The Duke's Deceit

by Sherrill Bodine

  It was frightening to see how quickly the sweeping valleys, the quaint villages, the slate-roofed chapels of the north country gave way to the gentler, rolling hills of the south.

  Soon she would be in London. Richard would be reunited with his love, Lady Arabella. That was right and proper. After all, she had wished to find his family, to restore him to their care. Then why did the prospect give her so much pain? She could never have guessed that he was one of the premier lords of the land, that he was engaged to a true lady. All of her daydreams and fancies had to be forgotten in the light of the truth. That thought brought a sick ache to her stomach and forced her gaze back to his face.

  She found him studying her from under his hooded gaze. She tried to smile at him but was afraid and her lip trembled. What was it about him that was subtly different now? Was it the knowledge she possessed, or had something changed him? Since that moment in the stable his eyes seemed harder and the twist to his lips more sardonic.

  “What are you afraid of, Mary?”

  His blunt question, spoken so near to her ear, threw her into confusion. His soft warm breath was a distraction, but she would strive to be as honest as possible.

  “I’ve never been far from Hexham. My grandfather is correct, Richard. I don’t belong in your London world.”

  “Your grandfather is a miserable reprobate! Good Lord, where is the rest of your family that he can treat you so?” Although the words were full of feeling the glance he settled on her was oddly indifferent.

  “I have no one besides my grandfather and Uncle Ian,” she answered briefly, not wishing to burden him with the fear and abandonment she had felt after her parents had died and her grandfather had communicated that he wanted nothing whatsoever to do with her.

  He lifted one brow and stared pointedly into her eyes, as if he expected more.

  “My grandmother died before I was born,” she explained, driven by his unnerving silence. “She was the only child of Sir Charles Grenshaw. She and her cousin, Charlotte, were the last of their line.”

  “Where is this cousin? Couldn’t she have helped you?”

  All these questions she herself had wondered about. “My mother told me she married the youngest son of the sixth Lord Fordham and they went to the colonies long ago. My mother lost touch with her before she … she came north with my father.”

  She searched his hooded eyes for some sign of what this shift in his manner could mean. There was nothing in them of the man who had insisted he couldn’t go to London without her support. It was hard to believe that only a few days ago she had seen such tenderness in him.

  “Richard, what have I done to anger you?”

  As close as they sat on the carriage seat, Mary couldn’t miss the slight tightening of his mouth as her shaft hit home.

  “Forgive me,” he drawled softly, almost in the voice she’d come to enjoy so. But his small smile didn’t bring any warmth to his eyes. “It must be the fatigue of the journey. Rest, Mary. We’ll be in London soon.”

  With that he shut her out, leaning his head back against a green velvet squab and closing his eyes.

  She had no choice but to believe him. Just as she’d had no choice but to come on this journey. Despite her misgivings and the miserable guilt that blighted her days, she had come. Because she owed it to him. No matter the cost, she would stay with him for as long as he needed her. She could only hope that her stay in London would be mercifully brief.

  The carriage bowled through the streets of London at twilight, clattering over cobblestone streets, past enormous buildings set side by side, twisting and turning until it entered an area of greenery, where the noise of the city was hushed. Set around a square, enclosed by fences, were mansions unlike anything Mary had ever experienced. Certainly, there was the manor house in Hexham, and the squire lived in grandeur there, but it couldn’t compare to even one of these dwellings!

  The carriage jolted to a stop in front of a high openwork iron gate under a gas lamp. Within moments, a servant materialized to open the door and place a small step stool for their convenience.

  “Where are we?” she whispered into the darkness, expecting the duchess to answer.

  “Home.” Richard drawled the word, pride evident on his face as he stepped out of the carriage.

  The duchess gave Mary her peculiarly sweet smile, then she too stepped out, assisted by the footman.

  Lottie’s eyes were round with wonder. “Never seen such a place. Lord Ferguson’s was half the size,” she muttered quickly. “But never fear, Mary. We’ll do, see if we don’t.” With a defiant tug at her errant bonnet, she alighted.

