What I Did For a Duke (13 page)

Millicent gestured to the daisies in her apron. “I thought we could make garlands for our hair. I’ve needle and thread in my pockets. I don’t suppose I could persuade you to assist, Lord Moncrieffe?”

The duke snatched up his hat and coat and shot to his feet so quickly one would have thought Millicent had flung a scorpion into his lap.

“Er, I think I’ll leave the weaving and braiding and whatnot to you ladies. Swinging bats is man’s work.”

He winked at Genevieve—winked!—and bowed to both of them, touched his hat, and strode off to join Ian and Harry.

She followed the line of him. He was so tall and lean, shoulders and spine meeting in clean, masculine angles, coat elegantly hanging from them, strides crisp and long as the swing of an ax. With the sky was a spotless blue, the grass a flat and brilliant green, he was an emphatic slash mark against the landscape.

She saw sunny Harry struggle to produce his usual smile as the duke approached. Hard speculation was, in fact, written all over his face for a discernible moment. Genevieve had never seen him look
hard
before. She ached a little bit for him, as she did whenever he suffered at all. She wanted the world to be every bit as kind as he expected it to be.

And yet . . . and yet . . . a perverse little song of hope started up in her heart.

Chapter 11

I
thought
that would drive Moncrieffe away.” Millicent was pleased with herself, as she shook her shawl out and settled herself more comfortably on it.

Genevieve laughed, but the laugh felt strangely weighted. Millicent still seemed new and faintly strange and superior, given that Harry had decided she was worth turning into a wife.

“Were you
trying
to drive him away, Mill?”

“Well, you didn’t really want to sit there shadowed by the dour, dangerous duke, did you? Of course not. He was
terribly
rude to me last night. He walked away. You ought to be talking with me and Harry and Olivia.”

Genevieve was so accustomed to sharing everything openly with Millicent. But she’d learned a good deal about strategy in just a few days—most of it in the last few minutes, in fact—thanks to the duke. So all she said was, “I talk to you and Harry all the time.”

Even that was difficult to say. You and Harry. Harry and Millicent. Millicent and Harry. How would people refer to them when they were married? Which of their names would come first? Inextricably linked forever.

Her name would forever be excised from theirs.

The shock and pain and sheer disbelief came suddenly afresh and she was speechless.

Genevieve apparently waited too long to reply, because Millicent’s mouth dropped open.

“
Never
say that you don’t mind if that man is courting you!”

“I shan’t,” Genevieve said shortly. “Because it isn’t true.”

“It isn’t what others were saying last night.”

Splendid. Others
were
discussing them.

Off in the distance she saw the duke demonstrating what appeared to be a very fine cricket swing. She bit her lip against a laugh when she saw Ian flinch every time the duke swung the bat. A traitorous thought, but it really did serve him right.

What about you? Is Harry courting you, Millicent?
Why is it she hadn’t Olivia’s talent for directness? Did it come with courage? Perhaps she hadn’t any of that, either.

“But good heavens, Genevieve, he is a duke and if you marry him you’ll be—”

“Don’t, don’t, don’t!”
Genevieve frantically prepared to cover her ears.

“—a duchess. Which wouldn’t be
so
terrible, would it?”

Genevieve closed her eyes slowly. Did
no
one see? Had
no one
considered her a match for Harry? How was that even possible?
Everything
in her recoiled from the notion of being married to anyone but Harry. She could envision such a joyous, easy future with him. The duke’s blood ran so cool he found everything faintly amusing and could calculate a revenge in which her life would be ruined in order to show the world he would not tolerate being crossed.
Ever
.

He was all too aware of the failings of his species and he knew how to use them to his advantage. A fascinating skill. A useful one. But hardly a loving one.

Your hand is unconscionably soft, Miss Eversea.

The words rushed back at her, and inwardly she shied from them again.

Millicent lowered her voice to an exaggerated hush. “Ah, but I heard he
poisoned
his first wife for her money. If you married him you mightn’t be duchess for
long
.”

Genevieve rolled her eyes. “Everyone has heard that. How true do you think it likely is?”

She didn’t believe it. But what if his
wife
had cuckolded him? What then?

“Not very,” Millicent admitted. “That sort of murder is probably less common than pantomimes would have it. Not a thing was proved. Besides, I heard she was a rare beauty.”

As if beauty precluded murder. Ian was quite lovely for a man, but he would have gotten himself murdered very neatly if he’d cuckolded a more hotheaded duke. As it was, he was hardly in a comfortable position.

The duke went to hand the bat to him. Ian dropped it.
His hands are probably sweating.

“Dead wives are always rare beauties.”

They both giggled wickedly at that. The three masculine heads swiveled, hoping and worrying that the girls were talking about them.

But she felt instantly guilty. What must his wife have been like?

She knew irony was a veil through which the duke saw the entire world. And of course nothing could hurt him if everything amused him.

The realization struck her dumb for a moment.

