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A Destitute Duke
The Heirs & Spares (Book Two)
Copyright © 2018 Patricia A. Knight
ISBN: 978-1-946454-53-9
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted, with the exception of a reviewer who may quote passages in a review, without written prior permission from the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, events, incidents and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.
Other books by Patricia A. Knight:
The Heirs & Spares Series
A Husband for Hire
Lessons for a Lady (coming soon)
Verdantia Series
Hers to Command
Hers to Choose
Hers to Cherish
Hers to Claim
Hers to Captivate
Stand Alones
Adam’s Christmas Eve
Undertow
There will be at least 3 novels in the Heirs & Spares series, if you’d like to be notified when Patricia has a new release, or to be included in launch party events, join her Regency group at:
http://eepurl.com/dcJVCn
Dedication
To Mr. PAK, a/k/a the best man on the face of the earth. You support my dreams. You celebrate my successes and console me in my failures. You help iron out many a plot hole over a cup of coffee or a gin and tonic (with extra lime). My love for you is beyond measure. All my book heroes begin with you.
And last but not least, to my mother and her bridge group. Love you, Mom.
First and foremost and huge thank you for the warm reception and wonderfully kind things said about my debut foray into Regency historical romance. As of this writing, because of you, A Husband for Hire has either been in Amazon’s top 100 best sellers for Regency romance or has flirted with that magical number for over six months. As one of my heroines might say, “I’m in alt.” A Husband For Hire was so well received that it has posed something of a problem for me in that I must “rise to the occasion” with the next two books and give my readers stories and characters equally entertaining. I have tried, dear reader, I have tried—and sweated bullets while doing so—and not just because it is over 100 here in Texas right now.
I have expanded the dictionary of terms in the back to include those phrases and words used in A Destitute Duke that might be unfamiliar to my modern day readers. If you run across an obscure term, check the back. It’s probably there. Again, I have painstakingly researched the etymology of words, words, words, for historical accuracy. There is nary a “climax” or “gorgeous” or “bun” used in this book. Had you been a little mouse in the corner as I wrote this you would have heard a boatload of blue language as I was repeatedly forced to the thesaurus for historically accurate speech and description.
Because so many of you have said you enjoyed it, I have also included “bits and bobs” of my research done while writing A Destitute Duke. You will find some snippets on merchant vessels and the spice trade with Indian and China, the birth of investment banking, and the abysmal lack of property rights for single and married women. This story, as in A Husband For Hire, was heavily researched for accuracy to the time period. I am sure I have made mistakes along the way. Although I have tried to my best ability to use language, clothing, and settings true to the period of 1814-1815 in which this story occurs. I have taken literary license where I wanted it for story-telling purposes. For example, I could not find any actual gentlemen’s clubs that took live-in guests, so I made one up. There was no Bentley’s Club for Gentlemen on St. James Street. Most gentlemen would have lived at a respectable rooming house or had their own residence in London, and I could have done that for Duncan…but I had my reasons not to.
If you are interested in the visual and aural inspirations I used while writing, check out my Pinterest boards for A Husband For Hire and A Destitute Duke.
As always, if you see what might be a factual error, please let me know. I do recheck aspects of the story that have been questioned and correct them where deserved. (Thank you to the reader who corrected my use of Eleanor’s surname as an unmarried woman. The manuscript for A Husband For Hire has been revised and reissued because of your comment.) My readers possess a vast base of knowledge, and I’m always delighted to add to mine.
There will be at least three titles to the Heirs & Spares series. If you would like to stay abreast of the new title release dates, receive free vignettes about the characters and notes on my personal appearances, give a thought to joining Patricia’s Regency Readers. http://eepurl.com/dcJVCn You will receive only information pertaining to my historical romance titles. (I also write in other genres.)
Warmest regards and happy reading!
Patricia
Chapter One
Newmarket, England August 1814
Captain, the Honorable Lord Duncan Worthington Everleigh of His Majesty’s 12th Light Dragoons, or as he preferred, simply Captain Everleigh, swore under his breath and complained to his superior officer. “We are but minutes from Fairwood Manor, Major, but one more blasted fall from your horse and I will bloody well leave you to bleed out on my favorite brother’s carriageway. I am too damned weary to hoist your carcass onto your beast yet one more time.” His gruff humor hid an ever-mounting concern. His dear friend and fellow officer laughed far too weakly at his jibe for Duncan’s peace of mind, and he reined his horse so closely alongside the injured man that the metal of their stirrups clanked.
“You will merely finish what that Frenchman began,” his friend gasped. Swaying and ashen-faced, Major Leeland Abernathy gripped the pommel of his saddle, pushed himself more or less upright and ground out, “Not to worry, Captain. My present appearance is merely a ploy for sympathy as our front line is about to be breached by the petticoat company. I rather fancy my face pressed between the tender breasts of the beauty leading the charge.” The major nodded at a brunette running toward them from the manor house, skirts held high, exposing delicate ankles and trim calves, followed at some paces by another woman and a gentleman, both notable for being of so tall a stature as to be most out of the ordinary way.