  Summoning all her courage, Mary followed. Immediately Richard clasped her hand and placed it firmly into the curve of his arm. Her tired eyes searched his unreceptive features for some softening, some return to the warmth that she both craved and feared in the same breath. Now that it was gone, she felt cast adrift in this new frightening world. Sudden trepidation made her search the darkness for Lottie’s reassuring presence.

  “They’re already inside,” he drawled, sensing her hesitation. “Come along.” He escorted her through the gate toward the Corinthian portico flanked by Venetian windows and crowned with a fan-vaulted door light.

  In the soft light spilling through the doorway stood an imposing personage who was unmistakably the butler.

  “Welcome home, Your Grace,” he pronounced in such a deep, ponderous voice that Mary blinked up at him in awe.

  “Thank you,” Richard answered, drawing Mary into the deep entrance hall, which by itself was larger than the cottage where she’d grown up. The ceiling rose majestically two stories above her head, and beneath her feet the floor gleamed with a cream Italian marble.

  Lottie’s mouth was a circle of awe. Mary, too, was overwhelmed, but she refused to give in to fear.

  “We are all exhausted.” The duchess smiled, and her eyes, so like Richard’s, glowed with kindness. “I suggest we retire and have our supper brought to us. Tomorrow we will meet for breakfast to decide our course of action.”

  Without waiting for comment, she turned and led the way up the wide double staircase. At the landing Richard turned to the right.

  “Why yes, Richard, your apartments are in the east wing. Being in the house has sparked a memory…?” There was a certain note in the duchess’s voice that Mary hadn’t heard before. She turned, catching the clash as identical eyes met and sparred.

  Richard shrugged. “Perhaps so, madame. We will see what tomorrow will bring.” He sent a perfect bow among the three women. “My apartment is…?” Lifting a brow, he waited.

  “It is the third door on the right. Crowley is waiting for you.”

  The duchess’s stare was unrelenting and, surprisingly, Richard looked away first.

  “My valet, no doubt.” With a flicker of a smile, he turned on his heels and strolled leisurely down the long hall of the east wing.

  Without a comment the duchess continued up the stairs. Mary followed her along a wide corridor hung with magnificent landscapes.

  “Your room is here, Mary.” She indicated a door on the right. “Miss Barton, you are just across the hall. Rest well; be sure to ring if you need anything. Don’t worry about tomorrow; we shall talk in the morning.”

  She returned the way they had come, leaving Lottie and Mary staring at one another.

  “I’m frightened out of my wits!” Lottie gasped, grabbing Mary and giving her a fierce hug. “But you belong here. And don’t you be forgetting it.” With a great sigh Lottie released her.

  Mary didn’t have the heart to argue with Lottie, whose eyelashes were webbed with tears. She knew she didn’t really belong; her grandfather’s words were branded permanently onto her soul.

  “Now get yourself to bed, Mary.” Lottie seemed to gather herself together when Mary couldn’t re
spond. “You look ready to drop. Let me come and help you get settled.”

  “Thank you, Lottie, but I know you’re as tired as I am myself. No matter what the others think, you’re here as my friend and not my servant. So please, go to bed yourself.”

  It wasn’t that she wouldn’t welcome Lottie, even as a distraction from her own disturbing thoughts, but she needed some time alone to acclimate herself to these strange and grand surroundings.

  The bedchamber itself was enormous. She sank into a delicate chair of striped blue and cream, which was set comfortably beside a carved marble fireplace. The cheery fire did much to set her spirits to rights. If only her mother could see her in a room like this. An enormous four-poster bed, festooned with cream-colored brocade hangings, stood on a dais at the far end of the chamber. The cherry furnishings were all graceful and feminine, and were polished to a lustrous finish. The windows were hidden behind thick drapes that muffled sound as well as light. The ceiling was muraled with clouds on a pale blue background.

