you ruin your life out there, that is your business. But if you ruin it in my hallway, it becomes my problem too.”