“Have a care, sir. Unless my eyes deceive me, that ‘beauty” you refer to is Her Grace, the Dowager Duchess of Chelsony and my step-momma. The gentleman is Lord Miles, the only brother I’m close to. I don’t know the other female.”
“’pologies, but do tell...your step-momma? She must have been all of five when you were birthed.” The major uttered the last in a trailing voice as his eyes rolled upward. He slid gracelessly down the shoulder of his mount and landed in an inelegant sprawl beside the animal’s front feet. It said much about the state of exhaustion of his mount that the dapple-gray barely reacted, simply halted, head down and stood with not so much as a twitch of its dark tail.
With a vehement curse, Duncan swung off his bay and strode to his friend, grasping him under the arms and pulling him from between his mount’s front legs to the grassy verge of the carriage drive. He unbuttoned the other man’s jacket and confirmed what he’d suspected. Blood saturated the heavy padding he had wound around Major Abernathy’s torso some few hours ago. “The devil take you, Leeland. You should have said—” A froth of pale yellow linen descended on his left as his step-mother knelt breathlessly on the grass next to him.
“Lord Duncan, how may I help?”
He shot her a quick glance of acknowledgment as he pulled back the major’s coat to fully reveal the blood-saturated bandages. “Your Grace. Major Abernathy suffered a wound from a French blade some two days ago. Our urgency was such we haven’t dared linger anywhere long enough to permit the bleeding to stop. The
wound itself is not so severe he will expire on the carriageway but he does need a surgeon. Spending the last two days on a horse was the worst thing he could have done, but the stubborn goat wouldn’t hear any different.”
“Oh, the poor man. We must get him to the house, then we will with all haste send for the surgeon.”
Another female descended to the grass on the other side of his friend and briskly set about removing the major’s coat.
“We must see what we can do to arrest the bleeding before we move him. If you would apply your blade to his shirt and these bandages, sir. I hesitate to jostle him further, but I must be able to see—“
“Hold! Madam, what do you think—”
The feminine hands of his step-momma clasped his forearm as he drew back in objection. “Your sister-in-law is a most competent female, my lord. I would advise that you allow her to assist.”
“My sister-in-law? What in the devil?”
“Good to see you whole, Duncan. Truth be told, I’d begun to fear for you.”
At his half-brother’s voice, Duncan glanced up, and though his observation was brief, it was enough for him to reflect that the Lord Miles Everleigh standing before him now was a far more mature version of the callow youth he’d last seen. “Though I dislike the circumstances, it is dashed good to see you, Miles.”
“For me as well.” His half-brother grasped his upper arm and helped him to his feet. Lord Miles spoke to the woman who had joined his step-mother on the grass and was now working with patent competence on Leeland. “My dear, this is my other half-brother, Lord Duncan Everleigh.” He smiled and glanced at Duncan. “The one I like. I know I spoke to you of him. Duncan, my wife and daughter of the Earl of Rutledge, the Lady Miles.”
The woman being introduced so precipitously on the side of the drive barely looked over her shoulder with a terse nod before she fell to baring the bandages that wrapped Major Abernathy’s torso. “I remember. You said the two of you were close and exchanged regular correspondence.” She held out a hand to Duncan and demanded, “Your knife, sir.”
He presented her with a short blade, hilt first. “Have a care, madam, the blade is keen.”
“Indeed. It would be useless if it were not.” Her curt retort accompanied her immediate return to the business of aiding his friend. “I will need a number of clean bandages. Your Grace, do you have a petticoat you can sacrifice?”
“Of course.” Without a hint of concern for propriety, the Dowager Duchess flipped up her gown and began to undo the tapes that fastened the skirts of her undergarment. Both he and his half-brother turned their backs to allow her some privacy as it was apparent she would shortly bare her lower limbs.
Lord Miles addressed a dark-haired woman who’d come up silently behind them. “Lady Florence, will you please hurry back to the house, find Mr. Welborn and ask that he send someone to fetch the surgeon and then get four able-bodied men and a wide plank. A door if they cannot find something else.”
She stood off some four to five paces in the middle of the carriageway, her hand to her mouth, staring at the prone and bloody body of the major. “Yes…I…I…” She swallowed a low moan and fainted onto the driveway.
A curse exploded from Duncan’s mouth in conjunction with an expression of alarm from his half-brother. “Bloody hell, that is all this day needed.” With a troubled look at his unconscious friend—the two women did seem to have matters well in hand, though they both gave the brunette a worried glance—Duncan strode three steps to the limp form of the female and stood glaring down at her. “I suppose it would be ill done of me to suggest we simply abandon her on the carriageway.” He shot a glance at his half-brother who stood next to him.
“Yes. As Lady Florence is my wife’s dearest friend, such action would not win you into Eleanor’s good graces, nor Lady Florence’s for that matter,” Lord Miles replied. “I believe Her Grace and Lady Miles are doing everything possible for your friend. I fear we will simply be in the way. If you deal with Lady Florence, I’ll get your horses, and we’ll both go to the house for additional help.”
Duncan nodded and proceeded to lift the lady in question into his arms. Meanwhile, Lord Miles gathered the two horses by their reins, and both men strode out in a purposeful manner toward the manor house.
