Jennifer Ashley - The Duke’s Perfect Wife

No. No. Never.

Hart held on to her, feeling the last of it, the mixture of excitement and lassitude that meant he’d reached a perfect moment.

“I can’t do this without you, El.” He opened his eyes, hearing the catch in his voice. “I need you.”

“Hart…”

“Don’t go away from me again.” The note in his voice was desperation. “I’ll never bear it if you go away again.”

Tell her everything, Ian had admonished.

I can’t. Not until she’s mine, not until she can’t ever leave me.

Eleanor looked at him with her beautiful blue eyes, her brows together, Eleanor assessing him.

“Please,” he said. Dear God, he almost sobbed it. But his heart was hurting. She’d go again, and that would be the end of him.

Eleanor touched his face with gentle fingers. She looked into his eyes as though she could see into his soul. Eleanor was the only one who could.

“Yes,” she said, her voice so soft he almost didn’t hear her. “I’ll stay.”

Hart swallowed, the breath he let out almost a sob. “Thank you,” he whispered. “Thank you.”

The boat had drifted. Eleanor emerged from the cabin to find that they were floating in the middle of the wide canal.

“Hart,” she called in alarm.

Hart came out, devastatingly handsome in his shirt and kilt, his coat still somewhere below.

A rope stretched through the water between the bow and the bank. When Hart tugged at it, it came loose.

Eleanor put her hands on her hips. “I suppose the great Duke of Kilmorgan couldn’t remember to tie up the boat?”

Hart didn’t look the least bit ashamed. “My mind was on other things.”

Arrogant, sinful, smiling once more. The lonely, terrified man who’d said to her inside the cabin, I’ll never bear it if you go away again, had vanished. Hart Mackenzie had gotten his own way once more.

A lone rider came along the towpath, the man huddled in a greatcoat against the wind and rain. Hart cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, “You there! Grab the rope!”

The man looked up, started, and slid off his horse. “Mackenzie? What the blazes are you doing in the middle of the canal?”

“Balls,” Hart said. “It’s Fleming.”

Eleanor peered through the rain and waved. “Please do pull us in, dear Mr. Fleming.”

“Don’t humor him,” Hart growled.

“We need his help, unless you want to float sideways all the way to Hungerford lock. The lockkeeper would laugh at us.”

Fleming moved to the rope and pulled it from the water, then started to reel them in, hand over hand. Hart lifted an oar that had been lashed to the cabin and used it to guide the canal boat back to the bank. The boat bumped gently, the canal water still. Hart tied the oar back in place as Fleming fastened the line to a tree stump.

Fleming had his hands out, helping Eleanor to damp land before Hart could reach her. Fleming looked from her to Hart, his dark brows lowering. “What the devil is this, Mackenzie? If you’ve despoiled her, I’ll shoot you like the mangy dog I know you to be.”

Hart stepped off the boat behind Eleanor and slid his arm around Eleanor’s waist. “Congratulate me, Fleming. Eleanor has just agreed to be my wife.”

Eleanor’s mouth popped open. Not exactly what she’d said. She’d agreed to stay when he’d given her that heartbreaking look and begged her to. In what capacity, they hadn’t yet discussed.

Fleming didn’t believe it either. His hand went to his pocket, drawing out the silver flask he always seemed to have on hand.

Eleanor knew that David realized quite well what they’d been doing on the boat. Eleanor and Hart were out here alone, the boat drifting. Eleanor had dressed with Hart’s help, but her collar was not all the way buttoned, her skirts still crinkled from lying on the floor. Hart was entirely in dishabille. When the wind opened Hart’s shirt, the tiny love bites Eleanor had given him were plain to be seen.

Hart did not bother to pull his shirt closed. “What are you doing in Berkshire, Fleming? You’re supposed to be minding the store in London.”

“I sent you a telegram,” David said. “But Wilfred telegraphed back that you’d vanished without a trace, so I thought I’d better come up and help look for you. The vote is tomorrow. Am I right to think that you want to be there for it?”

David spoke almost offhandedly, but there was a sparkle in his eyes. Hart’s answering smile bore an animation Eleanor hadn’t seen in him in a long time. “And do we have them?”

David’s smile was just as triumphant. “Oh, yes. Unless half decide at the last minute to betray us, we do.”

