Chapter 8
How could a man’s eyes look so warm and cold at the same time?
This was the thought that kept plaguing Elowyn as she bit into an éclair at Lady Ophelia’s garden tea party, trying very hard not to look at the man who’d just stepped onto the lawn.
The one with the burning cold eyes. But she could feel him.
Lord, how she could feel him. She didn’t need to stare when her awareness of his every movement was this complete.
What was Mandeville doing here?
He didn’t seem like a man who attended these sorts of events.
A wolf prowling a flock of sheep. Just like memories of him prowled her mind.
She could almost feel the shape of his hands at her waist, the firm line of his arm as if he had already claimed the waltz position and was guiding her through it.
Worse, she could imagine the press of his mouth against hers, the warmth of it lingering long after the kiss ended.
The thought sent a ridiculous flutter through her stomach, equal parts alarm and something that felt a lot like anticipation.
Persephone sent her a curious glance, eyes sparkling too much for Elowyn’s comfort. She should have joined Isadora in lawn games.
“Don’t give me that look,” she told her friend.
A bubble of laughter. “I’m not giving you any look.”
“You know exactly what look you’re giving me.”
Persephone lifted her brows. “The one that says you have been struck dumb by a handsome man and trying your best to pretend you haven’t been?”
Elowyn nearly choked on her indrawn breath. “I am not struck dumb.”
“Deny it all you want, but that man has gotten under your skin. Not that I blame you. He is handsome. In a cold way. However, in all the seasons we’ve passed together, I’ve never seen you this lively with anyone before.”
Elowyn popped the rest of the éclair into her mouth and chewed almost punishingly.
Lively . . .
She was pretty sure her friend wanted to use another word.
Such as fiery. Or fascinated. Or possessed.
Alarming. The trouble was, she didn’t know what to do with a man who made her feel both things at once—safe and unsteady, protected and utterly out of her depth.
She’d spent five seasons trying to make that season the best, and each time, something had gone wrong.
She’d found comfort in existing only at the edges of rooms where no one’s gaze swept twice.
And then she stepped into the path of a fox and a wolf, and that wolf .
. . he . . . spoke to some starving part of her .
. . But Mandeville was not a man to do the honorable thing.
The way he had kissed her . . . and then agreed to stay away from her .
. . No. A true gentleman would have courted her, right?
Mandeville . . . he was every bit as ruthless as her brother had claimed.
As the rumors whispered. But then he draped a jacket over her shoulders.
Madly confusing.
Elowyn didn’t rightly know which version of him to trust.
There were two dukes.
The calculating duke who did not wish to owe favors and demanded exchanges or the man whose hands had firmly held her when she missed a step.
Perhaps both were true. Perhaps that was precisely the trouble with him: he was not one contradiction she could resolve and dismiss, but a dozen of them, and she’d never in her life met a man complicated enough to make her want to stay and untangle him rather than quit and wait for another season to try again.
Had she fallen for a man who could never fall back for her?
How Shakespearean.
Nevertheless . . . Do not be that woman who falls for the first man she kissed, Elowyn.
That would be ideal, yes. But it might be already too late.
“Oh, right,” Persephone said, drawing her back to the present. “Do you know what happened after you left the night you caught him with Lady Gabrielle?”
Elowyn furrowed her brows. No. She’d never even thought of what happened after she’d made her timely retreat. “Why? Was it something bad?” Was that one of the reasons Lady Gabrielle had splashed wine all over her? Wicked woman.
“Mandeville climbed through the window to make his grand escape.”
Elowyn’s eyes flew wide at that. “He did what?”
“Right? I was shocked as well. A man as rigid as him climbing through a window like a thief.”
“Where did you hear that?”
Persephone smirked. “That wretched friend of that wretched woman let it slip to a friend of a friend. I won’t be surprised if more rumors spread about Lady Gabrielle after what she did to you. People are whispering tales of her jealousy.”
Oh, Lord. Another reason not to show her face in public.
“Do you know what I think?” Persephone added, her brows gathering thoughtfully. “I think no matter what that woman did, or how she made it look, he would have let her be ruined rather than marry her.”
Let her be ruined . . . The thought made Elowyn shiver, but she felt the ring of truth.
Oh, she had no doubt he would have done just that.
But why did he need her then? There must be something else going on beneath the surface.
Her brother’s warning came to mind. The duke was not a man who required help.
And Mandeville’s warning about Dansbury.
