“If you are going to be a duchess, youmustdress like it,” he insisted. Caroline was ready to tell him to bite a rock when he added, “Besides, Elara will be back in a few months, and I am worried that she will accuse me of abuse if she sees you in such rags.”
At the mention of her cousin, Caroline paused. Slowly, she lowered her head and looked over her clothes. When her grand adventure began, the plain dress she bought to blend in had been clean and new. She had always planned to buy one or two more, but as time went on, most of her money went to repairing her cottage, paying rent, or donating to the orphanage. Now, the fabric of that single dress was worn out from many washings. Tears lined the bottom of the skirts. Small, rubbed-away patches appeared under her arms and on the top of her skirts from the nervous rubbing of her palms. She only now realized she must have done this quite often. Her apron was also very faded; the white color had turned to a light beige.
“Perhaps a change of wardrobe is in order,” she begrudgingly agreed.
“Perhaps the shop you work at could provide such a thing?” Damien countered, and Caroline jolted.
Work!
They had left the orphanage with enough time to get to the shop, but with their... quarreling in the street, she was sure that she was now late. Mrs. Parks was going to be furious.
“I have to go to the modiste’s,” she said, hastily heading toward the direction of the shop.
“I am coming with you,” Damien answered, but she quickly disagreed as she kept up her hurried pace. She did not want Damien there for the scolding Mrs. Parks was surely about to give her.
“Come in later, if you must, but please, stay away for a little while. I must discuss some things with my employer.Privately,” she insisted as she rounded the street corner and stopped before the shop’s door.
Annoyance spread across Damien’s face as his jaw twitched, but after taking a look around, he gave a stiff nod.
“There is a messenger service just over there. I need to send out word to inform my accountant and solicitor of our recent purchase. They will ensure that Miss Willa receives the proper amount for the orphanage promptly. As soon as I am done, I will come to the shop.”
“Fine,” she quickly replied, choosing to ignore that he had said ‘our’instead of‘his’purchase.
She shifted nervously on her feet as Damien was annoyingly slow to cross the street, unwilling to let her leave his sight, but finally, when he disappeared into the shop, Caroline turned with a quickness toward the modiste’s, opened the door, and hurried inside.
Just as she predicted, Mrs. Parks was waiting for her, and her anger exploded the moment Caroline closed the door.
“Where the devil have you been?”
Chapter 7
“You do not stop, do you understand?” Damien commanded, placing the missive into the messenger’s hands.
They trembled as he held them out and took the sealed letter. The man’s head nodded vigorously.
“Yes, Your Grace,” he replied, the fear apparent in his voice. “I will get there by tonight. I promise you.”
“You had better,” Damien gritted out, taking a step back from looming over the much smaller man.
His rage was vibrating, hot and wild, just below the surface, threatening to break out. After two months of searching, he had finally found Caroline. He had assumed somewhere along the way that Caroline had hidden herself away in a village, but why she had chosen this miserable place was beyond him. A place so rundown, so full of nasty people like that scoundrel he had wanted to kill the night before for touching Caroline. He could understand that she might be frightened of him, but he did not realize that it would have driven her to believe thatthiswas abetter option than being by his side.
So even though he wanted to find the man from last night and feed him his own fingers for even touching Caroline, even though he wanted to find her landlord and wring his neck for taking advantage of a woman trying to survive in such a filthy cottage, Damien kept a tight fist over his temper, doing his best not to let it rage out of control.
He could not bear to make her unhappy, but it was slipping. With every passing moment, the roaring urge to get Caroline away from this place was growing greater. She did not belong there. She belonged back in his estate, where he could watch over her… Where he could convince her to tell him what about her life had made it so easy for her to run away.
In his letter to his solicitor, he had expressed the need to make haste. He had brought a substantial amount of funds with him—enough to cover the immediate needs of the orphanage and anything Caroline might want or need. However, he required a much larger sum to pay for the deed of the orphanage and to construct a new building.
“Your Grace?” the messenger timidly asked. “Will there be anything else?”
Damien blinked, forced his mess of thoughts and anger to quiet themselves, and refocused on the man in front of him.
“Go, man,” he grunted, nodding toward the man’s horse.
With another vigorous nod and a quick bow, the messenger shot off the stoop of the messenger service. Damien took another deep, centering breath, then at a much calmer pace, left the shop’s front stoop and crossed the street to Caroline’s employer.
He was still several steps away when he heard shouting from inside, and what little restraint he had to hold his anger inside broke like a twig.
“Youstupid, arrogantgirl!” a woman raged as he wrapped his large fingers around the dainty door handle. “You think you can just come and go whenever you please? Work whenever you please? I pay you to do things the way I want them!”
