No, Phoebe couldn’t blame his title. She’d have to blame the man himself.
“What doeshmmean?” she demanded.
The Duke got to his feet. He wasn’t a tall man, but he had a large presence. It was his command over his body, Phoebe decided. He moved like he knew precisely how every inch of his form would respond to his commands.Hehad never fallen on his bum in a parlor. She’d bet her hat on it.
“What it means,” he said, his words as slow and deliberate as his movements, “is that you and your father both seem remarkably determined to absolve your sister of any responsibility for her own actions.”
This was a dirty play, and Phoebe suspected that the Duke knew it. Comparing her to her father? Honestly.
“I can only assume that he laid the blame at my door,” she said, refusing to be put off. “But I am not speaking of whatever witchcraft my father believes I have cast over Hannah to make her leave. I am speaking merely of the usual way of young ladies which you yourself might have known.”
He paced closer to her in a way that was meant to seem idle but was transparently anything but.
“Do you think I have extremely high experience with young ladies?” he asked with dangerous mildness.
Phoebe fought the urge to roll her eyes. She understood how this man had used feigned casualness to get soldiers in his command to obey without even needing orders, butshehadn’t come up through the navy. No, Phoebe had been through endless ballrooms in theton. She’d been to Almacks!
He wasn’t even in the top half of people she’d met who could make cutting remarks with the tone of one talking about the weather. He should really try his skill against some of the Society matrons. Then he would see.
“Don’t be difficult,” she told him. “I know you have a sister, and I know you know what I’m talking about.”
“Pretend that I don’t,” he said, taking another few steps in her direction. He didn’t sound quite so mild now, but he wasn’tangry. She knew anger. She could hardly live with her father without learning how to recognize it—Lord Turner was always furious about something. It was only Phoebe about half the time.
But the Duke was… disquieted, she suspected. He didn’t seem to know what to make of her defiance.
Well, this was going to be a learning opportunity for him then. Phoebe was a master of defiance.
“Young ladies,” she said with exaggerated sweetness, “often dream of love. My sister is one such young lady. And then she was brought here, told she was to be married, and thrust at a man who still carries with him the habits of war. Can you blame her for balking?”
His eyes narrowed. He was standing close enough now that she could see the way the brown blended with the gold to make that dreamy hazel—far too dreamy for a man like him.
“She dreamed of love,” he repeated in a knowing tone.
“Yes,” Phoebe said. “So if you had just been a little kinder?—”
“No,” he interrupted. It really was so nice to see such pretty manners in a gentleman. “No, that’s not it, is it? Because she would have to be completely mad to flee out into the snowstorm by herself. And she’s not mad, your sister, is she?”
He stepped forward again, and suddenly, Phoebe felt like the mouse realizing that the cat had crept forward without making a sound.
“No, not mad,” he said. “Clever. Cleverer than any of us gave her credit for. Including you, I gather. Because you haven’t been quite as worried today as you were last night. Not once have you demanded that we go out searching. Which means that you suspect she’s safe. Youknowshe got into that carriage.”
“I don’tknowit.” She hadn’t meant for her inflection to sound quite like that; she’d meant more of a broad-scale denial, but his proximity was making her struggle to think. This was, of course, absurd. He was a man. They really weren’t that interesting.
“But you suspect.”
It wasn’t a question, and she didn’t give a response. She didn’t trust herself not to give too much away.
“Here is what I think,” he said. He was close enough now that he had to look down at her. “I think that you have some information that I lack. It has reassured you, at least to an extent, that your sister’s accomplice—whoever brought that carriage to squire her away—has taken her to safety. And I think, as you say, she did it for love.”
“If you think that,” she said, feeling as though her mouth struggled to form around the words, “then why don’t you call off the marriage?”
The corner of his mouth kicked up.
“Oh, Miss Turner,” he said, a chiding note in his voice. It was the most emotion she’d heard from him yet. “You misunderstand me. I have never quit anything. I have never allowed my will to be bent to someone else’s. I was not deterred by Napoleon’s armada. I’m not likely to be scared off by a flighty child.”
This was overall a very good point, which irritated Phoebe to no end.
“It’s no secret that you’re unbendable,” she scoffed, annoyed when the sound came out rather breathless. “That’s really what I came in here to talk about as you might recall.”
