Chapter Twelve
If she could just get that line to rhyme…
Hmm, that was a tricky one. Sarah glared at the pocketbook, as though that would magic up a rhyme for “battle.”
Rattle, cattle, mettle? No, not quite. Prattle. Tattle. Chattel…
No, none of them quite worked. She couldn’t write about a baby’s rattle in the middle of a desperate and vicious attack on—Sarah’s eyes gleamed. Perhaps not, but she could certainly describe the swords as rattling, couldn’t she? A great and glorious rattle—
“Sarah?”
Sarah bit the end of her pencil, tasting the lead. It was so close to being good, she could almost hear it echoing around a great room with hundreds listening.
And with a great sigh, the world’d never heard,
The hero parted his lips and uttered a word.
No, it was no good. Placing the pocketbook in her lap, Sarah leaned back and closed her eyes, allowing her mind to dreamily linger.
Montague. Montague Lancaster, Duke of Caelfall.
With each passing fencing lesson, her ability to prevent herself from launching into the man’s arms was getting more strained.
How did any woman manage it? There was something so delightfully delicious about him. Sarah had discovered her inability to resist since that shameful kissing situation she had managed to get herself tangled in.
“Now kiss me. For research.”
“Sarah!”
And it would be most wanton, Sarah knew, to concoct a situation for it to occur again.
Most wanton.
Such a shame he was starting to overtake all her waking moments. Whenever not in the Wessex College gymnasium, in fact, she was thinking of when she could next be with him.
Montague had captured her heart in a way no other gentleman had.
Sarah could not explain it, had never sought out such a connection…
yet it was powerful. She could not break it.
In fact, she sometimes permitted herself to daydream the distance in rank melted away, and Montague would look at her and realize he could never live without—
“Sarah Lockwood!”
Sarah started.
The morning room of the Lockwood residence was picked out in blue.
The light blue looked particularly beautiful as morning light streamed into the room.
There was an elegant set of chairs seated around a bay window, a console table with a vase of flowers, and a chess board laid out.
Her mother always said, “So people do not think we are dullards.”
Neither of them had ever played it.
Mrs. Lockwood was seated in one of the chairs by the window, enjoying two of her favorite pastimes simultaneously: drinking tea, and people watching through the window.
No, three of her favorite pastimes, Sarah corrected herself with a smile. Drinking tea, people watching, and criticizing her daughter.
“Yes, Mama?” she said aloud.
Her mother frowned, as though checking her tone for cheek. Unable to find any, she said brightly, “And how is your poem getting along, my dear?”
Sarah waited for the cutting remark, despondence growing in her chest, but it did not come. Mrs. Lockwood sipped her tea—a bergamot—with evident pleasure while she waited.
It was so unlike her mother, Sarah had to take a moment to collect herself.
Her mother, showing an actual interest in her poetry? It was bizarre to the extreme.
But Mrs. Lockwood was waiting patiently for a reply, so Sarah felt obliged to give one—though guilt seared through her as she spoke. How easy it had been to lay aside her pocketbook and daydream of a certain handsome individual…
“It is coming along well, I think,” she said awkwardly as a doorbell echoed down the hall. Ah, thank goodness. Her mother was to receive a visitor—a distraction.
Her mother nodded. “So it is finished?”
Finished? Oh blast, it was only days until the recital, and the stupid thing was most certainly not finished. Not in the slightest.
That was the trouble with turning one’s mind to one’s instructor, and not the fencing itself, she thought ruefully. Her mind was so entangled with thoughts of Montague she had failed quite spectacularly to make any real progress with the poem since last Wednesday.
Sarah swallowed. “Close, I think. It is difficult with a battle—not insurmountable, but I have yet to understand the transition between the battle and the duel.”
She had said too much. Already her mother’s eyebrows had risen so high they were almost lost in the curls that framed Mrs. Lockwood’s forehead.
“Battle? Duel?”
“It is a love poem,” Sarah said hastily, as though she could undo the damage already done. “Well, a poem about love, I suppose—no, more a poem about—”
“His Grace, the Duke of Caelfall, m’lady.”
Sarah almost fell off her sofa. She had not noticed the door open and their maid slip in, but the name she announced in hushed tones, evidently awed by the owner of the name she had to say, was not one she had been expecting.
Montague—here?
It appeared her mother was just as astonished as her, perhaps more so. Mrs. Lockwood gaped like a fish pulled from the ocean, then she rose hastily, teacup still in hand.
“His Grace?”
