Izzy descended from the table, clutching Snowdrop close to her chest. “Not a rat. She’s an ermine.”
He swore. “You carry a weasel in your valise?”
“No. I carry an ermine.”
“Ermine, stoat, weasel. They’re all the same thing.”
“They’re not,” Izzy objected, giving the agitated Snowdrop a soothing rub along her tiny cheek. “Well, perhaps they are—but ermine sounds more dignified.”
She cradled Snowdrop in one hand and rubbed her belly with the other, then carried her back to the valise and opened the small door in her ball—a spherical cage fashioned of gilded mesh.
“There you are,” she whispered. “Now be good.”
The dog growled at Snowdrop. In response, Snowdrop curled her lip, flashing needlelike teeth.
“Be good,” Izzy whispered, sharply this time. She turned to the duke. “Your Grace, let me see to your wound.”
“Never mind it.”
Undeterred, she caught him by the wrist and examined his fingertip. “There’s a fair amount of blood, I’m afraid. You’ll want to clean this. It shouldn’t wait. Perhaps we could . . . Ooh.”
As she prattled on, he’d picked up his decanter of whisky from the table and poured a liberal stream of the amber spirits right over the oozing bite.
Izzy winced, just watching.
He didn’t even flinch.
She pulled a clean handkerchief from her pocket. “Here. Let me see.”
As she dabbed at the wound, she studied his hand. Big, strong. Marred with all manner of small cuts and burns—some fresh, others faded. On his third right finger, he wore a gold signet ring. The oval crest was massive. Apparently, dukes did everything writ large.
“The wound is still bleeding,” she said. “I don’t suppose you have a plaster about?”
“No.”
“Then we’ll just apply pressure until the bleeding stops. Allow me. I’ve dealt with this before.” She wadded the handkerchief about his fingertip and pinched hard. “There. Now we wait a minute or two.”
“I’ll hold it.” He wrenched away, applying the pressure himself.
Thus began the longest, most sensually charged minute of Izzy’s life.
In the past, she’d suffered through many an unrequited infatuation. But she typically lost her wits for pensive scholars in tweed or poets who sported tousled dark curls and woeful airs.
The Duke of Rothbury was unlike any gentleman she’d ever fancied. He was hard, unyielding, and even before his injury, he didn’t care to read. What was more, they were engaged in a property dispute, and he’d threatened to turn her out into the cold Northumberland night.
Nevertheless, her stomach was a giddy frolic of crickets and butterflies.
He was just so near. And so tall. And so commanding.
So male.
Everything female in her was rallying to the challenge. Perhaps this was how mountaineers felt when they stood at the base of a soaring, snow-crested alp. Exhilarated by possibility; awed by the inherent danger. A bit weak in the knees.
“Snowdrop,” he scoffed, leaning his weight against the table edge. “You ought to change her name to Lamprey. Who keeps a weasel for a pet, anyhow?”
“She was a gift.”
“Who gives a weasel as a gift?”
“One of my father’s admirers.”
“I should think it was one of his enemies.”
Izzy joined him in sitting on the table’s edge, resigned to explaining the whole story. It made a good illustration of how her father’s literary success and the public’s adoration never translated into much practical benefit.
“My father wrote an ongoing saga of knights, ladies, villains, sorcerers . . . castles. Anything to do with romantic chivalry. And the tales were all framed as bedtime stories told to me. Little Izzy Goodnight.”
“That’s why Archer was expecting a young girl?”
“Yes. They always expect a young girl,” she said. “The heroine of the tales kept an ermine as a pet. A fictional ermine, of course. One that was brave and loyal, and every bit as majestic, pale, and slender-necked as her mistress. And this fictional ermine managed to accomplish all sorts of clever, fierce, fictional deeds, such as chewing her mistress free of bindings when she was kidnapped, for the third time, by the fictional Shadow Knight. So a devotee of my father’s stories thought it would be a lovely gesture to give real-life Izzy Goodnight a real-life ermine to call her very own.”
Wouldn’t that be precious? the fool must have thought. Wouldn’t it be marvelous and adorable?
Well, no. It wasn’t, actually. Not for Izzy, not for Snowdrop.
A real-life ermine did not make a cuddly, brave, loyal pet. Snowdrop was sleek and elegant, yes—particularly when winter turned her thick coat white. But though she weighed a mere half pound, she was a vicious predator. Over the years, Izzy had suffered her share of bites and nips.
“A stupid gift,” the duke said.
She couldn’t argue with his assessment. Nevertheless, it wasn’t Snowdrop’s fault. She couldn’t help being a weasel. She was born that way. And she was ancient now, near nine years old. Izzy couldn’t just toss her to the wolves—or to the wolf-dogs.
“I can only imagine,” she said, “that Lord Lynforth was following a similar impulse. He thought it would be an enchanting gesture to give little Izzy Goodnight a real-life castle of her own.”
“If you don’t want his fanciful gift, feel free to refuse it.”
“Oh, but this gift isn’t the same as an ermine. This is property. Don’t you understand how rare that is for a woman? Property always belongs to our fathers, brothers, husbands, sons. We never get to own anything.”
“Don’t tell me you’re one of those women with radical ideas.”
“No,” she returned. “I’m one of those women with nothing. There are a great many of us.”
She turned her gaze to the floor. “When my father died, everything of value passed to my cousin. He inherited my childhood home, all the furnishings in it. Every dish in the cupboard and every book in the library. Even the income from my father’s writings. What do I have to my name? I have Snowdrop.”
Her hands began to tremble. She couldn’t help it; she was still angry with her father. Angry with him for dying and angry with him for dying this way. All those years she’d helped him, forgoing any life she might build for her own, and he’d never found time to revise his will and provide for Izzy should the worst occur. He was too busy playing the role of doting, storytelling father.