Page 24 of How Not to Marry a Duke

"That sounds rather peaceful, actually."

"It has its advantages. No one expects me to be pleasant at breakfast."

Penelope's smile was sad. "I shall be expected to be pleasant at every meal. For the rest of my life. As a duchess, one's breakfast demeanor is apparently a matter of public concern."

"Frederick—His Grace—does not strike me as a man who requires pleasantness." The name came out before Florinda could stop it, too familiar, too intimate. She felt her face heat.

If Penelope noticed the slip, she did not acknowledge it. "He is... kind. I could do far worse." She paused. "My father could have contracted me to someone cruel. Frederick is not cruel. He will make an adequate husband."

Adequate. Florinda had never heard a word contain so much resignation.

"Love is not a requirement," Penelope said again, as though reminding herself. "Security is. Compatibility is. The ability to maintain a household⁠—"

"Without murdering one another," Florinda finished. "Yes. You mentioned."

They sat in silence for a moment, two women who understood each other far too well.

"I should go," Penelope said, rising. "I promised the housekeeper I would review the menu for the dinner party next week. Apparently there is a crisis involving oysters that requires my immediate attention."

"Oyster crises wait for no woman."

"They do not." Penelope paused at the door, looking back. "Thank you. For listening. I have not... I do not have many friends. My position makes it difficult."

"You have one now," Florinda said, and meant it, and hated herself for the lie underneath the truth.

Penelope smiled—that warm, genuine smile—and left.

Florinda stared at the abandoned novel on the table. The Italian. A story of imprisoned heroines and forbidden love and villains who got what they deserved. In novels, the woman who wanted another woman's betrothed was always the villain. The schemer. The one who deserved wolves.

She did not feel like a schemer. She felt like a woman sitting in a chair she could not escape, wanting things she could not have, forming friendships she did not deserve.

Footsteps sounded in the corridor. Deliberate. Measured. Approaching.

Her heart counted them without her permission. One. Two. Three. Four⁠—

The door opened, and Frederick appeared.

"It is time for dinner," he said. "I have come to⁠—"

"Carry me. Yes." Florinda's voice emerged sharper than she intended. "I am aware of the schedule."

He paused in the doorway, watching her. "You seem... discomposed."

"I have been reading Gothic novels all afternoon. Discomposure is inevitable." She held out her arm, not meeting his eyes. "Shall we proceed? I am told there may be an oyster crisis, and I should hate to miss the drama."

Frederick crossed the room. She did not watch him approach. She did not count his steps—seven, it was seven steps from the door to her chair, she was counting anyway, she could not seem to stop.

He lifted her, and she was in his arms, and Penelope's voice echoed in her head: He will make an adequate husband.

There was nothing adequate about the way her pulse raced when he touched her. Nothing sensible about the way she had memorized his breathing pattern. Nothing proper about any of this.

"Fourteen stairs," she said, because she could not say anything else.

"Yes." His voice was very close to her ear. "Fourteen stairs."

She had become the villain in someone else's love story. The worst part was that she could not even hate herself properly for it—she was too busy counting heartbeats and memorizing the exact pressure of his hands.

One step. Two. Three.