The Duke's Perfect Wife

by Jennifer Ashley

  “Sit down,” Hart said irritably when Fellows arrived in Hart’s study in answer to his summons. “Don’t stand there as though you have a policeman’s baton shoved up your backside. You make me nervous.”

  “Good,” Lloyd Fellows said. He took the chair but sat with his back upright, looking in no way obedient.

  While Cameron, Mac, and Ian had accepted Fellows as one of their own without much fuss, Hart and Fellows still circled each other warily. They were about the same age, resembled each other, and both had worked very hard to get where they were in their own worlds.

  “I understand that felicitations are in order,” Fellows said. The newspapers had blared it, even though the official announcement had not yet appeared. The Duke of K—will wed the daughter of a scholarly peer and take over England at the same time, one newspaper declared. Another said, The Scottish duke will marry his first sweetheart after waiting more than a decade. To be sure, one will never be able to say that they married in haste, repented at leisure. And other nonsense.

  “Which means I am too busy to deal with these kinds of threats.” Hart handed Fellows the paper that had come through his window the night before.

  Fellows took it gingerly and read it, brows rising. “Not much to go on. No one’s made much headway on the shooter either, I regret to say.”

  “Doesn’t matter. It’s Irishmen angry at a Scotsman, and I know finding them is a long shot. What I want is for you to keep them away from me. And on no account let them, or anyone else for that matter, touch my family.”

  “A tall order. You mean you want a bodyguard.”

  “I have bodyguards. I’ve left three to watch over Eleanor, and she’s with my brothers, who will take care of her for now. But I need to go about my business without hindrance. You’re canny, Fellows, and resourceful. You’ll do it.”

  “You have a high regard for my ability,” Fellows said dryly.

  “You pursued Ian and me for five years with a ruthlessness that would have made our father proud.”

  “But I was wrong,” Fellows pointed out.

  “So was I, in that case. This is where we are alike. When we are clearheaded, nothing can stop us. When we let emotion overcome us, we see nothing. I was blinded by worry for Ian and could not see the truth.” Hart stopped. “I still am.”

  Fellows studied the paper again. “I take your point. I will see what I can do.”

  Hart leaned back in his chair, lacing his hands behind his head. “You’re invited to the wedding, by the way. Isabella will send you a formal invitation.”

  Fellows tucked the note into his pocket. “Are you certain you want me there?”

  “It matters not what I want, or what you want. If you don’t come, Beth and Isabella, Ainsley and Eleanor will be most displeased. They will tell me so. Repeatedly.”

  Fellows relaxed enough to laugh. “The great duke made nervous by his sisters-in-law and wife-to-be?”

  “You’ve met them. Only very strong women can take living with Mackenzies, and so when one of us finds one…” He pretended to shudder.

  “Your brothers seem pleased with themselves,” Fellows said. “And you are to wed your former fiancée. You should be the happiest man in the world.”

  “I am.” Hart ignored the tightening in his chest as he said this. He’d coerced Eleanor into agreeing the same way he’d cornered Gladstone into a fight before the man was ready.

  “You look it,” Fellows said without inflection. “I will be the only bachelor left. No wife to greet me on my return home, no sons to guide my doddering footsteps when I’m gray.”

  “That is up to you. I imagine one of my sisters-in-law could find you a match if they put their minds to it.”

  Fellows raised his hand. “No, no.”

  “Be careful. They are determined women.”

  Fellows nodded, then they both fell silent, uncertain how to end the conversation. They had once been enemies, they’d not yet become friends, and they were still not entirely comfortable with each other.

  “You know, Fellows…” Hart began.

  “No.” Fellows stood up, and Hart got to his feet with him. “I know what you are going to say. Do not offer me a post in the great Mackenzie empire. I am happy with the job I have.”

  Hart didn’t ask how Fellows knew he’d been about to propose that Fellows work for Hart personally, to be in charge of keeping the Mackenzie family safe. The two men thought too much alike.

  “I’ll help you, for Lady Eleanor’s sake,” Fellows went on. “But understand this—I worked a long time to become an inspector, I enjoy being a policeman, and I’ll not give up my career because you beckon.”

  Hart raised his hands. “Well and good. But, if ever you need it, the offer stands.”

  “Thank you.” Fellows nodded once and turned to leave.

  “Wait, Fellows. I need to ask you a question.”

  Fellows turned back, trepidation in his stance. He wanted to be elsewhere, that stance said, but he waited politely.

  “How would you trace a letter?” Hart asked. “Find out who sent it to you, I mean?”

  Fellows blinked at the question, then considered. “I’d have a look at the envelope. Find the postman who delivered it, trace the letter’s steps backward. Why? Have you been receiving threatening letters in the post?”

  “No,” Hart said quickly. Fellows’s eyes narrowed, scenting the half lie. “Suppose I know the city from which the letter originated? Edinburgh, say?”

  “Ask questions at the post office there. Station yourself outside said post office and watch to see if that person returns to send another.”

  “Sounds tedious.”

  “Most policing is tedious, Your Grace. Tedious, hard work.”

