“You almost sound as though you disagree.”
“Not at all.” She glanced up at the portraits that lined the gallery: family members from long past. Children, dogs, formal portraits. The mischievous laugh of a girl painting, now framed and hung for posterity. Once, her home had too held echoes of a long history; now, her family and its estate were but a pitiful remnant. “I think you should be proud of where you’re from,” she said almost absently. “You can lose it all so fast, you know.”
“I appreciate your concern.” His arm tightened around her hand for a heartbeat, but when she glanced up at him, he was focused on the door at the end of the gallery. “Now we come to my father’s apartments, and you shall see why this is my favorite place in the entire house.”
Charlotte had been prepared for doubt—after all, it was hardly likely the Duke’s tastes would align with hers. Yet when they stepped through the door into a neat, old-fashioned parlor with wood paneling and the heavy furniture of the previous century, she was prepared to admit defeat.
To be sure, it was dark. Mahoganywasdark—but the furniture was exquisite, and with the sunlight streaming in through the windows, it was possible to see the woven colors in the carpet, and the intricate carvings on the back of the chairs.
It was warm and homely and worn and utterly lived in, and it brought back memories of tobacco-laden air as her father stood by the fireplace, his back to the roaring flames. The image flashed bright before her eyes, even though the world before her didn’t change.
“Do you like it?” Aaron asked, almost hesitantly, as though her opinion mattered to him.
“The rest of the house is beautiful,” she said, “but cold. This feels like a home.”
“This was my home as a boy,” he said. “Before my mother decided it was far too old fashioned for her taste.”
“Itisold fashioned, but somehow—” Charlotte’s words trailed away as she walked further into the room. There would be other rooms further in, with more of the old-fashioned wallpaper and the heavy curtains that were so different from the modern, airy styles. Her home had been just the same, largely because there had been no money for redecoration.
“It reminds me of home,” she whispered, looking about.
“A positive memory?”
“Oh—of a childhood spent before the fire, while my mother sewed, and my father smoked a pipe and read the paper. We lived a quiet life, you know, when I was a child.”
Before she had known about their financial woes. Before she had gone to her first Season, failed to make an acceptable match, and there had been no money for another Season. Before, before, before.
“Charlotte.” Aaron was before her again, brushing his fingers under her eyes with such tenderness she could hardly believe it was him. “I did not bring you here to make you sad.”
“I can well believe it,” she said, sniffing. “I’m sorry. It just reminded me of the way things had been.”
“Wereandhad beencan be some of the worst words in the dictionary.”
“My father was a good man, however poorly he handled our finances. I miss him, sometimes.” She straightened her back, already embarrassed he had seen her tears. “We should return downstairs. They’ll be expecting us.”
“You may come here whenever you wish,” Aaron said, offering her his arm once again. “My home is yours for the duration of your stay.”
“And what will the servants think if they see me wandering around?”
“They will think my future wife is examining the home I am to provide her,” he said with the ghost of a laugh in his voice. “And in some ways, they would be right.”
“Except I amnotyour future wife,” she reminded him.
“No one need know except us.”
That was the most sensible course of action, she knew it, and yet in his house, the deception weighed on Charlotte. Deceiving London was one thing, but deceiving the servants that one day believed they would be taking orders from her? That felt like a step too far.
“Fear not,” Aaron said, his voice nearly a whisper. “We shall not need to continue this deception long—once I have found Constance and you a suitable husband, we may dissolve the agreement as easily as we made it.”
“Do you not feel a scrap of guilt?” she whispered back.
“What have I to be guilty for? Many a couple get engaged only to dissolve things later.”
“Usually, that decision is not premeditated.”
“And what if our decision is?” Charlotte chewed her lip as they descended the stairs to where her mother and Lady Brighton were entering the house, her mother looking a little worse for wear.
Though she hardly wanted to admit it to herself, the worst part of the deception was not the servants but the fact that Aaron had kissed her, now, three times. He had touched her in ways she had not ever thought to be touched and awakened her body to the prospect of pleasure she could never have imagined.
