“Well, that’s settled!” The dowager nodded her head slowly. The poor thing did look quite put out, perhaps she was coming down with the ague? Which is exactly what she had suggested to Benedict.
He laughed, and stated that she was known for having a list of ailments, all of which were non-existent but always helpful in her manipulations and strategies.
They were silent the rest of the opera.
And in the carriage.
Until, all of a sudden Benedict stopped the carriage a block from her house. “You cannot be silent!”
“Why ever not?” she near shouted.
“It isn’t like you!”
“Pardon?”
“Silence? Beauty? Intelligence? Devil take me, it isn’t at all like you! Be disagreeable. Saints alive, help a man out! It would be so much easier to marry a woman who was… was…”
She must have hit him harder than she thought.
“Let me see if I understand you correctly. You desire for me to be undesirable.”
“Thank the saints, yes!” He lifted his eyes heavenward and sighed happily. “Do you not understand? I was just getting used to the idea of being married, of being forced — nay, coerced, perhaps manipulated is a better word? Yes, manipulated — into marrying you! At least then, I knew I could keep my distance. After all, you’d probably send me to an early grave, and then I wouldn’t have to suffer along side you in holy matrimony.”
“How romantic.”
He shrugged. He would shrug at a time like this. Devil take him.
“But now, don’t you see how much more difficult it is going to be for me to be… Well, to be…” He bit his lip and scowled.
“Selfish?” she offered.
“Yes!” he roared. “Now wait one minute, I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s selfish to want to live one’s life without the irritation of a woman by their side.”
“Your words are like poetry,” she gushed mockingly.
Banbury glared. “I do not want marriage. Least of all with a woman who can throw a right punch with the best of them, nor one who I can’t imagine without pigtails. Besides, she picked you.”
“By she you mean the dowager? Were we not just discussing this last night? She picked me for your cousin, not you. Truly, you need to learn the art of humility.”
“She tricked me,” he said, ignoring her. “Besides, you’re stuck with me. Forget the courting, hang it all! You will marry me, and you will be boring!”
Perhaps she should tell the footman to take them to Bedlam instead of her home. “Are you unwell?” She leaned forward and lifted a hand to his cheek.
“Why the blazes would I be well? A few days ago, I was happily drinking the night away at a gambling hell. And now, now, I’m… going to the opera with my aunt of all people! Along with my soon-to-be wife. By Jove, I’m going to have a wife…” He leaned his head back against the seat.
“And an apoplectic fit if you don’t calm down,” she added.
He glared. “My thanks. That was ever so helpful in putting my mood in a better state.”
“I don’t love you,” she stated rather boldly.
He opened his eyes and burst out laughing. “Truly, a man can’t hear that enough. It is akin to a woman confessing that she only has days to live and has never been with a man, or when the proprietor suddenly announces that the whiskey is free.”
“You don’t love me.”
He paused.
Saints alive, why was he pausing?
The air in the carriage swam with tension.
“No?” The word hung as a question between them. He blinked his eyes a few times as if trying to ascertain that they were still functioning, a side effect of the dust no doubt.
“No.” She nodded and leaned forward. “But, your grace. We are stuck. Let us think nothing more of crying off or trying to best one another. Can we not simply be friends?”
“Marriage and friendship?” He looked skeptical as his eyebrows drew together.
She nodded.
“I guess this means you won’t try to be boring.”
“I cannot be what I am not.”
His eyes narrowed.
She cleared her throat and patted his hand. “Just like you cannot help but be disagreeable and grumpy with a nasty habit of forgetting to smile.”
Banbury opened his mouth to speak, but she kept talking.
“And let us not forget your horrid talent at telling a fib. Gracious, my three-year-old niece could do it better. Dust? Really?”
“In my defense, I am allergic.”
She grinned. “Remind me to bring dust to our ceremony.”
“Wouldn’t shock me at all if you arrived with pistols firing, let alone dust.”
“It would be less than you deserve,” she added.
“Minx.” He tapped the roof of the carriage and sighed. “Friends?” His hand was outstretched in a manner signaling a peace of sorts. So why, when her gloved hand touched his, did she feel that she had just made a deal with the devil?
He smiled.
She gulped. Because the truth hit her full force. She didn’t feel like she had made a deal with the devil. The deal was already done, and the devil looked quite pleased.
Chapter Eleven
What’s a Devil to Do?
He was worse than a woman. His own mood swings were driving him mad; he could only imagine how Katherine felt, that is, if he was one to care about others’ feelings, which of course, he didn’t.
He was the devil after all.
It was morning, precisely two days since the dreaded ball where his life changed forever, and less than twenty-four hours since his last erotic kiss with the woman that was to be his wife. By his calculations, he had less than two weeks before the Kringle Ball. The very same ball that sealed his fate as a leg-shackled duke.
