When the Duke Found Love (21 page)

That wasn’t true, not when she’d spent the last nights awake and thinking of him. But that was what she
should
have done, however, so there could be no real harm in saying so. Besides, he was the one determined to confess, not her.

“I wanted to see you,” he said, more moody than confessional. “After the park, I’d have thought you wanted to see me as well.”

Now she frowned, too, wishing he didn’t sound so much like a spoiled boy—albeit a handsome and virile one—who wasn’t getting his way. Of course, dukes
were
spoiled boys who generally did get their way; she’d seen that often enough with March and Charlotte. But in this case, Sheffield wasn’t going to.

“What I want, and what you want, doesn’t matter,” she said, as patiently as if she were addressing one of her nephews. “Your betrothal may be a sham, but mine is not. I belong to Lord Crump. You have no right to see me, and it will be much better for us both if you don’t.”

“It’s your fault,” he said mournfully. “If you hadn’t kissed me that first time, none of this would have happened. Now you have bewitched me, and it’s your obligation to help me recover.”

“Sheffield, please. You are not serious, are you?” she asked, incredulous and overwhelmed, too. At first she’d thought this was more of his flirtatious teasing, but now she wasn’t as sure. Yet she couldn’t believe he was saying such things with such conviction, especially not in this shop with a score of other women around them. “Or are you simply mad?”

“If I am mad,” he said sadly, “then that is your fault, too.”

She had to pause for a moment to control herself, to be sure she did not raise her voice with frustration. The more he talked like this, the more confused and uncertain and unhappy she became herself.

And, heaven save her, a mournful, melancholy Sheffield was ten times as devastating as a jolly one.

“It can’t be my fault, Sheffield,” she said at last. “At least not how you paint it.”

He nodded gravely, letting her believe he agreed.

“Another confession, then,” he said. “And I will agree that it wasn’t your kiss that bewitched me.”

“I am thankful for that,” she said, rubbing her fingers nervously over her beaded bracelet. “I’d not wish myself to be such a—a demon as that.”

“No demon kiss,” he agreed. He sat upright on the stool and reached into the inner pocket of his waistcoat, the one where gentlemen kept their valuables. “You recall that first afternoon, when Fantôme found you amongst the trees?”

“You’re supposed to have forgotten that day, as should I,” she said softly. She couldn’t guess what he’d drawn from his pocket. Hidden by his fingers, it looked like a small scrap of linen, wrapped around something else.

“But you haven’t, have you?” he said. “Nor have I. Look. Here’s the proof. I’ve carried it with me ever since.”

He put the little linen bundle in his palm and opened it. There in his hand lay the silk flower he’d plucked from her hat that first day, a perfect match to the ones that were still blooming on her crown now. She could not believe that he’d kept it. Most gentlemen who claimed tokens like that didn’t, especially from women whose names they did not know.

But Sheffield had. And he’d done it because the flower had belonged to her.

Stunned, she looked from the flower to his face. His expression was an odd mixture of sheepishness and pride, with a measure of defiance, too.

“You’re going to laugh,” he predicted grimly. “You think me a great sentimental oaf, don’t you?”

“Here is the hat, my lady, as you requested,” the assistant said, returning with the newly trimmed hat for Lady Enid. “To be sure, it is not finished, my lady, not as we like our hats to be here at Hartley’s, but her ladyship can consider the placement of the flowers.”

At once Sheffield covered the flower in his hand and stuffed it into his pocket. He turned away from Diana to greet the assistant, visibly composing his face into a charming smile for her sake.

“Truly you have wrought a miracle,” he declared, his smile warming as he saw her smile. “Lady Diana, do you approve?”

“Yes—yes,” stammered Diana, not yet adept at making such a swift transition. She stared down at the hat, striving to make a coherent comment. “The color of the ribbon is as handsome against the straw as I’d hoped, and the flowers are most cunningly arranged. But perhaps another bow behind them, as a frame?”

“An excellent suggestion, my lady,” the assistant said, nodding. “Does her ladyship wish to review the hat again?”

“I’m sure it will be acceptable,” Sheffield said. “As soon as it is completed, have it sent to Lady Enid Lattimore.”

“I am finished, Diana,” Charlotte announced cheerfully, standing to go. She glanced down at the small gold watch at her waist. “My, look at the hour! Come, we must be off.”

