Some peers were of the opinion that their rank made them gentlemen, but Anthony had always felt that being a true gentleman required honor as well as fortune of birth. He had offered to teach Miss Wade to dance in exchange for more of her time, and he had assured her that he would carry out that instruction to the best of his ability. He intended to keep strictly to his word, though she was beginning to test his honor in a very dangerous way.
He had told both her and himself he wanted that apron off of her because it was so damned ugly, but the truth was far less honorable. He wanted to look at her without it, envision again the figure he had discovered hiding beneath its stiff canvas protection that day in the rain.
He had been right about that thing. She wore it like a chastity belt, and with that body, she had good reason to need it. Standing so close to her last night, with his hands in her hair, it had taken everything he had not to lower his hands to far more intimate places. Her first dance lesson, and her tutor was imagining the oldest dance of all.
This morning, as he made his daily tour about the estate, just thinking of last night was enough to make him burn.
Anthony brought Defiance to a halt beside the lake, and the groom who rode with him paused a respectful distance away.
It was a glorious afternoon, pleasantly warm, though the chestnuts, elms, and oaks were showing the full glory of their autumn color. But he barely noticed. As his gelding took a drink, Anthony closed his eyes and allowed himself the indulgence of a bit of harmless imagining, in which a pair of long, shapely legs played a very significant role.
When he opened his eyes, Anthony found that Defiance had finished quenching his thirst. He pulled on the reins, starting to turn the horse around, intending to head toward the farm, but as he lifted his gaze above the water to the folly on top of the grass-covered knoll opposite, something caught his attention and he stopped again.
Sitting in front of the folly, shaded by a huge chestnut tree, was the woman who had been occupying his thoughts all morning. She was seated on a blanket spread across the grass, a large picnic basket on one side of her, and her discarded straw bonnet on the other.
Anthony gestured to the groom to follow him and spurred Defiance to a canter around the lake and up the hill toward the folly.
Like all the other garden ornaments of the estate, the folly had been designed by Capability Brown fifty years earlier for the ninth Duke of Tremore, Anthony’s grandfather. It had been given the grand name Temple of Apollo, but it was simply a small, round structure of curved limestone blocks capped with a dome and surrounded by decorative columns and faux Roman statues.
She looked up at the sound of their approach. “What a lovely place this is!” she called out as both men halted their horses about ten yards from her and dismounted.
Anthony handed the reins of his gelding over to the groom. “Wait here,” he ordered, and turned away to join Miss Wade.
“Thank you for the compliment to my estate,” he said, walking over to where she sat and coming to a halt at the edge of the blanket. He bowed to her, then clasped his hands behind his back and turned his head slightly to look at the sketchbook on her lap. On the top sheet of drawing paper was a half-completed image in charcoal of the lake, gardens, and fountains below, with Tremore Hall in the distance. “I see you have come to sketch the view.”
“Who could not?” She gestured to the basket beside her. “I also have a picnic. Would you care to join me?” She moved her hat out of the way for him to sit down beside her. “Your cook is generous with your larder, and I have far too much for one person.”
He remained standing. “Are you certain you want me to do so? After all,” he added softly, “you do not like me. Remember?”
“If you are still waiting for that apology, you can just go away,” she answered with spirit. “If you are prepared to be nice, you may stay.”
“Thank you.” He bowed to her. “I shall endeavor to be as charming as my nature will allow.”
She looked at him with doubt. “I do not know if that is enough, your grace.”
Anthony gave a shout of laughter, but his humor vanished as she scooted over to make room for him on the blanket. The movement caused the hem of her skirt to ride up, revealing her bare feet. Very pretty feet they were, but his mind led him upward, thinking of delicate ankles, rounded calves and smooth, taut thighs.
“Are you all right?” she asked, staring up at him, her eyes wide behind the lenses of her spectacles.
All right? God, no. He was making himself insane.
Anthony drew a deep breath, feeling as if he were dragging himself out of quicksand. “Of course,” he said, and moved quickly to join her on the blanket before she could notice what was so close to her eye level, grateful that she was still looking into his face. “I am perfectly well, thank you.”
He pulled off his jacket and draped it as carelessly as he could manage across his hips as he stretched out his legs. He loosened his cravat, then leaned his weight back on his arms, noticing her brown leather boots placed neatly at one corner of the blanket, each one holding a rolled-up white stocking. He stared at them, trying to think of something to say. He took refuge from his own lust in the only thing he could think of—teasing her.
“So this is how you decided to spend your day out,” he said, with mock disappointment. “You spurned my company for a picnic basket and a day of sketching?”
