It wasn’t Emily.
The Duke stood in the hall, leaning against the door frame and looking down at her. Once again, Prudence was struck by his height, by how massive he was. He towered over her. She had to crane her neck back to look up at him. Her heart pounded. So, he had come after all. Why? What was he expecting? What did he want?
“I see you’re ready for bed,” he said.
Her heart missed a beat. She’d completely forgotten the fact that she was standing here in her nightgown, whereas he was still fully dressed. Instinctively, she made to close the door, to shield herself from his eyes, but he put a hand on it and kept it open.
“Don’t get shy now,” he told her. “It’s so unlike you, Lady Prudence.”
If he didn’t want her to be shy, she wouldn’t. “Just Prudence,” she said firmly. “You can call me by the correct title, the one you’ve given me, or you may call me by my name. You may not call me by the form of address I left behind at my father’s house when I married you, for it no longer applies.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Very well… Prudence. If that is your wish.”
“And what brings you here tonight, Your Grace?”
“Now, if we are going to be informal with one another, Prudence, surely that ought to go both ways. You ought to call me Leonard.”
She was surprised in spite of her own identical request. “Do you want me to?”
“I can’t see why there should be any difference between the way I treat you and the way you treat me,” he said. “If we are to be on a first name basis, we should go ahead and do that.”
“Very well,” she said. “Leonard, then. What brings you to my room tonight?” She held her breath, knowing what he might say, knowing that he had the right to insist upon whatever he wanted from her now that they were married. If a husband’s privilege was what he wanted, she would simply have to give in and hope that he was quick about it and that she would be able to return to sleep soon.
“May I come in?” he asked her.
She hesitated. “What will happen if I say no?”
“I would appreciate it if you didn’t, but I’m not going to break the door down,” he said. “This may be my house, but it is your room, and I will afford you your privacy. If you tell me to go away, I will do it.”
It was enough to assuage her fears, for if he had wanted to come in badly enough to force his way, they both knew he could havedone that. “I suppose it’s all right,” she said, stepping back from the door to admit him.
He entered the room and crossed to an armchair that sat in the corner. He eased himself down into it. Even seated, his height was staggering. Prudence was not a short person, but he was almost as tall sitting down as she was standing up. She returned to her bed, but something about sitting down on it felt too intimate, so she remained standing beside it.
“How was your first day?” he asked her.
She shrugged. “I didn’t see much of you.”
“No,” he agreed. “I was busy as I frequently am. But I trust that my staff took care of your needs.”
“The staff was very helpful,” she agreed. “You have good people working for you.”
“Yes, I do. And I’m sure that with their help, you will be very comfortable here in no time at all. But I wanted to take this time to speak with you and see whether there was anything I could do to make you feel more at home here.”
She frowned. “And you’re asking me this now?”
“Is there something about now that doesn’t suit you?”
“It seems the kind of thing you might have asked me when we first arrived, rather than waiting until the middle of the night. That’s all. I would have thought that you would want to make sure I was happy here at once. Instead, you disappeared the moment we arrived and left me to my own devices. That was a very difficult thing to deal with on my very first day in a new place. So if you’re concerned about what I might need in order to feel comfortable here, a place to start might be simply not leaving me to face it on my own.”
“I’m here now, aren’t I?” There was no remorse in his tone, no indication that he understood what she was trying to communicate. “Why don’t you just tell me what it is you want from me?”
“I want you to treat me like a person,” she said. “I want you to behave as if I matter to you in some way, even if that way is very little. You must eat dinner on a normal night—why would you not appear in the dining room, unless your reason was that you were avoiding me? And I do not deserve to be avoided, Leonard. You may not hold me in high esteem, but I am your wife, and you should treat me as such. You should treat me as a part of this household and not just something you can hand off to your servants and forget about.”
“That’s your feeling? You believe I handed you off to my servants and forgot about you?”
“It’s obvious that you did. I have no desire to make undue demands on your time, Leonard. I know that you are a busy man. But I refuse to feel as if I am not here and not a significantpart of your life. If we are going to live together, you are going to have to treat me better than you have thus far.”
He smirked at her. “You’re giving ultimatums? What do you imagine you’re going to do about this? What will you do if I say no to what you’re asking?”
