OUNGING IN A big wingback chair the next morning, Anthony studied his cousin with a combination of admiration and disbelief. "Hawk," he chuckled, "I swear to God, what everyone says about you is true—you don't have a nerve in your entire body. This is your wedding day, and I'm more nervous about it than you are."

Partially dressed in a frilled white shirt, black trousers, and a silver-brocade waistcoat, Jordan was simultaneously carrying on a last-minute meeting with his grandmother's estate manager and pacing slowly back and forth across his bedchamber, glancing over a report on one of his business ventures. One step behind him, his beleaguered valet followed doggedly in his wake, smoothing a tiny wrinkle from his finely tailored shirt and brushing microscopic specks of lint from the legs of his trousers.

"Hold still, Jordan," Tony said, laughing with sympathy for the valet. "Poor Mathison is going to drop dead in his tracks from exhaustion."

"Hmm?" Jordan paused to glance inquiringly at Tony, and the stalwart valet seized his chance, snatched up a splendidly tailored black jacket, and held it up so Jordan had little choice but to slide his arms into the sleeves.

"Do you mind telling me how you can be so damned nonchalant about your own marriage? You are aware that you're getting married in fifteen minutes, aren't you?"

Dismissing the estate manager with a nod, Jordan laid aside the report he was reading, and finally shrugged into the jacket Mathison was still holding out to him, then he turned to the mirror and ran a hand over his jaw to verify the closeness of his shave. "I don't think of it as getting married," he said dryly. "I think of it as adopting a child."

Anthony smiled at the joke and Jordan continued more seriously, "Alexandra will make no demands on my life, nor will my marriage to her require any real changes. After stopping in London to see Elise, I'll take Alexandra down to Portsmouth and we'll sail along the coast so that I can see how the new passenger ship we've designed handles, then I'll drop her off at my house in Devon. She'll like Devon. The house there isn't so large as to completely overwhelm her. Naturally, I'll return there to see her from time to time."

"Naturally," Anthony said wryly.

Without bothering to answer that, Jordan picked up the report he'd been reading and continued scanning it.

"Your beauteous ballerina is not going to like this, Hawk," Tony put in after a few minutes.

"She'll be reasonable," Jordan said absently.

"So!" the duchess said tautly, sweeping into the room wearing an elegant brown satin gown trimmed in cream lace. "You truly mean to go through with this mockery of a marriage. You actually intend to try to pass that countrified chit off on Society as a young lady of breeding and culture."

"On the contrary," Jordan said blandly. "I mean to install her in Devon and leave the last part of that to you. There's no rush, however. Take a year or two to teach her what she needs to know in order to take her place as my duchess."

"I couldn't accomplish that feat in a decade," his grandmother snapped.

Until then, he had tolerated her objections without rancor, but that remark seemed to push him too far, and his voice took on the cutting edge that intimidated servants and socialites alike. "How difficult can it be to teach an intelligent girl to act like a vapid, vain henwit!"

The indomitable old woman maintained her stony dignity, but she studied her grandson's steely features with something akin to surprise. "That is how you see females of your own class, then? Vapid and vain?"

"No," Jordan said curtly. "That is how I see them when they are Alexandra's age. Later, most of them become much less appealing."

Like your mother, she thought.

Like my mother, he thought.

"That is not true of all females."

"No," Jordan agreed without conviction or interest. "Possibly not."

The grooming and dressing preparations for her wedding had taken Alexandra and two maids three hours. The wedding took less than ten minutes.

An hour later, self-consciously holding a crystal glass of bubbling golden champagne in her hand, Alexandra stood alone with her groom in the center of the huge blue and gold salon, as Jordan poured champagne for himself.

Despite her determination to ignore it, her wedding had a distinct aura of unreality, of strain. Her mother and Uncle Monty had attended and been barely tolerated by the duke and his grandmother, even though Uncle Monty was on his very best behavior and had scrupulously refrained from eyeing the derrière of any female in the room, even the duchess'. Lord Anthony Townsende and Mary Ellen had also been here, but now everyone was already on the way home.

Surrounded by the stifling elegance of the gilt salon and garbed in Jordan's mother's fabulous wedding gown of ivory satin encrusted with pearls, Alex felt more like an interloper than she had at any time since coming to Rosemeade. The feeling that she was a trespasser, who had invaded a world where she was no more welcome than her relatives, was nearly choking her.

