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“More than I would care to admit, MissStone.” his tone held a heaviness of frustration in it, and she realized that perhaps the reason he was up at dawn most morningswas because he had not slept. Another thing she had thought about but had not thoughtpossible.
Is his heartbreak so acute, that it stops him from sleeping?
“I’m sorry,” she could only say.
He gave her a thin smile. “There is nothing for you to be worried about, MissStone; it is my traitorous body that’s at fault.”
She wanted to tell him that she knew about his past, how the lady he had loved had broken his heart, and that the double pains from losing his parents and her had taken a toll on him, but she bit her tongue from telling him and kept drinking. What sense or help would that be for either of them?
“I hope it stops,” Louisa said kindly, while taking her cup and the now cooled pan to the washing basin.She quickly rinsed them out. “Good night, Your Grace.”
“You as well, Miss. Stone,” he said, thenwalked away with the bottle in his hand.
When Louisa got to her room, she closed the door with slightly trembling hands. The faint feeling of the Duke’s body behind her was enough to have her head whirling. His body felt a solid as a brick wall, and the woody scent from his skin was headier than the thick perfume from the gardens outside.
She peeled the wrapper away from her body and slid back into the sheets, grasping for her pillows. Never before had she been so close to a man, much less a man who she found dearly attractive. But she knew nothing could be there; it was only in fairy tales when the poor girl married the prince.
Sighing, Louisa hugged a pillow to her chest—nothing could happen, she knew, but was there a rule against dreaming about it?
***
Humming while dusting the library's shelves, Louisa gently removed the books five-at-a-time and wiped down the shelves. She took notes of the tomes and found that the Duke had a relatively high number of law and legislative manuscripts.
There were books about history, calculus, astronomy, mythology, and books written in French, but a few were fictional novels. Some of them had fingermarks pressed deeply into the leather covers, and she realized that those were the ones he used the most.
Pausing, she opened one and frowned at the text—the words were nonsense, but then her eyes landed on a familiar word, and she laughed—it was written in Latin.
“I was not aware thatOpusLocatumlaws are that humorous,” Duke Westwood said from the doorway, and when Louisa looked up, he clarified, “Its means labor laws, MissStone.”
“Oh,” Louisa said.“I only recognized one word, opus. Our priest back at the orphanage used to ramble on about the Opus Dei, the work of God, that we are all charged to do to our fellow man.”
He plucked the book from her hands and spun it.“I’d rather sit in ten hours of a dreary sermon than work my way through this book again.Sadly though I need to deal with my tenants and their issues.”
While paging through the book, his eyes met hers, and Louisa believed that she caught a flicker of warm emotion in them. He did not look as tired as she thought he would be, and his shoulders were relaxed, and a faint smile was on his handsome face.
“Were you able to sleep last night?” she asked.
“Yes,” he nodded while resting the book back in its place. “And you?”
“The same,” she replied, while pulling away and going to another shelf.He stood there, skimming his hand over the titles.
“Have you read much, MissStone?” Duke Westwood asked while plucking a few books from the shelves. “Do you have any favorites?”
Looking up, Louisa blushed.“The orphanage had few books, a bible, a copy of Gulliver’s Travels, and a few guides for women on how to care for a home. I read all of them.”
Duke Westwood hummed, then crossed over to her and reached over her shoulder. Though he did not touch her again, his presence was undeniable and magnetic, and she could hardly do her job because he was so close, and the imaginations she had about him last night were not helping.
Fruitless dreams of him holding her, of him laying soft kisses on her lips, or her skin, still lingered in the back of her mind, and she nearly dropped a stack of books. She managed to set them down and go back to wipe over the shelf, but her mind felt scattered.
He cannot be doing this to me on purpose. I do not think he knows that he is doing anything to me; he’s probably just being kind. That’s it, like with the hairpins, he’s only considerate.
“Miss Stone?” Duke Westwood asked.“Are you all right?”
“Yes, why w-wouldn’t I be?”
His brow ticked up.“You have wiped that section about seven times.”
Forcing out a laugh, Louisa replied, “I was woolgathering.” She turned to see the Duke holding out a book to her, and she reached to take it. Doing so, their fingers touched, and she nearly yanked her hand away. A mere touch should not feel so…breathtaking.
