Free Sins of a Duke by Suzanne Enoch Page B

the way she clung to him?
    “Apologies,” he muttered, moving back another step.
    “That’s quite—”
    He turned on his heel and strode off into the dark depths of the alley.
    She felt cold. Bereft and insulted. “You owe me a waltz,” she called in his general direction, though she couldn’t see him in the gloom.
    “You’ll have it,” his voice returned, clipped and toneless.
    Josefina stood for a moment in the dark. As the night sounds of London crept closer around her like a not quite comfortable cloak, she pulled open the door and returned inside alone. Her father wanted to see her wed to Melbourne. For the first time she considered what making such a union would mean to Sebastian Griffin. He was not a man who had to marry. If he wed again, it would bebecause someone could answer the deep…need…in him. If that person was her, God forgive her if she betrayed it or proved herself false or unable to live up to it—because the Duke of Melbourne would have no mercy at all.

Chapter 6
    “H ow do you mean, ‘odd’?” Eleanor, Lady Deverill asked, shading her eyes to look at her husband pacing beside the daffodils. With her other hand she scooped their five-month-old daughter, Rose, back onto the blanket and away from the butterfly she was attempting to eat.
    “I’m not certain,” Valentine returned, the unaccustomed hesitation in his voice as troubling as what he was attempting to say. “I would say he seemed…confused.”
    “Sit down here before you blind me,” she said, patting the blanket beside her. “And tell me how my brother seemed confused. Last night was Almack’s. I would equate that with boredom, rather than confusion.”
    Her husband sank onto the blanket beside her, absently lifting Rose onto his lap to twiddle his fingers at her. “I am painfully aware of that, believe you me.” He drew a breath, as thoughtful and concerned as she’d ever seen him. “He asked me to join him so I could ‘observe with my usual cynicism,’ or so he said. The Costa Habichuela people werepolite and eager to make a good impression, as anyone coming to London in search of funds and support would be. But the chit…”
    “You’re referring to Princess Josefina, I presume? The one who slapped my brother in public?”
    “Put your knives away, my heart.” Valentine leaned sideways and kissed her in that soft, sensual way that made her glad she was sitting down. “He looks at her when she’s not looking at him, but to her face he either argues, or is so formal he’s almost rude.”
    Her breath caught. “He likes her. Good heavens.”
    “That’s what I thought, as soon as he admitted that she annoys him. But…” Valentine lifted Rose to look her in the eye. “You are staying away from men, my sugar cake. Men are evil, wicked, and devious. I know this, because I am one.”
    Rose laughed, grabbing her father’s handsome nose.
    “Oh, you think it’s funny now. Just you wait.”
    “Valentine, you’re changing the subject.”
    He stood, holding Rose in one arm and pulling Eleanor to her feet with the other. “You should go talk to him. You’re a chit and his sister, so he might converse with you about things he won’t with me.”
    Nell smiled, leaning up against his arm to kiss him again. “Look at you, caring about other people. And holding a baby.”
    “Yes, I’m doomed. Go. Rose and I will discuss the merits of celibacy.”
    With a fond look back at her husband and daughter, Eleanor went inside Corbett House to call for a coach and to change clothes. The odds were very small that her oldest brother would confide in her, but if Sebastian’s behavior had cynical Valentine troubled, it was something she needed to look into.
    Four years ago when Charlotte had wasted away anddied, Sebastian had asked her to stay on at Griffin House instead of moving in with their Aunt Tremaine for her debut London Season. He’d asked Charlemagne and Zachary to abandon their bachelor apartments and return