It was odd that she felt so insecure and uneasy now, Alexandra mused, for she was wearing a gown more glorious than any she had ever imagined, and she looked far prettier than she had ever believed she could. Craddock, the duchess' dresser, had personally supervised Alexandra's toilette this morning. Under her exacting ministrations, Alexandra's riotous curls had been brushed until they gleamed, then swept into a mass at the crown and held in place at the sides with a beautiful pair of pearl combs that matched the pearls at her small ears.

Alexandra had looked at her reflection in the full-length mirror in her room and been privately overjoyed. Even Craddock had stood back and announced that she looked "very well indeed, considering—" But Jordan had said nothing about her appearance. He had smiled reassuringly at her when Uncle Monty placed her hand in his, and that had been enough to sustain her during the hour since the ceremony had taken place. Now, however, they were alone together as husband and wife for the first time, and the only sound was that of servants carrying their heavy trunks down the stairs and out to the traveling chaise, where they were being loaded for the wedding journey.

Uncertain of what to do with the champagne, Alexandra chose the path of least resistance and drank some of it, then she put it down on an elaborately carved gilt table.

When she turned, Jordan was studying her as if seeing her for the first time. Not once all morning had he commented on her appearance, but now, as his gaze drifted from the top of her shining hair to the hem of her gleaming satin gown, she sensed that he was finally going to comment, and she held her breath expectantly.

"You're taller than I originally thought."

The unexpected observation, added to his genuinely puzzled expression, wrung a startled laugh from Alexandra. "I don't think I've grown more than a few inches in the last week."

He smiled absently at her quip and then continued thoughtfully, "In the beginning, I mistook you for a boy, and you would be small for a boy."

Determined to inject gaiety into their relationship at every possible opportunity from this day forward, Alexandra said teasingly, "I am not, however, a boy."

Despite his intention to treat her impersonally after yesterday's kiss, Jordan was not proof against her sunny, entrancing smile. It even dispelled the gloom of his marriage ceremony from his heart. "You are not a boy," he agreed, smiling back at her. "Nor are you a young girl exactly. But then, neither are you a woman."

"I seem to be at an awkward age, don't I?" she agreed, her eyes aglow with gentle mockery of his fixation with her age.

"Evidently," he chuckled. "How do you describe a young lady who is not quite eighteen?"

"I am already eighteen," Alexandra said seriously. "Today is my birthday."

"I had no idea today was your birthday," he said, truly apologetic. "I'll buy you a present on our trip. What do girls your age like?"

"We like not to be constantly reminded of our extreme youth," Alexandra said lightly, but with a meaningful look.

Jordan's sharp bark of laughter echoed throughout the salon. "God, you have a quick wit. Amazing in one so youn—so pretty," he corrected swiftly. "I apologize once again—for teasing you about your age and for forgetting the matter of a present."

"I greatly fear that, like it or not, you were my birthday present."

"What a way to phrase it," he chuckled.

Alexandra glanced at the clock; it was less than a half hour before Jordan had said he wished to be off for their ship. "I'd better go upstairs and change my gown," she said.

"Where has my grandmother gone?" he asked as she started to leave.

"I believe she has taken to her bed, prostrate with grief over your unfortunate marriage," Alexandra said with a lame attempt at humor. More seriously, she added, "Will she be all right, do you think?"

"It would take more than our marriage to send her to her couch calling for her hartshorn," Jordan said with what sounded very much like fondness and admiration. "My grandmother could take on Napoleon himself and emerge victorious from the encounter. When she was through with him, he'd be plumping up her pillows and begging her pardon for his bad manners in making war on us. A little thing like my 'unfortunate marriage' won't send her into a decline, believe me. And now that you bear my name, she will flay anyone alive who dares to cast aspersions on you."

A half hour later, clad in the cherry traveling costume the dressmakers had designed for her, Alexandra climbed into a shiny black-lacquered coach with Jordan's ducal seal emblazoned in silver upon the door, and settled back against incredibly luxurious grey velvet squabs. The coachman put up the stairs and closed the door, and with scarcely any sensation of motion, the well-sprung traveling chaise glided down the long drive behind four prancing bays, escorted by six liveried outriders.

Alexandra glanced about her, admiring the heavy silver handles at the doors and the crystal-and-silver lamps. Luxuriating in the unexpected comfort of the spacious conveyance, she tried to believe she was really married, really leaving on her wedding trip. Across from her, Jordan stretched his legs out, crossed them at the ankles, and stared out the window, lapsing into a comfortable silence.