“I am afraid so,” she said, mirroring his injured demeanor with a pretense of apology in her tone. “But you would have made me work.”
“And you prefer to idle away your day in such frivolous pursuits as these?”
“It is worse than that,” she told him gravely. “I also went into the village this morning and did a bit of shopping. I bought a set of gardenia-scented soaps and a box of chocolates.”
“I had hoped you would choose to buy a new dress.”
She leaned toward him in a confidential fashion. “I did that, too.”
Surprised, Anthony glanced at the dun-colored cotton fabric of her skirt. But that made him think again of her legs, and he fixed his gaze on the lake and gardens spread out below them. “If you bought a new dress, then why in heaven’s name are you not wearing it?”
She hit his shoulder with her pencil. “I bought an evening gown!” she cried, laughing. “And do not tease me about my clothes.”
“An evening gown? Miss Wade, every moment I spend with you is filled with surprises. What color? Do not tell me any shade of brown, for if you do, I shall go to Mrs. Avery myself and order you a different frock, thereby ruining your reputation for the remainder of your life.”
“It is not brown. It is pink. Rose-pink, and made of silk.” Her breath escaped on a dreamy little sigh, and he turned his head again to look at her. On her face was an expression of pure bliss.
Like men everywhere, he did not understand how something as trivial as a mere garment could engender such joy in women, but he did appreciate the effect. A woman could be as beautiful as she felt herself to be, and it seemed as though even the efficient and sensible Miss Wade was not immune to the magic of a pink silk frock to help that feeling along. But then, the woman who sat beside him was not the same Miss Wade he had known a month ago. “You have relieved my mind.”
He watched as she bent her head over her sketchbook again, and he caught the golden glint of sunlight in the intricately braided crown of her hair. “I also note that you have taken my advice.”
“Advice?”
“About your hair.”
She did not look at him, but he saw a tiny blush creep into her cheeks as she tucked a loose tendril behind her ear in a self-conscious gesture. “Ella helped me. She was a lady’s maid once.”
“Ella?”
“Third housemaid. Do you not know the names of your servants?”
Anthony shook his head. “Only the upper servants. I have seven estates, most of which I only visit for one week each year to tour the park and meet with the steward. Each has its share of staff, and I do not hire any of them myself. That falls within the purview of butlers and housekeepers. I could not remember all the names of my servants if I wanted to.” He gave her a rueful look. “I suppose you are now going to reprove me and say that I should know all their names.”
“Perhaps I was,” she admitted, and gestured to the groom who was standing motionless about thirty feet away, ready and waiting to obey any command given him. “Do you know his name?”
“No, and I do not wish to,” he said, feeling almost defensive and wondering how he got that way. “It would not be appropriate. A man of my rank only speaks with upper servants unless absolutely necessary. He is a groom.”
“He is a man.”
“He is not a man, not to me. He is a groom. If I knew his name, if I knew anything about him, he would become a person to me, and that begins to narrow the gap between my rank and his. Over time, I might even begin to regard him as a friend.”
“And that would be a bad thing?”
“It is not a question of whether it is good or bad. It is not acceptable.”
“What a convenient way to prevent anyone from getting close to you,” she murmured, and resumed her sketching. “You can always pull rank.”
“I do not think how I treat my servants is your concern.”
“No,” she shot back without looking up. “It is yours.”
“Are we quarreling again, Miss Wade?” He drew a deep breath and raked a hand through his hair. “How is it that you and I seem to be doing that so much of late?”
“Because I no longer allow you to treat me like a nameless servant, perhaps?”
“Have I been doing that?”
She looked over at him, her face as unreadable as those of the marble statues behind them. “Yes.”
She bent her head, returning her attention to the drawing in her lap and he studied her profile, wondering for the hundredth time what went on beneath that placid exterior. He wanted to know, suddenly, what she was thinking, what she was feeling, for she was a mystery he wanted to solve.
That wisp of hair had fallen forward again. He reached up, tucking it back, feeling both the hard, gold line of her spectacles and the velvety softness of her ear against his fingers. She froze to rigid stillness as he ran the tip of his finger down the column of her throat to the thin ochre braid that trimmed her plain white collar. Slowly, he moved closer, then curled his hand around the back of her neck. “I do not think of you as a servant.”
She gave a little start and leaned sideways, away from him. “What do grooms do, exactly?” she asked, her voice almost desperate as she reverted to the safe topic of servants. “I fear I know little about horses. I am an accomplished rider when it comes to camels, but I have never ridden a horse.”
He could have continued his tantalizing explorations, but he allowed her to escape them. He lowered his hand and sat back. “Camels?”