“Yes, Charlotte,” Diana murmured, sliding from her stool. She wished Sheffield would look at her again, just her, the way he had before. Now she almost wondered if she’d imagined the little flower in his hand.

“Sheffield, good day,” Charlotte was saying, giving him her hand to kiss. “I trust we shall be seeing you again soon. Pray bring Lady Enid to me, too. Diana has sung her praises so highly that I cannot wait to meet her.”

“I should be honored,” he said, bowing over her hand, “and so shall Lady Enid, I’m sure.”

“And her ring!” Charlotte said. “I do so wish to see her betrothal ring. Diana told me it was quite magnificent. I pray that Lord Crump will soon give her one to equal it.”

Diana winced. Doubtless Sheffield had noticed she’d yet no ring on her finger, but still she wished Charlotte hadn’t called his attention to it so obviously.

“I’m sure his lordship will soon, Charlotte,” she said. “You know how his affairs occupy his time.”

“Indeed,” Charlotte agreed, and with obvious approval, too. “It’s the price a gentleman must pay if he wishes to accomplish grand things in this world.”

“I’m certain Lady Diana understands,” Sheffield said, taking her hand in farewell. “The wife of such a gentleman pays a similar price. Good day, Lady Diana, and thank you again for your opinions.”

She smiled at him, but his smile in return was the same one he’d granted to Mrs. Hartley and her assistants, the smile of perfunctory charm that came to him without thinking. As delightful as it was, there was nothing in that smile that spoke of shared secrets or confidences, or of kisses stolen and given. There was certainly none of the vulnerability that he’d dared to let her glimpse when he’d shown her the silk flower from her hat.

Was Sheffield protecting her by treating her like all the others, without any special respect or regard? Or were his earlier confidences—“confessions,” he’d called them—only the guile of a worldly gentleman too practiced in pleasing ladies?

She did not begin to know, and as she joined Charlotte in their carriage, her thoughts were in almost as great a confusion as her emotions.

“Sheffield looks well,” Charlotte said as the carriage drew away from the shop. “There’s a new purpose and direction to his manner that is most pleasing. Clearly he has finally found the one woman to make him forget all the others, exactly as Brecon and March had hoped for him. Though who can truly know the heart of a gentleman like Sheffield?”

She chuckled, but Diana did not join her. Who indeed truly knew the heart of the handsome, charming Duke of Sheffield?

Not I,
she thought miserably,
not I.

C
HAPTER
T
EN

A blithering, babbling idiot.

Nearly two weeks had passed since Sheffield had watched Diana leave the milliner’s shop, yet he still could not recall that afternoon without coming to the same judgment regarding himself. She’d told him she did not want to be alone with him, she’d defended her betrothed, she’d told him to forget they had ever kissed. He’d responded by behaving like a mooncalf, telling her how he was bewitched and befuddled by her, how he could not put her from his mind, how he was desperate to see her alone again. He’d confessed it all, even used that very word,
confession
, as if he needed to grovel for her approval and absolution.

Then, as if that had not been enough, he’d showed her the silk flower that he’d plucked from her hat the first day he’d seen her, before he’d even known who she was, the flower he’d kept like a talisman ever since. No wonder she’d been left speechless by that. What could any lady say?

Nothing. Except that the Duke of Sheffield, famous for his charm and the ease with which he could seduce the most worldly of women, had been undone by a country-bred virgin who’d promised to wed the dullest man in all Britain.

Oh, yes, he was a blithering, babbling idiot, and no one was going to persuade him otherwise.

Which was why he was now in a place specially designed for other idiots like him, or at any rate, for gentlemen with more money than sense. It was a house so exclusive that it had no real name, but everyone for whom the door would open knew of it, and where exactly in Covent Garden it was. The main sport was gaming, with tables arranged in several rooms, but also available was an assortment of overpriced wines and unsavory food pretending to be French. Equally overpriced and unsavory women paraded among the gentlemen, paying the most attention to those who won or who flashed the largest wagers. Because Sheffield did neither, they generally ignored him. But then he drank little of the wine, ate less of the food, and took part in none of the games, either; his entire reason for being there was so that he would not have to go home just yet to a vast house that was empty except for servants.

