Verity closed her eyes, because if the infuriating, baffling man did not stop calculating the precisely correct kiss to give the woman who had spurned him and actually get on with it, then she was going to kiss him herself. And then he really would be shocked.
* * *
He wished he understood Verity. Her eyes were closed, her cheeks had turned a very charming pink and she was shaking slightly. Nerves, of course. True, on those previous occasions when they had kissed she had responded without inhibition, but then it had been more in the nature of flirtation. This was, somehow, serious. This kiss was a like the signature on the bottom of a treaty. He was accepting her decision and he was undertaking—even if it had not been spoken of—to protect her reputation when the gossip mill got hold of the story of their night on the island and their scandalous failure to marry.
Mentally he was already bracing himself for the unpleasantness—and it was going to be unpleasant, he knew that. He must shoulder all the blame for her loss of reputation and that was only just. If he had controlled his siblings better, had given them a stronger example—or had not fallen for their plot in the first place—then none of this would have happened.
But now there is this kiss. He desired Verity Wingate. He had known that from the first, had admitted it to himself. And now he had her, not as he fantasised, warm and willing in his arms, but reluctantly, because she had faced a stark choice—marry him or deal with the ruinous consequences—and had chosen the wrong path. He could have made her want him if he had been careful and then she might have agreed. But it was too late now and it was not the action of a gentleman to try to seduce her into a agreement.
Will bent his head and took the soft lips that were raised to him. He slid his hands from her shoulders to her waist and she lifted hers to clasp around his neck. Despite everything, he smiled and felt the answering movement, the warmth as her lips parted, and eased the tip of his tongue between them.
He knew her taste now, was beginning to understand the soft sounds she made as he kissed her and to have confidence that he could read the way her body responded to him, curving into his, her fingers flexing in his hair, caressing the back of his neck. She was becoming aroused and so was he. The bedchamber was surely the one place where they would have found harmony.
When he moved his hands to cup her buttocks Verity lifted, pressed closer against him and then stilled abruptly. His erection was pressed against her and, however innocent she was, he would wager that she was not ignorant. She knew what that was and she had been startled to have encountered an erection quite so blatantly. Will almost released his hold on her, but she rose on tiptoe, pressed herself tighter against him and then slid, very slowly, back down. Only then did she pull back and he released her, managing, somehow, not to groan aloud.
Verity’s eyes were wide, the pupils dilated as she regarded him silently, lips slightly parted. Her nipples had peaked, all too visible through the fabric of her gown, and the sight made him growl, low in his throat. Will turned it into a cough. Growling with lust would be enough to send even the most aroused virgin fleeing down the terrace. Surely she had no idea what she had just done, the effect it had on him.
He cleared his throat.
Pull yourself together, man. She will think you are suffering from consumption if you carry on coughing.
She moved away from him, the colour high on her cheekbones. ‘I will miss our kisses,’ she confessed. ‘That is doubtless a very shocking thing to say and only goes to show how right we are to part. I am sure duchesses do not talk about such things. I have a suspicion that duchesses do not have any human weaknesses or even bodily functions. Perhaps ducal babies are not born at all, but arrive, pink and perfect, in a satin-lined crib by some special arrangement with the College of Heralds.’
She was joking, of course, to calm her nerves. Will had the nightmare vision of his duchess discussing the delivery of babies with Garter King of Arms at some dinner party. That particular Herald was in his fifties, but as ossified in his manner and thinking as a man forty years his senior. He would never suspect that she might be teasing him. The vision was succeeded by one of a procession of Heralds with a bassinet borne aloft before them to be deposited at his feet with a flourish of trumpets.
‘I believe duchesses a
re perfectly normal in all such particulars,’ he said repressively to cover the gasp of laughter that his ridiculous fantasy provoked. What was the matter with him? The College of Heralds was a venerable and scholarly pillar of the Establishment, not a cause for slightly risqué levity. Verity Wingate was infecting him with her disgraceful sense of humour, but no one made him laugh the way she did. Kisses, laughter, intelligence, those brown eyes...
‘Verity. We could try. Sleep on it—’
He could see the answer in her eyes even before she spoke. ‘No.’ Heat flared, anger. ‘I trusted you not to try to seduce me into changing my mind, Will. I was a fool to think that we could be friends...kissing friends.’ She shook her head, clearly impatient with herself as much as him. He saw her straighten her shoulders, the effort it took to steady her voice and sound calm and businesslike. ‘I will do everything in my power to see that you are not blamed for this, Your Grace, and you have my blessing for whatever you need to say, but I do not want to see you again, or to hear from you.’
The curtsy she gave him would have not disgraced a Court presentation. As Verity Wingate turned and walked away Will thought she had never looked more like a duchess. He looked down at his hands and the smear of blood on one of them. She had pounded her fist so hard on the wall as she spoke of her hopes and her fears that she had drawn blood. He should have known then that nothing was going to change her mind about him.
* * *
‘Papa, I cannot marry him. He has done nothing wrong, I do not hate him—I only know that I cannot be his wife. I could not take my marriage vows and mean them.’
Her father frowned, then began to mouth words, moving his hands slowly at the same time. As soon as they had reached the Old Palace, Verity had asked the Chaplain to leave them alone. She liked and trusted Mr Hoskins, but this was too personal. She made herself concentrate hard on understanding.
‘It would be a great match, better than I could have ever hoped or dreamed for you.’
‘I know, but it would be wrong for both of us.’
‘The scandal...’ He threw up his hands, abandoning any attempt to speak with them.
‘Yes. I will just have to face it down. I did nothing wrong. The Duke did nothing wrong. I refuse to behave as though there is something to feel guilty about.’
Her father sighed, then patted her hand. ‘I want you to be happy. I love you, Verity.’
‘I know and I love you, too, and I am so sorry to distress you over this. Papa, I cannot see him again—but will you be seen with the Duke on good terms? Show everyone that you do not hold him responsible for this?’ There was nothing better to calm the rumours, surely, than for the neighbourhood to see their much-respected Bishop treating the Duke as a friend.
Her father nodded slowly. ‘Yes,’ he mouthed. ‘I accept that he did nothing wrong and has done all he can to make amends. He can hardly drag you to the altar and I am certainly not going to try to do so.’
They sat for a while, hand in hand, watching the shadows lengthen over the courtyard garden. Then her father stirred. ‘Your aunt Caroline.’
‘Yes?’