To Woo a Widow (The Heart of a Duke Book 10) (3 page)

P
hilippa was sensible. She’d long been practical and proper and demure. It was those traits that had snared the notice of her late husband and led to a predictable courtship and subsequent marriage.

Yes, she was hardly the manner of woman to note a towering, ginger-haired gentleman with exquisitely sculpted features. And
certainly
not the manner of woman who allowed herself to steal a glance back for a final glimpse of said gentleman’s perfect figure. Except, he had rescued her wandering daughter…and picked flowers with her, and surely a gentleman such as that warranted a lingering look.

Such intrigue was dubiously rewarded. She glanced back and promptly stumbled. With a gasp, she fell sideways, coming down hard on her hip. Her daughter’s soft cry cut across her distracted musings of Lord Guilford. “Mama!”

What in blazes had she stepped in? Philippa looked to her foot, partially dangling inside a rabbit hole. Bloody rabbit hole. The fairytale book she’d brought to read to her daughters lay mockingly beside it. She really
should
have been attending where she was walking.

“Oh, Mama. You
arrre
hurt.” Worry stretched out that syllable.

As she removed her foot from the hole, pain radiated from her ankle and she moved it in a slow, experimental circle. “Not at all,” she assured. Seated on her buttocks, with her skirts rucked about her ankles, she managed a smile. It was nothing other than her pride now smarting. It was fitting that she was now so inelegantly sprawled in the trail after being so gauche and clumsy in staring after a gentleman who’d been kind to Faith. Philippa made to stand, when Cynthia’s sharp cry cut across the horizon.

The young nursemaid rushed over, shifting Violet in her arms. “Oh, my lady,” she cried, with a fervor more suited to a carriage accident than a little stumble in the park.

She sighed. Then, she’d always been weak, pathetic Philippa, doing exactly as people wished to keep everyone
happy
. Doted on by all. “I assure you, I am fine,” she murmured and once more made to stand, when thundering hooves sounded in the distance.

They looked as one. Philippa’s heart did a funny leap. He’d returned.

The Marquess of Guilford brought his mount to a stop. In one fluid movement, he dismounted, tethered his towering horse to a nearby oak, and strode toward their quartet. He dropped to a knee beside Philippa. “Are you hurt, my lady?” he asked, in a mellifluous baritone that caused her heart to speed up another beat.

Unable to drag forth words, Philippa shook her head and then glanced at her ankles. She gasped and rushed to cover her exposed lower legs.

“My mama is hurt,” Faith said, when Philippa failed to respond.

The marquess shifted his gaze from her feet and she braced for his questioning. Instead, he moved his attention to the little informant. “Is she, my lady?” he asked in gentle tones.

“Oh, yes. She stepped in a rabbit hole because she was not looking where she was going.”

As her daughter proceeded to chatter like a magpie, Philippa cocked her head. Never in the course of her life had a gentleman taken the time to speak to her as a woman, let alone a small girl. Her own father, God rot his soul, had been a dark devil who’d beat his daughters with the same frequency he’d beaten his sons. As a woman, her elder brothers had taken little interest in her future or her happiness, beyond the proper, formal match coordinated by her eldest brother. And yet, here was this man…a stranger, speaking to her child as though she were an equal, when gentlemen tended to not see a child, and most especially not a female one.

“Isn’t that right, Mama?”

Blinking wildly, Philippa looked from her daughter to the nursemaid cradling Violet, and then to the marquess. Each stared at her, expecting something. Her mind raced. Just as Philippa was not the manner of woman to not attend where she was walking or to stare after a gentleman, neither was she the one who woolgathered while others spoke. She attended conversations. She worried her lower lip. Or she did. Normally. Not now. And when possessed of an absolute lack of idea on how to respond, she opted for the very safe, “It is.”

A lazy smile turned the marquess’ lips up and her maid gasped.

Philippa’s stomach dipped and she realized she’d said the absolute worst thing.

“See, my lord,” Faith said loudly, beaming. “I told you my mother was looking back at you. That is why…” Philippa choked on her swallow. “She stepped in the hole.”

Mortification set her cheeks ablaze. “I was… I was…”
Please let that rabbit hole widen and suck me under…

His smile deepened, revealing two even rows of gleaming white teeth. No gentleman had a place being so wholly beautiful…
even
his teeth. “Allow me to check your ankle for injury, my lady,” he murmured.

And when presented with the option of debating whether or not she’d been staring curiously after him, or having him probe her decidedly uninjured ankle, Philippa gave a small nod.

