This Duke is Mine (9 page)

“Likely the other carriages missed the turn in the dark. It’s quite common when a driver hasn’t visited the manor before.” More footmen appeared at the door, and the butler sent them flying in different directions. Then he turned back to her again. “Mrs. Snapps, the housekeeper, will dispatch a maid to your bedchamber, Miss Lytton. And I will send up a hot bath and drinks, perhaps a light repast, if you wish.”

“But what about Lady Cecily and my sister?” Olivia asked. “I can’t simply retire without knowing they are safely indoors. Not to mention the coachman, who might be lying dead in the ditch. And the horses.”

“I will send—”

But whatever suggestion the butler was about to make was interrupted by a flurry of noise in the entry. Olivia jumped to her feet. Lucy skittered to the floor, the coat slid from Olivia’s shoulders, and she saw Cleese’s eyes slide below her neck and then jerk away, as if mortified.

One downward glance revealed that her garments were doing absolutely nothing to conceal her breasts. They were perfectly outlined, nipples and all, by her wet clothing. Her cheeks hot, she managed to resecure the coat and then walked past Cleese back down the servants’ hallway.

Lady Cecily was standing in the middle of the entry, propped up on one side by the duke, who was now thoroughly drenched, and on the other by Georgiana. Her sister was a distinctly bedraggled version of her normally duchified self.

Olivia couldn’t help noticing that the duke had rather remarkable cheekbones, emphasized by his sleek hair. And that a soaking wet shirt was as revealing on him as it was on her. Fine linen clung to muscular shoulders— she tore her eyes away. What on
earth
was she doing, ogling the man her sister was likely to marry?

Just then the door closed behind Cleese, at her back, and the wet arrivals looked up.

“My dear Olivia, you are the heroine of the hour!” Lady Cecily called instantly. “Rushing through this tempest; why, you could have drowned—though, of course, drowning is apparently quite a pleasant death, as those things go. That is, as deaths go. Much better than being hanged, by all accounts.” She tapped the duke’s arm. “Miss Lytton, this is my nephew.”

Lady Cecily’s hair looked as if a flock of swallows had turned it into a community nest, but other than that and her sprained ankle, she seemed little the worse for the accident.

Olivia curtsied. “It is an honor to meet you again, Your Grace.”

“Indeed,” the duke said, turning to his aunt. “Miss Lytton and I have already met, in a manner of speaking. My sartorial disarray led her to the logical conclusion that I was a member of the staff.”

Olivia must have been out of her mind when she came to that conclusion. Even without a coat or cravat, the duke had a kind of ironclad self-possession that declared “aristocrat.”

In fact, he looked astonishingly ducal. She couldn’t see the slightest trace of the man who had laughed when she blurted out that hopelessly unladylike comparison between his brain and a mouse’s privates. Instead he looked like a pasteboard portrait of a duke, staring down his nose at her in a superior fashion.

So be it. He must have suffered a temporary lapse into madness, only to revert to his title. “I apologize for my misapprehension, Your Grace,” she said, sinking into a deep curtsy.

“I’m surprised that you didn’t recognize him immediately,” Lady Cecily put in cheerfully. “I always think that there’s a sort of squint about the eyes that identifies a Sconce. Even those born on the wrong side of the blanket have just a touch of it.”

The duke’s eyes may not squint, but they were as startling gray-green as Olivia remembered. And cold, with just a trace of condemnation. As if she had tempted
him
to kiss her. Which she certainly had not. “As a matter of fact,” she said, “I do believe I see exactly what you mean, Lady Cecily.”

Georgiana gave a little gasp, which she covered with a cough. “What my sister means, Your Grace, is that you have the unmistakable look of a Sconce.”

“That’s exactly what I said.” Olivia smiled at the duke’s stiff features. “From now on I’ll recognize that squint anywhere.”

“I am happy to welcome you to my house, Miss Lytton,” he said, dismissing the question of the squint as beneath him. Olivia had the feeling that he often ignored trivialities of that sort. “I trust that you, Lady Cecily, and your sister plan to make a long visit. My mother, the dowager duchess, will be most happy to greet you tomorrow morning, as will my cousin, Lord Justin Fiebvre, who is paying us a visit before he returns to Oxford University.”

He had a very deep voice, deeper than her father’s. It made him sound . . . it was very manly, Olivia thought, before she jerked her mind away from the subject.