“Yes, indeed.” She nodded several times, tightened her grip around her pencil, and continued to draw the view. “Camels are rather difficult animals. Contrary, hard to ride, and they spit.”
“I cannot imagine any camel getting the better of you, Miss Wade.” He glanced at her bare toes peeping out from beneath the hem of her skirt, and he felt desire flicker dangerously within his body. “I know I can never seem to do so.”
“Good,” she said in a prim voice. “I prefer it that way.”
“Yes, I am certain you do.” Anthony forced his gaze away from her feet. “Would you care to learn to ride?”
She continued to sketch without looking at him. “And in return for riding lessons, how much time would I have to give you?”
At this moment, time was not what he really wanted to bargain for, but something far more intriguing and not at all honorable. “A month?”
She shook her head, laughing. “Thank you, but no.”
“Riding on the Row is quite the thing to do,” he said in an attempt to intrigue her.
It worked. She looked at him. “The Row? What is that?”
“Rotten Row is a track of sand in Hyde Park where the fashionable people gather from twelve o’clock to two o’clock for riding.”
“Rotten Row. What a name!”
“Being seen riding on the Row is an excellent way for young ladies to impress country gentlemen. Riding is yet another of the season’s many opportunities to meet prospective husbands. So you see, you should learn how to ride.”
She pressed her pencil against her lips, her expression wary as she considered the matter. “I do not believe a month is a fair exchange,” she finally said. “I already know how to ride a camel.”
“I am open to negotiation. What would you believe to be fair?”
“As I told you, camels are difficult animals. I shouldn’t think more than a day of practice on a trained horse would be needed.”
An image flashed across his mind of Miss Wade astride a camel, her legs encased in trousers. He shoved that tantalizing image aside and made a calculated guess. “And when you rode camels, did you also master a sidesaddle?”
That got to her. She blinked behind her spectacles. “I had not thought of that.”
“I told you before, I will not lie to you.” As he said the words, he admitted to himself that some fashionable young ladies, through ignorance or preference, did not ride horseback, but he was not going to offer Miss Wade that additional piece of information. After all, he reasoned, an omission was not a lie. “There is no question that a sidesaddle is considered de rigueur for young ladies.”
“All right, then. In exchange for riding lessons, including the proper use of a sidesaddle, I will give you two days.”
“Two days? A week.”
Those lavender-blue eyes narrowed a bit. “Two days, until December twenty-third.”
He pretended to think it over, though he knew he had no choice. “Very well,” he agreed, and moved to sit opposite her, stretching out his legs beside her hip, and gestured to the basket. “So, are you going to allow me to sample these picnic viands of yours?”
“Of course.” She set aside her sketchbook and her pencil, then folded her legs beneath her, tucking her feet under her hips and out of his view, which was probably a good thing.
She placed the picnic basket between them and opened it. Anthony leaned back on his hands and watched as she laid out their meal of roast chicken, apples, cheese, bread and butter. “No wine?” he asked. “Miss Wade, a picnic should always have wine.”
“Not necessarily.” She pulled a bottle of cider and a glass out of the basket. She pushed up the metal clip of the bottle that held the stopper in place. “If our picnic were in Palestine,” she added, as she poured cider into the glass, “you would not have wine.”
“Nor cider.”
“True.” She held out the half-empty cider bottle to him.
He stared at the bottle in her hand, but he did not move to take it. “I wish we were in Palestine,” he said abruptly.
“Do you? Why?”
“I should like to see it, along with all the other places you have been. Egypt, Syria, Morocco.” Even saying the names stirred something inside him, a longing he had often felt but never acknowledged, and he surprised himself by confessing, “God, how I envy you.”
She stared at him, seeming just as surprised as he by his admission. “You envy me?”
“Yes.” He leaned forward and took the bottle from her hand. “You have ridden camels, you have lived in tents amid Roman ruins, and you have had the opportunity to be part of excavations throughout the Mediterranean crescent. What a romantic, adventurous life. Is it so hard to believe that I would envy you?”
“Well, yes,” she said with a half laugh, and gestured to the lush scenery all around them. “You are a duke. You have all that life can offer.”
“So it would seem.” He took a swallow of cider, then set the bottle on the short grass at the edge of the blanket. He leaned back again on his hands, staring up at the monument to idleness that stood behind her. “There is one thing you have that I lack, the one thing I long for more than anything else because it the one thing I can never have.”
“What is that?”
“Freedom.”
She shook her head, uncomprehending as she pulled the loaf of bread toward her and reached for a knife from the basket. “You have money and power. If one has those, one can do anything.”
“Perhaps it seems that way, but it is not true. I may have the means to do whatever I please, but I do not have the opportunity.”