He had changed for the trip, and Alex quietly admired the way his tight-fitting biscuit breeches and shiny brown boots emphasized his long, muscular legs. His cream shirt was open at the neck, displaying a glimpse of tanned throat, and his coffee-colored jacket set off his powerful shoulders to wonderful advantage. She uttered a silent prayer that someday he might find her as pleasing to look at as she found him, then she decided that some form of pleasant conversation might be in order.

"Your mother's wedding gown was very beautiful," she ventured softly. "I was worried that some harm might come to it, but nothing happened."

He flicked a glance in her direction. "You needn't have worried," he said dryly. "I'm certain you are far more worthy of that symbol of chaste purity than my mother was when she wore it."

"Oh," Alexandra said, aware that she had just been complimented, though in the context the compliment was given, "thank you" seemed highly inappropriate.

When he made no attempt to converse further with her, Alexandra sensed that he was grappling with some sort of weighty problem, and she let the silence continue, content to watch the lush, rolling landscape pass the windows.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, they finally stopped for dinner at a large, rambling inn with ivy covering its mellowed brick exterior and a neat, white fence enclosing its huge yard.

One of the outriders had obviously been sent ahead, because both the innkeeper and his wife greeted them and then promptly ushered them through the common rooms, into a cozy private dining parlor where a sumptuous meal in covered trays was already laid out.

"You were hungry," her husband remarked later, as she laid her knife and fork down and sighed with relief.

"Starved," Alexandra agreed. "My stomach is not yet accustomed to the town hours you keep at Rosemeade. When you are eating your supper at ten o'clock, I am normally in bed."

"We'll be stopping for the night about eight o'clock, so you won't have to wait as long as that for your next meal," he volunteered politely.

When he seemed to want to linger over his wine, Alexandra asked, "Would you mind very much if I waited for you outside? I'd love to walk around a bit before we get into the coach again."

"Fine. I'll join you in a few minutes."

Alexandra strolled outside, enjoying the sunshine beneath the steady, watchful eye of Jordan's coachman. Two more coaches pulled into the innyard, both of them handsome and shiny, but not nearly so magnificent as her husband's wonderful traveling chaise with its silver seal and shiny silver harnesses on the horses. Hostlers ran forward to take charge of the horses, and for a few moments Alexandra simply watched, savoring each sight.

Jordan's horses were being put to when Alexandra noticed a young boy crouched on his haunches near the corner of the fence, apparently speaking to the ground. Curious, she wandered over, then smiled when she saw that he was talking to a litter of frolicking, long-haired puppies.

"How cute they are!" she exclaimed. The puppies' heads and front legs were white, their hindquarters brown.

"Would yer like t'buy one?" the boy said eagerly. "I could let yer have th' pick o' the litter fer a good price. They be pure bred."

"What kind are they?" Alexandra asked, laughing delightedly when the smallest of the balls of white and brown fluff detached itself from the others, scampered over to her, and clamped its tiny teeth onto the hem of her skirt, tugging playfully at it.

"Fine English sheepdogs," the boy provided, as Alexandra bent down to separate the puppy from her hem. "Very smart, they be."

The moment her hands touched the thick, silky fur, Alexandra was enchanted. Long ago she'd had a collie, but after her father died, food had been too precious to waste on any animal that didn't earn its keep, and she'd given her collie to Mary Ellen's brother. Scooping the puppy up, she held it at eye level while its tiny legs flailed the air and a small pink tongue eagerly licked her hand. She was still holding the puppy, discussing its merits with its enthusiastic owner when her husband came up behind her and said, "It's time to leave."

Alexandra never considered asking her new husband to let her have the puppy, but the unconscious appeal was there in the large eyes and soft smile she turned up to him. "I had a collie once, a long time ago."

"Did you?" he asked noncommittally.

Alexandra nodded, put the puppy on the ground, patted it, and smiled at the boy. "Good luck finding homes for them," she said.

She had not taken three steps before she felt a tug on the back hem of her skirt. She turned, and the puppy she'd been holding let go of her skirt and sat down, its pink tongue lolling, its expression comically worshipful.

"She likes me," Alexandra explained helplessly, laughing. Bending down, she turned the puppy back toward the litter and patted its backside, urging it to go back to the boy. The puppy stubbornly refused to budge. Left with no other choice, Alexandra cast an affectionate, apologetic smile at the small ball of fur, then she turned her back on it, and let Jordan escort her to the coach.

After pausing to issue instructions to his driver, he climbed in and sat down beside her. A few minutes later they were off.

