What the Duke Desires (19 page)

“Great God, Simon, you do know how to make a visit exciting!” she said with a musical lilt of laughter that had always brought a smile to his face even in the most trying of times.

“I cannot believe Mother sent word to you along the road,” he groaned. “And I can only imagine what she said in her missive.”

“Well, there was little good to the note, I admit,” Naomi said as she took a seat. When he held up a bottle of sherry, she nodded. “But I must say I like Lillian from what little I have seen. She looks terrified as a mouse facing a cat whenever I look at her, but I think once she gets past that little issue, she’ll fit in quite well.”

Simon pursed his lips as he handed a glass to his sister. He had noticed Lillian’s discomfort earlier, as well. Even though Naomi had been kind, Lillian still shifted and shook whenever she thought no one was looking.

“If she appears terrified, it is likely because Mother despises her,” he said with a deep sigh.

Naomi gave an audacious wink. “Well, that is one more mark in Lillian’s favor.”

They shared a brief laugh, but Simon’s soon faded. He and his mother had never had a close relationship, which had been a point of great pain to him as a child. A pain sharpened by the fact that their mother had interacted very differently with Naomi. In fact, she had doted on her daughter, while almost entirely ignoring her son. Other girls might have taken her cue and treated him badly.

Naomi never had. She had always been loving toward him, protecting him from the worst of their mother’s moods and sometimes even attempting to mother him, though she was a child herself. Often he had caught her looking at him, guilty and sad. Those were the worst times.

“Really, Simon,” his sister said, interrupting his thoughts. She was all seriousness now. “I could never find fault with a person you chose to love. After all, you have impeccable taste.”

Simon set his drink down. “I don’t think I ever said love,” he said, suddenly uneasy. “This union is one that was somewhat forced upon us.”

Naomi shut her eyes and held up both hands like a shield. “Yes, I know, Mother said something about father’s office and you being caught there. But
do
spare me the details. I still imagine you in short pants when I don’t see you before me. I do not want to ruin that image by replacing it with another more unsavory one.”

Simon laughed despite himself. “My apologies. I am as innocent as a lamb, if it will help you sleep at night.”

She opened one eye and stuck her tongue out at him playfully. “It does a little.”

Then she set her drink aside. “Truly, Simon, so you do not love her. You have really just met the girl, I don’t think that is such a bad thing. But I wonder, do you think you
could?
Because a lifetime is a long while to share with someone who you do not love.”

He pondered that question for a long moment, thinking of Lillian. He had desired her from the moment she stepped from her carriage and that desire had been returned, though somewhat reluctantly. Still, that feeling alone was not likely to have held his interest. He was not a profligate led by his cock, as some of his contemporaries were. He had desired many an inappropriate woman and never pursued that craving.

No, something else had kept his interest in Lillian alive, beyond the fact that he longed for her physically.

“From almost the first moment,” he mused, “she has been a riddle to me. A puzzle that is not immediately solved. In one moment, she was open and friendly, the next she shut me out like she couldn’t bear to look at me. But in all the times we talked, I was always struck not just by her beauty but by her intelligence. She is quick-witted and well able to hold her own in a verbal sparring match.”

His sister’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “I can see how that would be interesting. Many of the current day’s debutantes seem dull as plain toast. A girl with a tongue and a mind behind it would certainly stand out. But that does not answer the question, Simon. Do you think you could love her?”

He shut his eyes, running over their short time together in his mind. Lillian had been standoffish at times, but there had also been moments when she had been kind. When he confessed the secret of his bastard brother, she seemed to understand the pain that discovery had caused him. She had supported him, comforted him, and once he’d begun, his hesitation in revealing that secret to her had faded almost instantly, replaced with relief at having someone with whom to share his pain.

“Yes,” he finally said softly, his eyes coming open. “I think perhaps, with time, I
could
love her.”

