Jilting the Duke

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J
ILTING
The DUKE

R
ACHAEL
M
ILES

ZEBRA BOOKS
KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

Table of Contents

 

A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS

No book makes its way to readers without the kindness of many people, so many that I fear I will miss someone.

I'm especially grateful to the following: my agent, Courtney Miller-Callihan, for her instincts, patience, and general good sense, and Ingrid Powell, for her generous and insightful critique.

At Kensington, I've been lucky to have a great cover designed by Janice Rossi and illustrated by Anthony Russo as well as engaging cover blurbs written by Erin Nelsen Parekh. But most of all, I've been tremendously lucky in my editor, Esi Sogah, for her advocacy, her articulate and perceptive commentary, and her questionable sense of humor.

I benefited as well from a gracious and attentive group of readers: Cathy Blackwell, Celia Bonaduce, Leigh Bonds, Michelle Carlin, Ann Donahue, Stephanie Eckroth, Jean Kimball, Jeff Kinman, Veronica Rice, Lynn Rushton, Brandon Shuler, Tony Walker, and especially Lowell Rice.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge my family who never questioned that I could do it and, as always, Miles, who reads everything well.

Chapter One

 

Who murders a dying man?

Aidan Somerville, Duke of Forster, pulled loose the tight knot of his cravat. News of Tom Gardiner, Lord Wilmot's death had arrived in London the preceding fall. But even after a year, Aidan had no answers, just suspicions. He only knew that he had failed his old friend—and continued to fail him—in not avenging his death.

The streets were dark, illuminated at intervals by the dim light of street lamps low on oil. It was reckless to walk London streets alone after midnight. But the walk was short—no more than half an hour if he took the path across the park—and it couldn't be helped. He'd sent Fletcher and his coach home hours ago.

From the darkened alleyway ahead of him, Aidan heard muffled sounds of movement, and he stepped into the shadows. Waiting to see what trouble emerged, he wished—not for the first time—that he hadn't gone to Lady Belmont's salon. Her invitation included more than witty repartee, but he had felt nothing, not even male pride, when she'd let her hand linger too openly on his. And nothing later, when at dinner—during a rancorous debate on currency and the bank question—she had slipped a nimble foot up the inside of his thigh, then asked coyly whether he took pleasure in “the increased movement . . . of foreign markets.” Lady Belmont would have laughed if he had confessed that a dead man haunted his dreams. She would have turned it into a provocative game:
“Ah, then, let us undress each other, my pet, and we will chase away the night until it is day.”

Listening, he moved his hand midway down his walking stick; the solid brass knob on the strong ebony made an elegant weapon. Another sound, closer. He would feel foolish to come up dead after living through the worst campaigns of the Peninsular War. But perhaps his grave would be quiet, quieter at least than Tom's. Aidan tightened his grip. Another low sound, just beyond the entrance to the alley. He tensed, a seasoned soldier ready for battle.

From the alley, a large red fox trotted into the light. Aidan caught back a laugh. An old soldier alarmed by a fox. As the animal disappeared into the dark on the other side of the street, Aidan continued past the alley toward the park, his thoughts returning to Tom, a man so ill no one had expected him to live out the year. Others might think it a natural death, but Aidan knew it had been murder, just as surely as he knew who had done it.

Tom's wife. Sophia.

The thought of her name twisted like steel in his chest. Even now, after the separation of a decade, her name still evoked desire and the memory of the supple warmth of her body taking him in. He felt her betrayal as a cold mass below his diaphragm, impeding his breath. If he could discover proof of Sophia's treachery, he could avenge them both, himself and Tom. Yet despite Aidan's inquiries, he knew no more than he had a year ago. He quickened his pace, as if exertion could exorcise his guilt, then crossed into the park.

The night was beautiful, cool, with a hint of the evening rain still in the air. But the scent of something else, something heavy and florid, drew him into a section of the park lit only by intermittent moonlight. He knew the path well, for he often walked it when sleep wouldn't come. It undulated gently along the side of the park, curving against the open iron fence separating the park from the street in front of his house. Each bank of shrubs concealed the next section of the path, and he always liked the surprise of reaching the end of one bank to suddenly gain the vista of the next.

In the first section, banks of flowers, blooming white in the night, escaped their beds and crowded the path.
Ipomoea.
Without thinking, he remembered the flower's proper name, and—without wanting to—Sophia's hand warm in his, teaching him the names of the night-blooming flowers as they walked through her uncle's gardens.