Georgiana deserted Lady Cecily and trotted over to Olivia’s side, giving her a little pinch. “What on earth are you doing, making fun of the duke?” she whispered. “He hasn’t a squint!”

“Our driver was found in the ditch quite uninjured,” Lady Cecily said, “and my dear, he reeked of gin. Reeked! A knavish type he must be, soaked in drink. If it had been up to him, we could have died right in the carriage and been eaten by vultures.”

“Eaten while still in the carriage?” the duke remarked. “That would be quite unusual.”

“It’s a wonder we didn’t drive straight into a river! Or into a mail coach. We should have examined his fingernails before we entered the carriage. Were you aware that a man who has a slightly longer fingernail on the little finger is invariably an inebriate?”

“The duke was remarkably surprising,” Olivia whispered back. “He just—I’ll tell you later.”

“You didn’t say something unladylike
already
,” Georgiana groaned.

“No! Well, I did, but I’ll tell you later. But are you feeling quite all right, Georgie? I think Lady Cecily landed on top of you.”

“Five more minutes in that carriage alone with Lady C, and I’d have been a candidate for Bedlam,” Georgiana breathed, so quietly that she could scarcely be heard.

Olivia squeezed her hand. Olivia and Georgiana had survived the past five days in the carriage by reverting to the games they’d played as children: betting on the number of times that Lady Cecily mentioned her “dearest friend”—Lady Jersey, one of the patronesses of Almack’s—just as they used to bet on their mother’s references to
The Mirror of Compliments
.

“I was not aware of any parallel between a man’s character and his fingernails,” the duke said now, to Lady Cecily. Olivia could have told him that his aunt was a treasure trove of odd theories, mostly to do with the digestion. Olivia didn’t believe a single one.

“Oh, it’s very true,” Lady Cecily assured the duke. “I expect it’s the very first thing Bow Street Runners look for when they apprehend a criminal.”

“I always heard the telltale sign was a squint, myself,” Olivia remarked. For some reason the duke’s implacable expression made her long to tweak his nose, although she didn’t quite dare look to see how he took her comment. So she added hastily, “Have the carriages with our maids and trunks made an appearance?”

“I had a new gown in one of my trunks,” Lady Cecily said instantly. “And although you haven’t suckled the milk of the court, my dear, and thence come to be a proper courtier, anyone could understand the need to recover my fringed gloves. I wore those gloves when I met the Spanish ambassador and he paid me a great compliment, though I couldn’t tell you what it was, as he didn’t speak English.”

Cleese broke in the moment Lady Cecily paused for breath. “There is, as yet, no sign of the service carriages, Miss Lytton. I have taken the liberty of assigning a lady’s maid to each of you, who will be happy to aid you until your own servants arrive.”

“But I must have my maid,” Lady Cecily said, nimbly taking up the new subject. “No one but Harriet can make my face. You know what they say, dear.” She peered at Georgiana and Olivia through dripping strands of hair. “
A woman’s past her prime at twenty, decayed at four-and-twenty, old, and insufferable at thirty
. My dears, you’re not yet four-and-twenty, are you?”

“We have one year before we are entirely decayed,” Olivia stated.

“I am glad to hear it,” the duke put in, rather unexpectedly. “My squint may well indicate a marked state of decay.”

Olivia raised an eyebrow. There was just the faintest gleam in his eye . . . his comment
almost
suggested a sense of humor. What a peculiar man he was.

“Decay!” Lady Cecily hooted. “As if we would accept such a description of
you
! Men do not decay.”

Olivia felt nettled all over again. “Lady Cecily,” she asked, “why on earth should men not decay, if ladies do?”

“Oh, men
do
decay,” Lady Cecily said, not one to be stumped by any question that might possibly be construed as within her area of expertise. “That is, they rot, which is all the same thing, isn’t it? Mr. Bumtrinket always used to say that a man who can’t go diddly-diddly-up when required is rotten to the core.”

Olivia choked, but otherwise Lady Cecily’s comment was met with silence. She stole a look at the duke and found that very subtle gleam in his eye again. He looked as sober as an alderman, but possibly, just possibly, he was laughing inside.

Then she took another look and changed her mind. No one with a face that righteous could have a sense of humor. What’s more, he had presumably been raised according to the precepts found in the
Mirror for Poker-Faced Peacocks
. The ability to laugh would have been trained right out of him.

