The Black Duke's Prize

by Suzanne Enoch

  16

  The Duke of Sommesby knew that by now Katherine was ruined. Polite society shrank from any scandal, whoever actually happened to be at fault. Even if some paragon of virtue such as the Viscount of Sheresford or Captain Reginald Hillary had come after her, there would have been little chance to repair the damage. With the Black Duke as rescuer, there was no hope at all.

  If he had needed a reason to marry her other than the fact that he was desperately in love with her, her unexpected removal to Crestley had provided him with one. He had begun that venture thinking only that he was purchasing a piece of property for a friend. He had had no idea that the prize, the true prize, would be a beautiful black haired madcap with a quick tongue and a quicker wit. She was worth any price, any inconvenience, including having her shoot him, although he wished to avoid that happening again if possible.

  On the morning of their fifth day at Crestley he rose early, as he usually did when he was in the country, and headed downstairs to the breakfast room to find Neville and Alison. "Good morning," he said with a smile.

  "Good morning," Neville returned. "Your color is much better. I think the country air agrees with you."

  "I think it's just that being shot disagrees with me," he replied with a grin as he took a seat. "Is Katherine awake yet?"

  Alison nodded. "Yes. She and Jack have gone down to the village to look into the purchase of lumber to rebuild the stables."

  "Do you intend to return to London soon?" Neville asked as he passed a basket of hot biscuits. The cook Gladstone had found was a treasure.

  Nicholas nodded. "I think it best if we all did. A united front, as it were."

  "Nick," Alison said abruptly, setting down her tea, "we know you have behaved properly toward Kate, and I know she thinks she will be able to handle any rejection from society, but I don't think she realizes what that really means. I think it will hurt her a great deal."

  Nicholas nodded, agreeing. He remembered how alone Katherine had seemed when she first arrived in town, something he had sensed when he saw her empty dance card at the Albey ball. He tilted his head at her godparents, both now looking at him hopefully. "I intend to take care of things," he said by way of answer, and then leaned forward. "How do you know I have been behaving properly? I almost never do."

  The baroness smiled. "Kate said you'd been acting like an old sobersides."

  In his entire life no one had ever accused him of such a thing, and he stared at Alison, stunned into silence. Finally he gave a shout of laughter. "Oh, good God." He chuckled. "I shall have to remedy that immediately." He rose and excused himself from the table.

  While he waited for Katherine to return, he went to find Gladstone. He closeted himself with his secretary for several hours, for between Crestley Hall, being shot, and the distraction of Katherine, he had recently fallen somewhat behind with matters regarding his own properties. Gladstone brought him up to date, and then informed him of several of the innovations that Katherine was planning, including a new irrigation system that his secretary had been trying unsuccessfully to talk Nicholas into installing at Sommesby for years.

  Afterward he went outside to find that Katherine had returned and was pacing around the outside of the stable, eyeing it critically. As she turned around to greet him, Nicholas stepped forward and wiped a streak of dirt off her nose with his thumb. "I wish I could write poetry," he murmured, ''because saying that you are beautiful simply does you no justice."

  Her eyes twinkling, she turned away to head back to the manor. "I think you might be more of a poet than you confess."

  Grinning, he followed her. "I thought I was an old sobersides. The two hardly seem compatible."

  She stopped and turned to face him, flushing. "Lady Alison told you I said that?"

  He nodded. "Very unflattering." She continued to look embarrassed, so he glanced away toward the field. "Are you certain you want to try a whole new irrigation system on something the size of Crestley?" he asked. "You'll be using up good planting ground."

  She was silent for a moment. "I thought you weren't going to interfere," she finally said.

  "Suggesting isn't interfering," he countered, taking a step toward her and wondering how in the world he was going to get around to the subject of asking her to marry him.

  She turned away and started back toward the house.

  "You said that Gladstone was at my disposal."

  "So I did." She was getting angry about something, and

  whatever she was implying, he didn't like it.

  "You didn't tell me he would be acting as your spy." "He's not my spy."

  Kate turned around again, hands on her hips. "You said he had a talent for such things."

  He frowned. "Yes, I did. But I didn't send him to spy on you, for Lucifer's sake."

  ''Then how is it that you know everything I'm planning here? And why do you think you know more about Crestley Hall than I do?"

  She had gotten it all wrong, and now he was angry as well. "I don't. And that's not fair, Kate."

  "Oh?" she snapped, folding her arms across her chest "And why not?"

  "You'll take my money, but not my opinion?"

