Page 3 of Duke of Fire
“Should I be?” Her brow arched, but she did not smile.
“It would make things simpler, I suppose,” he said.
“Simple things rarely interest you,” she answered.
August felt something like irritation. Or perhaps it was the thrill of being met, stride for stride, in a contest he’d thought unwinnable.
“You are very quick, Miss Hartwell,” he said.
“I have to be. The alternative is being left behind.”
He looked past her at the moonlit garden. “And yet, here you are. Outpacing the room.”
“It is less a matter of speed, and more of direction.” She rested her hands on the cold stone. “Some find it easier to move in a crowd. Others require… space.”
He turned to study her, his suspicion rising. “You make me sound like a wild animal.”
She shrugged. “I have seen you hunt, My Lord. But you wear your mask with such dedication, I begin to wonder if even you remember what is beneath it.”
He was caught between amusement and a flare of something less pleasant. “Are you always this forward?”
“Only when necessary.” There it was—the ghost of a smile.
He straightened, the sense of play giving way to something more bracing. “Very well, Miss Hartwell. Let us drop the pretense. Iam not fond of these gatherings, but I attend them. For family. For duty. Because the world expects it of me.”
“Because you expect it of yourself,” she said.
He blinked. “You sound like my father.”
She shook her head. “If you wished to please your father, you would have married years ago, produced an heir, and retired to a country estate.”
“I do not wish to please him,” he said, more defensively than intended.
“I believe you,” Eliza said. She turned to face him fully. “I also believe that you are tired of carrying the room, but you do not know how to put it down.”
He stared at her. There was a reckless impulse to step closer. Instead, he reached for the armor of banter. “Miss Hartwell, are you in the habit of psychoanalyzing every man you meet on the terrace?”
“Only the ones who matter,” she said.
He barked another laugh, but this time it left him a little raw.
He studied her for a long moment. “You are a mystery.”
“Not really,” she said. “I am exactly what I appear to be. Most people simply do not look.”
He realized, abruptly, that he was being outmaneuvered. That this woman—this companion—was seeing more than she should. He did not care for it.
He pushed away from the railing, and his shadow loomed over her.
“I could make you go back inside, you know,” he said softly. “I could tell you that your place is not here with me.”
“You could,” she agreed, not flinching.
“But I suspect you wouldn’t listen,” he said.
“I suspect you would not truly want me to,” Eliza replied.
He had no answer to that.