“You have what?” Eleanor asked.

She’d always liked that David didn’t insist that such discussions were not meant for ladies. He answered readily. “Bums on seats, my dear El. Bums on seats that will vote our way. Enough to overturn Gladstone’s bill and wipe him away with a vote of no confidence. It’s all over. He’ll have to call elections, our party will win a majority, and Hart Mackenzie will be prime minister of Britain, God help us all.”

Eleanor’s excitement rose. “Good heavens, Hart.”

“It has been a long time coming,” Hart said. The fire in his eyes belied the calm in his voice.

“But if Mr. Gladstone knows you will defeat him, why would he let it come to the vote?” Eleanor asked.

David answered before Hart could. “Because any more delay at this point makes our victory more certain. If he calls an election tomorrow, he might have a chance to return, although we don’t intend to let that happen.” David rubbed his hands together. “Hart Mackenzie will be back in Commons, to lead it this time. There are those still stinging from his whiplike wit from back when he was an MP. They breathed a sigh of relief when he took his title and went to the Lords. And now he’s returning. Ah, the delight.”

“I imagine it will be quite entertaining,” Eleanor said. “My father will be certain to watch from the gallery.”

“David.” Hart said the word without inflection, but Fleming seemed to understand.

“Right. I’ll be up at the house, warming away the rain with some of your single malt. I intend to drink large quantities.” David caught his horse, mounted, and rode on up the towpath.

“You’ll be off to London with him, then,” Eleanor said, her voice too bright.

Hart cupped her shoulders, hands warm through her damp bodice. “Yes.”

“It’s everything you’ve worked for,” she said.

“Yes.” He circled his thumbs on her collarbone. “We’ll have the wedding at Kilmorgan. A large, showy affair to satisfy the general public. No eloping for the new prime minister.”

Eleanor found it hard to meet his gaze. His eyes blazed hot, determined, Hart the controlling master once again. “You’ll be far too busy to have anything to do with weddings at the moment, surely,” she tried.

“I’ll buy you the most ostentatious wedding jewels I can find and let the newspapers go insane. They can make our reconciliation a grand romance if they want, and we’ll give it to them.”

“Make a good show of it, you mean,” Eleanor said tightly. “It will help you with the election.”

“I don’t care about that. You’ll have to marry me this time, Eleanor. David will be telling the family any moment how he found us, and then we’ll never have any peace. They’ll know exactly what you and I were doing out here on this boat.”

“That’s Ian’s fault. He sent me to you when he knew you were alone.”

“Yes, my devious little brother manipulated things to his satisfaction. But we are stuck with it.”

“So, I must marry you to save my reputation?”

Hart stepped close to her. “Your reputation won’t be harmed. I’ll make certain the knowledge does not go outside the family. But I want you to marry me regardless. I need to take care of you.”

“You need to…”

“I will take care of you whether you marry me or not, but things will be easier if you are my wife. You need a husband, Eleanor, as much as I need a wife. When your father passes, you’ll have nothing. Glenarden will go to a cousin you barely know, and you’ll be turned out. What will you do then?”

“I’m proving to be very good at the typing machine.” Eleanor tried to make a joke, but Hart did not laugh.

“You will end up in a cheap boardinghouse full of dreary old women,” he said. “Prey for any man who decides that a lovely spinster is fair game. Or you’ll pass from country house to country house, living with friends, but I know you—you’ll feel horribly ashamed and believe you’re taking advantage of them.”

“When you put it like that, things do sound rather bleak.”

“They don’t have to be. Once you’re a Mackenzie, no one can touch you. Even being betrothed to me will have weight. You’ll never have to worry again, El. Neither will your father. And who knows, I might have given you a child today.”

Eleanor shook her head. “I did not conceive when we were lovers before, and I am rather long in the tooth now…”

“You never know, El. Today was an impulse, but you shouldn’t pay for it. Neither should a child. I’d want him to have a name.”

Eleanor heard the fervor in his voice. Hart wants a baby, she realized in surprise. Her heart warmed.

Hart’s hands were firm points on her shoulders, hot in the cold rain. “I will take care of you and any child—my name will take care of you.”

Eleanor’s mouth was dry, thoughts rising and dying in her head. “Any woman marrying you will have to become a grand society lady, the other half of your political career.”