Page 26 of Kathryn

Gerrit remained silent and stared, which generally served to get most people talking.

It worked this time, too.

***

Dulverton regarded her with cold, reptilian eyes, their iciness all the more noticeable given how very hot Katie’s face felt. He dwarfed the chair he sat in, his arrogant fury cloaking his massive shoulders and making him look even bigger and more striking.

Yes, Katie decided that striking was a far more accurate word for him than ugly, which was too simple. Dulverton’s looks struck a person like an axe. In fact, she did not have to stretch her imagination at all to imagine his huge hand wielding an axe, stripped to the waist with his near-white hair plaited and hanging down his back, his powerful torso glistening with—

“Lady Kathryn!”

Katie jerked her gaze from his broad chest—garbed in an exquisite coat rather than sweat and the blood of his vanquished foes—to his harsh, austere face. “I beg your pardon, Your Grace?”

His scowl deepened and he cut her a look of such loathing that Katie knew he was going to say something offensive. “I asked if this footman is still in your employ?” He regarded Katie as if she were vermin—the same way that she would look at him if he had confessed to bedding a housemaid. She had always believed there should be a special circle of Hell reserved for masters—or mistresses—who took advantage of their servants and now she had plunked herself right in the middle of that vile cohort.

Katie hated that she’d lied, but she could hardly tell him the truth, could she? Even if she ignored the story Andrew had told her about Dulverton’s lethal skills and willingness to duel, the proud set of the duke’s jaw and the barely restrained savagery in his frigid gaze persuaded her that the first thing he would do if he encountered her prior lover—Lord Jasper Staines—at one of his clubs was call him out. He might not banish Katie to the Continent as he had his last wife and her lover since her affair had happened before their marriage, but he might very well kill or maim Jasper to send a message.

By lying about the identity of her lover, Katie had likely saved Jasper’s life. Not that the scheming weasel deserved it.

“I would like an answer. Now,” Dulverton snapped, his abrupt, dictatorial tone setting her back up.

Rein in your temper! This man will likely be your husband.

Katie ignored the wise warning. “He is not my footman; he never was. He was a servant at my aunt’s house but no longer works for her. So, you needn’t tease yourself about ever seeing him again.” His look of loathing bit into her like a spur. “Unless you frequently encounter footmen at your clubs, that is.”

He stared at her with his unnervingly pale eyes, the pupils narrowed to pinpricks of displeasure, his lips compressed into a thin, disapproving line.

Katie did not blame him one bit. But that didn’t mean she had to like being examined as if she were dung.

“Why are you looking at me that way, Your Grace?” she demanded.

“What else am I supposed to do?” the duke snarled. “Throw a parade to celebrate your woefully catholic taste in rutting with a servant? Award you a medal to—”

“Enough, Your Grace!” She crossed her arms, as if that could protect her from his stinging derision. “You have made your point and then some.”

His jaw flexed and, to her astonishment, he nodded. “You are correct. I apologize for my incivility.”

Katie ignored his apology. “You asked me if I was being forced into this?”

He frowned at the change of subject but nodded.

“I am not, but I know you are.”

He did not try to deny it.

Katie told herself to be grateful for his honesty no matter how much it stung. “You have done your duty by coming here today and offering for me. I absolve you of any responsibility toward me.”

“But I have not offered for you,” he pointed out pedantically.

“Rest assured that I will tell everyone I rejected your offer. Nobody but the two of us will ever be the wiser and we can go our separate ways.

He rubbed the back of his neck, his gaze distant. A moment later his pale eyes sharpened and he sighed. “Scandal is attached to both our names. The only way to vanquish it is to marry.”

She dearly wanted to bring up the last scandal in his life and point out how that seemed to have miraculously disappeared. But even she was not that cruel. “It seems extreme to marry a person you loathe merely to avoid damage to one’s reputation.”

“Perhaps your reputation is of no concern to you, but mine is to me, and I daresay your family will care,” he said, not denying his loathing for her.

Katie’s sisters were hardly sticklers for propriety, but none of them would appreciate having her appalling behavior attached to their names. But was that reason enough to spend the rest of her life shackled to this cold, rude man? Katie tried to imagine bringing Dulverton to her annual family Christmas celebration—the three weeks each year that she lived for—and knew he would hate it. If he even permitted her to go.