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“I’m not sure I understand the full scope of it, anyway.”
“It is friendship,” she said, firmly. Adelaide had never spoken to anyone about her friends, and she shouldn’t want to. Shouldn’t want him to understand. Still... “They were the first people to make me feel... not alone. I barely suit with them—I’m not titled like Duchess, not rich like Sesily, not... well... no one is really like Imogen.”
“Lady Imogen is rather like a helter-skelter.”
“She’s quite brilliant.” She smiled, thinking of her madcap friend.
“One does not preclude the other,” he said, and there was a half smile in his own voice.
Resisting the urge to say more, Adelaide cleared her throat and adjusted her spectacles. “I don’t know what you think you’ve noticed.”
A secret smile played across his lips. “I’ve noticed that when powerful men fall, you’re often nearby.”
Of course he had. “Does that not worry you? You are a powerful man.”
He watched her for a moment before answering. “I am not worried. But I think that if I were, I would have good reason to be, as matchbreaking is not the most dangerous thing you do, by far, Miss Frampton.” He added, “Though you are currently racing across Britain, alone, to do just that.”
“Not alone,” she said without thinking. When the words were out, she flushed, dipping her head and taking another bite of food, knowing that he watched her carefully. Ignoring the enjoyment that threatened under his scrutiny.
“Shall I tell you what else I think?” he said, continuing when she nodded. “I don’t think you are chasing them to matchbreak. My brother might be an ass at times, and he could certainly be called stupid at others, but he would never hurt Helene.” He did move, then, as though his certainty propelled him toward her. “And I think you know it.”
She swallowed her surprise. “What would make you think that?”
One of his dark brows rose. “I pay attention, Adelaide Frampton. And when you heard my brother and Lady Helene were headed from London to Gretna, you weren’t shocked and you weren’t angry and you weren’t fearful. You wererelieved.”
He was right. She had been.
And he’d noticed.
“Someday, I hope you’ll find your way to telling me why,” he finished. “But I am not asking you to feed that hope now. Nor am I asking you for money or power orrevenge. Instead, I am asking if you would let me eat dinner with you. So neither of us is alone.”
And in two days of thinking that the man was dangerous, that was the moment he became most terrifying—when he offered her something she could not resist. Companionship.
They ate together, the sounds of the taproom below a distant hum in the space. Adelaide watched him from the corner of her eye until she could not stay quiet any longer. “At Havistock House, you called John your heir.”
He met her gaze, his eyes like a clear blue day. “Jack is my heir.”
“Because you have no plans to marry.”
“Correct.”
“Why not?”
It was the question he’d avoided answering downstairs. Clayborn sat back in his chair and watched her for a moment. “Are you offering?”
“What? No. What?” He couldn’t really believe she would—
“Adelaide,” he said, with an amused smile that she hated and liked too much. “I jest, but thank you for putting me directly back into my place with a wicked blow to my pride.”
“I didn’t mean that you weren’t marriageable,” she rushed to say.
“Thank you.”
“I mean, you’re aduke.”
He nodded. “I am.”
“A duke who believes in love... or so you say.” Which made him the closest thing Adelaide had ever seen to a mythological creature.
