The Day of the Duchess (Scandal & Scoundrel, #3)

by Sarah MacLean

“If you knew—if you came to Boston—why did not you not find me?” “I did, dammit.” He looked away, his throat moving with frustration and anger and years of regret. “I found you. It took me a year to get there. I started in Europe. Spent months chasing mad suggestions—many of which came from your harridan sisters—that you were in half a dozen places. I went all the way to Constantinople before turning around and coming back. And when I landed in London, steeped in filth and exhaustion, I heard the story of a beautiful Englishwoman in Boston. A singer. The Dove.” Her lips opened and he saw her surprise—the final confirmation that the American had kept his arrival from her. “I knew before I booked passage on the damn ship that it was you. And I found you the moment I landed—went to Calhoun’s raucous tavern and made a fool of myself looking for you. I heard you, dammit. I heard you singing, and I knew it was you. And still, there was enough disappointment that you’d fled me and our life, that I believed them when they told me it wasn’t you, I believed them.” He looked away again. “It wasn’t disappointment. It was fear. Fear that you might not return. Fear that you might not want to. Fear of where we are, now.” Silence fell, and then, “Caleb knew who you were?” “He knew I was after you. He hid you from me. . . . Not before I broke his nose,” he added, evoking the one moment of light in the darkness. Her eyes went wide. “You were the toff.” “He never told you.” “No.” She shook h...