Page 1 of A Virgin to Tempt the Duke

CHAPTER 1

“Move your feet.” Jonathan’s grip on her arm was like a vice, her cousin’s fingers gripping the white silk of Anna’s sleeve as he hauled her from the cobblestone street up toward the church steps.

The morning was grey and cold, the street still half-asleep. Anna stumbled to keep up with the Viscount Edgeware in shoes she had never worn before, shoes she had found on her bedroom floor two hours ago when the housemaid had shaken her awake with downcast eyes.

“Now,” he pressed as he tightened his grip.

“Jonathan…” She pleaded softly as she pulled back, nearly losing her footing on the wet stone, which quickly emboldened her. “Jonathan, stop this,please!”

“Stop making a spectacle of yourself.” He did not even look at her. His sharp jaw was set, his pale brown eyes fixed on thechurch door ahead like a homing beacon. “You are embarrassing us both,” he hissed through gritted teeth.

“There is nousin this, cousin.” She planted her heels, hoping they would take root. “I woke up this morning and found a wedding dress laid out for me. You did not ask me… no, you did not eventellme!”

“I am telling you now.” He yanked her forward again, and she stumbled into step beside him as they walked. “Lord Birchall?—”

“Lord Birchall!”

“—obtained the license three days ago. Everything is arranged. The only thing left to arrange isyou, and I suggest you do so quickly. My patience is running thin.”

Three days.

The words landed like stones in her empty stomach, and her eyes began to prickle with salty tears she would soon spill.

“You have known for three days?” she repeated.

“I have known considerably longer than that.” He finally glanced at her then, and Anna saw the cruel impatience on his face; she was just a letter he wanted to seal, send off, and be done with. “The finer details required time to settle. I told you when it was necessary for you to know. It is not personal?—”

“It did not occur to you…” Her voice broke and trailed off against her will, and she hated herself for it. She swallowed a breath and forced herself to set her shoulders back. “It did not occur to you,” she continued, “that I might have something to say about marrying a man I have met all of two times?”

“You had a Season, following the required mourning period for your mother. You had your chance to do this on your own,” he said as they reached the top steps. “You did not choose, so I have chosen for you. That is that.”

“He has areputation, Jonathan…” She was begging now, and she knew it. She hated it yet could not stop herself from trying anything to avoid her fate. “Everyone knows what he is. Lady Ascott’s niece said when he was courting her that he had put his?—”

“I cannot believe that you take into consideration such drivel.”

“She was seen… with bruises on her!”

“That is meregossip,” he said, a door slamming in her face. “And even if it were not, it is none of your concern. You are my responsibility, and I have made this decision for you.”

“It is my life?—”

“You will be his wife, not his judge. If you behave yourself, you will have nothing to worry about, I am sure. Now…” He stopped just shy of the church doors and turned to face her fully, theireyes meeting for the first time that morning. “Anna. It is done. It has been done since the license was acquired. The only question now is whether you walk in with your head held high, or make a fool of both of us in the street, which you seem intent on doing. I sincerely hope it will be the former.”

She looked at him, at the face she had known all her life and one she once respected. She scoffed inwardly at the thought. It was the face that had told her very kindly, when she was twelve years old, that her father’s library would need to be sold. The face that had always been solving a problem, and the problem had always been her.

She drew her hand back.

And she slapped him.

It was not elegant, the way she did it. It was the first time she had ever slapped anyone. Her hand connected with the side of his jaw, open-palmed and desperate.

Jonathan jerked back with a grunt, and for one bright, terrifying second, his grip slipped from her arm.

Now is my chance.

She ran as fast as she could in silk down the stairs. She made it all of four steps before a hand closed tight around her wrist.

“Jonathan, let me?—”