Daring and the Duke (The Bareknuckle Bastards #3)(3)

“Promise to take me when you leave,” she whispered into the quiet.

His lips set into a firm line, his promise written in the lines of his face, older than it should be. Younger than it would have to become. He nodded once. Firm. Certain. “And I’ll make sure you have jewels.”

She rolled onto her own back, her skirts haphazard in the grass. “See that you do,” she jested. “And gold thread for all my gowns.”

“I shall keep you in spools of it.”

“Yes, please,” she said. “And a lady’s maid with a particular skill for hair.”

“You’re very demanding for a country girl,” he teased.

She turned a grin on him. “I’ve had a lifetime to prepare my requirements.”

“Do you think you’re ready for London, country girl?”

The smile faded into a mock scowl. “I think I shall do just fine, city boy.”

He laughed, and the rare sound filled the space around them, warming her. And in that moment, something happened. Something strange and unsettling and wonderful and weird. That sound, like nothing in the wide world, unlocked her.

Suddenly, she could feel him. Not simply the warmth of him along her side, where they touched from shoulder to hip. Not only the place where his elbow rested beside her ear. Not just the feel of his touch in her curls as he extracted a leaf from them. All of him. The even rise and fall of his breath. His sure stillness. And that laugh . . . his laugh.

“Whatever happens, promise you won’t forget me,” she said quietly.

“I shan’t be able to. We’ll be together.”

She shook her head. “People leave.”

His brow furrowed and she could hear the force in his words. “I don’t. I won’t.”

She nodded. But still, “Sometimes you don’t choose it. Sometimes people just . . .”

His gaze softened with understanding and he heard the reference to her mother in the trail of her words. He rolled toward her, and they were facing each other now, cheeks on their bent arms, close enough for secrets. “She would have stayed if she could,” he said, firmly.

“You don’t know that,” she whispered, hating the sting of the words behind the bridge of her nose. “I was born and she died, and she left me with a man who was not my father, who gave me a name that is not my own, and I’ll never know what would have happened if she’d lived. I’ll never know if . . .”

He waited. Ever patient, as though he would wait for her for a lifetime.

“I’ll never know if she would have loved me.”

“She would have loved you.” The answer was instant.

She shook her head, closing her eyes. Wanting to believe him. “She didn’t even name me.”

“She would have. She would have named you, and it would have been something beautiful.”

The certainty in his words had her meeting his gaze, sure and unyielding. “Not Robert, then?”

He didn’t smile. Didn’t laugh. “She would have named you for what you were. For what you deserved. She would have given you the title.”

Understanding dawned.

And then he whispered, “Just as I would do.”

Everything stopped. The rustle of leaves in the canopy, the shouts of his brothers in the stream beyond, the slow creep of the afternoon, and she knew, in that moment, that he was about to give her a gift that she’d never imagined she’d receive.

She smiled at him, her heart pounding in her chest. “Tell me.”

She wanted it on his lips, in his voice, in her ears. She wanted it from him, knowing it would make it impossible for her to ever forget him, even after he left her behind.

He gave it to her.

“Grace.”





Chapter Two



London

Autumn 1837



“To Dahlia!”

A raucous cheer rose in reply to the shout, the crush of people in the central room of 72 Shelton Street—a high-end club and the best kept secret of London’s smartest, savviest, most scandalous women—turning in unison to toast its proprietress.

The woman known as Dahlia stilled at the bottom of the central staircase, taking in the massive space, already packed with club members and guests despite the early hour. She offered the assembly a wide, glittering smile. “Drink up, my lovelies, you’ve a night to remember ahead of you!”

“Or to forget!” came a boisterous retort from the far end of the room. Dahlia recognized the voice instantly as that of one of London’s merriest widows—a marchioness who had invested in 72 Shelton Street from the earliest days, and loved it more than her own home. Here, a merry mar chioness was afforded the privacy she never received in Grosvenor Square. Her lovers, too, received that privacy.

The masked crowd laughed in unison, and Dahlia was freed from their collective attention just long enough for her lieutenant, Zeva, to appear at her side. The tall, willowy, dark-haired beauty had been with her since the earliest days of the club and managed the ins and outs of the membership—ensuring that whatever they wished was theirs for the taking.

“Already a crush,” Zeva said.

Dahlia checked the watch at her waist. “About to be more of one.”

It was early, just past eleven; much of London only now able to sneak away from their boring dinners and dances, making their excuses with megrims and delicate constitutions. Dahlia smirked at the thought, knowing the way the club’s membership used the perceived weakness of the fairer sex to take what they wished beneath the notice of society.