“I’ll Marry the First Woman Who Enters,” the Duke Declared— Then She Burst In Chasing a Bird With…

Chapter 3

“I mean it.”

“Of course.”

“I am not the Duchess.”

“Not yet.”

“Not ever.”

The dressmaker only smiled and wrote something in her little book, and Clara understood that the entire county had already signed a document she had never been shown.

Her aunt sat by the window with her tea, unbothered, watching the road. Aunt Louisa — the only family Clara had left worth the name — had spent twenty years being quietly disappointed by life and had developed, as a result, a talent for enjoying absurdity wherever it appeared.

“Why,” Clara said, “is everyone behaving as though this is settled?”

“Because you are now the most interesting unmarried woman in England.”

“That is a terrible position to be in.”

“It is worse for the Duke.”

“How?”

“He has spent eight years refusing women with the dignity of a bishop. Now the first woman who has caught his attention is the one he promised, in front of witnesses, to marry.” Her aunt stirred her tea. “Men hate being caught by their own jokes.”

“I did not catch his attention. I was chasing a bird.”

“Sometimes life has the bad manners to disguise an opportunity as a humiliation.”

“I prefer the humiliation.”

“Of course you do.”

Clara freed herself from the dressmaker at last and went upstairs to her room, where the necklace lay on the dressing table on a square of linen. She had not worn it since she was fourteen. She had not, if she was honest, been able to look at it directly since her mother died — a gold chain, unremarkable except for the pendant, a flat oval of gold with something engraved inside the seal. Her mother had told her once, in a voice that meant the conversation was closed, that the necklace was old and worth more than the house they lived in.

She had said nothing else. There had never been anyone left to ask.

Clara put it in the drawer, shut it, and went to the window.

The carriage came up the lane at five o’clock.

She watched it from behind the curtain: black lacquer, two matched grays, a driver in a coat that cost more than her aunt’s roof. The door opened, and the Duke of Ashbourne stepped down onto a road that had not seen a carriage like that in twenty years.

Clara dropped the curtain as though it had burned her.

“Oh, absolutely not.”

Her aunt set down her cup. “You are going to speak with him.”

“I am going to hide.”

“You are twenty-four years old.”

“That is precisely old enough to know when to hide.”

She went upstairs. Five minutes later, a maid found her standing behind the wardrobe.

“His Grace is waiting in the drawing room, miss.”

Clara sighed. “Tell him I died.”

The maid blinked.

“Tell him I died peacefully.”

“Miss—”

“In my sleep. It was very quick.”

“You are standing in front of me.”

“Yes. It is a miracle.”

The maid looked at the wardrobe, at Clara, and back at the wardrobe, decided in favor of silence, and withdrew. Clara counted to ten. Then she counted to ten again. Then she went down, because her aunt was right about many things and cowardice had never once improved anyone’s afternoon.

He was standing by the fireplace when she entered — tall, dark-haired, coat cut severely enough to make a point, one hand braced on the mantel. He turned as the door closed behind her.

“You are alive,” he said.

“Disappointing, I know.”

“I had hoped the newspapers were wrong.”

“About what?”

“That you have a sense of humor.”

She stared at him. Somewhere between the doorway and the chair, she had expected the Duke to be a piece of furniture with a title attached. He was not. There was something faintly dangerous about him, the way there is about a dog that is not growling yet.

“Sit,” he said.

She sat, because the alternative was standing awkwardly, which is worse.

“I came to make a proposal.”

“If you say marriage, I am leaving.”

“Then I shall say something else.” He waited a beat. “I want six weeks.”

Clara frowned. “For what?”

“To know you.”

“Why?”

“Because I refuse to marry a stranger.”

She considered that. It was, irritatingly, sensible. “That is the first reasonable thing anyone has said to me since last night.”

“I have not always been reasonable.”

“No. I noticed.”

Something flickered at the corner of his mouth. “If, after six weeks, you want nothing to do with me, I will release you from the promise. Publicly. And if you do not—”

“Then what?”

“Then I will ask you properly.”

She studied him. He had not sat down, which she suspected was deliberate — it gave him height, and he knew it. “And what happens if you decide you do not want me?”

“Then I will tell you to your face. And I will not blame you for it.”

That, she had not expected. The men she had known made exit sound like mercy.

“And what exactly are we doing during these six weeks?” she asked. ” ‘Getting to know each other’ sounds vague.”

“Then let us make it simple. Come to Ashbourne Hall. Meet the people who live there. Walk the estate. See me on a day when I am not performing for a room.” He paused. “You will find it instructive.”

“You perform.”

“Everyone does.”

“Do you always answer a question with another question?”

“Only when I am nervous.”

She blinked. “You are nervous?”

“Yes.”

That was strange enough to be true. The Duke of Ashbourne, who had dismissed six women in a single evening with the efficiency of a man sorting grain, admitted to nerves, standing up, in his own coat, in her aunt’s shabby little parlor.

“Why?” she asked.

“Because you are the first woman I have met in years who is entirely unimpressed by me.”

“I am impressed by your ability to get a bird to decorate you.”

He laughed — a real one, short and rough, the sound of something rusted being worked loose.

She smiled before she could help it.

“Six weeks,” she said.

“Six weeks. No assumptions.”

“Agreed.”

“And no pretending this is a love story.”

“Agreed.”

She stood. He held out his hand, and she took it, and his fingers closed around hers — warm, dry, steady — and neither of them let go quite as quickly as the moment required.

Clara noticed. So, plainly, did he.

She withdrew her hand first. “Six weeks, Your Grace.”

“Adrian.”

She looked up.

“If you are going to spend six weeks arguing with me,” he said, “you may as well use my name.”

She smiled. “Very well. Adrian.”

“Clara.”

“You may.”

He nodded once, gravely, as though a treaty had been signed.

She walked to the door. Then she turned. “The necklace. What about it?”

“Keep it somewhere safe.”

“I thought you disliked it.”

“I do.”

“Then why are you worried about it?”

Adrian looked toward the window, where the garden lay in long evening shadows and something white sat on the old stone wall, quite still, watching the house.

“Because it has excellent timing,” he said.