  She didn't back down. "If that's part of your bargain, then I'll take neither. You said Crestley was still mine. I can manage quite well, without your money and without your assistance. I certainly don't need you to feed me and clothe me, or to tell me which of my-my-projects you approve of."

  "That's enough, Kate," he said warningly.

  ''What, will you withhold the deed until I've made improvements that meet your approval?" she retorted. "You're worse than Uncle Simon, trying to ruin what belongs to me and telling me it's for my own good."

  "You need some manners, you shrew," he flung back at her.

  She went white. Abruptly she flung her hand out, catching him full on the left cheek with her open palm. The blow stung, but far more stupefying was the fact that she had actually struck him.

  She looked stunned as well, but stood her ground. "I have only one question for you, Your Grace," she ground out.

  "Yes, Miss Ralston?" he returned stiffly.

  "Is Crestley Hall still considered to be my property to manage?" she asked, her voice shaking. "Or are you going to hand my deed over to some shepherd?"

  "Crestley is yours, Miss Ralston," he affirmed, so angry, his own voice was unsteady.

  "Then get off my property."

  For a moment he was again too stunned to speak. "As you wish," he was finally able to reply, and turned his back to stride away from her.

  He headed for the stables, where Jack was busy hammering at something. "Jack!" he bellowed. "Put that damn thing down and get the coach ready! We are leaving for London."

  "Your Grace?" his groom said questioningly, sticking

  his head out of one of the stalls.

  "Now, Jack!"

  "Yes, Your Grace."

  Back inside the house he found Gladstone and told him he was to remain until he was satisfied that Crestley was being properly restored, and he was then to hire a coach and take himself back to London. His secretary agreed without comment. Upstairs Nicholas threw his things back into the traveling cases he had unpacked less than a week earlier. That done, he brought the cases downstairs himself, not willing to wait for the damned doddering old butler to do it.

  Neville and Alison were going through the disorganized mass of papers in the drawing room when he strode in. "I am taking my leave of you," he said, and turned around again.

  "Nick, what's going on?" Alison queried, standing up in alarm.

  "Ask your darling Kate," he spat out, and walked out, slamming the door behind him. He couldn't believe that he had been on the verge of asking that damned stubborn, impossible, ungrateful woman to marry him. He would sooner wed ... He couldn't think of anyone who made him as angry as she, and so he grabbed up his cases again, swearing. He didn't stop cursing until he was well on the road back to London.

  17

  Katherine st
ayed away from the house for better than an hour. When she finally returned she had calmed down, and half expected to see Nicholas waiting for her, ready to fly up into the boughs at her for slapping him and behaving like such a gudgeon. He was maddeningly overbearing, but belatedly she had realized that he had only been trying to assist her. And perhaps she did need him a little, not for his considerable wealth, but for the way he made her feel.

  Instead of Sommesby, though, she found her godparents sitting in the parlor. They looked at her as though some great tragedy had befallen them all. "Oh, dear," Lady Alison said-taking Kate's hand and drawing her down to the couch.

  "What is it?" Katherine asked, bewildered and more than a little worried.

  "Whatever did you say to Nick?" her godmother asked earnestly.

  Katherine lowered her eyes. "I told him to get off my property."

  "You said that to the Duke of Sommesby?" Neville queried, raising his brow.

  Lady Alison gasped. "How could you do such a thing?" "He made me angry," Katherine stated, "trying to order me about and telling me what to do as if I were one of his footmen."

  "But what about—"

  Katherine sighed and stood. "Where is he? I suppose I have to apologize."

  "He's gone back to London," Lord Neville said when his wife put one hand over her face.

  "He's gone back . . . " Katherine sat down rather abruptly, feeling as though the breath had been knocked out of her lungs. "Well, good. Good riddance," she said, her voice breaking. Nicholas was gone. She knew he had been angry, but they had. argued before. She had never thought he would leave.

  "Did you refuse him?" her godmother asked softly. "Refuse him?" Katherine echoed, beginning to feel hysterical.

  "He was going to offer for you," Neville explained.

  Kate's heart faltered. "Nicholas was going to ask me to marry him?" she whispered.

  "Yes, child." Lady Alison tried to take her hand again, but she pulled away.

  "Well, I wouldn't have married him, anyway. I could never marry such an arrogant, provoking man."

  "I'm so sorry, Kate," her godmother murmured.

  "Don't be," she said, shooting to her feet and hurrying toward the door, so they wouldn't see her crying. "I'm glad he's gone. I hope I never see him again."