“I do think he’s in search of a wife since Lady Abigail threw him over,” Millicent said, piercing a daisy stem, her tongue between her teeth to help her concentrate on her suture.

“She didn’t throw him over. The end of their engagement was mutually decided,” Genevieve said so shortly she realized she sounded very much like she was defending the duke.

She was even more surprised when she realized that she
was
defending the duke.

“Perhaps he’s tired of sleeping alone.”

“Millicent Emily Blenkenship!”

“Nevertheless.” Millicent dimpled in a way she always had but which now made Genevieve wonder if Harry was enchanted by the dimple, too, and what Millicent knew about how men wished to
sleep
, and with whom. “So why on earth he could find fault with Abigail Beasley is beyond me, as she is considered a great beauty and she doesn’t lack for charm. I like her well enough. Perhaps he was releasing her from her obligation to him because Abigail had fallen in love with someone else and he couldn’t bear the notion. Still, it’s difficult to imagine a man like him marrying for
loooooove
.”

She drawled the word with exaggerated sentimentality. Because Millicent was funny and sunny and open, not careful and clever and watchful.

No wonder Harry wanted to marry her.

Correction:
thought
he wanted to marry her.

And
that
subversive thought was courtesy of the duke.

“Why are you staring at me so oddly?” Millicent said suddenly. Her needle and thread paused midair.

Genevieve blinked. “I think there’s an ant crawling up your neck.”

“Aaaaargh!”
Millicent swiped at the nonexistent ant.

“Have you ever been kissed by a man, Millicent?”

“Genevieve!”
Millicent’s turn to gasp.

Her hand dropped to her lap, and her jaw all but swung down on its hinges.

Genevieve had surprised herself by blurting the question. Two days ago she would have asked it much more easily. No, that wasn’t true: Two days ago it wouldn’t have occurred to her to ask it, because she was certain Millicent would tell her if such a thing had ever happened.

“Well?” Her own daisy chain was about six inches in length now. About a third of the way to becoming a crown.

“Not . . . as such.” Millicent wouldn’t meet her eyes. “Why? Have
you
been kissed?”

“I asked you first.”

They momentarily abandoned their daisies to their laps. And regarded each other in wary, stubborn, embarrassed silence.

“Have you thought of
marrying
?” Genevieve pressed. Why hadn’t they discussed this before?

“I’m not on the shelf yet, Genevieve,” she said reprovingly. “Nor are you. We can eke out a few more seasons before we live happily ever after and have broods of our own and set about marrying
them
off. Why do we need to talk of it at all? Perhaps I’d prefer to run off with the Gypsies.”

Was Millicent really pragmatic as all that? Or was she dodging the question?

It didn’t matter. Genevieve had lost her nerve. She hadn’t the duke’s ruthless patience for interviewing a clearly reluctant subject or Olivia’s tenacity in pursuing an ends. What if Millicent was simply trying to spare her feelings? What would she do now if Millicent admitted she was passionately in love with Harry?

She didn’t want to lose both friends.

She wanted to turn back time to the day before she knew Harry intended to propose to Millicent, or she wanted to turn the calendar ahead to the day when Harry and Millicent were married and she was done with her grief, or had at least come to an acceptance, had acquired four cats and settled into a wing of her parents’ house with Olivia to grow old.

Suddenly the both of them were quiet, and their daisy wreaths were growing at an almost frenetic speed beneath their fingers. They both looked up at Harry. He smiled a smile that caught like the sweetest hook in her heart.

And lifted his hand in greeting.

Millicent and Genevieve lifted their hands in reply.

And behind Harry, Genevieve could have sworn the duke lifted an eyebrow.

Chapter 12

T
he evening passed uneventfully in terms of proposals being issued.

It didn’t pass uneventfully for Harry, who lost enough money to the duke in five-card loo to make him perspire. Or for the ladies, who made significant headway with their embroidery.

“There!” Millicent announced happily. She’d put the finishing touches upon a sampler.

Genevieve leaned over and peered. It featured a bundle of gray kittens tumbling about with a ball of yarn.

“It’s wonderful,” Genevieve assured her warmly, exchanging glances with Olivia from across the room, who mouthed the word
kittens
in a question. They both stifled smiles.

“What’s on
your
sampler, Genevieve? You’ve been so secretive about it. Come, let us see.”

She sighed. “Oh, very well.”

Ironically, she’d been working on it for some time. But she finally felt ready to show it.

Millicent took it in her hands and studied it.

Hers featured an enormous urn stuffed full of astonishing flowers in a profusion of oranges and crimsons. She’d
invented
those flowers. They were roselike but not roses, and chrysanthemum-like but not chrysanthemums. No flowers quite like them had grown anywhere on the planet except in her imagination.

She had, in fact, been working on it for some weeks. She’d chosen her finest silk threads for it and the piece glowed.

Millicent ran an admiring thumb over them. “Oh, you’ve embroidered Olivia’s flowers.”

Genevieve looked long and expressionlessly at her.

“I’m not quite finished,” was all she said, and took the sampler back to do just that.

