"Oh, news of your magnitude travels fast, even for a duke."
He continued to walk Samson in silence as she slowly rode her horse next to him.
"I am sorry to hear about your father's passing." Her words were almost too quiet to hear.
"And your father's. It seems a curse has fallen upon both our families, wouldn't you agree?"
He was testing her, trying to see if she believed in the curse just as much as his mother and family. For this to work, he needed her to believe in its importance. For time was limited.
As the snow drifted down around them, she urged her horse forward, the question unanswered still hung in the air between them, making it thick with tension.
"The curse," she said.
"I assume you know about it."
Nodding, she stopped her horse to look at Stefan. "I am aware."
Apparently that was all the information he was going to receive from her. They walked in silence the rest of the way to the house.
"Good day, Your Grace, and thank you for walking me home. As you can see, I haven't once fallen asleep in your presence, nor have I come to any harm. I trust you can see yourself out. The road," she gestured with a nod, "is just over that hill." Turning on her heel, she lifted her skirts to walk up the stairs. The girl sure didn't appear to be dying? Maybe his mother was mistaken; for the more primal parts of his body screamed that she was healthy — ripe for the taking. As unromantic as it sounded.
He waited and admitted to being transfixed. In all honesty, he was quite content to watch the slow sway of her hips as she ascended the stairs.
Smiling, he waited for the inevitable. At the top stairs, she paused, cleared her throat, and turned around. He waved, hoping for a reaction out of her.
"What are you still doing here?" Her voice sounded calm but did nothing to hide the tense jut of her chin.
Stefan laughed, loud and jolly. It felt good to laugh. And it seemed Lady Rosalind's every reaction made him feel a little less sad than before. "I thought that would be obvious. I'm here to rescue you." He made a gallant sweeping motion with his arm.
"From?" She put her hands on her hips in the most alluring way, drawing his eye to the spectacular cut of her Spencer jacket.
"Dragons? The evil godmother? Yourself? Take your pick, really. Or how about the curse that seems to be picking off our family members one by one."
She smirked and began descending the stairs.
"And how do you hope to fix this lovely spell?" Her eyes narrowed on him.
"We are to be married, of course."
Rosalind stopped walking, her once narrowed eyes widened in horror, and her face went a little white. Suffice to say, it was not the reaction he had hoped for. In fact, it was nothing close to what he had been dreaming nights previously. He could just see Lady Rosalind running into his arms, her soft lips against his, crying with relief over him saving her family. And in the end, him saving her from the terrible curse that seemed to plague them all.
"Absolutely not." She turned on her heel and went into the house, slamming the door behind her.
"Well, Samson, I think I could have done that better." He hit his gloves on his thigh and cursed. The horse nudged him in response and neighed, digging his hooves into the ground.
He swallowed his pride, because if he were being honest with himself, he had quite a lot of it to swallow, he took the steps two at a time and knocked on the door. No was not an option to either of them at this point, not when other lives hung in the balance. If need be, he would drag her kicking and screaming to the altar, witnesses and all. And when it was time to consummate the marriage, she would be screaming for other reasons entirely.
Stefan would start with her hair. Yes, her hair — letting it loose around her waist like the crowning glory it was. Then he would spend hours looking at her creamy white skin, fascinated with the glow of the candlelight upon it. Then when he could not bear it anymore, he would kiss every inch of that voluptuous body until she was panting — begging for more.
He raised his hand to knock again. She would marry him. It would just take more prodding than he originally thought. After all, he was a duke! What woman wouldn't jump at the chance to not only marry a duke, but save her family in the process? To say no was ungrateful, wasn't it?
He waited another few minutes and almost lost hope, when the door finally opened, and a short elderly woman looked at him with interest in her crystal blue eyes.
Her face was aged with wrinkles, her hair gray and pulled into a knot on her head. Though she was small, the gleam in her eye told him she could probably outsmart Samson and he both together. Regrettably, the courage given him by his own little day-dream spurred him towards more rakish behavior; he bent and kissed the woman on the hand, lingering as he did so.
Then things went horribly wrong. She kicked him in the shin because she was so blasted short. Then she cursed him for assaulting a woman in her own home. Add that to the already embarrassing state of arousal he felt after his vivid daydream about Lady Rosalind in his bed, and he was more mortified than he ever thought possible.
But things became worse when the woman, still yelping at the top of her lungs, pulled him by his jacket into the house and hit him across the thigh with her cane.
"What madness is this? Dear woman, cease your hitting at once!" He put his hands up in defense, which seemed to egg the lady on even more. Where was his good-for-nothing horse? "Samson! Help!" It was after that plea that he realized never had he been desperate enough in a fight to ask his horse to come to his aid.
Samson, however, did not come.
But Lady Rosalind did — slowly, around the corner — her eyes were twinkling with amusement. "Did you get him, Mary?
Get him? Was the girl implying he needed to be squashed like a bug beneath her boot?
"Aye, my lady, though the rascal pleaded for his horse to rescue him before I finished punishing him."
Lady Rosalind released a spurt of laughter before she covered her mouth with her hands, cleared her throat, and took on a solemn look. "Thank you, Mary. I am forever in your debt for welcoming his grace to Raven Court."
"It isn't polite to propose marriage to a woman after following her home, my lady, it really is not." Mary made a point to stare at Stefan longer than necessary, then raised her cane above her head again.
Stefan, quite alarmed let out a vivid curse, and backed away only to find that the woman was merely stretching her arms, as if the whole ordeal of attacking him had caused her muscles to be sore.
Feeling rather embarrassed, and for the first time in his life, horribly stupid, he waited for one of the mad females to say something — anything really. For he wasn't sure how to follow such an attack. A duke wasn't often welcomed in such a manner.