It was a stunning revelation, but he found himself smiling at it. The idea of falling in love with his future wife was actually a very pleasant one. They had years to court while being able to share a bed. It was bound to be an interesting proposition.

Naomi smiled at him. “Good. That makes me happy. At least it is better than Mama and Papa.”

All the pleasant thoughts Simon had been having of Lillian suddenly faded at the mention of his parents and their very unhappy union. He understood the cause better now. The truth had a funny way of clarifying the unfathomable.

“Yes, Father,” he murmured, looking at his sister from the corner of his eye.

Should he tell her what he knew? Conventional wisdom said that as a woman she had to be protected from such indelicate subjects. And yet it didn’t feel right to keep such a secret. If he was entitled to know their father’s true colors, wasn’t she? They had both loved and looked up to him.

“Why do you look at me so?” she asked, and she shifted in her chair nervously. “Simon, what is going on?”

“You know that part of the reason I came here was for the party Mother was so insistent upon. However, there was something else that drew me to the estate,” he said slowly, still uncertain how much he wanted to reveal.

She nodded. “I assumed as much. Father was an important man, and with the new Season starting in such a short time, I thought you probably came here to take care of some of his affairs.”

“Yes, that is exactly why. Do you remember how messy his office always was?”

Naomi’s smile was instant and wide. “Heavens yes. Both here and in the other homes. In London Mother forced him to have a second one where he could meet with people because she was so embarrassed by his disorganization.”

Simon got to his feet and paced to the window. As he looked down at the gardens below, he said, “Well, part of what I must do is put his papers in order. I thought to go through his paperwork myself before I had the staff do the rest. In fact I thought I might have a memoir written about him.”

His sister straightened up a fraction. “I-I see. Yet from your expression, it appears you aren’t happy with what you have found while sorting through the receipts and letters.”

He turned on her. “How much did you know about Father beyond the face he showed the public?”

Naomi shrugged, but she didn’t seem comfortable. “I’m not certain what you mean by his ‘face’ Simon.”

He sighed. “I-I mean what did you know about the real man? The one who wasn’t always good or decent or fair.”

Now it was Naomi who was on her feet. “What do you mean? Are you accusing Father of something?”

Simon drew back. His sister’s wild expression and her trembling hands were not common. Normally Naomi was cool and collected, her high emotions happy ones, not ones of fear or upset. And yet at the mere mention of their father and the potential for secrets, she was in a panic.

Was it possible she already knew something?

“Naomi—” he began, moving toward her. “I was only asking—”

“You were
implying
,” she corrected, backing up. “Implying that he did something wrong. I do not wish to hear it, Simon. The past is best left there. Leave it alone.”

With that she spun away and virtually sprinted from the room, leaving Simon staring at her retreating back and wondering what his sister knew that made her so afraid.

And if it could possibly be something even worse than what he himself had already uncovered.

When she was in this room, she could almost forget the true mission that had brought her to this estate and to the man she would now marry. She could almost forget she had lied to him and misled him in the name of revenge. That she had yet to be fully honest with him.

Almost.

She was about to shake away her troubling thoughts and return to her book when the library door swung open and Lady Westford hurried into the room. Lillian got to her feet, but Naomi didn’t seem to notice her at first. She turned to close the door and lifted a hand to her lips, her breath coming in heaving sighs, as if she was fighting tears.

Immediately Lillian moved forward. “My lady, are you quite all right?”

Naomi jumped as she turned on Lillian. For a moment, Lillian saw a world of hurt and upset and even fear in her companion’s eyes, but then it faded, pushed away. Hidden.

“Oh, I didn’t see you there, you gave me a fright.” Naomi laughed, but it was a mere false echo of the earlier pleasant sound.

“You seemed quite preoccupied when you entered,” Lillian said, setting her book down and coming closer. “Is anything amiss?”

“No, of course not,” Naomi said as she patently avoided Lillian’s gaze by staring up at the high shelves that rose above them. Her expression relaxed. “My, I do love this room.”