B
ut then came time to retire for the evening.

This is how Damocles felt,
Genevieve thought dismally.

Flat on her back, wide awake, blankets up to her chin, a hot brick at her feet, she ought to feel cozy and sleepy. She’d all but memorized her ceiling since Harry had informed her he intended to propose to Millicent. The fire burned at a medium height.

There was no point in attempting sleep while her mind was crowded, and so she allowed whichever thought was most compelling to crowd through.

And it was this:

Harry had spoken of Millicent in terms of qualities of character. But he never rhapsodized about her lips, or her eyes, or her hair, or her smile. Beyond “you look lovely,” Harry had never gone into specifics.

And each and every compliment issued by the duke had been just singular enough to kindle her imagination. Calculated to intrigue, to imply that he saw her in detail, that touching her was a pleasure.

Unconscionably,
he’d said. As though being soft was something she did specifically to torment him. It had almost been an accusation, a dare. She’d received more than her share of compliments in her life. But for some reason the duke made her feel very much like a . . .

Like a
woman
.

Purely and simply.

It had nothing to do with love. Or with marriage. He was thinking of her in terms of . . . of sensual pleasure. And in concluding this, she was overtaken by that raw, awkward feeling again, a restlessness she wanted to surrender to and to escape.

And her restlessness evolved, shifted distinctly into curiosity, which, she discovered, was a remarkable palliative for pain.

Regardless, there was no point in attempting sleep. No matter how she courted it, it wouldn’t come. She thought she’d read a book, something pleasantly dull, but this required a trip downstairs to the library.

So she slid from her bed and padded across the carpet.

Then hesitated. And almost tiptoed to the window, and tentatively parted the curtain an inch and peered out.

But there was no one in the garden.

She lit the candle next to her bed and brought it down with her to the library. Likely there would be just enough of a fire left burning to help her find the book she wanted. She raced down the marble steps, quickly and on tiptoe, as they were blocks of ice by this time of night, and as she crept across the foyer toward the library she saw a tall shadowy figure standing in the green salon, pointed toward the window.

Dear God!

Her heart leaped into her throat. Motionless, as riveted as a statue, her spine was suddenly as icy as the floor beneath her feet, she tried to shriek, but no sound emerged.

It was about time an Eversea ghost made itself known, but that didn’t necessarily mean she wanted to be the first one to see it.

But her senses settled. A moment later she knew it was the Duke of Falconbridge.

Her breath caught.

And her heart began to hammer in her throat, and this time it was from a peculiar excitement.

His back was to her. His arm was upraised, holding the drawn curtain away from the window, and he was looking intently out, but she couldn’t imagine what he might see. That full moon, a sky full of stars. He was still dressed, or mostly dressed. Trousers and boots, a white shirt rolled up at the sleeves. A candle no taller than a thumb was lit and pressed into a dish on the table next to him, and it illuminated a small crystal glass in which glowed what appeared to be brandy. Likely poured from the library decanter.

Which meant he’d likely wandered from room to room.

So she
had
seen him in the garden. Why did he haunt the house every night after midnight? Were all those things said of him true, and did his conscience dog him?
When
precisely did he sleep?

He picked up the brandy and sipped at it, then lowered it again. The dying fire in the salon illuminated half of him. He appeared to have been dipped in gold.

She stared longer than she ought to. As he was coatless, she could clearly see the outline of his body. He was lean and spare, dangerous as a whip.

She saw his shoulders move in a breath, perhaps a sigh.

And then he released the curtain, and it shimmied back into place.

He turned slowly away from the window, seemingly resigned to needing to return to his room. He began to reach for the candle.

Then he went still.

Something must have caught his eye, because he spun so quickly she jumped.

He straightened slowly to his full height . . . and stared.

Perhaps he thinks
I’m
a ghost.

But no. She was certain he knew at precisely whom he stared.

Riveted, silent, mutually breathless, they regarded each other across a gulf of marble and carpet. His cravat was looped ’round his neck, undone. His shirt was open, revealing a vee of skin burnished by low firelight and fascinating curling dark hair.

She couldn’t at all see his expression.

But she could
feel
his eyes on her. And from the distance he managed once again to make her acutely aware of her good mouth. Her naiad hair. Her unconscionably soft hands. And every inch of her skin was suddenly alive, restless, and even the night rail she wore was a sensual disturbance, reminding her that she was a creature that could touch and be touched.

What would happen now,
she wondered . . .

. . .
if I went to him?

His reputation as a man who took the women he wanted preceded him. He wasn’t known to be a despoiler of virgins. Or a cuckolder of married men. And everyone had been shocked when he’d courted Lady Abigail in more or less traditional fashion.

He was absolutely motionless. She entertained for another brief disorienting moment the notion that he was in fact a dream. Her heart slammed in her chest.

She decided to back away.

She took a step forward.

She could have sworn his breath caught.

And then she whirled abruptly, her night rail whipping at her legs, and dashed up the stairs again.