“At any rate,” Lady Cecily said, picking up the conversation again, “my nephew is famous all over the kingdom for the clever things he does with numbers. More than an accountant could do, I expect.
Better
than accounting. Such clever things.”

“It is an honor to meet such a renowned mathematician,” Georgiana said.

Olivia glanced to the side and saw with an odd little flip of her stomach that her sister was smiling at the duke. Of course, it would never occur to
this
man that Georgiana’s smile signaled condescension—because it wouldn’t. He was a duke. They were perfectly suited for each other. It was positively disgusting to think that she had kissed—no matter how unwillingly—her future brother-in-law.

The duke was as susceptible to Georgiana’s smile as she had always known men would be. His eyes softened perceptibly and he said, “Lady Cecily exaggerates, Miss Georgiana.” It was rather astounding the way he could murmur something self-effacing and yet look so proud.

“You mustn’t be modest,” Olivia said, unable to resist. “Accounting is
such
a useful skill. And it’s quite brave of you to have realized your desire to be an accountant, given your elevated position, Your Grace.”

Beside her, Georgiana gave a tiny, and likely involuntary, moan. The duke’s eyes shifted from her sister’s face.

“Most dukes haven’t the wits for simple fractions,” she finished, giving him a smile that didn’t include a hint of her sister’s worshipfulness.

“If I may, I suggest that we repair to the chambers that Cleese has kindly prepared for us,” Georgiana said, sticking an elbow into Olivia’s ribs.

“Yes, indeed,” Olivia said, feeling a little ashamed of herself. She had done it again; the moment she became aggravated by flagrant displays of propriety, she abandoned all the ladylike traits her mother had instilled in her. “If you would be so kind, Cleese,” she said, turning to the butler.

“I shan’t retire until I have a warmed milk and brandy,” Lady Cecily announced. “I’ve drunk it every night since my thirteenth birthday, and I assure each of you that it has made all the difference with my digestion. There are any number of diseases that I might have caught and haven’t, because I cleanse my stomach every night.”

“Withers, bring a hot milk and brandy to Lady Cecily’s chamber as soon as possible,” Cleese said, proceeding to the foot of the steps. “If you would please follow me, my ladies, I will escort you to your chambers.”

“You’ll have to haul me up, Nephew,” Lady Cecily said. “Just wait until the young ladies reach the top of the steps, if you please.”

Olivia couldn’t resist turning about when she and Georgiana neared the top of the flight of marble stairs. Her shoulders were prickling, as if . . . Sure enough, he was watching them.

The jokes she and Georgiana had made about satyrs leaped into her mind. There was something fierce and powerful about the duke’s face that would suit a satyr. He had sharp cheekbones, but it was his eyes . . . they burned with the kind of utterly contained power that one could imagine of a satyr.

She loathed a goatee, but she had to admit that the fashion would suit his faintly exotic look. His hair had begun to dry, and the shock of white fell over his brow.

“Olivia,” Georgiana said sharply.

Olivia blinked and turned away.

Georgiana, of course, did nothing so ill-bred as to ogle the duke from the top of the stairs. Instead she dropped a curtsy, giving both the duke and her ladyship a measured, affable smile. Then she sent one sharp-eyed glance toward Olivia that said
follow me
, turned, and walked down the hallway after Cleese.

For the first time in her life, Olivia felt a deep longing to possess her sister’s figure rather than her own. Georgiana looked so slim and elegant, even in a drenched costume.

Whereas she herself undoubtedly looked like a loaf of bread, wrapped in a heavy coat, wet skirts clinging to her legs. Which weren’t nearly as nicely shaped as her sister’s.

“I’ll just lean on your arm, Nephew,” Lady Cecily was saying. “I certainly don’t wish to be carried up the stairs like a bundle of linens.”

Olivia started down the hallway, planning to escape before the duke reached the top of the stairs and had a good look at her wet gown from the rear.

“I hope you don’t mind my saying this,” Lady Cecily told the duke, “but your hair looks a little disordered. My husband used to wear a little net cap at night that kept his hair neatly in place. Your valet will find you one, Nephew; I shall give him the proper direction.”

Olivia giggled at the thought of the duke in a hair net. She glanced over her shoulder and . . .