Chapter Three #2
Mrs. Hartwell, the duke’s housekeeper, received them at the entrance with the kind of brisk efficiency that brooked no hesitation. A woman of middle years, she bore herself with the rigid dignity of one who had managed this household through storms far worse than unexpected callers.
“His Grace will be informed of your arrival,” she said with a curt bow of her head once they’d introduced themselves, and given a brief explanation for their unannounced visit. “Please wait here.”
As Thomas and Penelope waited in the foyer, the measured tap of a walking cane on the marble floor drew their attention.
A tall, regal woman in a stunning emerald gown advanced from the far end of the corridor, her bearing commanding in a way that reminded Penelope, quite without warning of the duke himself.
Her gaze passed over the party with an assessing weight that required no words.
After a brief pause, she gave the faintest inclination of her head to the butler, who immediately moved to ensure refreshments were provided and the guests settled in the drawing room off the main hall.
Without another word, the woman disappeared through a side door, leaving in her wake the faint scent of rose attar and an unspoken awareness that she was mistress of her domain.
Though the room was appointed in deep, rich colors, mauve draperies, dark walnut paneling, an Aubusson carpet that softened each footstep, the atmosphere was no less imposing than the facade.
Penelope’s fingers brushed the back of one of the carved chairs as she sat, grounding herself in its solidity. The air here smelled faintly of old parchment and aged wood, a scholar’s scent, but it was unexpectedly comforting.
Charlotte reached for Penelope’s hand, giving it the smallest squeeze. “Courage,” she whispered. She always knew what to say at any given time.
Penelope offered her friend a faint, fleeting smile. She was grateful for her beloved companion’s unwavering support, though her heart was a butterfly’s frantically beating wings, and courage felt very far away.
***
Adrian Sterling sat in his study, the dim light from a single leaded window casting his scarred profile into stark relief.
The desk before him was strewn with open volumes, and manuscripts spilling across the dark surface in a riot of vellum and ink that was not dissimilar to the disarray of Cornelius’s study before it had been ransacked. It was a familiar chaos, one that Professor Whitmore would have understood.
When the butler appeared at the door, Adrian did not look up. “What is it, Travers?” His tone carried the low, rough edge of a man accustomed to solitude.
Travers shifted nervously, his fingers worrying at the edge of his livery. “Your Grace… there are visitors.”
Adrian’s quill stilled. His jaw tightened. “Visitors,” he repeated, his voice sinking into a growl. “You should know by now that I do not receive callers without an invitation.”
The butler’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “They said… it is a matter of urgency, Your Grace, to do with an incident at Whitmore House.”
“They?” Adrian’s head snapped up, his eyes narrowing.
Travers paled beneath the scrutiny, his words faltering. “Miss Whitmore and… and…”
“Enough.” Adrian rose in one fluid motion, the chair scraping sharply against the flagstones. His height alone seemed to fill the room, but his fury lent him an even greater presence.
Travers shrank back as though the air itself had grown too heavy to breathe.
***
The sound of approaching footsteps reverberated down the hall…deliberate, unhurried, but heavy with purpose.
Thomas stiffened, every inch of him the wary solicitor defending his charge. Charlotte’s grip on Penelope’s hand tightened until it almost hurt.
Penelope’s breath caught.
The Duke of Sterndale appeared in the doorway, his shadow creeping up the wall like some specter conjured from a nightmarish tale.
He did not merely enter the room, he occupied it.
His presence claimed their surroundings with such force that, for one suspended moment, Penelope could neither think nor move.
He was as she remembered from the graveside.
Tall, broad-shouldered, draped in the dark austerity of a man who eschewed frippery.
His scar caught the light, a livid reminder of violence past, running from his left temple to his jaw with cruel precision.
His face betrayed no emotion, but his eyes, icy gray and unrelenting swept over their little group with the predatory assessment of a hawk regarding trespassers in its midst.
Thomas straightened instinctively, squaring his shoulders as if to shield Penelope and Charlotte from that penetrating gaze.
Adrian said nothing. The silence stretched taut, an unspoken test.
Penelope swallowed hard, willing her trembling hands to obey her.
“Your Grace,” she began, her voice barely above a whisper. “I come on behalf of my uncle, Professor Whitmore.”
At the mention of the name, something incomprehensible flickered in Adrian’s eyes.
Penelope reached into her reticule, retrieving the letter she had read so many times it had begun to feel burned into her brain. She rose, her knees unsteady, and stepped forward to place it on the table between them.
Adrian did not immediately touch it. His gaze sharpened, his posture stilled, and the faintest shift, imperceptible to anyone less watchful, softened the rigid lines of his jaw. He studied the folded parchment as though its very creases might betray a falsehood.
Only when he had accepted it did he cross to the window, letting the pale, late winter light fall across the page.
His gaze traced the familiar, angular hand, pausing to examine the pressure of the pen, the flourishes of certain capitals that no forger could quite imitate.
The cadence of the words precise, economical, and laced with the dry wit of a man who had once corrected his Latin in the margins banished any lingering suspicion.
“Cornelius,” he said, handing the note back to her, his voice low and roughened with memory.
When he spoke again, the words were stripped of the menace that had cloaked his initial silence. “He was my tutor at Cambridge.”
Penelope blinked. “I heard you were acquainted academically.”
Adrian nodded once, still studying the letter as though its folds contained Cornelius’s spirit. “Medieval history. He was… the only one who believed my fascination with such subjects was more than an idle indulgence.”
The hard edges of his demeanor softened further as he set the letter down with deliberate care.
“We kept in touch through correspondence for fifteen years,” he continued, his voice quieter now.
“Research others dismissed as unprofitable speculation, codes, forgotten texts, the kind of mysteries that keep scholars awake when saner men sleep. Cornelius understood that. His death is a tragic loss.”
Penelope’s throat tightened.
In that moment, she no longer saw the Devil’s Duke, the reclusive peer whose name society spoke in hushed tones. She saw a grieving scholar, a man who had loved her uncle in his own reserved, intellectual way.
Her heart warmed unexpectedly, despite the chill that still clung to her from their journey.
The fearsome facade had cracked though not entirely, but enough for her to catch a glimpse of the man beneath.
And in that glimpse, she felt the first fragile stirring of trust. Perhaps this was not a man to be feared after all.