Wild Passions of a Mischievous Duchess

by Violet Hamers

  The Duke stayed at the piano, turning the pages of music for Rosaline as she played.

  Watching the Duke and Duchess of Stonehill dancing together to what normally was a three couple dance seemed to be quite a sight for Lord Limingrose. He dissolved into fits of giggles as his mother and father bowed and curtsied to the imaginary other dancers. This only made his parents pantomime even more ridiculously, which brought even Elizabeth to laughter.

  Once again, she met the Duke’s eyes. He was laughing, his eyes glinting in the light that streamed in from the window as he looked at her. His hand was stayed on the page of music and Rosaline’s playing halted awkwardly until he started suddenly and seemed to remember what he was doing. He turned the page and the music went on, but Elizabeth felt sure that the pause had been noticed by all. She felt her cheeks growing hot, but refrained herself from twisting her fingers nervously in her lap.

  “Miss Peaton, may we go play in the playroom?” the child said, tugging on her hand and looking up at her. Lord Limingrose began to grow impatient with the company of adults and the absence of his toys.

  Elizabeth nodded quietly, standing up. “Yes, I think so. Unless your mother wishes you to stay.”

  The Duchess noticed her standing and smiled. “The young Lord has grown weary of our company?” she asked, with a wink to her son.

  “I want to play with my soldiers,” Lord Limingrose said resolutely.

  The Duchess laughed. “All right, far be it from me to keep you. Miss Peaton, thank you for your patience. It’s always a joy to spend time with you and Thomas together. We shall have to prevail upon you to play for us more often.”

  Elizabeth was always taken aback by the Duchess’ kindness. Despite how intimidatingly beautiful and accomplished the lady was, her popularity was owing much more to her warmth and kindness to everyone she met. Elizabeth returned her smile.

  As she led the boy out of the room, Elizabeth cast a quick glance over her shoulder at the Duke. He was watching her again. She turned quickly away and closed the door behind her.

  Out in the hallway, Elizabeth felt as though she could finally breathe again. Lord Limingrose took her hand and they ascended the stairs to the playroom. Elizabeth’s nerves were shaken at the strange hour she had just passed. She didn’t know if she was more exhilarated or terrified, but whichever it was, she was greatly relieved to return to the peaceful quiet of the playroom.

  Chapter Twelve

  Gerard did not want to stop to think about the way that he felt. He knew that if he stopped to analyze it, the guilt would set in, and this pleasant haze would lift. All he knew, was that Miss Peaton was a fascinating distraction from all of the troubles that had plagued him for the last seven years.

  When he woke up in the morning, he looked up at the ceiling of the room and his mind wandered to her. He wondered what sight she woke up to every morning. Her room would not be as grand as this one, of course, but was she pleased with her surroundings? Did she wake up feeling satisfied? As she got dressed in the morning and twisted those long locks into her customary braided knot, was her mind totally occupied with the day’s duties, or did she daydream?

  You’re being a fool.

  He removed himself from the warmth of the nest of blankets he’d wound himself in as he slept. Perhaps the reason why he found himself so taken with the governess was precisely because he knew it was impossible to be with her. Even if he did decide to marry, it would have to be a lady of his own station. What would people think if he plucked a domestic from his sister’s employ and endeavored to make her his Duchess?

  He’d had enough of people’s whispering about his private affairs.

  So this fascination with Miss Peaton was, in its own strange way, safe. It could go nowhere beyond a pleasant admiration. A friendship, even. An unnamed, unspoken intimacy that soothed and comforted him on this difficult trip.

  His determination to name this nascent relationship ‘friendship’ quaked when, as he wandered the halls after breakfast, he crossed paths with her. The hallway was empty save for the two of them. And now, when he saw her, in his mind’s eye he could only see the soft way she had looked that night in the library. He remembered her hair over her shoulder, and the loose way her nightgown had draped over her body. Friendship was not the word for what he felt for her.

  “Miss Peaton,” he said, bowing to her.

  “Your Grace.” She dipped into a short curtsey.

  “It is unusual to find you without your student,” he said, glancing around at the empty hallway. He half expected Thomas to come bounding around the corner at any moment.

  “He has gone with his father this morning to try his hand at shooting.”

  Gerard felt himself smiling. “Thomas is quite young for that, isn’t he?”

  “That’s not for me to say. At any rate, he’s been begging the Duke to take him for weeks now.” Her voice was steady and calm. Gerard wondered if his interest in her was entirely one-sided. Despite the few times he had made her blush, she remained as stoic as ever.

  “My sister truly did find the most soft-hearted Duke in the country.”

  Miss Peaton smiled politely but did not answer

  “I’m happy for her. She always was of a romantic sort, with her views of marriage always centered around love. I never worried that she would be swept off her feet by a gentleman of ill-intent.”