When had he lost control of his life?
Was it the day he stepped into Agatha’s house? Or perhaps the very second he decided to accept her invitation?
And now, he was stuck.
With a wife he didn’t want, well, that is to say he didn’t emotionally want her. Wanting her physically was quite another topic entirely. His body replayed images of her responsive kiss over and over again until his only solace was whiskey.
He finished half the bottle. Not a proud moment since he wasn’t one to normally drink alone.
The problem was he saw no way out of this predicament. Contrary to popular notion, he truly did possess a heart, though it was small, and at times he did wonder if it worked properly. Especially considering he rarely felt guilty for ruining women left and right. It had always been a sport, a way to pass time, an entertaining amusement.
But now, he had one woman. One irritatingly attractive woman who was depending on him to make one right decision amidst all the bad ones.
He swallowed, suddenly wishing he wasn’t nursing a headache or nausea, for the whiskey called out to him again.
There was no way out of the mess.
It would be helpful if the chit would at least be agreeable. His demands were straightforward and honest, but in the end, it wouldn’t have mattered if she tried to be boring. Her eyes shone with intelligence.
Nor if she tried to be indifferent, her mouth often curved into a mischievous smile when she thought nobody was watching.
But he watched.
He noticed.
Devil take him, he was actually falling for a woman who wasn’t his mistress.
Which meant he was in danger of creating the biggest scandal the ton would ever see or talk about for centuries.
The Devil Duke was successfully becoming besotted with the very woman he was going to marry.
Wonders never ceased.
He smiled, despite a herculean effort not to and took a slow sip of coffee.
“Your grace, this just came for you. It is urgent that you respond straight away.” His butler bowed, but made no move to leave.
Benedict took the letter into his hand and broke the seal.
A house party.
Gads, he hadn’t been to a house party in years.
He continued reading.
The party was to be thrown at Lord Marks' estate just outside London.
A holiday party.
His mind worked sluggishly through the details. It would be endless days filled with ice-skating and games.
It sounded like the exact opposite of something he would normally agree to.
Which was why, when he wrote his acceptance, he nearly banged his head against the table in order to conjure up part of his old self.
“Deuced idiot is what I am,” he mumbled as he closed his eyes, and contemplated returning to bed.
But then a thought struck him.
A devilish thought, one that brought a cheerful smile to his face and did wonders for his headache.
Katherine.
What he needed was to put her in situations where she would yet again prove disastrous and dangerous, and would successfully kill any sort of attachment he had for her. It would remind him that she was not any type of woman he wanted to marry. This was so simple! The girl was as clumsy as she was beautiful. Put the girl in skates and she would find the thin ice.
He laughed aloud nearly scaring himself in the process, for he had just laughed over the thought of a girl falling into an ice pond.
His smile faded. Did he truly just imagine her beautiful body falling into an icy hole? What in the blazes was wrong with him? Perhaps she could just take a tumble, reminding him again that she was not fit to be a duchess and certainly unfit to be wed.
On the other hand, considering his imagination had run away with him again, mayhap he should return to bed?
No, no, he scolded himself. He had preparations to make.
****
One day later
Katherine glared at the man sitting opposite her. The carriage hit a bump; she glared harder. Could he not feel the penetration of her stare?
“You’re going to hurt me if you keep glowering at me in that fashion, or worse your eyes will be stuck in that position, and we both know how offensive you find me.” He grinned, his dimples mocking her every nerve.
Drat the man! Days ago, she did not think him capable of emotion, let alone smiling! And now he was. Practically enthusiastic. When she agreed to be his friend despite having to marry him, it seemed the best course of action.
In her defense, she had thought to only see him a few more times before the Kringle Ball, and at worse, every day.
But now, she was to spend four days in his company.
In his cousin’s company.
She’d be shocked if she didn’t expire from the emotional turmoil of it all.
Add in ice-skating and other games, and she was a ball of nerves. It had been pure luck on her part that she had managed not to accost the duke in the past three days.
Surely her luck was running out.
Benedict grinned again. Yes, it was most definitely running out.
“Am I to understand that you’ve never ice skated before?” he asked, looking idly amused. If she could call inspecting her gloves and smiling amused.
“I am quite skilled at ice skating, your grace.”
He cursed aloud and leveled her with a glare so intense, she was surprised her face didn’t go up in flames.
“We are to be husband and wife. I believe you can cease from calling me your grace, at least in private.”
“Sorry, Benedict.”
His teeth clenched. “Don’t know why you’d have such trouble saying my name now, you were deuced good at screaming it when you were busy trying to plan my demise.”