"This stretch of road must be much less smooth than it was to the north," she remarked a little nervously an hour later as the heavy traveling chaise again swayed sharply, pitched to the left, then righted itself and continued on.

Sitting across from her with his arms folded imperturbably across his chest and his legs stretched out, Jordan said, "It isn't."

"Then why is the coach lurching and swaying like this?" she asked a few minutes later when it happened again. Before Jordan could answer, she heard their coachman shout "Whoa" to the team and pull over to the side of the road.

Alexandra peered out the window into the woods alongside the road. A moment later the door of the coach was pulled open and a harassed, apologetic coachman's face appeared. "Your grace," he said contritely, "I can't handle the horses and keep control of this perpetual-motion machine at the same time. I nearly put us into a ditch back there."

The "perpetual-motion machine," which he was holding in the crook of his right arm, was a squirming ball of brown-and-white fur.

Jordan sighed and nodded. "Very well, Grimm, put the animal in here. No, take it for a walk first."

"I'll do it," Alexandra volunteered, and Jordan climbed out of the coach, too, walking with her into a little clearing in the woods beside the road. Turning, Alexandra lifted her shining eyes to her husband's amused grey ones. "I think you must be the very kindest of men," she whispered.

"Happy birthday," he said with a resigned sigh.

"Thank you—so much," she said, her heart swelling with gratitude because it was perfectly obvious he had a low opinion of the gift she'd wanted so much. "The puppy won't be a bit of trouble, you'll see."

Jordan directed a dubious look at the puppy, who was now sniffing every inch of ground it could put its nose to, its stubby tail wagging excitedly. Abruptly it seized a twig and began tearing at it.

"The boy told me she's very smart."

"Mongrels frequently are."

"Oh, but she isn't a mongrel," Alexandra said, bending down to pluck some of the pink wildflowers blooming at her feet. "She's an English sheepdog."

"A what!" Jordan demanded, thunderstruck.

"An English sheepdog," Alexandra explained, thinking his surprise sprang from a lack of knowledge about the breed. "They're very smart and they don't grow very large." When he stared at her as if she'd taken complete leave of her senses, Alexandra added, "That nice young boy told me all that about her."

"That nice, young honest boy?" Jordan asked sardonically. "The same one who told you this is a pureblood?"

"Yes, of course," Alexandra said, tipping her head to the side and wondering about his tone. "The very same."

"Then let's hope he also lied about its pedigree."

"Did he lie to me?"

"Through his teeth," Jordan averred grimly. "If that dog is an English sheepdog, it will be the size of a large pony with paws the size of saucers. Let's hope its father was actually a small terrier."

He looked so disgusted that Alexandra turned quickly away to hide a smile and knelt to pick up the puppy.

The skirt of her cherry traveling dress created a bright circular splash of color against a carpet of mossy-green grass as she knelt down, scooping the wriggling puppy into her arms, holding the pink wildflowers she'd picked in her free hand. Jordan looked at the child-woman he had married, watching the breeze tease her hair, blowing mahogany curls against her alabaster cheek as she knelt in the clearing, holding a puppy in her arms and flowers in her hand. Dappled sunlight filtered through the trees above, surrounding her in a halo of light. "You look like a Gainsborough portrait," he said softly.

Mesmerized by the husky sound of his voice and the strange, almost reverent intensity in his grey eyes, Alexandra slowly stood up. "I'm not very pretty."

"Aren't you?" There was a smile in his voice.

"I wish I were, but I fear I'm going to be very ordinary."

A slow, reluctant smile tugged at his sensual lips and he slowly shook his head. "There is nothing 'ordinary' about you, Alexandra," Jordan replied. His decision to stay away from her, until she was a few years older and able to play the game of romance by his rules, was suddenly overpowered by a compelling need to feel those soft lips beneath his. Just one more time.

As he walked slowly, purposefully toward her, Alexandra's heart began to hammer in expectation of the kiss she sensed he was going to give her. Already, she was learning what it meant when his eyes turned sultry and his voice became low and husky.

Cradling her face between his palms, Jordan threaded his fingers through her dark curls. Her cheeks felt like satin, and her hair was crushed silk in his hands as he tipped her head up. With infinite tenderness, he took her lips, telling himself he was a thousand kinds of madman for what he was doing, but when her lips softened and responded to his, he ignored the warning. Intending to deepen the kiss, he started to put his arms around her, but the puppy she was holding let out a sharp, indignant bark of protest and he abruptly pulled back.

