How to Catch a Duke in Ten Days by Violet Hamers

Chapter Twenty-Nine

“How can I call this man my friend now?” Antony muttered as he shifted his weight back and forth between his feet, standing on the front step of the house.

“You said he was your friend,” Hermione said at his side, reaching for his arm. He clutched at that arm tightly, not intending to let her go.

“That was before I found out what he did to you!” Antony said in a harried whisper. Ahead of them, Lord Lulworth’s carriage was pulling up on the driveway, announcing his arrival. “He left you standing at a church. Why?”

“I do not know,” Hermione said, turning her eyes away from him and toward the carriage. The movement of those eyes made jealousy rip through Antony, an envy he could not bear.

Did she love him? I haven’t asked her that yet. I am afraid of her answer.

There was no more time for words now. The door of the carriage opened, and the Viscount stepped down. Antony was rather pleased everyone else that lived in the house was out for the day. He felt he might snap and lose his temper with his old friend at any minute, he didn’t particularly want any of his or Hermione’s family to hear that.

“Well, it has been too long, my friend!” Lord Lulworth announced as he jumped down from the carriage. He strode forward with his hand outstretched ready to shake, jerking his head once to tip the blond hair out of his eyes, then those eyes turned to Hermione at Antony’s side. “I do not believe it.”

“Yes, that’s what I’ve been saying a lot,” Hermione said wryly.

“I’ve heard you know my new wife?” Antony said, gesturing toward Hermione.

“Your wife!?” Lord Lulworth said, his gaze snapping between the two of them before he regained his composure. “Well, yes, I do.”

“In unpleasant circumstances,” Hermione said hurriedly.

“They were not always so unpleasant, were they?” Lord Lulworth’s flirtation made Antony tighten his hold through Hermione’s arm even more and pull her slightly away from his old friend.

Some friend he is. Clearly, he is not the caliber of man I thought he was.

“I remember the unpleasant, My Lord,” Hermione said, just as Lord Lulworth offered a bow to her.

“Well, you seem to have landed well on your feet, Your Grace.” He turned his attention back to Antony with a smile, but Antony could not mirror it. He could still feel the anger coursing through his body.

He couldn’t understand how anyone could go back on their word promising to marry Hermione for starters then leaving her standing outside a church. That didn’t make sense.

“Shall we go in?” Antony said sharply, gesturing inside the house from where they were on the doorstep. “I have a feeling I know why you are here.”

A few minutes later, the three of them were in the drawing room. Antony was sitting perfectly still, staring with daggers in his eyes across the room at Lord Lulworth, whilst Hermione was serving tea for the three of them. Antony’s mind wasn’t helped by the way Lord Lulworth’s eyes were following Hermione around the room.

He lusts after her still. So why didn’t he marry her?

“Lulworth,” Antony snapped his name, watching as his friend jerked his eyes away from Hermione. “She’s not yours to stare at anymore.” He looked uncomfortable, turning away. “So, you want money?”

“Ah, yes my friend,” Lord Lulworth took on a jovial tone. “That old bother again I am afraid.”

“Gambling debts?”

“Just so, I fear I have had some rotten luck on the card table.”

“You think you would have learned to stay away from the card table by now. You never have good luck with it,” Antony said tartly. Hermione stood from the coffee table with a cup of tea in hand and passed it toward Lord Lulworth. As he took the cup, he brushed his hand against Hermione’s for a second.

She jumped back. The touch was enough to shake something in Antony. He couldn’t bear the sight of it. He’d lost one woman to another man, and now Hermione was here, gazing at a man she had once promised to marry. It was too much.

Antony leapt to his feet and crossed the room. “Is something wrong?” Lord Lulworth asked, looking up from his teacup.

“Stay there,” Antony warned him and took Hermione’s hand, pulling her out of the room.