Sarah knew she ought to warn her mother, explain this was not as great an honor as she might think—the duke was her fencing tutor. This was not a social, let alone romantic call.
The words died in her mouth as Montague strode into the room and bowed to her mother before throwing a wink in her direction.
Her insides melted. Oh, how could Sarah attempt to lie and call this unromantic? There was nothing more that she wanted it to be. Yet she knew, logically, there was no intent in that regard from this man.
He may look at her as though he wished to take all her clothes off, Sarah thought as her cheeks burned and she curtsied in polite response. But that did not mean he would. Or that she would let him. Probably.
Her mother was fussing. “Oh my—a duke! Goodness, Your Grace, I never expected—please sit, have a cup of tea! Have mine!”
Sarah closed her eyes in agony as her mother rushed forward in a paroxysm of nerves and thrust her half-drunk teacup into the man’s hands.
When she opened them, it was to see Montague accepting the teacup with very good manners but a slight quirk of his lips.
Oh, why did her mother have to be so…so like that?
“Please, sit, Your Grace. What an honor, what an honor indeed,” Mrs. Lockwood fretted, patting the man’s shoulder as she pointed to a chair, as though he may not know what such apparatus was for.
It was all Sarah could do not to stride away and leave the shameful display behind.
Why was her mother so ridiculous? Didn’t she have any idea how foolish she was?
Yet she had to admit, she was still standing like an idiot, astonished to find him here. Montague, in her house? With her mother?
It was too much to bear—two worlds colliding which should have remained apart. Yet what could she do? She could not order Montague to leave. Her mother would never let her hear the end of it if she were to do something so rude as to merely depart.
“Sarah!” hissed her mother.
Sarah started and saw both mother and duke were seated happily. “Yes. Right. Fine.”
Thankfully, the instant she lowered herself onto the sofa, Montague spoke. “I wondered if I may prevail upon you to permit your daughter to accompany me on a summer walk.”
Sarah rocketed up from the sofa so quickly she barely touched it. “Summer walk?”
Was he mad? Did he not understand the expectations raised in her mother—that would be raised in any mother, should such a thing be undertaken?
She attempted to show him, with the widening of her eyes and a “no” mouthed behind her mother’s back, but it was quite useless. Her mother had snatched onto the suggestion like a dog to a bone. Sarah knew, as she groaned inwardly, that she would never let it go.
“Oh, what a capital idea! Sarah is so fond of walks and is such excellent company, Your Grace. I am sure you will have no occasion to ever wish to walk with another!”
Sarah’s shoulders slumped. Could she not have a modicum of decorum? Of subtlety?
And it was Mrs. Lockwood who was always critiquing her for lack of style!
The corners of Montague’s lips were twitching and Sarah was overcome by a great desire to laugh, chastise her mother, and whack the duke on the arm, all at once.
Such a shame none of those responses were appropriate.
“Fine, right, good,” she snapped. “Come on then.”
Sarah strode across the room to the hall, hoping to vacate the house immediately, but she was unfortunate enough to have a mother with an impressive stride.
Mrs. Lockwood caught up with her before the duke did. “Why did you not tell me you were acquainted with a duke?”
Her mother’s hiss was low, and evidently demanded an answer.
Sarah attempted to think of one as she pulled her reticule onto her arm. How was she supposed to answer? She was certain her mother would no longer worry about her fencing lessons—not now that she knew it had brought her daughter into the path of a duke—but would have all sorts of expectations now.
Expectations Sarah herself was fighting to ignore.
“Sarah!”
“It’s just a walk, Mama,” Sarah hissed back as Montague stepped into the hallway. “Let go, Mama!”
“Ah yes, of course, I must let you depart,” Mrs. Lockwood almost sang with glee as she glanced at the duke, leaning against his cane as he waited for them to end their conversation. “Take good care of her, Your Grace, she is my only child—and heir, but that is quite another—”
“Goodbye, Mama!” Sarah said firmly, mortification spreading through her bones like honey, sticky and discomforting.
It was with great relief that she slammed the door once Montague had stepped out.
“Why on earth did you do that?” Sarah exploded.
It was the wrong thing to say. Though she meant every word, the manner of her expression was quite unlike her—fueled by the embarrassment and shame of her mother’s words and actions, along with her own passion.
A walk with a duke, with Montague…yes, it was something delightful, but now that her mother knew…
Well. She would never hear the end of it.
Sarah was not surprised Montague looked offended. “You are ashamed of me then?”