“While I would wish the present situation different, I am heartily glad to see you whole of body, Duncan. When I had no response to my letters for over a twelve-month, I had begun to fear the worst.”
Duncan shot a glance at Miles. “My apologies. My duties as a courier for Wellington took a… strange detour… I became more ‘observer’ than messenger. For long periods of time my ability to send or receive correspondence was… ah…compromised by my surroundings.”
“An ‘observer’. I see.” Miles eyed him and commented in a deceptively innocent voice, “I believe the Department of Military Intelligence calls their officers ‘observers’.
“Oh! Are you a spy?” Vivid blue eyes met his, and the slight woman in his arms shifted. “I am quite recovered. Please put me down.”
Duncan set his burden on her feet and stepped back to put the length of an arm between them. “Captain Duncan Everleigh, 12th Light Dragoons,” he said in a clipped voice
“Lady Florence Lloyd-Smyth.” The dark-headed beauty dipped into a slight curtsy. “So…are you a spy?” She studied him with open, lively curiosity as the men resumed their brisk walk down the manor’s carriageway—and she trotted beside them to keep up.
He frowned. “I would be a very poor one should I confess it.”
She gave a moue of disappointment. “Pity. Except for Lord Miles, who belongs to Eleanor, every gentleman I know is commonplace. Had you been a spy, it should have injected a moment of intrigue into my ordinary life, and I might have been tempted to further your acquaintance, perhaps so far as to allow you to call upon me in London.” Her voice became breathless and forced. “It should have enlivened the daily routine.” Her audible breathing came in rapid pants.
At his side, his half-brother laughed softly and offered a mild reproach. “I beg pardon, Lady Florence, but with all due respect, might I observe that the life you declare commonplace others would deem adventuresome in the extreme.”
“Fiddlesticks…I—”
Their conversation went uncomprehended. Her astoundingly arrogant assertion that she might “allow him” to call upon her, staggered him such that he might as well have been deaf to any further dialogue.
“You might have been tempted to further my acquaintance!” Duncan broke in with a loud snort and walked a little faster. By God, who did she think she was to infer he couldn’t fix her interest—if he chose to. Women routinely made themselves nuisances over him. He had to drive them away. He could hold her attentions—if he cared to. He didn’t. At the moment he had two priorities—Major Leeland Abernathy and the War Office. “But should I have welcomed yours? If you routinely engage in fainting spells in the midst of a carriageway, drawing attention away from a man who lies in sore need of medical care, you must be a vexatious and cumbersome female. Such hen-witted behavior would put off even the most sympathetic host or hostess and cannot be a character recommendation to any gentleman.” Duncan received an annoyed sideways glance as she picked up her skirts higher and increased her trot to almost a run as she scurried to keep up with the long, brisk strides of the gentlemen.
“My actions today were an exception. I am not the fainting type, which you would know if you knew anything about me, at all…which you don’t. Such quick, ill-informed judgment of another’s nature does not reflect well on yours, sir.” She inhaled in large draws to catch her breath as Duncan quickened his step yet again. “Regardless, I will make allowances for your rude behavior as you are probably distressed for your friend. Now…” She paused her speech for several gasping breaths as she exerted herself to keep up. “You side-stepped my question. Are you a spy?”
Well…he wasn’t about to address that subject with her. Duncan caught the attention
of Miles, not hard to do as his brother observed the hostile exchange of words between Lady Florence and him with lively interest and an expression that suggested their discourse provided him high entertainment. “Is there someone who can go for a surgeon?”
“Yes, I’ll send a rider straightaway.”
He and Miles, with the bent over and gasping, but mercifully silent, Lady Florence Lloyd-Smyth—there was a God in heaven—reached the forecourt of the manor house. A party of laborers and the property steward, a man introduced to Duncan as Mr. Welborn, greeted them. Lord Miles issued a number of quiet, concise orders and shortly a rider left at a gallop to fetch the surgeon while four men trotted down the carriageway with a door taken from the carriage house. A groom took the reins of Major Abernathy’s grey and his bay from Lord Miles and led the two horses to the stables.
Duncan clasped his half-brother on the shoulder. “Thank you. I greatly appreciate the calm dispatch with which you have dealt with what must be an upsetting development. It cannot be every day a man lies bleeding in the middle of your drive.”
Lord Miles shrugged off his thanks with a half-smile. “Add the unforeseen appearance of a brother I had feared dead and some unanticipated news my wife imparted to me earlier this morning,” he smiled broadly, “I’m to be a father... and yes, I’ll confess this day has been…out of the ordinary way.” Miles shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. “We will do our best for Major Abernathy… My memory didn’t deceive me, that is Major Leeland Abernathy?”
Duncan nodded. “Yes. It is important that I get to the War Office as soon as may be possible, but I don’t wish to leave Leeland until I know he is out of harm’s way. Oh, and all felicitations, on your good news.” Duncan smiled. “It really is good to see you, Miles.”
“Ah… thank you… I think between the Dowager Duchess, Lady Miles and Dr. Hickum—he’s the surgeon—Major Abernathy will have as good a chance as any man at a full recovery.”
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