  “So it seems. Thank you for your help, Fellows. And when you receive Isabella’s invitation to my wedding, for God’s sake, answer that you’ll attend.”

  Fellows gave him a mirthless smile. “I long to say no, and watch the fireworks go off around you.”

  “They’d go off around you too. Don’t think they wouldn’t. The ladies would be disappointed, and you’d never hear the end of it.”

  “Hmm. Then I’ll respond correctly.”

  “See that you do.”

  Fellows nodded again, and took his leave.

  The High Holborn house was as quiet and dusty as it had been a few weeks ago when Hart had found Eleanor there. He conceded that Eleanor was right about the fact that the house might hold a clue to whoever was sending the photographs. That did not mean, however, that he’d let her back in here.

  Hart stole a few hours away from election hysteria a few days after his meeting with Fellows to take his coach to High Holborn and enter the house alone.

  Ian wanted Hart to tell Eleanor all about his life here. Hart realized that was why Ian had let her come here in the first place. She should know all of Hart, Ian had intimated, down to the bottom of his grimy soul.

  Hart stood in the bedroom filled with jumbled furniture, where Eleanor had busily searched. He remembered her red gold hair under the pillbox hat, the veil that drooped over her eye, her maddening but warm smile.

  “I can’t do it, Ian,” he said out loud.

  Hart was not ashamed of his proclivities, or what he’d done in games of pleasure. But he thought of how Eleanor had looked at him on the canal boat, with desire in her eyes, and trust, and languid delight. He needed nothing more, he thought.

  Why shouldn’t that be enough, Ian Mackenzie?

  You need to show Eleanor the house. Once you tell her everything about it, you will know.

  No. Ian was wrong. Some things were better left buried.

  He quickly made his search, discovered nothing, quit the house for Bond Street, and bought Eleanor the largest diamond necklace he could find.

  Eleanor’s wedding day dawned fair and clear, a soft Scottish April morning, the only clouds well beyond the hills surrounding the Kilmorgan estate.

  Eleanor stood in her room while Isabella, Be
th, and Ainsley dressed her from the skin out in wedding finery. Silk camisole and drawers, new corset with pretty pink bows down the front, a long bustle to hold the many yards of wedding satin, a silk bodice that hugged Eleanor’s shoulders and buttoned snugly up the back. Seed pearls and lace adorned the bodice, and yards and yards of cascading ruffles and lace spilled down the front of the skirt. The skirt caught in a gentle pouf over the bustle, with roses, both silk and real, adorning it. From there the fabric flowed to the ground, ending in a three-foot train covered with seed pearls and lace.

  Maigdlin smiled as she put another pin into Eleanor’s glossy red hair. “You’re pretty as a picture, lass—my lady. Pretty as a picture.”

  “Absolutely beautiful.” Isabella stood back, hands clasped, and surveyed her work. “I want to throw my arms around you and eat you up, but I spent two hours getting you to look like this, El, so I will refrain.”

  “Hugs afterward,” Ainsley said cheerfully. She sat on the bed, doing last-minute sewing on Eleanor’s veil. “And wedding cake—a nice, tasty one with plenty of currants and candied orange. On the happiest day of your life, you should enjoy your cake.”

  The happiest day of her life. Eleanor’s throat was dry, and a cold pain had formed in her stomach.

  She’d barely seen Hart since the heartbreaking morning in the canal boat, and the happy celebration with the family and the Romany later.

  Hart had returned to London immediately with David to overturn Parliament while Isabella had swept Eleanor, Beth, and Ainsley into the most hurried, intense, and agitated planning Eleanor had encountered in her life. No expense to be spared, nothing too extravagant—but tasteful, everything had to be perfectly tasteful. Nothing ostentatious or vulgar for the new Duchess of Kilmorgan.

  Eleanor had seen Hart alone only once since then, when he’d returned to Berkshire for a day and given her the ring. Eleanor twisted it on her finger now, the diamonds and sapphires catching the light, the same ring he’d given her the first time. She’d thrown this at him in the garden of Glenarden the day Eleanor had sent him packing.

  “I thought you’d given this to Sarah,” she’d said as Hart slid the cool band onto her finger.

  Hart’s voice had gone quiet, his warm hand cradling hers. “I only ever gave it to you. I bought a new one for Sarah. This ring belonged to my mother.”

  “Like the earrings.” Those reposed in Eleanor’s jewel box, wrapped carefully in tissue.

  “Exactly. She’d be pleased with you.”

  Eleanor thought of the gentlewoman who must have felt lost and alone in the family of unruly boys and men. At least the duchess would have had no shame in her sons, had she lived to see them grow up.

  “I’m happy to wear it for her,” Eleanor said.

  “Wear it for me too, damn it.” Hart turned her hand over and kissed her fingertips. “Try to look happy that we’re marrying at last.”

  “I am happy.” And she was. But…

  Hart had grown so distant. He was busy and preoccupied, true, because of everything happening in London. But she’d thought, that rainy morning on the bank of the canal, that she’d at last reached the real Hart buried under layers of pain and heartache.

  She had found him, she knew it. But then he’d gone again.