“What is happening? Where are we going?” she asked, pleadingly. He didn’t answer, not straight away. Instead, he towed her out of the room and toward the study, being the nearest room that he could get to. He pulled her inside, closed the door behind them and leaned against it as he released Hermione.

“Good Lord, Antony, what is wrong?” Hermione asked, standing back from him with shock on her face.

The image of Lord Lulworth’s hand against Hermione’s was still there in his mind. He felt burned by it.

“Would you ever leave me?” The question fell from his lips before he had really thought about it. The moment the words were out, he walked hurriedly away from the door, around the desk, as though he could walk away from the words themselves.

“Antony? Is that what you think?” Hermione asked with panic in her voice. She followed him around the desk. As he sat in the chair, she stopped in front of it, looking down at him. “Why do you think I would leave you?”

“Sometimes people do leave,” he said, trying to sound impassive, as if the words didn’t matter to him, although they greatly did.

“Your mother…” Hermione paused. “She told me your last betrothed ran away.”

Antony jerked straight in his seat, startled his mother had told his secret. “I will be having words with her later for that.”

“Do not be angry with her,” Hermione pleaded. “She told me because she thought it was for the best. She was trying to help you.”

Antony couldn’t answer, not straight away. He rested his elbows on his knees anxiously, and laid his chin in his hands, unable to settle. “Who was she?” Hermione asked softly.

“Lady Dianne Rochford.” The name came from him without much pain. “I did love her,” he said with a deep sigh, “then she ran off, and it showed me how painful love can be. That’s when I vowed never to marry.”

“Because of her? Or because you didn’t want to get hurt again?”

“Because of the hurt,” he answered honestly. It didn’t feel so scary to tell Hermione the truth now, not after all that they had shared together. “Now, if it is possible, I think I love you even more.”

“I wouldn’t ever leave you,” she said softly, though there was an intensity to those words.

“You wouldn’t?” he asked, glancing back to the door. “Lord Lulworth is certainly still following you with his eyes–”

“I never loved him.” Her words startled him so much that he jerked further forward in the chair.

“What?”

“I never loved him,” she said again. “I was happy to marry him. He offered a comfortable life that I thought would keep me secure and make my father happy, but I never loved him. I love you.” She reached out toward him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “I am not going anywhere, you fool.”

“You call me a fool a lot, you know,” he said, with a small smile peeking through on his cheeks.

“Well, you deserve it,” she said with a laugh. “I made a vow in church to love you until the day I day. Strangely enough, I intend to keep that vow– Ant–!” He cut her off mid-sentence, pressing his lips to hers.

He wasn’t going to lose her, and he would never have to go through that heartbreak again.

He urged the kiss deeper and deeper until he was pulling her up from the floor and onto his lap in the chair. Hearing her breathy moans between their kisses spurned him on. He didn’t want to leave this moment. As he moved his kisses from her lips, down her neck and across her collarbone, those breathy moans she was making grew in intensity.

“You have a guest… We should be getting back to him,” she said between breaths.

“He can wait. Leave him there for all I care,” he said, not caring in the slightest anymore about Lord Lulworth.

He adjusted Hermione’s legs around him, so that she was straddling him in the chair, and he began to pull up the skirt of her dress, needing her. When she took the cue, she went to help him with the skirt, apparently just as eager. “You are as impatient as I am,” he said, chuckling.

“No doubt about that,” she said, as he lifted her off the chair. With one arm around her waist, he used the other to push the paper, ink pots and quills off his desk, hardly caring if some of them dropped to the floor in a mess. With the desk free, he placed Hermione down on the desk and leaned over her, kissing her again.

As the kiss grew more heated, with Hermione reaching her hands up to thread in his hair, he couldn’t wait any longer. He reached down and unbuttoned his trousers then reached forward, finding her center. He only had to touch her there to feel she was wet and ready for him. He took hold of her hips, pulled her to the very edge of the desk and lined himself up then pushed inside of her.