Just what in the merciful heaven’s was going on?
“Lady Elowyn.”
Her back snapped straight at the gruff voice that skittered over her skin and burrowed straight into the marrow of her bones.
“You heard that, too, right?” she asked Persephone, not yet daring to turn.
Her friend’s eyes went wide, darting from Elowyn to a point somewhere behind her, then back again, a slow grin spreading across her face. “Oh! Look!”
Don’t you dare.
“The archery match is starting.”
Persephone!
“I’ve been waiting for this all afternoon,” her friend chirped, wagging her brow before ending with, “See you later!”
“Persephone!”
Elowyn drew a deep breath. If she could run after her friend, she would. Her feet, however, remained rooted on the spot. Slowly exhaling, she turned to that overwhelming, looming, presence, her gaze meeting a pair of burning, cold, amber eyes.
***
He couldn’t help himself.
All Julien wanted to do was see if the wallflower was all right.
And she was. She didn’t look any worse for wear.
In fact, she looked downright beautiful in her soft pink dress.
Just like the first time he’d set his eyes on her.
A vision of sunshine and sweetness. She might even have smiled a time or two.
And he knew, because he couldn’t keep his eyes off her.
So much so, that Wrath had abandoned him with a mutter of nauseating love sickness.
Which he simply ignored because he was suffering from nothing of the sort.
It rankled, however.
She refused to look at him. Refused to acknowledge him in every sort of way.
And the pit in his gut that forever shimmered with fury spread through him.
Not even his damn toes were spared. He couldn’t bloody stand, damn well live, with the distance she placed between them, even though he understood it. Wanted it. Agreed to it.
But couldn’t stay away.
When her gaze finally met his, nothing inside him calmed. No. How could it? His heart sank at the wariness creeping into the depth of hers.
“Can we talk?” Julien asked softly.
He had no idea what he wanted to bloody impart, but it was imperative that he talk with her.
Hear from her mouth that she wasn’t damaged beyond repair over what happened to her.
Deep down, he knew she wouldn’t be. She was strong.
Not like him, who succumbed to his anger.
Who would destroy anyone who slighted him.
He didn’t know if he’d ever change that part of him.
She gave a slow nod. “Very well. I do have a question for you.”
Relief flooded him. He offered his arm and her brows furrowed. Tension shot back up his back. “Take a stroll with me? Please, Elowyn.”
He noticed gooseflesh break out over the swell of her breast, the hair on his arms rising as she placed the palm of her hand over his arm. He let out a slow breath, guiding her to a set of trees clustered beyond a man-made pond.
“Are you all right?” he asked softly.
She glanced up at him. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“That night . . .”
She averted her gaze. “Let’s not talk about that night, please.”
His jaw clenched. Very well. “You said you had a question.”
“I do.” She paused, an unnerving few seconds, before asking bluntly, “You were never planning on falling into the marriage trap laid for you, were you?”
Julien flinched. Of all the questions she could have asked, she had to ask that question.
This was all his damn fault. If he hadn’t called on her.
If he hadn’t interrupted the dance meant for Stagbourne, then she might not have been humiliated in such a way.
Red dripping from her body like blood. Rage still simmered at the memory, and would, until he got the sight out of his head. Which he knew would be never.
“No.” The truth.
A moment of silence passed.
“Then you never needed my help,” she said softly. “Why approach me, then?”
He should never have done that. He could have used other means to handle Dansbury, but he didn’t want to risk anything coming in the way of his plans for Silkin. “There were,” there are “other things at play.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Such as?”
He sighed. “Business.”
“Business. Right. And if I go back on my word now?” Those beautiful eyes blazed. “You still won’t allow yourself to be trapped.”
“No.”
“I see.”
Hurt crossed her features, and Julien loathed that he put it there.
A sense of powerlessness made him clench his fist. This was why he didn’t become attached.
Attachment meant this—this helplessness, this inability to fix.
For a second, he was once again kneeling on a floor beside his mother, unable to turn back time or save her, helpless to undo what had already been done.
He was, it seemed, powerless all over again.
In fact, he seemed to have lost all power when it came to Lady Elowyn Wildflower Price.
“I . . .” Damn it. Words bloody failed him.
“I truly don’t understand you, Mandeville.”
Julien drew her behind a tree, jaw ticking as he studied all the pinched lines forming on her face. “I don’t, either.” Could he even afford to try?