“I do not understand.”
He met her gaze. “My father died when I was twelve, and I became the Duke of Tremore. My uncle served as my guardian and fulfilled my actual duties until I was sixteen, but from the day my father died, I established the power of my position. I made all the decisions, and it was I who told my uncle what was to be done, not the other way around.”
“At the age of twelve? But you were a boy.”
“I had known all my life that I would be the duke, and that someday I would be required to step into that position. Even at twelve I was old enough to appreciate power and what it means. I could, perhaps, have taken the easy road and done all manner of enjoyable things, such as travel, but I knew my estates were the core of my life, and I felt they deserved my full attention. I never took the Grand Tour. I have never been out of Britain in my life.” He gave her a slight smile. “So I am forced to be an armchair traveler. I will never see Rome or any of the many other fascinating places of the world.”
“But why do you not go now?” she asked as she began to slice bread. “You could afford to go anywhere on earth if you wished to do so, and surely a few months away would not go amiss.”
“I can never seem to find the time. Being a duke is an enormous job, Miss Wade. The tasks and duties are demanding and endless.”
“And you say I am too severe and sensible!”
He conceded the point with a nod. “Perhaps I was speaking as much to myself as to you, for my excavation is the only indulgence I allow myself.”
She stopped slicing bread. “I see now why the excavation is so important to you,” she said softly. “It is your Grand Tour.”
“Yes.”
Daphne set the slices of bread aside and returned half a loaf to the basket. She then pulled out a wedge of cheese. “Tell me more about what it is like to be a duke,” she said as she began to pare off slices of Cheddar.
“It is not a romantic adventure,” he said. “It can feel like a prison. It can also feel like heaven. Most of the time, it is tedious and trivial and deadly dull. It has compensations, good ones—wealth, power, and prestige.”
“And influence. To think of all the good things one can do with money. If you could see the poverty I have seen—”
“I should hate it and be angered by it, for waste and futility always anger me, and there would be nothing I could do to truly alleviate it. If I gave all my money away, the world would still be just as full of poor people, sad to say.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “I suppose it would.”
“I do what I can. There are charities, and they are one of the greatest responsibilities I have. Politics, too, of course. And tenants. Then there is the constant scrutiny and the never-ending struggle for privacy.”
“When I was in the village today, I met Sir Edward’s wife and daughters, and they were talking with Mrs. Bennington about you. They said you were a very private man.”
His insides tightened, for they had probably discussed him at length. His father’s illness and death were always a favorite topic of gossip and speculation. “I have no doubt they told you quite a bit more than that, Miss Wade.”
“Not very much, and in what they did tell me, there was no spite or malice, if that is what you imply.”
Anthony gave a humorless laugh. “It was probably a short conversation, then.” He glanced at her and found that she had stopped slicing cheese. She was watching him with that solemn face, no different than usual, and yet, he could feel censure in her silence, censure and a hint of sadness. “I do not like gossip, Miss Wade,” he felt compelled to say. “I do not like my life, my family, and every move I make to be the subject of discussion. I take a great deal of trouble to give gossips little to talk about.”
“Yet you have accused me of being secretive and mysterious and giving nothing away. Perhaps, despite the difference in our rank and position, we are not so very different after all.”
She spoke as if she were surprised by her own words. “Yes,” he admitted, just as surprised as she. “I suppose we are.”
“As to gossip about you, you might be relieved to know that all of it was kindly meant. You were described as a very handsome man, as well as a good and kind landlord. The main criticisms leveled at you were given by Sir Edward’s daughters and were limited to three. You are somewhat intimidating, you do not give enough parties for the local gentry, and you never attend the assemblies in Wychwood. They agreed that if you ever spoke with one of them during their strolls in your park or if you ever asked either of them to dance at an assembly, their reaction would be to faint dead away.”
“I am gratified that I make young ladies swoon. Another of a duke’s many duties.”
“Do you not find their adoration to be a compliment?”
There was reproof behind that cool, soft voice, and he felt defensive again. “They do not even know me. My rank, my wealth, and perhaps my appearance allow them to build my life into some sort of fantasy, a fantasy in which they believe they should like to take part.”
Daphne bit her lip as if she were holding back a sharp reply. She looked away and said, “It might be a fantasy, but it is a harmless one.”
Anthony sensed that was not what she had wanted to say, and he would have given a great deal to hear the words she held back. He waited, but she said nothing more.
He stared into the distance, down into the brilliant autumn scenery of the land he owned. “You are right. I admit it freely. Their attentions are harmless, and a true compliment to me.” He looked over at the woman beside him. “I should do well to remember that.”
“Yes,” she replied, looking back at him. “You should.”
