Page 83 of The Duke and the Darkness

“Yes.” He took a healthy swallow of whiskey. There was no warmth in his throat this time. There was only a long, welcomed burn.

“So are you.”

The concern in his mother’s eyes stabbed him in the gut. He slowly lowered the glass from his lips. He didn’t bother denying it.

“For some of the same reasons.”

He couldn’t deny that either. So he stared into his cup and slowly swirled the whiskey just to watch it sheet off the china in dark legs.

“If life with your father taught me anything, it was to find allies who understand me. Peyton understands you, Devlin, and the pain you’ve suffered. She’s one of us.” She paused. “She deserves to become one of us in every way.”

“You mean marriage.” He shot her a quelling look. “I thought you wanted me to help her, not punish her.”

Not rising to the bait of that failed attempt at humor, his mother leveled a hard look at him. “She loves you.”

His heart skipped, and he covered any emotions that might have strayed across his face by shaking his head. “I don’t know if what she feels is—”

“Shelovesyou,” his mother repeated firmly. There would be no brooking an argument with her over that. Yet she paused. “Do you love her?”

The simple question hung in the air between them like a roll of thunder announcing an oncoming storm. He could barely remember to breathe beneath the weight of it and had no idea how his lungs filled with air, how he managed to stay on his feet, or how he was able to answer, “Yes, I do,” without his voice breaking.

“Enough to want to be with her, share a family, and create a real home together?”

“Yes.” Then he put voice to his deepest fears. “But is that enough reason for her to change everything about her life?”

“Two people who need each other the way you do, who are equals in intelligence and capabilities, who can work togetherlike true partners to create a happy life for themselves…” she murmured thoughtfully against the rim of her tea cup. “Seems to me to be the perfect reason.”

“Amid all the scandal of her return, she’s also supposed to withstand the gossip of becoming my wife and the trials that come with being Duchess of Dartmoor?”

A small smile played at her lips. “Duchess of Dartmoor isn’t such a bad position, I daresay, for the right woman. One who has the spine and resolve to match her duke in every way.”

That was the god’s truth, even if he didn’t want to admit it. But it was an even deeper worry that concerned him.

“And if she says no? If she would rather return to France and the life she knows there versus the struggle that awaits her here?”If she would rather keep me in her past with the ghosts who used to haunt her than walk into the future together?It was a fear he didn’t have the courage to raise with Peyton before, not even when he’d held her trembling and satiated in his arms. “What do I do then?”

His mother gave him a reassuring smile as she stood and approached him. “She won’t.” With that certainty, she removed a ring from her finger and placed it onto his palm, then closed his hand around it. “Take this when you propose. It was your grandmother’s engagement ring. You deserve to have the same happy, loving marriage that your grandparents had.” She leaned up to kiss his cheek. “If not more.”

When she moved away, she took the bottle of whiskey with her.

He looked down at the ring and shook his head. “Is it really that simple?”

“God no!” She poured the whiskey into her tea, then set the bottle aside and lifted the cup to her lips to take a tentative sip. “Marriage is the most complex situation in the world, at some times happy, at others thoroughly miserable, and alwaysa challenge, even when both people care for each other. But when you have love, support, and acceptance, it’s also the most miraculous.”

He felt the tiny ring dig into his palm as he tightened his hold around it. “I have your blessing, then?”

“You have a wonderful future ahead of you.” Her eyes softened on him. “I cannot think of anyone more perfect for you to spend it with than Peyton Chandler.”

Neither could he.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“All right, then.”Peyton clapped her hands, and the children lined up in the street, some so excited about their game that they bounced up and down in place, unable to stand still. “First—David.” She pointed at the towheaded boy of ten who stood first in line. “Count to five.”

The boy’s face lit up at such an easy pitch. “One, two, three, four, five!”

She pointed at the downspout halfway down the street. “Good! Take your base.”

The boy ran forward, and a little girl in a dress that was barely more than a collection of rags stepped up next.