Tall, Dark... Collection

‘It might interest you to know, Jane—’ Hawk’s tone was deceptively mild as he sat back in his chair to look at her from beneath narrowed lids ‘—that you are the only person of my acquaintance who actually dares to speak to me in this disrespectful manner.’ His voice hardened glacially over the last few words.

‘Really, Your Grace?’ The increased flush to Jane’s cheeks indicated that she was not as unchastened as her tone would have Hawk believe. ‘You surprise me!’

‘Do I?’ Hawk rose languidly to his feet to move lightly around the desk, a hard smile of satisfaction curving his lips as Jane instinctively took two steps back. ‘I think that once again you are choosing to deceive yourself, Jane,’ he drawled mockingly.

Was she? Jane wondered, slightly breathlessly. Perhaps so. But she had found herself completely overwhelmed a short time ago, when the carriage had entered through imposing iron gates that had preceded a fifteen-minute carriage ride to where Mulberry Hall itself reposed. Deer and cattle had grazed undisturbed amongst rolling parkland as the carriage had proceeded on its leisurely way along a driveway edged with hundreds of yew trees, before reaching a wide courtyard that had revealed Mulberry Hall bathed in late-afternoon sunshine.

Jane had gazed up as if hypnotised at the Hall’s magnificence. As the Duke had helped her alight from the coach. The house was built of mellow sandstone, with seemingly a hundred windows on its frontage, and a wide balcony over huge oak doors.

One of those doors had opened wide the moment the Duke had put one of his highly polished boots upon the first stone step leading up to the entrance, an elderly butler greeting his employer with solicitous warmth as he enquired as to the comfort of his journey. Jane had continued to gaze wide-eyed at her surroundings, sure that the whole of Markham Park would have nestled snugly into the cavernous entry hall of Mulberry Hall!

The bedroom she had been allocated had been yet another pleasant surprise after the almost cupboard-like space she had occupied at Markham Park for the last twelve years, with its highly polished floor, sunnily bright yellow walls, a four-poster bed draped with the same gold-coloured damask that adorned the two windows which, she discovered, looked out over the rolling parkland.

Jane had been happily enchanted with her new surroundings when she had returned downstairs and a footman had shown her into the drawing room where the Duke and his sister were about to take tea.

Only to have the Duke spoil it all by making the announcement to his sister that, as Lady Hammond had been indisposed since their sojourn in London—whoever Lady Hammond was—Jane was now here to act as her new companion. A companion that the Lady Arabella, once the Duke had excused himself and left the two women alone, had immediately informed Jane she had absolutely no need of!

It had been obvious from the first that Lady Arabella and the Duke of Stourbridge were closely related. That lady was several inches taller than Jane, and the aristocratic features that were so hard and unyielding on the Duke were softened to a striking beauty in the much youngerArabella. Her eyes were a dark brown, and she had hair of gold shot through with streaks of deeper honey, where the Duke’s was dark with those golden streaks.

A single minute alone in Lady Arabella’s company had shown Jane that that young lady had also inherited her brother’s arrogantly imperious manner!

Jane’s mouth tightened as she recalled the awkwardness of their conversation. She addressed the Duke once more. ‘I am very sorry if you take offence at my tone, Your Grace—’

‘Oh, I do, Jane. I do,’ he assured her softly. ‘And must I point out—yet again—that we are not in the company of others…?’

He might point out that fact as often as the occasion arose, but since arriving at the Duke’s ancestral home, and seeing the deference with which his household staff treated him, Jane had become even more aware of the differences in their social stations.

In a very different way she was also aware of being alone with him now, here in the privacy of his study…Even more so since he had risen to his feet and moved to stand in front of the huge mahogany desk.

Because once he had stood up it had become obvious that the Duke had not expected to be interrupted. For he had removed the royal blue coat and waistcoat that Jane had so admired earlier, and loosened his neckcloth. Following so closely on that incident in the carriage, Jane found his less than impeccable appearance more than a little disturbing!

Hawk narrowed his gaze as he saw the flush that suddenly brightened Jane’s cheeks. ‘Is something troubling you, Jane…?’

‘Something other than your not informing me that I was to be your sister’s companion?’ Her tone was waspish.

Deliberately so, Hawk surmised knowingly, allowing a mocking smile to curve his lips as he crossed his arms over his chest. He had the satisfaction of seeing Jane quickly avert her gaze. ‘As I recall, Jane, our earlier conversation concerning what was to be your place here at Mulberry Hall was…interrupted…’

He was rewarded by a deepening of that blush. ‘That is all very well, Your Grace,’ Jane dismissed briskly. ‘But my purported role here is obviously as much of a surprise to Lady Arabella as it has been to me!’

Hawk’s smile immediately faded. ‘My sister has said something to upset you?’

Jane looked up frowningly as she heard the sharpness that had entered his tone, inwardly relieved that she could now see only the Duke of Stourbridge in the angular handsomeness of his face, rather than the more disturbing Hawk St Claire.