Lillian looked at her for a long moment. It was clear her future sister-in-law had no desire to speak to her about whatever was upsetting her, but since Naomi had been spending a few private moments with Simon, Lillian felt an uncommon interest.

Still, she set it aside as she joined Naomi in looking up at the shelves. “It is wonderful. I believe it may be my favorite room on the entire estate.”

That and the billiard room, which she didn’t mention to Naomi even as her cheeks burned hot at the thought.

“Yes, I feel the same. And it’s Simon’s favorite as well.” Naomi’s face dulled and her voice grew distant. “He would hide here when he was a boy, sometimes for hours.”

Lillian tilted her head. “What about you? Would you hide here?”

Naomi looked at her sharply. “I had less to hide from. I suppose it isn’t a secret to you how strained my brother’s relationship with our mother is?”

Lillian shifted, suddenly uncomfortable. “It hasn’t escaped my notice that they do not have the bond that you and the dowager have.”

Naomi’s face softened. “Mother has her reasons for that. But Simon suffered for them.”

With a frown, Lillian said, “But it seems clear you two are as close as a brother and sister can be. So her disregard didn’t affect you as it might have done others.”

Naomi nodded. “No, I did my best to give him what my mother couldn’t. Love and affection. And protection.”

“Protection?” Lillian asked, wondering to what Naomi referred. Only their mother’s wrath, or something else? Her gaze was so faraway and sad that it seemed she meant something deeper.

Naomi nodded. “Yes. There are some things it is better to leave buried. Some truths that will only hurt if they are revealed. Simon has had a difficult enough life, why should his burden be made heavier?”

Lillian stepped back. So Naomi
was
talking about more than a mere rift with his mother. She sounded like she knew secrets, perhaps the very ones that Simon had begun to uncover about their father.

“But Simon doesn’t have to be protected any longer,” Lillian said softly, though she flinched because she was doing that exact thing by keeping her own secrets from him. “He is a man and he deserves to know the truth. He longs for that truth, even if it hurts him.”

Now Naomi turned on her, face pale and tense. “He said he’s been searching through our father’s things.”

Lillian nodded slowly.

“What does he know?”

She hesitated. It seemed wrong to insert herself in the private pains of the siblings. If Naomi knew something new about their father’s past, it wasn’t fair that Lillian would hear it before Simon. Even if her curiosity was at its peak.

With a sigh, she said, “I think it’s best if you speak to Simon about what he knows.”

Naomi shivered as she sank into the nearest chair. “Yes, I suppose I owe him that. It is simply difficult for me not to think of him as the child I vowed to protect, to never let anything bad happen to.”

Brow wrinkling, Lillian tried to picture that. Somehow a Simon who couldn’t take care of himself, a child Simon who needed a guardian…that was difficult to picture. All she could see was the capable, strong Simon who intrigued her despite herself.

“But surely you can see he isn’t that child anymore,” Lillian pressed.

“No,” Naomi said as she rose to her feet and smiled. “He isn’t that child. I only forget sometimes. You are good to remind me. I shall speak to him again, perhaps after supper.”

Lillian nodded; she remained strangely unappeased. Despite the fact that Simon wanted to know the truth, she felt as though she had wronged him in some way.

“Now,” Naomi said with a devilish look in her direction. “Let us not speak of my brother any longer, but let us talk about
you
.”

Lillian stiffened as she faced Naomi with discomfort filling her. “Me?”

“Yes.” Naomi motioned around the room. “Which is your favorite? And be mindful I shall be judging you based solely on your choice of reading material.”

“Then I shall be careful.” Lillian laughed as she moved toward the shelves and the wide array of choices to impress and amuse her future sister-in-law.

But even as they laughed, Lillian couldn’t shake her sense of unease. Every moment that she kept her own secrets from Simon, she kept a piece of the puzzle he longed to solve from his hands. And whether that was for his protection or her own, in some way it made her no better than his father.