Alexandra was still trying to suppress her disappointment over his abbreviated kiss when she climbed into the coach.

Jordan, however, was vastly relieved that one kiss hadn't led to another, which in turn would have undoubtedly led to another declaration of love from the romantic girl he'd married. He didn't think "thank you" would satisfy her as a reply the second time, and he didn't want to crush her with silence or shatter her with a lecture. He would wait a year or two to take her to bed, he decided firmly—wait until she'd been out in Society and would be more realistic in her expectations for their marriage.

The decision made and reinforced by his experience in the woods, his mood lightened tremendously. "Have you thought of a name for it?" he asked when the coach was again moving smoothly ahead.

He was eyeing the puppy, who was busily sniffing about the floor, happily exploring its new surroundings.

Alexandra looked fondly at the soft white ball of fur. "What do you think of Buttercup?"

He rolled his eyes in masculine disgust.

"Daisy?"

"You must be joking."

"Petunia?"

His eyes gleamed with laughter. "He won't be able to hold up his head among the other dogs."

Alexandra stared blankly at him. "The boy told me it's a 'she.' "

"He most definitely is not."

Unwilling to believe she'd been so completely duped by a mere child, Alexandra longed to lift the puppy up and see for herself, but she was not bold enough to do it "You're quite certain?"

"Positive."

"No!" she said sharply when the puppy clamped small teeth on the hem of her skirt and began to tug. Its only response was to tug more violently.

"Cease!" commanded the duke in a low, booming voice. Instantly sensing The Voice of Authority, the puppy let go, wagged his tail, and promptly curled up at Jordan's feet, laying his head on one brightly polished brown boot. This unwelcome show of affection earned from Jordan a glare of such excruciating distaste that Alexandra gave in to a helpless fit of laughter. "Don't you like animals, my lord?" she asked, swallowing a fresh onslaught of giggles.

"Not untrained, undisciplined ones," he said, but even he was not proof against the infectious gaiety of her musical laughter.

"I shall call him Henry," Alexandra decreed suddenly.

"Why?"

"Because if he's going to be a great hairy beast, he'll resemble Henry VIII."

"True," Jordan said, chuckling, his mood improving with each moment in her cheerful company.

They spent the rest of the journey talking about anything and everything. Alexandra discovered to her pleasure that her new husband was extremely well-read, intelligent, and deeply involved in the management of his vast estates, as well as a myriad of business interests which were completely beyond her ken. From that, she gathered that he was a man who shouldered responsibility quite effortlessly, and well. She was, in fact, well on her way to developing an extreme case of hero worship.

For his part, Jordan confirmed what he had already guessed about Alexandra—she was sensitive, intelligent, and witty. He also discovered that she was even more hopelessly naive about lovemaking than he would have imagined possible. The proof of this came later, when they had finished a highly satisfying meal in the inn where they were to spend the night. The longer Jordan lingered over his port, the more nervous and preoccupied Alexandra seemed to become. Finally, she leapt up and began carefully smoothing the wrinkles from her gown, then she made a great show of turning around and examining a perfectly common little oak table. "Excellent workmanship, is it not?"

"Not particularly."

Almost desperately, Alexandra continued. "When I look at a piece of furniture, I always wonder about the man who labored to make it—you know, whether he was short or tall, grim or pleasant… things like that."

"Do you?" he asked blandly.

"Yes, of course. Don't you?"

"No."

With her back still turned to him, Alexandra said with great care, "I think I'll go get Henry and take him for a walk."

"Alexandra." The word, spoken in a calm, no-nonsense tone, stopped her in her tracks, and she turned.

"Yes?"

"You needn't work yourself into a fever of anguished terror. I've no intention of sleeping with you tonight."

Alexandra, whose only concern had been a need to use the inn's facilities, looked at him in surprise and unconcern. "I never imagined you would. Why ever should you want to sleep in my room when this inn is so very large, and you can afford a room of your own?"

This time it was Jordan's turn to look blank. "I beg your pardon?" he uttered, unable to believe his ears.

"It isn't that you aren't welcome to share my room," she amended cordially, "but why you would wish to do so, I can't imagine. Sarah—our old housekeeper—always said I flail about like a fish out of water at night, and I'm sure I'd make you very uncomfortable. Would you mind terribly if I went upstairs now?"

For a moment Jordan simply stared at her, his wineglass arrested partway to his mouth, then he shook his head as if trying to clear it. "Of course not," he said in an odd, choked voice. "Go ahead."