“You knew that yesterday.”
“Yes.”
“And this morning.”
“Yes.”
“So what changed?”
Duke considered giving her a polished answer.
He had spent his life surrounded by men who could make appetite sound like strategy and selfishness sound like necessity.
Instead, he told her the least flattering truth.
“I noticed you.”
Claire’s brows drew together.
“That is not especially reassuring.”
A surprised laugh escaped him.
“No.
I suppose it isn’t.”
She almost smiled, then stopped herself.
Duke continued.
“I noticed that you were sitting beside me as my wife while I was already planning the hours when I would betray you.
I noticed that you seemed to expect nothing better.
And I realized I had been treating your silence as consent because it was convenient for me.”
Claire looked toward the darkening windows.
“I did not ask you to dismiss her.”
“I know.”
“You owe me no confession about your private arrangements.”
“They stopped being entirely private when I married you.”
She looked back at him.
For the first time, Duke saw uncertainty replace resignation.
It was not trust.
But it was different.
“What do you want from me?” Claire asked.
“Tonight? Nothing.”
“And later?”
Duke thought of heirs, dinners, appearances, the entire invisible list he had carried into the church that morning.
He let it go.
“I would like to learn what you want before I answer that.”
Claire stared at him so long he wondered if he had offended her.
Then she said, “I would like dinner.”
It was such an ordinary request that he nearly laughed again.
“Then dinner seems achievable.”
They ate in the smaller dining room rather than beneath the chandeliers that had witnessed the wedding breakfast.
There were no senators.
No judges.
No society women studying Claire’s posture.
Only Duke, Claire, two servants, and Mrs.
Hawthorne occasionally appearing at the door with the vigilant expression of a general overseeing a delicate treaty.
At first Claire spoke little.
Duke did not force conversation.
Halfway through the meal, he mentioned the Hudson redevelopment without thinking.
Claire set down her fork.
“The southern landing?”
Duke glanced at her.
“Yes.”
“Your engineers intend to place the service road along the lower ridge.”
He stared.
“How do you know that?”
“My father showed me the preliminary map.”
“And?”