The way she gasped and tipped back her head was as amazing to him as the feeling they were sharing. As he began to pulse the two of them together, pumping inside of her, he watched her intently. With his grasp on her knees, pulling her legs up around his hips, she reached back and clawed at the desk below. With each moan she made, she arched up off the desk, making him love her all the more from the way she responded to his touch.

It wasn’t long before he was reaching the penultimate waves of the thrill. He loved her so much that the initial touch could bring him to the edge, but he wanted to bring her there with him. As he got nearer to that pinnacle, he released one of her knees and lowered his hand down, brushing her swollen nub of nerves just above where they were joined.

It did the trick. She fell over her edge, moaning his name as he reached his height too. The thrilling sensation rippled through his body, making him buck his hips two more times inside her, before he fell still, unable to move anymore.

They both stayed there, connected, as he moved his hands to take hers. They grasped one another, staring at each other as he fought to catch his breath.

“Hermione,” he whispered her name. “I cannot bear seeing that man near you.” He confessed to his jealousy, needing her to know it.

“Then send him away,” she said with a smile, “and don’t ever let him come back.”

* * *

“Out,” Antony said, with his grasp on Lord Lulworth’s jacket as he steered him out of the house.

“But… what of the money?”

“No more money,” Antony said, pushing the Viscount through the door that led outside of the house, held open by the butler. As Antony shoved the Viscount down the front porch steps, he could hear Hermione’s footsteps hurrying behind him out of the house.

“Antony? What is going on?” Rose’s voice called to him. He lifted his head, seeing the carriage a little way down the driveway with Rose standing nearby on the arm of Mrs. Atkins. Behind them, the Earl of Branigan stood, whilst Fergus was still helping Lady Phoebe out of the carriage.

“I am ousting our guest,” Antony said with a smile as he looked back to Hermione behind him. She was still smiling too. Neither of them had lost their smiles since what they had shared in the study. “How was lunch?”

“It did not sit well,” Rose said, patting her stomach. “I think I ate too much at the tea house.” Mrs. Atkins held tightly onto her arm, escorting Rose back toward the house. “You have not really explained what is going on, Antony.”

He turned his head to see Lord Lulworth straightening his jacket from the tumble he’d taken down the porch steps.

“Lulworth, you will not be welcome here again,” Antony said as succinctly as he could.

“Why not? Is this because of…” he trailed off but had already gestured at Hermione. Antony took a step forward, feeling his anger spike within him. Lord Lulworth backed up a little, looking more than a bit frightened.

“You will not come near her again,” Antony kept his voice dark.

“What of the money? We have been friends since university! You’ve always helped me out when I’m down on my luck,” Lord Lulworth said, backing up though his hands were outstretched pleadingly.

“That ends now. You’re a grown man; you should be standing on your own two feet without having to borrow off me all the time,” Antony said, walking forward. This time Lord Lulworth backed up so far that he nearly tripped over his own feet. “In fact, no more money ever. For anyone! Least of all, for you,” he said, pointing back to Lord Lulworth. “I am not a bank.”

He turned round and walked back to where Hermione stood; she even clapped her hands together with delight, pulling a smile from him.

“Well, Antony,” Fergus said, walking to his side with Lady Phoebe on his arm, “I’m glad you finally did that.” He gestured to where Lord Lulworth was retreating into his carriage as quickly as he could. “I have never had a liking for that man.”

“I’m wondering why I ever did,” Antony said, taking Hermione’s hand in his own.

“May we go into the house?” Rose asked. “I think the sun is a little strong today.” Antony pulled Hermione to the side so they could move out of the way to let Rose in. She took two steps forward though and wobbled on her feet, coming to a stop.

“Mother? Is everything all right?” Antony asked, watching as her face paled, and her expression contorted.

“I…erm…” she couldn’t phrase words. She released Mrs. Atkin’s hand and reached toward him. He took it but could not catch her in time. “Mother!” She collapsed to the ground, her eyes closing as she slipped into unconsciousness.