Charlotte Featherstone - Pride & Passion

How had he guessed? she wondered. Everyone who looked at her believed her to be a spoiled, shallow society miss who cared for nothing but fashion and parties. Certainly no one had ever thought she might have a heart and conscience. Yet with one sweep of his storm-gray eyes, Sussex had seen to the core of her, and what she kept hidden.

“Sussex, stop this at once,” Elizabeth demanded. “You cannot come in here and start such a bold discussion without first at least inquiring as to our company’s health and spirits.”

“Absolutely. It was unpardonable of me. Forgive me. Now then, how are you ladies today?” he inquired politely as he placed four of the pink custard squares on his plate, but not before his gaze flickered to hers and he grinned. Such a cheeky grin, she thought as the hair on her arms stood straight on end.

“OH, WE ARE very well, your grace,” Isabella replied as she stole a perplexed glance at Lucy. “Now, if only the weather would cooperate and allow the sun to shine, if only for a few hours, we would be much better off.”

Sussex glanced over his shoulder and out the tall window that was behind the settee. “Mmm, yes, it is gloomy. Makes one long for the comforts of bed.”

Isabella flushed delicately, and Lucy struggled to swallow the mouthful of hot tea she had just taken. The word bed was one she would have preferred not to hear coming from Sussex’s mouth. It was far too familiar, and she could not put aside her fears that when he said it, he was recalling the moment between them when he had returned the bit of lace to her, and discovered her most carefully guarded secret.

How she wanted to quit this house, to leave Sussex and his strange conversation behind. She was on tenterhooks, she realized. Disconcerted by every glance, and word. She could not endure this, not while trying to stay polite and removed.

Studying Lizzy, Lucy looked for any signs from their host that the tea was over, and they should take their leave. Unfortunately Lizzy had only managed to appear more comfortable on the settee, as if she were settling in for a much longer conversation. Even Isabella, who had looked extremely uncomfortable during their discussion of gossip now looked at ease, and was even in the process of pouring herself more tea.

Traitor , Lucy wanted to shout at her friend. Did no one understand how horrid it was to sit across from his grace and suffer through his stare? Of course they did not. Because neither Lizzy nor Isabella knew what had transpired between them. Only Sussex knew, and Lucy could not help but imagine what thoughts were running rampant in the proper duke’s mind. “Oh, yes, I adore afternoon naps,” Elizabeth said on a sigh, “especially in the rain. Just lying there, listening to the raindrops rattle against the windowpane is so soothing. Don’t you think, Lady Lucy?”

Determined to ignore Sussex, she focused her attention on answering Elizabeth. “I am afraid I am not a fan of rain, but I am rather fond of the feel of cool grass beneath my feet on a warm spring day. I like to hear the chirping of birds, and see the swelling of flower buds. I like the wind not to be cool and bracing, but warm and scented with the aromas of the sun and earth.”

Sussex met her gaze, allowed it to linger, then slowly he slid it away, down to his plate where he picked up a custard slice, and popped it into his mouth.

“Oh, I enjoy that too,” Elizabeth said wistfully. “When I was younger I could lie in the grass for hours and stare at the sky and imagine the clouds were all kinds of fanciful shapes, and animals.”

Lucy knew her expression was not one of rapture at Elizabeth’s description, and the duke noticed and said, “Do you not approve of the pastime, Lady Lucy?”

She was forced to raise her gaze from the teacup and saucer that was balanced on her lap and look at him. That stare … it made her tremble once again, and she despised how easily he could disconcert her. No one had ever had that ability, she’d made certain of it, but when the duke came into her life, he had torn down those safe walls she had erected.

Now here she was, feeling vulnerable and cornered, held hostage by eyes that bored deeply into hers as he patiently awaited her answers. And he would wait. She had learned that about Sussex, he was the most patient man on Earth—maddenly so—and she knew he would sit there all afternoon, his plate of pink sweets balanced in his palm while he watched her with his eyes that saw too much. Nothing dissuaded him when he wanted something; she had learned that much about him.

“Stonebrook wouldn’t have allowed it,” he replied for her, his gaze unwavering. “Your father is a difficult man to please, not given to gaiety or lenience.”

Yer papa will tan my hide if he finds ye getting yer ‘ands dirty wit the likes o’ me. I’m yer lesser, or so Mr. Beecher says. No lady of Gov’ner Square will look at a little street urchin the likes o’ me .

Lucy recalled that day in the kitchen, as she and Gabriel sat at the table and talked. She had made it her business to be in the kitchen on Tuesdays when the butcher made his deliveries. It had been curiosity at first—the quiet, sullen boy who had accompanied Mr. Beecher had captured her interest. But after a few visits, and some shared stories, it became something more than curiosity, but infatuation. They had become friends, borne out of common circumstances, their differences ignored as they shared whatever treat Cook had left at the table for them.

“I don’t care about such trivial things such as stations in life,” she had boldly stated. “Are we not all created equal?”

“No, Miss Lucy, we ain’t. Ye were made better ‘n me. And that’s why I’m to leave ye be and not look at ye. I’m beneath ye.”

She had glared in the direction of the butcher, then. “Never mind him,” she’d ordered. “We’re friends, are we not?”

“I ain’t never ‘ad a friend.”

“I ain’t never, either.”

They had dissolved into a fit of laughter, which had died as suddenly as it sprung up when a dark shadow emerged in the kitchen …

“He would have had you kept inside the schoolroom,” his grace continued on, pulling her from her memories, making her confront a reality she had no wish to contemplate. “A young lady meant to remain pale and unmarred, her mind filled with useful information, her days occupied with learning tasks that would set up her future. He would have frowned upon frivolous pursuits such as daydreaming and cloud watching.”

She swallowed, and he followed the action of her throat, his long, dark lashes shielding the expression in his eyes and the thoughts behind them. How Lucy wanted to rail at him for it.

“Is my brother right?” Elizabeth asked sympathetically. “He paints a rather bleak picture of your childhood.”

“Yer just as lonely as me,” her friend had once told her. “I guess it don’t make no difference if you live on a pallet of straw before a fire, or in a great big palace like this one. I’m a prisoner of St. Giles parish, and yer a prisoner of this world. We are what we are, so different because ye have money, I have nothin’ … but that’s just the outside. Inside I think we’re more alike than any two people could be.”

That was when their connection had been made, when she realized there was someone else like her, who felt the same way, who was trapped in a world they did not want, and did not choose.

“Promise me, then,” she had pleaded with him, “that you’ll always think this way of me. That when we’re grown you’ll come back and rescue me from this life.”