direct, or slap her face, but if he allowed her to speak, she would fulfil her vow and tell him the story.
At the thought of seeing him again, a tiny flicker of anticipation bubbled up from deep within. Holding her breath and squeezing her eyes tightly shut, she stifled it.
* * *
Having awakened before dawn to pace his room until daylight, Alastair chose to avoid breakfast, knowing he wouldn’t be able to hide his agitation from his eagle-eyed sister. When mid-morning finally came, Alastair set out from the Crescent, his exuberant nephew in tow.
Much as he’d tried to tell himself this was just another day, a trip to the park with Robbie like any other, he failed miserably at keeping his mind from drifting always back, like a lodestone to the north, to the possibility of seeing Diana again—a possibility that flooded him with contradictory emotions.
The defiant need to confront her and force a reaction, and curiosity over what that reaction might be, warred with the desire to cut her completely. Overlaying all was a smouldering anger that she had the power to so effectively penetrate his defences that he’d been required to employ every bit of his self-control to keep the memories at bay—a task he’d not fared so well at while half-conscious. He’d slept poorly, waking time and again to scattered bits of images he’d hastily blotted out before trying to sleep again.
Fatigued and irritable, he tried to focus on Robbie’s eager chatter, which alternated between enthusiastic praise of the horse his uncle had ridden to Bath, a wheedling plea to be allowed to sit on said horse, and anticipation at meeting his new friend again.
‘The boy may not be able to come today,’ Alastair said, the warning as much for his own benefit as for Robbie’s. ‘You may have to settle for just the company of your dull old uncle.’
‘Uncle Alastair, you’re never dull! And you will let me ride Fury when we get back home, won’t you? We can still stop for cakes, can’t we? And I’m sure James will come again. His nurse promised!’
‘Did she, now?’ Alastair raised a sceptical eyebrow, amused out of his agitation by the ease with which his nephew turned a possibility into a certainty, simply because he wished it. How wonderful to possess such innocence!
But then, maybe it wasn’t. He’d had his innocence torched out of him by one splendid fireball of humiliation.
Whatever reply Robbie made faded in his ears as they entered Sidney Gardens—and Alastair saw her. Shock pulsated from his toes to his ears, and once again, for a moment, he couldn’t breathe.
Dressed modestly all in black—at least her critics couldn’t fault her there—Diana sat on a bench, as her son tossed his ball to the nursemaid on a nearby verge of grass. While Alastair worked to slow his pulse and settle his breathing, Robbie, with a delighted shout, ran ahead to meet his friend.
Now was the moment, and with a sense of panic, Alastair realised he still wasn’t sure what he wanted. If Diana turned to him, should he speak with her? Ignore her? If she did not acknowledge him, should he go right up to her and force his presence on her?
Before he could settle on a course of action, with a grace that sent a shudder of memory and longing through him, Diana rose from the bench—and approached him.
‘Mr Ransleigh,’ she said as she dipped a curtsy to his stiff bow. ‘Might I claim a moment of your time?’
A reply sprang without thought to his lips. ‘Do you think you deserve that?’
‘I am sure I do not,’ she replied, the serenity of her countenance untroubled by his hostile words. ‘However, I vowed if I were ever given a chance, I would explain to you what happened eight years ago.’
The violet scent she’d always worn invaded his senses. Unconsciously, he looked down, into eyes as arrestingly blue as he remembered from the day they first captivated him. No lines marred the softness of her skin, and the few dark curls escaping from under her bonnet made him recall how he’d loved combing his fingers through those thick, sable locks. Desire—powerful, potent, unstoppable—rose up to choke him.
He had to get away. ‘Do you really think, after all this time, that I care what happened?’ he spat out. ‘Good day, Duchess.’ Pivoting on one boot, he paced away from her down the gravelled path.
He heard the crunch of her footsteps following behind him. Torn between a surge of triumph that this time, she was pursuing him, and a need to escape before he lost what little control he had left, he could barely make sense of her words.
‘Although I may not deserve to be heard, since you are a gentleman, Mr Ransleigh, I know you will allow me to speak. Infamous as I am, it’s best that I do so here, now, out of sight and earshot of any gossips.’
‘I have never paid any attention to gossips,’ Alastair flung back, turning to face her. She halted a step away, and he couldn’t help noticing the flush in her cheeks, the rapid breathing that caused her bosom to rise and fall beneath the modest pelisse—as if she were recovering from a round of passion.
Desire flared again, thick in his blood, pounding in his ears. Curse it, why must the Almighty be so cruel as to leave him still so strongly attracted to this woman?
But what she said was true—if she was determined to speak with him, it was far better here than at some ball or musicale or—worse yet—a social function at which Jane was also present. ‘Very well, say what you must.’
‘Walk with me, then.’
In truth, some tiny honest particle of his brain admitted, he wasn’t sure he could have turned away. Curiosity and lust pulled him to her, stronger than reason, common sense, or his normal highly developed sense of self-preservation.
Despite the volatile mix of anger, confusion, pain and desire coursing through him, he also noted that, though she asked him to walk with her, she did not offer him her arm.
Not that it mattered. So intensely conscious was he of her body a foot from his, he could almost hear her breaths and feel the pulse in her veins.
‘I met the Duke of Graveston at one of the first balls of my debut Season,’ she began. ‘He asked me to dance and accorded me polite interest, but I thought nothing of it. He was older, married, and I had eyes for only one man.’
Her words struck him to the core, despite the fact that she said them simply, unemotionally, as if stating a fact of mild interest. Swallowing hard, he forced his attention back to her narrative, the next few words of which he’d already missed.
‘...began seeing him at home, visiting Papa. They had similar scientific interests, Papa said when I asked him. It wasn’t until some months later that I learned just what those “interests” truly were. By that time, the Duke’s wife had died. To my astonishment, he proposed to me. I politely refused, telling him that my heart and hand had already been pledged to another. He...laughed. And told me that he was certain I would change my mind after I carefully measured the advantages of becoming his Duchess against marrying a young man of no title who was still dependent upon his father.’
Though they walked side by side, Alastair noticed Diana seemed increasingly detached, as if, transported to some other place and time, she was no longer even conscious of his presence. ‘He returned a week later, asked me again, and received the same answer. In fact, I urged him to look elsewhere for a bride, as, though I was fully aware of the honour of his offer, it