The marquess slightly lifted her satin skirts and, with infinite tenderness, removed her boot. Her breath caught. Head bent over her ankle and the early morning sun shining off his ginger-blond strands, Lord Guilford gently pressed and probed the sensitive flesh; his touch burning her like the hot summer sun.

This is scandalous. I am in the middle of Hyde Park with a stranger, whose hands are on my person…

And never in the course of her life had she ever dared anything that was remotely scandalous. Perhaps if she had, she’d not have ended up married to the cold, soulless man she had. As such, she bit hard on her lower lip, while this gentleman trailed his fingertips over the curves and arches of her ankle and foot; his touch rousing delicious warmth that set off a wild fluttering in her belly.

He lifted his gaze and their stares collided. A spark of passion lit his eyes, reflecting the same current running through her. There should be the appropriate modicum of embarrassment at being caught watching him. And yet…she fixed on his face. She, who’d always demurely looked away and certainly never did something as bold as meet a gentleman’s eyes.

“Is my mama all right?” Faith’s concerned tone slashed across the charged moment and Lord Guilford promptly lowered her skirts.

“I believe she is,” he said, reassuringly. The marquess stood, his midnight cloak whipping about him. “If you’ll lead Her Ladyship’s children to their carriage,” he instructed the maid and in one fluid movement, bent and swept Philippa into his arms. Heat singed through the fabric of her satin dress as he drew her against the powerful wall of his broad chest.

She gasped. “What…?”

He looked down at her and quirked a ginger brow. “Surely you do not expect I can leave you laying in the middle of Hyde Park, my lady?” he drawled with a sardonic twist to those words.

God help her. If she were at all honorable and proper she’d insist there was no injury. She would correctly inform him that she was, indeed, fine to walk. “Thank you,” she breathed.

He flashed another one of those smiles that sent her heart tripping into double time. “It is my pleasure,” he said, as he strode towards the carriage.

Gentlemen were not supposed to be these six-foot three-inch towering, muscular figures. They were supposed to all be like her heavily-padded, more than slightly soft late husband. Her fingers curled reflexively about the marquess’ powerful bicep. Philippa’s pulse raced. After all these years of indifference to her husband, she’d believed herself incapable of the heady desire that sent her thoughts into riot. Now that myth was shattered in Hyde Park, in the arms of a stranger, no less.

As they made their way in silence, the occasional passersby stared with open curiosity and Philippa burrowed closer into Lord Guilford’s arms. The scent of sandalwood, so wholly masculine, and not those fragrant florals preferred by her late husband wafted around her senses, blissfully distracting. She closed her eyes and ignored those curious stares that portended gossip. There would come time for Edgerton disapproval later. For now, there was this ginger-haired gentleman who so effortlessly carried her through the grounds.

“I confess,” the marquess began, bringing her eyes flying open. “I know that we must have met before, my lady, but to my shame, I cannot bring forth a memory.”

Bitterness twisted in her belly; harsh, ugly and real. “Since I made my Come Out seven years earlier, I have spent the majority of my time in the country,” she said softly. Six of those years where she’d been treated as nothing more than a broodmare her late husband had gotten child after child upon. Children who had never mattered to Calvin. But to Philippa, even with her loathing for her husband, those babes had been precious souls in her pregnancies. She’d journeyed through hell with them, only to emerge solitary at the end of their battle—left with nothing but a husband who was angry for all the wrong reasons. All the well-hidden hatred for her late husband boiled to the surface, scaring her with its power.

Lord Guilford paused and looked down, their gazes meeting. The heated intensity of his green-eyed stare shot through her; eyes that could see into a person’s soul and dig forth all those darkest, most coveted secrets. “That is a shame, my lady,” he said quietly.

And, of course, his words were spoken for politeness sake, but her breath hitched. “Philippa,” she blurted, as he continued walking.

He again halted.

She wet her lips. “My name is Philippa. Given the circumstances of our…meeting, I expect you might call me by my given name.” As soon as the indecent offer left her lips, heat scorched her body, threatening to burn her inside out. Only shameful widows went about offering strangers the use of their Christian names and she would never be one of those wanton creatures.

“Philippa,” he murmured, wrapping those three syllables in his husky baritone and set off another round of fluttering in her belly. He shifted her in his arms, to touch the brim of his elegant black hat. “I am Miles.”

Miles. Strong, commanding, and direct. It suited him perfectly.

Up ahead, her daughter, Faith, paused and looked over her shoulder. She waved excitedly. “Are you all right, Mama?” she called, her voice carrying on a spring breeze.

