Page 69 of An Inconvenient Duke

She couldn’t stop the short laugh that fell from her lips. “Your brother doesn’t need anyone.”

“More than you realize.” Claudia shook her head in bewilderment. “What on earth is going on between you two?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” But Dani’s traitorous cheeks flushed hot, and she had to take a long sip of her now-cold tea to hide as much of her blush as possible.

“Oh, I think you do,” Claudia muttered knowingly. “Since his return last winter, Marcus has been absolutely insufferable. He’s barely home at all, and when he is, he’s mostly sullen and grim, except when he’s with you. Then he has a spark of life in him, as if he’s back on the battlefield and ready to charge after victory for all he’s worth. But when he isn’t with you, he spends his time pacing in his study and sorting through Elise’s things in her room, as if hunting for something he’s lost.” She bit her bottom lip. “I think thatyouare that something he’s hunting.”

Dani choked on her tea and squeaked out between coughs. “Pardon?”

“I’m not a nodcock, Danielle. I’ve seen the way that man looks at you, how his entire demeanor changes when you’re near—how he spent every minute of that supper with Adam, your aunt, and me pretending that he wasn’t completely captivated by you. And the way he looks at you whenever you’re with Pippa…” She looked away as her voice trailed off, but not before Dani saw the glistening in her eyes. “I thought before that he needed a sense of purpose in his life. But I was wrong. What he needs is so much more than that.”

“He needs time to find—”

“He needsyou.”

Dani paused for one brutally painful beat, so desperately wishing that were true. Then she repeated, reality slicing at her belly, “He doesn’t need anyone.”

“He does. He’s just too proud to admit it.”

Her shoulders fell in exasperation. “You don’t know that.”

“I do. In your heart, you know you do, too.” Claudia clasped Dani’s hand. “Please—come visit us at Charlton Place.” She paused meaningfully. “Better yet, find a way to be there permanently.”

Her throat tightened with emotion. “Claudia, what you’re implying—”

“Yes, I know. But if you’re at Charlton Place, then maybe he’ll be there, where he belongs, instead of haunting that old armory.”

Dani’s gaze flew up to hers. She whispered, “You know about the armory?”

“I bribed our coachman to find out where he’d been the night when he didn’t return from Vauxhall. In the past, he would come home to tuck Pippa into bed, then go off again somewhere, usually not returning until dawn. But he always came home. Until the night he went for supper at Vauxhall.” Claudia smiled conspiratorially, not at all surprised that Dani knew of the armory. “Untilyouwere with him.”

She didn’t know whether to blush or turn pale.

“I was beginning to think that place was just like his heart—impenetrable…unless you know how to get inside.” Claudia reached into her reticule and withdrew a key, then took Dani’s hand to press it into her palm and close her fingers around it. “This is a key to the armory.” Her eyes sparkled. “And you are the key to his heart. So unlock it, please. Bring him peace and save him from himself.”

Dani folded her fingers protectively over the key. “It isn’t that simple.”

“But it is. I know my brother. He thinks that life should be run like an army, with clear choices between right and wrong, definitive answers to every problem, and the enemy always easy to identify. It frustrates him to no end that the world doesn’t really work that way. So whatever you do, don’t let him treat you like a soldier. Stand up to him. Don’t let him order you about. And make him realize that he loves you, which the rest of us already know.”

Dani stared at her, struck speechless. She’d greatly underestimated Claudia Braddock’s audacity. And her intuitiveness.

When a group of women called out for Claudia, chattering on about using the gardens at Charlton Place for their next luncheon, she kissed Dani’s cheek and left to rejoin them.

“I can’t do that,” she breathed out after her, so softly that she was certain that Claudia couldn’t hear as she walked away. How could she make him do that when all he wanted was to keep waging war? Even in matters of love.

She set down her unwanted tea on a nearby card table before her shaking hands could spill it. Then she squeezed shut her eyes for a moment’s peace to gather herself.

“Danielle, are you all right?” Beatrice McTavish, Lady Hartsham, sidled up to her and gripped her elbow. Concern darkened the woman’s face.

Dani obligingly smiled, pushing down the sharp bite of betrayal that sparked inside her from their last conversation at Vauxhall. Despite all that Beatrice had done by hiding information about Elise, the woman truly was sympathetic. “Only a bit of a headache. Too much tea and biscuits, I fear.”

That lie did nothing to ease Beatrice’s concern. “Are you sure? You left so suddenly the other night at Vauxhall, and without a parting word, too. Mrs. Slater said you’d suddenly taken ill and needed to leave. She gave us your apologies.”

Oh, Dani could have kissed that woman! Apparently, she’d found a kindred spirit in Mrs. Slater.

Beatrice’s mouth twisted, and nervously, she lowered her voice. “It was what I said about Elise, wasn’t it? I upset you.”

The woman had no idea how much.