Eleven Scandals to Start to Win a Duke's Heart (Love By Numbers #3)(6)

“No.” She shook her head. “I mean why are you doing this? Don’t you have a battalion of servants just waiting to perform such an unpleasant task?”

“I do.”

“And so?”

“Servants talk, Miss Fiori. I would prefer that as few people as possible know that you are here, alone, at this hour.”

She was trouble for him. Nothing more.

After a long silence, he met her gaze. “You disagree?”

She recovered quickly. “Not at all. I am merely astounded that a man of your wealth and prominence would have servants who gossip. One would think you’d have divined a way to strip them of all desire to socialize.”

One side of his mouth tightened, and he shook his head. “Even as I am helping you, you are seeking out ways to wound me.”

When she replied, her tone was serious, her words true. “Forgive me if I am wary of your goodwill, Your Grace.”

His lips pressed into a thin, straight line, and he reached for her other hand, repeating his actions. They both watched as he cleaned the dried blood and gravel from the heel of her palm, revealing tender pink flesh that would take several days to heal.

His movements were gentle but firm, and the stroke of the linen on the abraded skin grew more tolerable as he cleaned the wounds. Juliana watched as one golden curl fell over his brow. His countenance was, as always, stern and unmoving, like one of her brother’s treasured marble statues.

She was flooded with a familiar desire, one that came over her whenever he was near.

The desire to crack the façade.

She had glimpsed him without it twice.

And then he had discovered who she was—the Italian half sister of one of London’s most notorious rakes, the barely legitimate daughter of a fallen marchioness and her merchant husband, raised far from London and its manners and traditions and rules.

The opposite of everything he represented.

The antithesis of everything he cared to have in his world.

“My only motive is to get you home in one piece, with none but your brother the wiser about your little adventure this evening.”

He tossed the linen into the basin of now-pink water and lifted one of the small pots from the tray. He opened it, releasing the scent of rosemary and lemon, and reached for her hands once more.

She gave them up easily this time. “You don’t really expect me to believe that you are concerned for my reputation?”

Leighton dipped the tip of one broad finger into the pot, concentrating on her wounds as he smoothed the salve across her skin. The medicine combated the burning sting, leaving a welcome, cool path where his fingers stroked. The result was the irresistible illusion that his touch was the harbinger of the soothing pleasure flooding her skin.

Which it wasn’t.

Not at all.

She caught her sigh before it embarrassed her. He heard it nonetheless. That golden eyebrow rose again, leaving her wishing that she could shave it off.

She snatched her hand away. He did not try to stop her.

“No, Miss Fiori. I am not concerned for your reputation.”

Of course he wasn’t.

“I am concerned for my own.”

The implication that being found with her—being linked to her—could damage his reputation stung, perhaps worse than her hands had earlier in the evening.

She took a deep breath, readying herself for their next verbal battle, when a furious voice sounded from the doorway.

“If you don’t take your hands off of my sister this instant, Leighton, your precious reputation will be the least of your problems.”

Chapter Two

There is a reason why skirts are long and bootlaces complex.

The refined lady does not expose her feet. Ever.

—A Treatise on the Most Exquisite of Ladies

It appears that reformed rakes find brotherly duty something of a challenge . . .

—The Scandal Sheet, October 1823

It was quite possible that the Marquess of Ralston was going to kill him.

Not that Simon had anything to do with the girl’s current state.

It was not his fault that she’d landed herself in his carriage after doing battle with, from what he could divine, a holly bush, the cobblestones of the Ralston mews, and the edge of his coach.

And a man.

Simon Pearson, eleventh Duke of Leighton, ignored the vicious anger that flared at the thought of the purple bruise encircling the girl’s wrist and returned his attention to her irate brother, who was currently stalking the perimeter of Simon’s study like a caged animal.

The marquess stopped in front of his sister and found his voice. “For God’s sake, Juliana. What the hell happened to you?”

The language would have made a lesser woman blush. Juliana did not even flinch. “I fell.”

“You fell.”

“Yes.” She paused. “Among other things.”

Ralston looked to the ceiling as though asking for patience. Simon recognized the emotion. He had a sister himself, one who had given him more than his share of frustration.

And Ralston’s sister was more infuriating than any female should be.

More beautiful, as well.

He stiffened at the thought.

Of course she was beautiful. It was an empirical fact. Even in her sullied, torn gown, she put most other women in London to shame. She was a stunning blend of delicate English—porcelain skin, liquid blue eyes, perfect nose, and pert chin—and exotic Italian, all wild raven curls and full lips and lush curves that a man would have to be dead not to notice.