Her heart pulled at that devotion. Since she was born and Calvin had disdained her because of her gender alone, Philippa had forged a special bond with the tiny human entrusted to her care. She cupped her hands around her mouth in a move her mother would lament and called back. “I am quite all right,” she assured. Faith returned her attention forward.

“She is devoted to you,” the marquess…
Miles
observed quietly.

Philippa stiffened. After all, one could hardly explain to family, let alone a stranger, that they’d been so since Faith’s birth when the late earl sneered down at the girl babe in her arms. “She is,” she said softly. “She worries after me.”

As soon as the revealing words slipped from her lips, she bit down on the inside of her cheek, wishing to call them back. Alas, they’d been uttered. She held her breath. Mayhap he’d not heard. Mayhap he’d not probe. After all, he was a stranger and gentlemen didn’t truly worry after women. Not enough to
ask
those probing questions. Certainly not of a stranger.

Miles frowned. “And what does she worry about?” There was a hint of something primal and primitive in that inquiry that sent warmth spiraling to her heart. Even her brothers—Alex had seen her more of a burden he didn’t care to chaperone and Gabriel as a miss to be properly married off to a man who’d never harm her—had never been protective in that sense of her as a woman.

She cleared her throat. She’d already said too much. “She wishes to see me happy.” Except that reassurance only brought his ginger eyebrows dipping lower. “She wishes to see everyone happy,” she hurriedly explained. It was simply the manner of child Faith was, that she asked after and worried after everyone else’s happiness.

Some of the tension left Miles’ shoulders.

At last, they reached the waiting carriage and the marquess effortlessly shifted her inside the conveyance. His broad, powerful frame swallowed up the expansive carriage. He paused, their gazes locked and another shock of energy passed between them. “Philippa,” he said for her ears alone.

And then he ducked out of the carriage. An inexplicable rush of disappointment went through her at the loss and she gave her head a hard shake. Silly thoughts. And she was never, ever, ever silly.

Moments later, her daughters and their nursemaid occupying the opposite bench, the driver closed the door. As the elegant black barouche rocked forward, she pulled back the edge of the curtain and stared after the retreating marquess. He, in their brief, chance meeting, had shown more interest in her daughter than her late husband ever had.

A
fter carrying Philippa to her carriage, Miles returned for his mount.

The chance meeting with the lady with midnight curls, thoughts of the quiet young mother with her expressive eyes, swirled around his mind. Unwelcome thoughts. One about the lady’s bow-shaped, crimson lips and trim, delicate figure. Thoughts he had no right having of her, given the lady’s status as a married woman. For even as most lords took their pleasures with unhappy wives, Miles had never been that man. He’d never been a rogue or rake or deliberate charmer. Mayhap that was why ladies of the
ton
had never clamored for his notice.

As Miles gathered his reins and made to climb astride and resume his previously interrupted ride, something from the corner of his eye caught his notice. Reins in hand, he walked over to it. Faith’s leather bound volume of
The Little Glass Slipper
lay forlornly forgotten beside the spot Philippa had fallen.

Miles quickly retrieved it, studying the gold lettering on the front of the tome.

Who was Lady Philippa? His own mother, devoted to her family though she was, had never done something as outrageous as gallivant through Hyde Park. And certainly she hadn’t read to her children. No, there had been nursemaids and tutors to properly attend her offspring. From two exchanges alone, Philippa had shown herself to possess more unrestrained love and emotion and there was something beautiful in that unwillingness to prevaricate.

Miles tucked the small book inside his jacket.

Abandoning his hope of a distracting ride, he mounted Whisper and made for his Mayfair townhouse. As he guided his horse from the park, through the awakening streets of London, the memory of Lady Philippa’s full, crimson lips tempted him. Taunted him. And he thought of all the wicked things he would do with—Miles swallowed a groan.
Enough
.

Reaching the front of his ivory stucco townhouse, Miles drew on the reins.

The dutiful servant, Gavin, came forward to collect Whisper.

“Gavin, a good day, isn’t it?” he asked as his feet settled on the pavement.

“Lord Guilford,” the older groom with his white, more than slightly receding hairline smiled. “You are late.” Such a statement came from a man who’d long, long ago learned Miles’ daily routine in London of riding early; a routine he’d not deviated from…not even during the winter months.

He grinned. “I was detained.”
Thinking of another man’s wife.
He made a sound of disgust. Doffing his hat, Miles took the handful of steps two at a time and sailed through the front entrance as the butler opened it. “Terry,” he greeted, tossing the article to the other man who easily caught it.