  If she was a bit intimidated, she would only admit that it was her surroundings and not the idea that Richard insisted that she was integral to his recovery.

  As promised, a serving maid appeared with a delicious supper of cream spring soup, poached turbot with sides of cucumbers, and tiny green peas. The trifle was delicious but so rich that she laid down her spoon after only a few bites.

  The maid quietly went about her chores, tending the fire and turning down the bed, but when she reached for the small portmanteau, Mary sent her away. She could unpack her few possessions easily. Besides, she felt vaguely uneasy that the maid would be scandalized by her lack of finery. She hung her two dresses—an evening gown of pale green sarcenet that she’d cut down from one of her mother’s dresses, and a walking dress of blue cotton dimity—in the wardrobe alongside the identical costume to the one she wore—her serviceable uniform of black and white.

  She poured warm water from the pitcher into a blue-and-white porcelain bowl and made her ablutions. Then she pulled the lawn nightgown over her head and crawled slowly into the center of the four-poster. Her body ached with weariness, and her mind was numb, with so many conflicting feelings and emotions that she’d never be able to sleep. She lay there, trying vainly to order her thoughts and find a way out of her own foolish dreams.

  Richard might say he needed, nay, wanted her with him, but his eyes no longer sent that message. They were cold and remote. They tortured her. And more important, she felt the bonds between them disintegrating.

  Unable to sustain the pain of such thoughts, she embraced the drowsiness finally overtaking her, resisting only long enough to remember Richard’s words of encouragement: “We will see what tomorrow will bring.”

  Richard awoke to a new day. Strong beams of late morning sunlight slanted through the slits of his draperies to make patterns of light on the Bakshaish carpet.

  He stretched and gazed around at the familiar objects that he’d always taken for granted. The heavy dark oak armoir made him smile as he recalled hiding in it once so that he could leap out to terrify his brother and sister, when as children they played at hide-and-seek. The painting of a hunt scene, hung over the black marble fireplace, had been a gift from his mother on his seventeenth birthday. He’d come down from Oxford to discover she’d prepared a birthday celebration. He’d been horrified, for he had been too old and grand for such childish fancies. Now he remembered it with a curl of love warming his chest.

  Very cleansing, losing your memory, he decided ruefully. The relief upon its return crystallized down into a deep, abiding understanding of its true importance. He could be almost grateful for the experience, if it wasn’t for Mary.

  Mary.

  The warm feeling in his chest spiraled wildly through every fiber of his body as he lay contemplating her treachery. His first rush of rage had dissipated, leaving only a thin layer of anger, and yesterday, he’d realized that she sensed it. He was usually much better at hiding his feelings. Bloody hell, he had honed his languid boredom to perfection! He was notorious for his saber-sharp wit and sardonic humor. Why did they, now, not fill the sucking emptiness inside him?

  The thought of vengeance wouldn’t do, either. That had been his first inclination when he decided to make Mary play this out. Found out, she was ready to confess all, but like a moth to the flame that would consume it, Richard fed his pain by refusing to listen to her, thereby insuring her stay within his sphere.

  He could be honest about himself and his motives, a trait that his mother would no doubt say saved him from being insufferable, but for some reason, this time, the arguments for dragging this bitter charade out to its bloody end were too complex to articulate.

  Without question the baron was a bastard—his treatment of his granddaughter verged on the criminal. In fact, there had been a desperation in his attempt to keep her buried in the wild that inspired further study.

  He did not delude himself that he’d brought Mary here under false pretenses so that she could take her rightful place in the ton. Mary was here so that he could dissect her feelings as skillfully as she had manipulated his.

  And she was here to help him untangle himself from a future marriage that would make both Arabella and himself utterly miserable. He could see that this end would take more than a little manipulation.

  He flung himself out of bed and went to the wide desk between the windows. He penned two notes: one to his betrothed and the other to Lord Frederick Charlesworth. It was time to start displaying vague memories of certain events and people.