He gave her a wry smile. “Why is it that when I am with you, Miss Wade, I can never feel myself to be quite as arrogant a fellow as you have declared me to be? Quite the opposite, in fact, for with you I often feel the humbling effects of having been put in my place.”
“I had no idea that my comments should have such an impact upon you.”
“They do, for I am coming to have a high regard for your opinion. Please do not interpret my lack of enthusiasm for the attentions of Sir Edward’s daughters to mean I am a callous man. But there are times when the duties of my position can be a great burden. As the daughters of a knight, the Miss Fitzhughs have no true comprehension how great a burden that position can be.”
“I understand what you mean,” she said, lowering her head to stare at the knife in her hand. “But one could also look upon such a life as a great comfort.”
“I do not take my position for granted, I assure you. I fully understand and appreciate how fortune of birth has given me all the physical comforts of life, as well as the ability to indulge in all manner of luxuries.”
“It is far more than that,” she replied, sudden passion in her voice. “You have a place in the world, your grace, and you know what it is. That is a very comforting thing.”
She did not move, but her sudden intensity startled him. In the past, he had taken her impassivity to mean she was not a person of deep feeling. Now, after a month of closer inspection, he was beginning to understand that the opposite was closer to the truth. Her fingers were curled around the knife in her hand so tightly that her knuckles were white. There was a great deal of passion there. It all lay beneath the surface.
“You have no idea how it feels to not quite belong anywhere,” she went on with an odd little catch in her voice. “To have no roots that tie you to a place and give you purpose. It is I who envy you.”
“It is understandable to feel rootless when you have had no home of your own.” He could see her hand start to shake, and he tipped her chin up, wanting to see her eyes, even if it was a view through her spectacles. “You shall find your place one day, Miss Wade. Everyone does, eventually.”
“I hope so, your grace.”
He ran the tips of his fingers across her lower lip. “Tell me,” he said before he could stop himself, “how does a woman who has lived most of her life in the desert manage to have skin as soft as velvet?”
Her mouth opened against his fingertips. “I—” She stopped, drew a deep breath, let it out in a puff of air against his fingers. “I worked under a tent, always.”
“Did you?” He traced the outline of her mouth. So, so soft.
“Yes, and wore a hat, and a veil, too, much of the time.”
Her sang-froid was admirable. Only a slight, momentary quiver in her jaw told him she was at all affected by what he was doing. All that passion just under the surface. What would happen if it were ever allowed to come out?
“Do you know,” he mused, running his fingertip along the line of her jaw, “almost no one calls me by my name? Your grace, or Tremore, but only Viola calls me Anthony. Even amongst my friends, and there are few I trust enough to call them friends, my rank is always an inevitable barrier. Even they do not call me by my name.”
He touched the tiny mole at the corner of her jaw, and her hand moved as if to push his hand away, but stilled in the air, hesitant.
What would it take, he wondered, for her to let down her guard? He had always prided himself on his own self-control, but she was a master at it. “If we were friends, Miss Wade, would you call me Anthony?”
She turned her face away. “I do not think that would be appropriate. I would…I would rather not.”
He moved closer. If he kissed her, the dam might break, something might snap, all that passion might come out. He cupped her cheek to turn her face toward him.
“Do you want us to be friends, your grace?” she asked.
“I do. Believe me, I do.” He could feel her desire and her apprehension in the rigid tendons of her neck beneath her ear, in the shallowness of her breathing. He bent his head.
“Do friends take such advantage as this?” she asked, her words more effective at stopping him than a slap across the face.
Anthony froze, his lips an inch from hers, his fingertips against her neck. He pulled back a bit and studied her profile in the dappled sunlight that filtered between the leaves of the chestnut tree. For the first time since he was a boy, he felt the agony of uncertainty.
He had no personal experience with virgins. He’d been sixteen when he had chosen his first mistress. In the thirteen years that had passed since then, he had provided himself with quite a few female companions. He also enjoyed the pleasures of London demireps on occasions when he went to Town. But of all the women he had intimately touched in his life, not one had been a virgin.
Desire had nothing to do with experience, and he felt Daphne’s desire as much as his own, but she was in his employ, and at this moment, she seemed so very vulnerable, almost fragile. If he pushed, he could win a kiss, at least. But honor, which dictated everything in Anthony’s life, dictated his decision now.
He sucked in a deep breath, summoning the iron will that had made his reason the master of his emotions since he was a child, and let her go.
He told himself the entire incident was innocuous. There was no harm in simply touching a woman. No harm at all. Nonetheless, he moved a safer distance away from her, and they finished their meal in silence on opposite corners of the blanket.