Page 46 of The Duke’s Defiant Love

"His Grace, the Duke of Ravensmere."

Barrow's announcement fell into a breakfast room gone entirely silent. Her father's newspaper lowered by inches, her mother's teacup paused halfway to her mouth, and Amelia's pulse climbed so fast she had to set down her fork before her hand betrayed her.

"Send him to the drawing room," her father said, after a pause that stretched a beat too long. "I will speak with him first."

Amelia endured what felt like an eternity, her mother saying nothing, her father's absence saying rather more, until Barrow returned to fetch her with an expression carefully arranged to give nothing away.

"His Grace would like a private word, Miss Hartwell."

The drawing room felt smaller with Sebastian standing in the middle of it, dressed with his usual precision, though nothing about his bearing carried its usual composure. He turned the moment she entered, and something in his face, tight, unguarded, told her before he said a single word that this was not a courtesy call.

"Your father has given us a quarter hour," he said. "I do not intend to waste it."

"Then say what you've come to say."

"I owe you an apology. Several, as it happens." He stepped nearer, then stopped, as though uncertain what claim he still had to the distance he'd once closed so easily. "I walked away from you in the park because you saw something I did not want seen. I told myself I had matters to attend to.We both know that was a lie. Do you believe I am capable of changing, Amelia? Truly? Not as an argument. As the truth."

"I don't know." She kept her voice steady, though it cost her considerably to do it. "I would like to believe it."

"I would like that too." Something eased in him, briefly, before the next weight settled back over his face.

"The second apology is for last night. I did not bring you to that house, but what happened in the library was as much my choice as yours. I should have considered what discovery would have cost you before your father was standing in the doorway. I take full responsibility for and what it will go on costing you if this is not addressed properly."

"Addressed."

"I should have protected you from that."

She gave a small, bitter laugh. "You cannot protect me from society."

"No." Sebastian's voice hardened. "But I can refuse to let you face the consequences of the mistake alone."

Amelia looked up.

"I have already spoken with your father." He said it plainly, without flourish, and she felt the floor tilt slightly beneath her even before he finished the sentence. "I intend to marry you, Amelia. I have told him as much this morning, and I meant it."

The words landed exactly wrong. Some part of her had been hoping, foolishly, for an entirely different sentence, and this one, however necessary, was not it.

"Because of the scandal."

"Because it is the right thing to do, given what happened."

"That is precisely what I said. Because of the scandal." She heard her own voice go flat, and hated how quickly the warmth from the library had curdled into this. "You are not offering because you wish to marry me, Sebastian. You are offering because society requires it of you, and duty is the one demand I have never known you to ignore.”

"That is not fair."

"Is it not." She looked at him steadily, though it cost her everything to keep her voice from shaking. "Tell me plainly, then. If no one had found us. If there were no scandal at all this morning. Would you be standing in this room asking me to marry you?"

He did not answer immediately, and the silence, however brief, told her everything she needed to know.

"I thought as much," she said quietly.

"Amelia—"

"You do not need to explain further. I understand the position we are in. I understand what happens to a woman found alone with a man in that house, whatever anyone believes occurred inside it." She lifted her chin, holding herself together through sheer force of will. "I will marry you, Your Grace. There is little else to be done, and I am not fool enough to pretend otherwise. But I would ask you not to dress the arrangement up as anything warmer than obligation. I find I would rather know exactly what I am agreeing to."

She forced a smile that did not reach her eyes. "If this is what must happen, then I will do it."

"That is not what I wanted."