  By way of Crowley, he sent apologies that he would not be at breakfast. Crowley reported back that all the ladies had also had trays in their rooms.

  Perhaps they were all afraid of what this day might bring.

  Richard, dressed in impeccable buff trousers and a rich chocolate corded jacket, was going through his neglected correspondence when Wilkens showed Charlesworth in.

  He was nearly an hour early for their appointment, and his owl eyes were wide with concern as he rushed to clasp Richard’s shoulder.

  “Long! When I got your note I couldn’t wait for the appointed hour. Word has it you’ve banged your head and forgotten the lot of us!”

  Flicking him a smile, Richard moved away from the desk to sprawl in the deep wing chair. “Like most gossip there is a thread of truth.” He laughed and heard a genuine and rare note of amusement. “Actually, I was struck on the head and lost my memory. But this morning I awoke and remembered you.”

  The younger man looked so extraordinarily pleased that Richard felt a strong pang of guilt for using their friendship in the way he had planned. Another restitution to make, along with the one he owed his mother.

  “Tell me what has gone on in the ton while I’ve been away.”

  Settling back, Richard listened to the usual tales of card parties, afternoons at Gentleman Jackson’s, bets on at White’s, rabid indiscretions, and brutally boring descriptions of balls and routs. Strange, he hadn’t felt a bit of ennui up in Hexham, where he’d had to put in quite a bit of hard labor, helping with the barn and the horses.

  He noted with some curiosity the number of times Charlesworth mentioned Bella. Even after his pronouncement that Richard must know that the duchess had asked him to act as escort to the lonely child, she seemed to show up in every one of his stories.

  A short time later, the look on the perfect oval of Bella’s face, as she rushed through the library door and spied Charlesworth sitting with Richard, was a revelation, particularly twinned with Charlesworth’s startled smile, followed by a swift look of guilt.

  The rage of the last two seasons blushed like the veriest schoolgirl. She tried to conceal it by fussing with the sea-foam green ribbons of the absurd confection perched atop her golden curls.

  “Gentlemen, do I interrupt? I came over as soon as I received your missive, Ava
lon.” She fixed him with a steady gaze. “You don’t look ill to me.” “Good morning to you, Bella,” he drawled, flicking her a smile.

  “I knew it was all a hum!” she declared, folding her arms across the bodice of her exquisite walking costume of sea-foam-green-and-cream-striped satin. The flounce at the end of one long sleeve fluttered becomingly when she cast a dramatic gesture around the paneled library. “You know perfectly well who we all are!”

  Sighing, Richard crossed his ankles. “I’m afraid all I remember of you is family gatherings when I was quite young, and you a mere child with … pigtails, wasn’t it?”

  She managed to mask her affronted look with one of indulgence before he continued, “Our engagement is still a total blank.”

  “Oh, pooh!” she shrugged with a feigned pout. “I’m sure it will all come back. There’s no rush. We shall simply postpone all our plans until you are quite well again.”

  From Bella’s cheery tone and a clearly discernible relief in her posture, it would have been crystal to even the simplest lout that if that event took forever, it would be too soon for her.

  “Lord Charlesworth has been an unexceptionable escort in your absence.” She smiled prettily in his lordship’s direction, batting absurdly long lashes. “And I hope he will be so gracious as to continue during your recovery, however long it takes.”

  Charlesworth, not being a particularly simple man, flushed bright red and ran a finger between his cravat and his throat as if his breath had been suddenly cut off.

  Richard gave his friend the gentlest look of inquiry he could muster without bursting into a pleased grin.

  “Of course, Long, you have only to ask anything,” Charlesworth gasped, his eyes stretched to truly alarming proportions.

  “I give you my thanks.” Richard knew it was time to back off a little—clearly the two youngsters before him were uncomfortable. “And one more request if I may. I believe you’re friendly with the young Lord Fordham?”