A Duke By December by Sabrina Darby

Author:Sabrina Darby
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2016-01-06T00:00:00+00:00

• • •

Although he had seen her briefly that morning, at the light knocking on the door Nate was convinced it would be Lizzie. Something about the confidence and the tone in the rapping. And perhaps a bit of wishful thinking. The land manager had left his office only a few minutes earlier, and although over the past few days they had worked through a great deal of the most pressing issues, Nate had the beginnings of a headache.

The door opened and Nate’s breath caught in his chest as he stared at the fashionably attired woman who stood at the threshold of the study.

“Do you like my dress?”

She looked like Lizzie about the eyes and mouth and nose, but with her hair swept up in an elegant twist and her dress… the new lavender blue dress she was asking about…

Yes, he liked it. Especially the way her breasts filled the bodice and her hips swelled out beneath the straight lines of the gown. He was aware of her in all the ways he shouldn’t be.

For the past year, he’d successfully sublimated his attraction beneath his sense of honor. But with his trousers growing uncomfortably tight across the groin, he was having difficulty remembering exactly what the definition of honor was.

This was Lizzie, who depended upon him. What kind of man would salivate over a woman he was supposed to protect?

“It’s rather distracting. Perhaps while I am working, you could wear something plainer.”

She looked away, and his stomach twisted. He’d hurt her, but it was better than him staring at her lasciviously, entertaining all sorts of fantasies in his head.

Like pushing that dress up inch by inch and revealing the legs he’d only glimpsed in the past year.

He swallowed hard.

“I do not see how I could distract you when I have hardly seen you this last week but for dinner.”

“I need to work,” he said. “Mr. Ford did his best, but with the weather what it has been and the repercussions of having no authority… And the dukedom includes half a dozen other properties scattered about advised by far less capable hands than his.”

“Nate.” His name, said in that plain, no-nonsense tone of hers, the one she used when she was about to inform him of something he had overlooked, did something to his nerves, something that made his skin all too aware of the cloth that touched it. This was getting ridiculous. This was Lizzie. About to chide him. Not some Cyprian. And speaking of Cyprians, perhaps a visit to London and the procurement of a mistress was exactly what he needed. In Boston, there had been that widow, and improper thoughts about Lizzie had never once crossed his mind. Apparently, two months of celibacy could ruin a man.

“Did you not hear me?”

He flushed. “I beg your pardon. What did you say?”

“I said it would be best if you made an effort to attend tea and meet some of your neighbors. You might also wish to quell this idea of a Twelfth Night ball before it becomes village gossip and everyone expects it to happen.

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