had spent the past three days taking meals in her room. Alexander had spent the past three days with the rest of his party, pretending to feel festive.
He wanted to give her a chance to heal without being plagued by guests, or... him.
He wanted to give her so much more than that.
But she had emphatically declined his offer to marry, and she was right to do so.
Mother had been appalled to learn that Alexander had suggested the union. She had been delighted that at least Cynthia Louise had the good sense not to make a bad situation worse.
So why did Alexander feel like this was the worst?
He was standing in an extravagant ballroom decorated with bright ribbons and boughs of holly. He was surrounded by a slightly diminished but still impressive number of sweet, pretty, well bred, respectable, proper young ladies who would not slam a door in his face if he offered to make her his duchess.
But he didn’t want to.
They were all perfectly fine. They were better than fine. Each of them were splendid, accomplished women who would be a credit to the title and no doubt caring mothers to their future children.
But they weren’t Cynthia Louise.
He shouldn’t care.
It shouldn’t matter.
He hadn’t planned this party intending to marry her in the first place. As she’d rightfully pointed out, he would not have offered if extraordinary circumstances hadn’t divulged his indiscretion. He should be thrilled she hadn’t taken him up on his offer.
Thrilled.
Squeals filled the ballroom as the blindfolded gentleman with outstretched arms in the center almost touched one of the other guests before they could dance away, laughing.
It was as though Alexander were at a completely different party.
“Your Grace!” A rosy-cheeked miss held up a long strip of cloth. “Do you want a turn?”
“No, thank you,” he called back, pressing himself deeper into the wainscoting.
He didn’t need a blindfold.
Alexander was adept at avoiding uncomfortable truths.
Such as, his offer to Cynthia Louise had been no better than the morning seventeen-year-old Alexander Borland had woken up the new Duke of Nottingvale.
Here’s a coronet. Now, be someone else.
Alexander hadn’t been given a choice. Primogeniture forced the change upon him. He’d gone from an adolescent lad to a powerful lord overnight.
The rules had saved him.
Those same rules would stifle Cynthia.
Asking her to not be all of the things he liked best about her... What kind of offer was that?
A duchess had expectations she was required to live up to. He should choose someone who wanted to live by the strictures of the beau monde. Who would thrive ruling that world, not wither within it.
If he liked Cynthia, he should leave her be.
His sister Belle emerged from the crowd and joined him against the wall. “Not playing the game?”
“There’s no way to win,” he muttered.
His heart was torn in two.
The thought of living without Cynthia Louise was infinitely worse than the scandal of choosing her.
But he was a duke, and duty came first.
“How is Cynthia Louise?” his sister asked.
“I haven’t seen her.”
“Whose fault is that?”
He sent her a flat stare.
She blinked innocently and turned her gaze back to the ballroom. “Skis, eh? Was it terrifying?”
“Yes,” he replied. “And the most amusing afternoon I ever had... Until it wasn’t.”
“Mm.” She made a moue. “Mother says you narrowly avoided leg-shackling yourself to a mortifying hoyden.”
Said like that, it sounded horrid.
Said like that, Mother’s words resembled Alexander’s speech to Cynthia Louise.
“I asked,” he told his sister. “She declined.”
Belle raised her brows. “Did you ask? Or did you imperiously inform her of your ducal decision?”
He glared at her. “What’s the difference?”
Belle’s eyes widened and she shook her head. “If you have to ask, then I have my answer.”
“We don’t suit,” he said.
Belle’s expression was suspiciously blank. “Mm-hm.”
“The weight of this title almost crushed me. I cannot ask Cynthia Louise to voluntarily subject herself to the same fate.”
“You definitely didn’t ask,” Belle murmured. “From the sounds of it.”
“She doesn’t have to be a duchess,” he told his sister. “Cynthia can be and do anything she pleases.”
Belle nodded. “Like marry a man who appreciates her just as she is.”
Jealousy roared through Alexander’s veins, hot and thick and itchy. He could not stand the thought of some other man with Cynthia Louise. Juggling chestnuts with her, sliding down mountains with her, loving her.
It was Alexander who—
“Oh, bollocks,” he muttered.
He loved her.
That was the reason he’d gone sliding down a mountain, the first time as well as the second.
It wasn’t the skis.
It was Cynthia.
Belle brightened considerably. “Something wrong, dear brother?”
He closed