  He turned his gaze on the portraits that lined the hallways of Stonehill Manor. Long-dead relatives of Jonathan stared down impassively at himself and the governess. “Regardless, I am glad to have caught you here this morning, Miss Peaton. The truth is, I have been turning over the events of yesterday in my mind, and I fear that I may have embarrassed you.”

  “Embarrassed me?” she asked quietly.

  “If I am incorrect in my judgement, please disregard this. But I feel that perhaps I made our friendship too obvious for your liking. I enjoyed watching you play, and I had no mind in the moment to temper my interest. But I have worried ever since that I was too pointed in my attention. Although, I confess that it can be difficult for me to read your reactions to things. You are so self-possessed.”

  He thought that he noticed a glimmer of something in her eyes as he apologized. She kept her face so politely expressionless most of the time, that any crack in that façade warranted study for him.

  “You could not embarrass me, Your Grace. I was merely surprised. I had not expected to play for such an audience that day. Rather, I found your attention comforting. If I imagined myself playing for you alone, I was not so nervous.”

  She was not telling the whole truth, that he could see. He could not have misread her discomfort earlier. But he did not try to draw her out, embarrassing her further by pressing her to admit it. Still, he was encouraged by her answer.

  “How have you slept these past few nights?” he asked, dropping his voice lower.

  “As well as ever, Your Grace.”

  “Which is to say, not well at all?” He stepped closer to her, drawn by some instinct that acted on him unconsciously.

  She did not answer, but merely smiled shyly and lowered her gaze to her hands, clasped in front of her.

  “When you cannot sleep, come to the library. I will meet you there. I do not wish to be seen as rejoicing in your insomnia, but the thought that I may not be the only soul awake on these long nights has brought me comfort.”

  Acting on instinct alone, he reached out and placed his fingertips on the curve of Miss Peaton’s neck. Her pulse thrummed under his fingers, but she did not pull away. He had never dwelt on his own needs, or the toll of the long years of solitude without the touch of a woman. But all at once, the years caught him up in a great rush that compelled him to lean down and kiss her. All other thoughts went out of his mind, and still she did not pull away from him. Her eyes were wide, as if she could tell what his thoughts were, as if she were waiting.

  Just then Gerard caught a flash of movement behind Miss Peaton. For a moment, he perceived the f
ace of one of the housemaids whom he recognized. As soon as he saw her, she was gone, and he could not have known how long she had been there, perhaps listening to his conversation with Miss Peaton.

  A weight dropped into his stomach at the sight of the maid turning away so quickly. Her startled flight seemed to imply that she had, in fact, been caught listening. His one relief was that she could not have heard what he’d said about meeting her in the night, as he had lowered his voice to a whisper. He looked back at Miss Peaton, wondering if he should tell her that they’d been caught out.

  Caught out doing what?

  Surely rumors would not spread based on only a polite conference in an open hallway. It was not as if they had been seen whispering in a darkened library. Still, his conscience troubled him. Perhaps this tête-à-tête had been perfectly innocent and proper on her side, but his own heated blood condemned him.

  Miss Peaton nodded at him, her eyes large and unreadable. “I will.”

  His fear about the maid melted away in the warmth of her acceptance and the hope that he would pass another night with her.

  “I cannot tell you what it means to me,” he assured her, bowing again.

  She curtseyed once more. “Your Grace.”

  “Miss Peaton.”

  As they went on in their different ways, Gerard wondered how many nights he would have to sit up in the library waiting for her.

  * * *

  After Lord Limingrose was put to bed, Elizabeth retreated to the peace of her own room. The small room adjoining the nursery was her one respite of privacy in the large manor where she lived and worked but could not call home. The room was small and dark, with only a small window that looked out over the front of the manor. She kept it neat as a pin, though, and she felt a wave of relief come over her every time she stepped inside and closed the door.

  On this night, she sat down in the wooden chair near the window and picked up her knitting. She tried to focus on the steady rhythm of the needles, but her mind could not stay on the task. The moon rose over the landscape, and she wondered whether or not she would go to the library after all.

  She had said she would. In the moment, it had felt like the right thing to do. She had answered without even really thinking about it, but now she was less sure. Traipsing through the manor in search of a book to read had felt clandestine enough, let alone the thought of sneaking through the halls to meet a gentleman.

  She thought of the gentle touch of his fingers, her skin warming at the mere remembrance.

  A knock came to her door, soft and gentle as a whisper. Elizabeth’s heart jumped into her throat. Her first, irrational and panicked thought, was that The Duke of Hadminster had come to her room. She jumped up from the chair, wiping her hands on the front of her gown. It could not be. He was not that type of gentleman.

  She crossed the room and opened the door a sliver, revealing the face of Dorothy.

  “Heaven’s above, you scared me half to death,” Elizabeth said, chuckling and opening the door wider for her friend to come in.

  “Expecting someone else?” Dorothy asked, coming in and taking her customary seat on the chair. Elizabeth herself sat down on the edge of the bed.

