style="font-size:15px;"> Georgianna ran the tip of her tongue across suddenly dry lips before speaking huskily. ‘Why do you say that?’
He gave a derisive laugh. ‘My dear Georgianna, if you really were just the foolish romantic you claim to be, then once your usefulness to Rousseau was at an end he would have had no choice but to kill you for what you already knew about him, rather than simply allowing you to leave.’
She drew her breath in sharply, the colour draining from her cheeks even as she felt the burning in her chest and temple, a painful reminder that André had attempted to do exactly that.
She still cringed at the numbing disillusionment, the cruel and frightening way in which she had discovered André had never cared for her, but had merely been using her. And the shock, the devastation of learning that André intended to rid himself of the nuisance of her by taking her out of the city before killing her.
That he had not succeeded in doing so had been more by chance than deliberate intent.
And Georgianna had the scars, physical as well as emotional, to prove it.
Zachary remained unmoved by the haunted expression on Georgianna Lancaster’s suddenly deathly pale face. Her elopement with André Rousseau, the mystery of where she had been and what she had been doing this past ten months, were all more than enough reason for him to distrust every word that came out of her delectable mouth.
And he did still consider it a delectably sensual mouth, he conceded regretfully. The sort of mouth that he had once imagined doing wild and wonderful things to his body—
Zachary stood up abruptly. ‘Fortunately, the decision as to the truth, or otherwise, of the information you wish to impart, does not rest with me.’
‘Then with whom?’
Zachary looked down at her grimly. ‘There are others—less gentle than myself—who will decide the matter.’
‘I do not understand.’
‘You will, Georgianna.’ Zachary hardened his heart to the increased bewilderment in those violet-coloured eyes. ‘Have no doubt, you most certainly will.’
She stared up at him with fearful eyes. ‘You cannot mean to— You are saying I shall be tortured, in order to ascertain whether or not I am telling the truth?’
‘The English government does not resort to torture, Georgianna.’ Zachary bared his teeth in a hard and mocking smile. ‘Not openly, at least,’ he added softly.
‘You are trying to frighten me,’ she accused emotionally.
‘Am I succeeding?’ he taunted.
‘You must know that you are.’ Her slender fingers tightly gripped one of the downy pillows.
‘Poor Georgianna,’ Zachary drawled mockingly. ‘Are you even aware of your father’s death?’ he prompted sharply.
‘Yes. I learnt of it yesterday when I returned to England.’ Her lashes lowered. ‘I— Do you have any news of Jeffrey?’
‘He is well, I believe. Inheriting the title put paid to Cambridge, of course,’ he drawled dismissively. ‘But he fares well with his new responsibilities as Earl of Malvern, with the aid of his guardian.’
‘Who on earth...?’
‘I am sure your belated concern for your brother is all well and good, Georgianna,’ Zachary continued dismissively, ‘but it will not succeed in deflecting me, and others, from the suspicion that you might also now be a spy for Napoleon.’ He gave a mocking shake of his head. ‘And to think, just ten months ago the situation was all so very different. That if you had not run away, then all of this might now be yours.’
All of this, Georgianna knew, being the Hawksmere houses and estates, the title of duchess, and the Duke of Hawksmere himself as her husband.
All of which would most assuredly have been hers, if she had continued with the betrothal her father had accepted on her behalf and married Zachary Black, the aloof and enigmatic Duke of Hawksmere.
It was every young girl’s dream, of course, to receive an offer of marriage from a duke, to become his duchess, revered and looked up to by society.
It might also have been Georgianna’s dream, too, if her father had once consulted her and not instead roused her stubbornness by accepting Hawksmere’s offer without so much as discussing it with her.
If she had truly believed she could bear to be married to such a cold and arrogant man as Hawksmere, a man she had no doubt did not love her.
If she, stupid romantic fool that she had been, had not already believed herself to be madly in love with another man, a penniless tutor, whose situation in life had appealed to her young and too-innocent heart. The man she had believed to be in love with her.
As opposed to this man, Zachary Black, the icily composed Duke of Hawksmere, whom she knew had not loved her, but had only offered for her because she was the eminently suitable, and malleable, nineteen-year-old daughter of the Earl of Malvern.
Georgianna had been flattered but terrified when her father first came to her and proudly told her of the offer of marriage he had received, and already accepted, on her behalf, from the wealthy and powerful Duke of Hawksmere.
Until that moment Hawksmere had been a gentleman Georgianna had never so much as spoken to and seen only rarely, and then only from a distance, at several of the ton’s entertainments during the past two Seasons. The toplofty gentleman had much preferred his clubs, and the company of his close friends, to the bustle and formality of society’s much tamer entertainments.
But even viewed from a distance, Hawksmere had seemed intimidating to her, and aged one and thirty years to her nineteen, their twelve years’ difference was so obvious in experience as well as age.
His demeanour was always one of icy disdain as he habitually looked down his arrogant nose at the crush of guests assembled at those entertainments. And the terrible scar visible upon the duke’s throat had caused Georgianna to tremble every time she so much as glanced at it, as she imagined the raw savagery that must have been behind such an injury.
The very idea of her ever becoming the wife of such a haughtily cold and frightening gentleman had filled her young and romantic heart with fear. Especially so when the two of them had not so much as spoken a word to each other. Indeed, the only possible reason Georgianna could think of for the proposal was that, as the only daughter of the Earl of Malvern, Hawksmere must consider her a suitable candidate to provide his future heirs.
The dukedom aside, even the thoughts of the intimacy necessary to provide those heirs with such a terrifying man as Hawksmere had been enough to cause Georgianna’s heart to pound fearfully in her chest.
Besides which, she was already in love and had been so for several months. With André Duval, the handsome and charming blond-haired, blue-eyed French émigré her father had taken pity on and brought into their home, so that he might help to prepare her younger brothe,r Jeffrey, for his entry into Cambridge.
That
