How to Catch a Duke (Rogues to Riches #6) - Grace Burrowes Page 0,31
letters. “I kissed you once to ensure we could support the fiction of a romance between us, and a second time because you caught me unaware.” He hadn’t been playacting the second time, but what had he been up to?
“What excuse will you make for our third kiss, because I very much hope there will be a third kiss?”
So did Abigail. “My justification for further familiarities will be that I am out of the habit of kissing overbearing louts and the business wants some practice.”
His lordship thumped the roof once with a gloved fist and the coach rolled smoothly forward.
“Which overbearing lout had the pleasure of relieving you of your virginity?”
He would ask that. “Relieving me of my ignorance, you mean? I can hardly recall. To whom did you surrender yours?”
He smiled—fondly, damn him. “Her name was Jenny O’Neill. She was four years older than I, a goddess wearing a tavern maid’s apron and a siren’s smile. I learned to spend an entire hour on a single tankard just for the pleasure and torment of watching her flirt with the other fellows.”
The coach was delightfully well sprung, traversing the cobbles as smoothly as a barge crossed a calm lake. “You weren’t supposed to answer that question, my lord.”
“I will always answer your questions, Miss Abbott.”
“Did you break her heart?” Abigail hadn’t meant to ask that. She was merely trying to put off any discussion of the letters.
“She broke mine, gently, sweetly, as all hearts should be broken the first time. I make it a point to stop by her inn when my travels take me back that direction. She has a pair of little boys now, and her husband worships her and the boys equally, else I should have to have a stern word with him. They are trying for a daughter and I expect they will succeed.”
Abigail caught a hint of wistfulness beneath this cheery recitation. “Her inn?”
The shades were drawn, doubtless to protect Abigail’s privacy, but she could see Stephen’s eyes well enough. He sent her a bland look.
“I might have bought the place for her. I can hardly recall, it was so long ago. Shall I tell you about the handsome blighter who stole your heart?”
“You will air your suppositions whether or not I want you to.” His lordship’s mood was hard for Abigail to read, which he doubtless intended.
“He was handsome, because only a man with a bit of arrogance would have the balls to approach you.”
“Language, my lord.” And whatever did he mean?
“You ride atop stagecoaches with ne’er-do-wells and drovers. My language does not shock you. This man, though, whom you can hardly recall, was above your touch too, or you would never have given him the time of day. He was no tame Quaker lad. He instead embodied what a sheltered Quaker miss would consider forbidden fruit.”
“I am not a Quaker miss.” The Quakers wouldn’t have her, not for one of their own. Good heavens, her dresses had pockets and she carried a sword cane and she wasn’t meek and peaceful and pious.
Nor did she wish to be. To be a bit more conventional might have been nice, though.
“Your lover was from a good family,” Lord Stephen went on, “maybe even a titled house. He was close enough to real consequence to trifle with somebody he considered of a lower order and know he would not be held responsible. He was all golden charm and lazy promises—he was doubtless an acolyte of Sartoris and probably gave you a bauble or two that you dared not wear. He had sense enough to win your heart. We must commend him for that one instance of good judgment, though he then broke your heart, for which I should call him out.”
“He did not break my heart, and you cannot call him out.” The wretch was dead, and his passing had occasioned all manner of confused emotions for Abigail. “I have no patience with guns, my lord, lest you forget.”
“Well, I can’t very well duel with swords, can I? My opponent would be felled by mirth when the first riposte sent me arse over ears into the dirt. I no longer duel, in the ordinary course, though for a time I indulged.”
The coach swayed around a corner and slowed.
“Indulged? And have you since realized masculine pride isn’t worth dying for?”
His lordship propped his foot on the opposite bench and idly rubbed his knee. “Masculine pride is not worth killing for, though I might set a brace of ruffians