“I choose myself,” she said. “I’d rather rely upon myself than you. Or any other. I find myself more reliable.”
He sighed again, and she heard it filled with frustration and something more. Something she loathed. “Don’t you dare,” she said, turning on him in fury. “Don’t you dare pity me. I don’t want it.”
He had the grace to look surprised. “It’s not pity I feel.”
“What then?”
One side of his mouth turned up in a smile she would have called sad if she’d believed for a moment he cared. “Regret.”
For heeding his summons, no doubt. For landing himself with her. “We all do things we regret, Duke.” She knew that better than anyone.
There was a long moment of silence before he changed the subject. “Which one owned this odious place?”
She didn’t hesitate. “Number Thirteen.”
“Ah. The one killed by a sheep, allegedly.”
“Precisely.”
“What happened to him, really?”
She blinked. “That is what happened to him. He was killed by a sheep.”
His brow furrowed. “You are joking.”
“I am not. He fell off a cliff.”
“Number Thirteen?”
“The sheep. The duke was out for his daily constitutional. Below.” She clapped her hands together. “Quite smashed.”
His lips twitched. “No.”
She raised one hand. “I swear it is true.”
He looked around the garish room. “You’d think the dogs would have warned him.”
She laughed, unable to contain it. “As the hounds survived, it is possible the animal kingdom was working together on the matter.”
He laughed, then, deep and rumbling and more comforting than she would like to admit. More tempting.
At the thought, she collected herself. “We should not laugh at his misfortune.”
He did the same, coming closer. “We all have misfortune. If we cannot laugh at it, what is there?”
She cut him a look. “Once again, you remind me of your own terrible sufferings, having to be rich and powerful beyond measure, and all because seventeen other poor, put-upon men were hit by falling sheep.”
He continued to advance. “I thought it was only one falling sheep?”
“A sheep with a ducal vendetta. You should be careful in the wilderness.”
“The wilderness of Grosvenor Square, you mean?”
“It does not hurt to be vigilant.”
He laughed again. “And Lady Thirteen? What of her?”
“Number Thirteen was a widower. Childless. No family to inherit.”
“No family but the dogs, you mean?”
“I’m told the dogs did not care for the décor.”
He chuckled, and she warmed at the response, reveling in the low growl of humor that she might not have heard if he weren’t so close. When did he get so close? And why did he smell so wonderfully crisp and clean? Couldn’t he smell like other men? All perfume and stench?
If she weren’t careful, she might begin to like him.
He might begin to like her.
“Why run from me, Lillian?” he asked softly, deep enough for the words to roll through her. “Why run here?”
Because there was nowhere else.
Well. She couldn’t tell him that.
Before she could find an appropriate answer, however, he added, “Why are you alone?”
She stilled at the question, going cold, then hot. Alone. What a horrible word. What a horrible, honest, devastatingly apt word. She stepped back, coming up against the wall and the painting. A crowned dog on a silk pillow.
A dog better loved than she’d ever been.
He shook his head and backed away. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked that. It’s just that—” he stopped. Changed tack. “What I meant was, why haven’t you had a season?”
“I haven’t wanted one,” she lied.
“Every woman wants a season,” he said.
She tried again. “I’m not an aristocrat.”
“You are ward to one of the richest dukedoms in England,” he said. “You could not find a sponsor?”
“Sadly, Your Grace, money is not enough to secure a girl a sponsor.”
He raised a brow. “A girl? Or a girl like you?”
Relief flooded through her at the question, returning them to solid, adversarial ground. She narrowed her gaze. “What’s that to mean?”
“A girl who sits for a nude.”
Anger flared. Anger, and a hurt she’d tucked away and sworn never to consider again. “Any girl,” she said, tartly. “You need connections for a season.”
“You’re connected. I’m a goddamn duke.”
“You forgot me,” she said finally. “I had no sponsor because none would have me. A shadow of a duke is not enough to win over the attention of London, it seems. Shocking as it is.”
“I am here now.”
She raised a brow. “Yes, well, surprisingly, your dukedom has lost some of its . . . cachet.”
“Why in hell is that?”
She made a show of tracking the swath of tartan from his shoulder, over his torso, and down to the place where it hung in pleats just above his knees. “I cannot imagine.”
He scowled at her. “You’re having a season now. This year.”
She laughed around the flare of panic that came at the words. “I don’t want one.” She had already been too much on show. The gossip pages already knew enough of her. And that was before Derek became involved.
“I’m afraid I don’t care. It’s the way we get you married.”
“There is no we, Duke. There is no getting me married. I told you. I wish my freedom.”
“If you want freedom from me, lass, it comes in the form of marriage. Nothing else.”
“Couldn’t you imagine me marrying myself? Give me the dowry for taking responsibility for myself?”
He smirked. “Marriage to a man.”
“You ask me to trade one master for another.”
He raised a brow. “I’m offering you your pick of men. Any man in London.”
“And I’m to get down on my knees and thank you.”
“Gratitude for such an exorbitant dowry would not be out of line,” he pointed out.