But as the Duke, she had come to realise, he expected his simplest instruction to be carried out without question…

Jane chose her next words carefully. ‘Lady Arabella is quite rightly displeased at having a person she is totally unacquainted with suddenly thrust upon her in this high-handed way—’

‘How displeased?’

Jane blinked at what she knew—from the cold glitter that had entered his eyes and the sudden hardness to the set of his jaw—to be the Duke’s deceptively mild tone. Both of which boded ill for someone. In this case Lady Arabella.

‘Come, Jane,’he encouraged in that softly disconcerting tone. ‘In what way exactly has my sister expressed her displeasure to you?’

Now that she was actually here in the Duke’s presence—in his disturbing presence!—Jane found herself loath to pursue the subject. In truth, she dearly wished that she had waited until her own temper had cooled before even broaching this subject with him.

But it was too late for such caution now. The Duke was waiting, compelling her to answer, those dark brows raised in deceptively lazy expectation.

Her chin rose challengingly. ‘I do not believe I said that Lady Arabella had given voice to her displeasure. It is merely that I believe—although Lady Arabella did not actually say so—that your sister sees me more in the role of—well, of spy for you,Your Grace,’she finished lamely.

Hawk drew himself up to his full considerable height and looked down his nose at her. ‘A spy, Jane?’ he repeated hardly. ‘And why would my sister suppose that I would want to set a spy on her? Unless—’ He broke off, his expression darkening as he glanced towards the open door. ‘Damn it, what has that girl been up to now?’

‘Your Grace…?’

Hawk glared, his hands clenching into fists at his sides before he turned sharply on his heel to move and stare sightlessly out of the window. ‘You will leave me now, Jane. Return to the drawing room and tell Lady Arabella that I wish to see her. Now. Immediately. Did you hear me, Jane?’ He turned to scowl at her darkly when he heard no movement to show she was about to do his bidding.

‘I—For what purpose, Your Grace?’

Hawk became very still as he looked at the pointed angle of Jane’s chin, at the stubborn set of her mouth and the challenging sparkle that now lit those deep green eyes as she steadily met his gaze.

He had doubted the wisdom of his visit to Norfolk even before his arrival there. The ill-bred behaviour of his hostess and her obvious matchmaking attempts between himself and her daughter had only confirmed those doubts, so hastening his desire to leave Markham Park at the earliest opportunity.

In the normal course of events that would have been the end of the matter, enabling Hawk to put the whole unpleasant experience behind him. Unfortunately the main irritation of his stay—and the main amusement, he inwardly admitted—was now standing before him!

With open challenge in her sparkling green gaze…

It really was a novel experience for him, Hawk acknowledged ruefully. He had become even more aware since his return to Mulberry Hall, where even his slightest need seemed to be fulfilled before he had expressed it, of how unusual it was for anyone to oppose him in the way Jane constantly did.

As a novel experience it had caused him amusement on several occasions, but it was surely not to be tolerated when it came to his dealings with his young sister!

He arched dark, arrogant brows. ‘The purpose of my summons is none of your concern, Jane.’

‘It is if it is something I have said that has instigated that summons!’ Jane refuted impatiently. ‘I cannot in all conscience—’ she gave a firm shake of her head ‘—give Lady Arabella such an instruction if, when she arrives, you intend to inflict some sort of unjustified rebuke or cruelty upon her—’ She broke off abruptly, alarmed by the way in which the Duke’s face had darkened ominously.

Her breath actually halted in her throat as he strode back to the dark and rested his clenched fists on its top, to lean so far forward that his face was now only inches from her own, his eyes glittering dangerously, nostrils flared, his mouth thinned to an uncompromising line.

‘I have no idea, Jane—no idea at all,’ he repeated in an icily soft voice, ‘what I could possibly have done in our so far brief acquaintance to give you the belief, even the idea, that I might—what was it you called it exactly?—Ah, yes, that I might intend inflicting “unjustified rebuke or cruelty” upon my sister. They were your exact words, were they not—’

‘Stop it, Your Grace!’ Jane cried her agitation as he once again spoke to her in that deceptively mild tone.

Because there was nothing in the least mild about the Duke’s emotions at that moment. In fact, he appeared so full of suppressed fury that it might cause him to explode at any moment!

‘If you wish to shout at me, Your Grace, then I would much rather you did so and got it over with. But do not, for goodness’ sake, play with me like a cat tormenting a mouse—’ She broke off, frowning, as the Duke gave a hard bark of laughter. ‘Did I say something to amuse you, Your Grace?’ she prompted, slightly indignantly.

Hawk gave an incredulous shake of his head. Anyone less like a mouse than Jane Smith he could not imagine!

This young woman challenged him, reviled him, defied him—and yet still something stopped him from telling her to go to the devil, to absent herself from his company and never show her face to him ever again.

The proudness of her carriage, perhaps? The sharpness of her spirit? The creamy turn of her cheek? The unfathomable depths of those enticing green eyes? Or maybe the fullness of her lips? Those lips that could be curved with amusement one moment and then turned down with such disapproval the next…