He’d spent the earlier part of the evening dining with Lady Enid and her parents, a strained and dutiful meal if ever there was one. He’d created this false betrothal, and now he had to abide by it, at least for the time being. He had kept his distance from Diana and the rest of the family, and to his regret, she’d likewise made no effort to contact him. When she’d asked him to keep away, he somehow hadn’t realized that she’d intended to do the same.

Surely Diana must have felt the same joy that he had when they’d been together, the same spark between them. Surely it hadn’t been all pretending, and she hadn’t been able to put that attraction entirely aside for the sake of duty and Crump. Surely she hadn’t forgotten him, for he had not been able to forget her, nor did he wish to.

The longer he’d sat at the Lattimore dining table beside Enid, the more he’d thought of Diana, just as Enid likely was thinking of her Joshua. Perhaps the characters in a Shakespearean comedy enjoyed this sort of complicated dissembling, but Sheffield was rapidly discovering that he didn’t, not to this degree.

Now he stood to one side of the gaming house’s garishly painted wall with a glass in his hand and pretended to watch the roiling scene before him. A few old friends greeted him, but they quickly moved on when they saw he was in no humor for merriment. He was alone with his thoughts in a crowd, exactly as he wished it.

Until the one man he most wished not to see in such a place suddenly appeared before him.

“Sheffield,” Brecon said. “I rather expected to find you here, though I’d hoped I wouldn’t.”

“Brecon,” Sheffield replied, sipping from his glass. “If I have so grievously disappointed your hopes, then perhaps you would do better to leave and pretend you’d not seen me at all.”

“Too late,” Brecon said. “I have seen you, and spoken with you, and withstood the impact of your sourness. That is too much to ignore or pretend away.”

Sheffield motioned for a servant to bring Brecon a glass of wine. “Then if you are determined to stay, you must drink with me and offer some reasonable company. Where is Mrs. Greene? I recall she’d a wicked taste for piquet.”

Mrs. Greene was the most recent of Brecon’s companionable mistresses, a plump, discreet woman with chestnut hair and intelligent eyes. Better to speak of her, Sheffield reasoned, than be forced to speak of himself.

“You’re right,” Brecon said, taking the offered glass. “That dear lady did enjoy her piquet, and what was better, she seldom lost at it– though I pray never in a house such as this. But it matters no longer, for she and I have parted ways”

“Then her doubtless worthy successor is with you instead?” Sheffield asked idly, looking about the room for any woman who might be remotely to Brecon’s taste.

“No,” Brecon said. “At present there is no successor. I am here alone, having dined at March’s house. Charlotte does keep a most excellent table, and wine that’s a good deal sweeter than this vinegar.”

He puckered his mouth with comical disgust at the wine, but Sheffield was instantly on guard. This was Brecon, and Brecon wouldn’t mention March and Charlotte without a reason. Had Diana said something to him?

“I fear the same cannot be said of Lady Lattimore and her cook,” he said, determined to reinforce his supposed ties to Enid. “Though the company this evening was quite fine, the table was abysmal.”

Brecon smiled pleasantly, abandoning the barely tasted wine on a nearby table. “You dined with the Lattimores?”

“I did,” Sheffield said. “This night, and last night, and several others in these past two weeks besides.”

Brecon’s smile continued its pleasantness, which made Sheffield all the more wary. “You continue to be pleased by the match? The lady is agreeable to you?”

“Completely,” Sheffield said, hoping he wasn’t being too emphatic. In truth, spending time with Enid had only convinced him that they were not suited. Oh, she
was
agreeable, exactly as he’d told Brecon, and pleasing, but they had little in common. Her nature was too solemn for him, or perhaps his was too lighthearted for her. Worst of all was that he felt absolutely no hint of desire for her or her person, a serious challenge if they actually did wed. Fortunately that would never be an issue, for Enid and Pullings were planning to elope in September—that is, if Sheffield didn’t expire from boredom first.

And then he thought of Diana again. He couldn’t help it. His traitorous brain was determined to focus on her, no matter how sternly he ordered it not to. He liked how she looked at him sideways from beneath her lashes, appraising and challenging at the same time, and altogether as enticing as hell. He liked how she laughed, and how she found amusing the same things that he did. He liked how she wasn’t afraid to jump into a pond, or kiss him until her hair fell down, or do most anything merely because she wished to. He liked how she was bold without being brazen. He’d even like her loyalty, loyalty being a great rarity in the women he’d known; he only wished she were being loyal to him instead of Crump.