Then he had kissed her, naming all the flowers by their botanical names in a line from her lips, down her neck, and to her breasts, and back to her mouth, until her kisses, sweet against his lips, turned mad with longing. In his youth and inexperience, he'd mistaken her fervor for love.

He pushed the memory away. Had he taken her advice and slept, not in her arms but in the scent of the flowers, he might have known she would betray him. Instead, the wound she'd struck festered still, leaving him a future as bleak as his past.

The moonflower's scent was delicate, familiar, but not the source of the heady hyacinth-like perfume that pulled him deeper into the garden. Along the next curve of the path, the moonlight fell on a bank of tall flowers covered with whorls of white and pink blossoms. Their scent was so rich that its sweetness echoed on his tongue. He did not know their name, and he found their anonymity comforting.

As he stood, he sensed the presence of someone, or something. At the opposite end of a long bed of flowers, a figure emerged out of the darkness into a pool of moonlight. The figure turned slowly toward him, revealing a woman in a long hooded cloak that fell almost to the ground.

Her face came fully into the moonlight. He would have known her—the shape of her face, the contours of her cheeks—even if it had been pure dark. When her eyes met his, he felt trapped, paralyzed, as the body does at the end of dreams when not fully awake. He didn't attempt to speak. She wasn't real. Instead, he stood, fists clenched, his heart beating fast, waiting for her to disappear.

She seemed unsurprised to see him, as if she had been waiting for his arrival. In one hand, she held a cutting of the plant, its white blooms still open. She lifted the other hand slightly, palm up. To welcome him or ask for forgiveness, he didn't know. She paused, watching his face. Then she stepped back into the darkness.

He knew not to follow.

In the pool of light, a white blossom lay on the ground.

* * *

Sophia Gardiner, Lady Wilmot, kept to the darkest parts of the path, cursing. He hadn't recognized her, she consoled herself. He couldn't have. It had been too long, and she was much changed. Her face had lost the winsome fullness of youth, her lips had thinned with worry and determination, and her eyes carried the sadness of one who had long lived with death. But what if she were wrong?

At the end of the park, her hands struggled against the latch of the iron gate, tearing the skin at her knuckles. She ignored the pain, looking over her shoulder into the darkness. Only darkness. The gate pulled free, but she forced herself to close it quietly behind her, lest the sound betray her escape.

Past the gate, she needed only to reach the corner, then a turn would protect her from sight. His sight.

She'd risked the night to see the Nottingham Catchfly—
Silene nutans
, she could hear her father correcting. They only flowered for three nights. That afternoon, her son Ian had brought her a spent white flower, asking her to name it. And she had been unable to resist the pull to smell its richness once more. The last time, she had been seven, her mother still alive. On each night of its blossoming, she, her mother, and her father had walked through the fields, until they reached the spot where the scent overwhelmed their senses. Afterward, they celebrated with savory biscuits flavored with rosemary and candied lemon peel.

She turned the corner and leaned back against the cold wall, listening for the sound of his pursuit. But she heard only the hard beat of her heart.

She had planned to propagate the cutting in her hothouse, then show Ian how the burgeoning buds heralded which nights the plant would bloom. She'd hoped the pleasure of the flowers blooming white and sweet might dispel some of the lingering sadness in Ian's serious blue eyes.

Had she imagined Aidan would find her in the park, at that hour, she would have stayed home for another year, or twelve. It wasn't solely for mourning that she hadn't ventured out; no, she'd stayed home to avoid the risk of seeing him again. Now her efforts had gone for naught, and at what cost? What would he do now that he knew she was back in London? She pulled away from the wall and walked swiftly to the alley that led to the mews behind her home. Before she turned in, she looked back. The street was empty.

When she had seen him standing at the end of the row, she'd known immediately who he was. She felt the pull of his presence, tight in the depths of her stomach. How could she not know him? Memories of his lips, warm on her neck and shoulders, had never left her. Even on her wedding day, her thoughts had turned to him.

She wiped unbidden tears with the back of her hand, then cursed herself for crying. But he'd been so beautiful, even with his face in the half-light, the shadows forming smooth planes below his cheekbones.

He hadn't spoken, only looked at her as if he saw through her. She wondered what he had seen in that long gaze: her guilt? her fears? her desire? But as he'd watched her, she'd known—if she hadn't known before—that she would never be free of loving him.

She would never risk visiting the night-blooming flowers again. Even though she'd promised Tom, she wasn't yet ready to share her secrets with Aidan.