“My lord.”

With excited energy thrumming inside, Miles whistled and made his way through the townhouse to the breakfast room. He stepped inside and his whistling tune trailed off for a discordant, weak finish. His youngest, unmarried sister, Lettice, sat at the table, staring at him.

He caught her gaze.
Go
, she mouthed. “Er…” Miles briefly eyed the door and then wheeled around.

“Miles?”

Swallowing a sigh, he shifted his direction and made his way to the sideboard. “Yes, Mother?”

“What is the meaning of this?” she demanded, as he piled his plate with eggs, bacon, and sausage.

“My breakfast?” he drawled, not deigning to glance at his perturbed mother. “I am having—”

“Not your morning meal, Miles,” she said sharply as he turned around. She gave her daughter a pointed stare and Lettice promptly surged to her feet.

He silently cursed. So it was to be one of
those
mornings. Miles stared after his quickly retreating sibling with no small degree of envy. Usually, the only thing that set their mother off on such a temper was the unwedded state of her children. The remaining three of her children, that was. Alas, one of them did reserve the majority of that displeasure.

“I asked you, what is the meaning of this news?” his mother repeated, brandishing a note at her side.

With deliberate, methodical movements, he snapped open his white linen napkin and placed it on his lap. “I daresay I’ve no idea what you are talking about, Mother.” And he didn’t. Usually, he did. But he was never one of those, nor had he ever been one of those rogues whispered about in the papers so, usually, her displeasure just had to do with his still unwed state.

“Well, I expect this from your brother. He is a shameful rogue who cannot be bothered to leave his clubs and bachelor residence. But you?” In a very unladylike display, his mother tossed the ivory vellum at him. It landed with a thump beside his plate. “You are no rogue.” Yes, she was right on that score. But there had been something decidedly wonderful in holding Lady Philippa’s delicate foot in his hand.

Ignoring the page, he picked up his knife and the flaky, white bread off his plate. “I am not in the mood for your games, Mother,” he drawled, buttering the bread. He’d much rather think about the lovely Lady Winston with her guarded eyes. What made a woman so cautious? And why did he have this desire to know?

“Then mayhap you are in the mood for this?” she carped and brandished that same folded sheet. “It is a note from the Viscountess Lovell.” He paused, mid-bite. Viscountess Lovell, one of his mother’s many second cousins. The two women, both mothers to twins and also three unwed children had struck up quite the friendship over the years. Nor had either of them been discreet in their intention to see Miles wed the viscountess’ oldest daughter, still unmarried at eight and twenty. In fact, an understanding of sorts had been reached between those women. “I see I have your attention now,” she retorted. “What were you doing in the park with an Edgerton?”

He furrowed his brow, his mother’s unexpected question throwing him off course. An Edgerton? And here he’d been thinking her displeasure stemmed from the striking beauty in the park. “What in blazes is an Edgerton?”

His mother closed her eyes and her lips moved as though in prayer. When she opened them, impatience sparked in her gaze. “The Edgerton family. The men are rogues who marry scandalous creatures. The daughters are deplorable.”

He tightened his mouth. As devoted as she’d proven to her children through the years, his sole surviving parent had long put rank and respectability above all else. And given his still unwedded state at nearly thirty, he’d earned her greatest frustration. “I do not personally know the Edgerton family,” he said between tight lips and motioned a servant forward. “Nor if I did, would I be in the habit of defending my connection to those people, as though I were a child.” He held out his glass for the footman, who filled his glass with steaming coffee and backed away.

His mother opened and closed her mouth. “You do not know the Edgertons, then?” Suspicion laced her question.

Miles blew on the contents of his glass. “I do not.”

Furrowing her brow, she reached for the paper and folded it closed. “My apologies,” she said in an unexpected display of remorse. Some of the tautness left her shoulders as she sat back in her seat. “I should trust Alaina’s sources are not always correct.” Ever correct. “I will tell her.” She let loose a relieved laugh. “Of course you’ll not deviate from the pledge to marry Sybil.”

The pledge. That long ago promise to his mother, he’d made years earlier that if he was unwed at thirty, he’d marry the viscountess’ eldest, now spinster daughter, Miss Sybil Cunning. He shifted in his seat. Odd, with that inevitable date rapidly approaching, that long-ago pledge sent unease tripping in his belly.

“Why are you doing that?” With a renewed wariness, she leaned forward in her seat.

He stilled. “Doing what?”

