Free The Duke's Cinderella Bride by Carole Mortimer Page A

safe journey.’ She walked towards the door.
    ‘Jane!’
    ‘Goodbye, Your Grace.’ The quiet dignity of her voice cut through him like a knife.
    Hawk crossed the room in long, forceful strides to press his hand against the closed door. ‘Jane, surely you must see how unsuitable it would be for you to travel anywhere alone with me?’
    ‘I understand completely, Your Grace—’
    ‘Jane, I have warned you about “Your Gracing” me in that dismissive way!’ Hawk reached out to grasp her shoulders with both hands. ‘I can see that you are upset, Jane.’ His voice gentled. ‘But can you not see it is an upset that will quickly pass? Lady Sulby does not mean to be cruel, I am sure—’
    ‘You know nothing of the sort!’ The defeated air had completely left Jane as she glared up at the Duke, her hands clenching at her sides. ‘She is a bitter, hateful woman, full of viciousness for those she considers beneath her. I do not believe you would treat even one of your dogs in the cruel way that she has dealt with me!’
    She wrenched out of the Duke’s restraining grasp before turning to leave, aware of his golden gaze following her frowningly as she let herself out of the his apartments to hurry back down the hallway to her own room.
    The Duke might have refused her passage in his coach, but that made little difference to her decision to leave. In fact, she refused to remain here for even another day!
    If she could only get to London she could then take a public coach to Somerset—could find Bessie, her father’s old housekeeper, who she believed now resided with her married son in a village only two miles from where they had all used to live.
    Bessie had known both her mother and her father before Jane was born. And household servants, as Jane well knew from her position as neither a family member nor quite a servant in the Sulby household, often knew more about their employers than those employers might have wished.
    Bessie would perhaps know more about Janette’s lover than Lady Sulby, in her vindictive prying into Janette’s personal letters, had ever been able to learn.
    Once Jane’s tears had stopped after she had read her mother’s achingly emotional letters—letters that had never been sent to her married lover—she had come to a decision. Her real father might never have wanted her,might have callously cast off his lover once he knew she carried his child, but that did not mean that child could not now come back to claim him.
    As a married man, it might not be comfortable for him to suddenly be presented with a daughter of two and twenty—but how much care had he given for Janette’s comfort when he had denied both her and their unborn child?
    None, as far as Jane could see.
    Yes, the Duke might have refused to allow Jane to accompany him when he left later this morning. But her resolve was now such that Jane knew she would walk to London if she had to!
     
    ‘More wine, Your Grace?’ The serving girl at the inn in which Hawk had decided to spend the night hovered expectantly beside the table, holding up a jug of wine.
    Hawk nodded distractedly, having touched little of the food that had been served to him along with the wine in this private dining room. Not because there was anything wrong with the food, but because wine alone served him better in his darkly brooding mood.
    He had left Markham Park shortly after that unsatisfactory conversation with Jane, any relief he had expected to feel at his release from the Sulbys’ oppressive company—Lady Sulby especially—completely overshadowed by that last haunted look in Jane’s eyes as she had turned away from him. As the distance between the ducal coach and Markham Park had increased Hawk had found those inner shadows deepening. Until now, ten hours later, he was beset with such feelings of guilt at leaving Jane to her fate that he could think of little else.
    But to have brought Jane away with him would have compromised her as well as himself.