  “Of course not. Who would I expect? I was just startled, is all,” the lie rolled off her tongue, but Dorothy looked at her differently than usual. A shiver of fear went through Elizabeth as Dorothy sat there quietly for a moment. For Dorothy, who was normally full to bursting of conversation and gossip, to struggle to find words was alarming.

  “Is everything all right?” Elizabeth asked, unable to bear the unusual silence any longer.

  “It’s just that I’m trying to think of the best way to ask. It’s…well, there are some rumors running around downstairs. About you and the Duke of Hadminster.”

  Elizabeth’s heart stopped. “Gracious. I can’t imagine what these rumors might be.”

  Dorothy looked at her as though she was just waiting for Elizabeth to crack and tell her some scandalous truth. Elizabeth wondered if she should just tell her about what had happened in the library. It wasn’t as if she had planned it, like some kind of ambush. It had been a chance meeting, that was all.

  “You and he were seen talking together in the hall.”

  Elizabeth scoffed delicately. “Is that all? Am I meant to play dumb when the Duke addresses me?”

  “You didn’t know him before, Elizabeth. His behavior towards you is highly unusual. It may not seem like it to someone who is unaccustomed to the attention of gentleman, but he is interested in you.”

  Elizabeth began to shake her head, but Dorothy was insistent. “I only mean to warn you. I don’t believe that he is the philandering sort, but…”

  Elizabeth laughed. “What? Do you think he is on the verge of proposing to me? A governess?”

  Dorothy shrugged her strong shoulders. “I don’t know, my dear. It’s possible he might. He’s been lonesome. And he likes you. If he is anything like his sister, which I happen to know that he is, issues of title and rank will matter very little to him when it comes to matters of the heart.”

  For Elizabeth, this was too much to bear. She could hardly confess to herself in the quiet and privacy of her own heart that she was in love with the Duke. She ushered Dorothy out of her room as politely as possible and attempted to go to bed. As she laid there, she could not get the thought of him out of her mind.

  She was sure that he was about to kiss her. Something had stopped him, but the desire had been evident in his eyes. And in that moment, she had known that she wanted him to kiss her. Regardless of anything else, the danger of it, the impracticality of it, she had wanted to be kissed.

  She squirmed in her bed, her body nearly upon the point of trembling at the mere thought of his fingertips on the side of her neck. To even let her mind glance off of the thought of his lips upon hers sent her on a dizzying spiral of naked desire and bewilderment. She tossed and turned as the moon rose higher in the sky outside her window.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Oh, Gerard. There you are,” Bridget laughed, striding towards the door where Gerard was just about to pass by. “Come talk to me for a moment.”

  Gerard was agitated. He had waited in the library all night, watching the moon rise and replaying his conversation with Miss Peaton in the hallway over and over again. Could it be that she was merely being polite? Perhaps he had pushed too hard. Perhaps he had frightened her.

  Bridget ushered him into her parlor and poured him a cup of tea. He gripped the delicate cup, remarking upon how the tiny cup made his hands look enormous and blundering.

  “There’s gossip about you downstairs,” Bridget began, getting right to the heart of it.

  “Oh?” he sipped the tea.

  “After that romantic tableau you made at the pianoforte with my governess, I inquired of my lady’s maid if there was any talk. It seems you have formed an attachment to my Miss Peaton. Is that true?”

  “An attachment…” he repeated, not sure how to answer her question. “I’m afraid I may have overstepped my bounds.”

  She cocked her head to the side. “What do you mean?”

  Gerard shifted uneasily in his seat, placing the diminutive teacup down. “I hardly know. When I came here I thought…I don’t know what I thought. I was anxious. You know how I hate being in London, in the place where I was once happy. But Miss Peaton…I don’t know.”

  “My, Gerard, you’re tongue-tied.” Her tone was teasing. “How unlike you.”

  “Unlike me, yes. That’s precisely what I’m trying to get at. I find your governess, shall we say, fascinating. I’m drawn to her, but I can’t justify it. I feel unruly and impulsive around her. Not like myself at all.”

  Bridget’s look of interest bordering on concern broke into an ever-widening grin. “Miss Peaton? Fascinating? Well, I certainly like the girl, I have since the day she came here. But I must say that I’m surprised. Here Jonathan and I have been racking our brains trying to come up with a list of title
d ladies to put in your way. Your tastes have changed since—” She caught herself before uttering the name of his deceased fiancée.

  “No. No, you’re wrong,” Gerard said gently. “Miss Peaton is just as gentle and intelligent as any lady. When I think of her…her lack of connection never comes into my mind.”

  Bridget reached out and patted his knee. “I understand, Gerard. I was lucky that in finding Jonathan, I just so happened to fall in love with a gentleman who was my equal in status. But you’ve always known that I would have married a farmer if I loved him and he loved me. If the company of Miss Peaton brings you back to life after this long slumber of grief, then you have all of my encouragement and support. She’s a good and upright sort. I trust her with my children, and I would trust her with my brother as well.”