She slashed her hand in his direction. “Shifting about in that manner?”

Miles dragged one hand through his hair. “I don’t know what you—”

“Regardless,” his mother went on. “I knew you’d not be so insensitive to take on with the Edgertons.” She let out a small, relieved laugh. “Why
would
you ever be carrying a woman through Hyde Park?” He froze. “It is preposterous. It is…” She immediately ceased her prattling. “What?” She slapped her hand over her mouth. Horror rounded her eyes. “You
did
carry a woman through the park? An Edgerton?”

He frowned. “The young lady fell. It hardly seems fair to question her respectability simply because she had the misfortune of miscalculating a rabbit hole,” he amended. After all, carrying a married woman who’d been injured was vastly safer than a young, unmarried debutante. At least in his mother’s eyes. Even if the lady did have a lean figure he could span with his hands. At his mother’s absolute silence, Miles blew once more on his drink and then took a sip.

Then, she buried her face in her hands and groaned.

His frown deepened. “Surely, you’d not have had me leave her and her young daughters there without aid?”

She let her hands fall to the table; the frustrated, resigned glimmer in her eyes, a woman of propriety who knew that he couldn’t have very well not come to the aid of a fallen stranger.

“Furthermore,” he went on. “The gossips,” Viscountess Lovell, that bloody shrew would be better used serving the Home Office, “were incorrect in their reporting. It was not an Edgerton, but rather Lady Winston.” The lady’s haunting visage flitted before his eyes. What caused the glitter of sadness in that endless blue stare? Or had he merely imagined that glimmer?

His mother stitched her eyebrows into a single line. “Lady Winston?” she parroted back.

He gave a tight nod and, setting his glass down, picked up his fork and knife.

“With her family’s notorious reputation, I expect the lady, a widow,” she spoke that word with the same vitriol as she might a harlot or courtesan, “has arrived in London with wholly dishonorable intentions.”

Miles snapped his head up. “A widow?” The young woman, with her sad eyes and two daughters, was, in fact—

“Indeed.” Mother pursed her lips. “And you were seen carrying her about Hyde Park.” She tossed her hands up. “Is it a wonder the viscountess is outraged?”

“Yes, it is,” he said dryly. “I would expect her to be a good deal more outraged if I’d simply left an injured lady on the ground without the benefit of help.”

His mother continued as though he hadn’t spoken. “Regardless, you need but demonstrate your devoted interest in Sybil by dancing two sets with her at Lady Essex’ upcoming ball.”

Two consecutive sets constituted an offer of marriage. Short of public ruin, it was an act that would send the loudest signal of his intentions for the lady. So why, given his promise to his mother to marry the lady by the time he reached thirty, did he hesitate? “I’m not yet thirty, Mother,” he said, with deliberate humor infused into his reminder.

She swatted the air with a hand. “Oh, do not tease. You’ll be thirty the day the Season ends.” Three weeks. Three weeks until he made a formal offer to a lady he’d known as a child, who really would make him a fine enough wife. They’d played as children and grew somewhat distant as adults. But to their mothers, the expectation had always been there just the same—they would marry.

Surely, Sybil desired more than that. He did. Or he had. Through the years, he’d been quite content in his bachelor state, with the eventual hope that there would be…more. That there would be a lady who desired more than the title of marchioness and the wealth and prestige that came with the noble position. A woman who was content with a noble gentleman, rather than a practiced charmer. Alas, there hadn’t. And a promise to his mother, given when he was a man of three and twenty, had been made. How to account for the regret that now rolled through him?

His mother rose in a flurry of skirts, bringing his attention to the moment. “If you’ll excuse me, I am paying a visit to Lady Lovell.” She pursed her lips. “I will take it upon myself to reassure her that nothing untoward occurred. After all, the lady was injured, correct?”

The reminder only conjured the memory and feel of Lady Philippa’s foot in his hand; the satiny smoothness of her soft skin. Had he imagined the breathy sigh as he’d run his fingers over her instep?

“Miles?”

“Uh…indeed, she was.” By the narrowing of her eyes, his mother was not in the least mollified. Without another word, she swept from the room, leaving him with blessed silence and the memory of the
widowed
Lady Philippa.

The woman whose book he carried in his pocket. No doubt, she’d been reading the child’s tale to her daughter, Faith. And why the girl was surely missing it, even now.

Miles climbed to his feet. Yes, the
least
he could do was see it properly restored to the pair.

Except, as he took his leave, why did it feel as though his intended visit had more to do with seeing the lady than anything else?