  Eleanor had looked over their clasped hands and the sparkling ring, straight into his eyes. I’ll not be your perfect wife, Hart Mackenzie, obeying you because it’s my duty. I’ll search until I find you, and I’ll make you stay this time. I swear this.

  The wedding took place in the ballroom. Isabella had not wanted to take a chance with the changeable weather to have the ceremony in the garden, and the family chapel was too small. But as the weather had stayed clement, she’d ordered all the doors opened, and a breeze from the famous Kilmorgan gardens wafted up and into the house.

  The Scottish minister waited at one end of the room, and the rest of the ballroom overflowed with guests. Isabella, happy that at least one of the Mackenzie brothers was having a proper wedding, had invited the world. Peers of the realm, ambassadors, minor royalty, and aristocrats from every European country, Highland lairds and heads of clans, and The Mackenzie himself with his wife, sons, daughters, and grandchildren.

  Local people and friends of the family filled out the rest: David Fleming, Ainsley’s brothers, Isabella’s sister and mother, Lloyd Fellows. Lord Ramsay’s friends and colleagues, who ranged from Scottish ghillies to learned professors and the head of the British Museum. Rounding them out were Eleanor’s girlhood friends with their husbands. The Mackenzie children and the two McBride children had been allowed to come, supervised by Miss Westlock and Scottish nannies in the back.

  The front corner of the room had been partitioned off with chairs and velvet ropes. Behind this barricade sat the Queen of England herself. She was in black, as usual, but wore a plaid ribbon pinned to her veil, and her daughter Beatrice was in Scots plaid.

  In deference to the queen, everyone stood.

  Every person in the room, including the queen, turned to stare as Eleanor entered on her father’s arm. Eleanor halted for an instant, all those eyes on her unnerving.

  They were speculating—why had Eleanor Ramsay changed her mind after so many years and agreed to marry Hart Mackenzie? And why had he decided that a spinster of thirty-odd years, daughter of an impoverished and absentminded earl, was a better match than the quantity of eligible ladies in Britain? A marriage of convenience—it had to be.

  “The best thing is to ignore them,” Earl Ramsay whispered to Eleanor. “Let them think what they want and pay no attention. I’ve been doing that for years.”

  Eleanor dissolved into laughter and kissed the earl on the cheek. “Dear Father. Whatever would I do without you?”

  “Muddle along, I expect. Now let’s get you married off so I can go home in peace.”

  Thinking of her father returning to Glenarden alone—with Eleanor not there to take tea with him, to listen to him read from the newspapers, to discuss bizarre and esoteric topics with him—made her eyes fill. Though she reminded herself that her marriage ensured that her father could go on writing his obscure books and eating scones with his tea in a well-repaired house, saying good-bye to him would hurt.

  Eleanor lifted her chin, following her father’s advice about ignoring everyone, and she and her father walked forward.

  Eleanor swished past them all in her glorious dress, following Aimee, who scattered rose petals along the way. There was no music, Isabella declaring that it was not in the best of taste. The orchestra would play afterward.

  Isabella, Beth, and Ainsley stood in the front row near the queen, all three radiant and smiling at Eleanor. On the other side of the aisle, mirroring them, stood Mac, Cameron, and Daniel, tall and formidable in kilts and black coats, the plaid of the Mackenzies swathing their shoulders. They were proud and handsome, with eyes of various shades of amber—Daniel and Cameron, the same height now, looked heartbreakingly alike. Mac reached around the earl and clasped Eleanor’s shoulder, gladness and strength pouring through his touch.

  At the very front of the room, standing to one side of the minister, stood Ian Mackenzie, Hart’s second, also dressed in kilt and plaid. Ian glanced once at Eleanor before his gaze was pulled back to that which he liked to look at most: his wife.

  Next to Ian, Hart. Hart’s gaze fell on Eleanor, and the world went away.

  He wore his kilt and plaid, the ducal sash of the Kilmorgans across his chest. He’d brushed back his dark red hair, which emphasized his hard, handsome face, honed with time and the brutal decisions he’d had to make. Ian at Hart’s side was as handsome as his brother, but Hart commanded the room.

  Hart had won. Everything. The dukedom, the nation, his wife.

  Eleanor curtseyed to the queen, and her father bowed, then the earl relinquished Eleanor, looking quite cheerful about it, to Hart.

  She whispered to Hart as he took her hand, “Don’t look so bloody pleased with yourself.”

 
Hart’s answer was a smile, wicked and swift.

  The ceremony began. Hart stood like a rock at Eleanor’s side as the minister droned the service in a thick Scots accent. The room was warm from the heat of pressing bodies, and droplets of perspiration slid from under Eleanor’s veil and down her cheek.

  When the minister asked whether anyone knew of a reason why Eleanor and Hart could not marry, Hart turned and glared down the room so intensely that Daniel and Mac both chuckled. No one answered.

  The ceremony was far too short. Eleanor found herself saying her vows, promising to give herself entirely to Hart and to let him worship her body, in sickness and health, in good times and terrible ones, through thick and thin, forever and ever, amen. Hart’s smile when he cupped her face in his hands to kiss her was triumphant.