  He had gone back to London. The Black Duke had changed his mind about her and left. He'd probably never even give her another thought. He'd probably already found someone else to tease and send roses to, if he even bothered with such things where his other conquests were concerned. Katherine looked for any excuse to remain at Crestley, but after a week her godparents finally told her in no uncertain terms that they were returning to London. They were concerned about her reputation, but she dreaded seeing Nicholas again more than she felt trepidation about encountering the snubs of the ton.

  They arrived back in town with no ceremony, and Katherine spent the next days moping about Hampton House and trying to pretend that she was not. From the reaction of her godparents she knew something wasn't right, and she realized that no one had come to call, or even sent a card. "I told you it doesn't matter," she said to Lady Alison when her godmother appeared close to tears after their third day back. "Just let me return to Crestley."

  "No, my dear. If anything is to be done to salvage this situation, we must act now. We shouldn't have stayed away even this long." She shook her head. "Oh, if only Nick hadn't ridden back here like that. He must have known this would happen."

  "I'm certain he didn't care." "You don't mean that, Kate."

  "Yes, I do." She had known better, had been warned innumerable times about the notorious Black Duke, and she had been a ninnyhammer and fallen for him anyway. And now she was paying the price.

  Despite Kate's protests, the baroness decided that they should go shopping. It would get them both outside, her godmother argued, and perhaps they would find that things were not as bad as they had imagined.

  Things were as bad as they had imagined. Once unctuous dressmakers were barely civil, a sure sign that her story had been widely bandied about. Katherine was certain that if she hadn't been with Lady Alison she never would have been waited on at all. Several ladies in the shops left as they entered, the younger ones staring at her with bald curiosity as they went.

  Lady Alison continued to claim that it didn't signify, but her protestations became more and more muted, and finally she suggested that they return to Hampton House, after all. Outside a dressmaker's her godmother stopped short. A beautiful brunette woman walked toward them along the street, her eyes so dark, they looked black. Her dark blue dress was of the finest muslin, and her skin like porcelain. She stopped before Kate with a rustle of skirts.

  "You are Kate Ralston," the woman stated with a heavy French accent .

  Lady Alison took Kate's arm and tried to turn her away, but Katherine was intrigued. "I am," she replied.

  "You are barely more than a child," the woman murmured. "Not at all the one for Nick. I am surprised he did not realize so much sooner."

  "Go away," Lady Alison snapped, pushing Katherine toward the carriage.

  The woman nodded. "I hope he at least gave you a nice parting gift. He does that, for the ones who amuse him."

  Lady Alison instructed their driver to leave immediately.

  "Don't look after her, Kate," she ordered.

  "Who is she?" Katherine asked, looking over at her godmother's white face. She had never seen Lady Alison so angry.

  "Josette Bettreaux. I thought her still in Paris. She would come back now."

  "That was Josette Bettreaux?" Katherine echoed feebly.

  Louisa had been right. The woman was stunning.

  When they returned to Hampton House Katherine was little heartened to see the Viscount of Sheresford's phaeton there before them. When Rawlins opened the door he informed her that the viscount had arrived several minutes earlier and was waiting for her in the drawing room. Her godmother sighed, then motioned for Kate to go meet him.

  When she entered, Thomas was pacing up and down as though he were being chased. "Thomas, is something wrong?" she asked.

  "Kate, I'm so pleased you're home safe," he said, coming to her and taking her hands.

  Privately she thought that if he had been that concerned he could have come to see her two days before, but she said nothing. She was in dire need of a friend, and he was the only one who had shown himself. "Quite safe," she replied.

  He released her and strode away, then turned around again. "I would have come sooner, but I had . . . there was business I had to tend to."

  "I understand." She seated herself.

  "Kate," he went on, walking over to the mantel and leaning on it, then striding over to the window, "I need to know something before I go on. I hope you understand."

  She nodded, wishing that he would stop moving around so much, for he was making her dizzy.

  "Did anything transpire between you and Nick while you were away?"

  She started to retort that it was none of his business, but he seemed so genuinely concerned that she relented. "We argued," she replied with a shrug.

  "That was all?" he pursued, coming closer.

  "That was enough," she answered. Enough to ruin her, and enough to break her heart.

  He nodded. "Nick's been in a rare temper since he came back to town. Right after he returned I asked him how you were, but he only glared at me until I thought he was going to kill me."

  "I really don't care to hear about him," Katherine said stiffly. "May I ask you a question now?"

  "Of course." He took a seat, but she doubted that he would light for long.

  "When did Josette Bettreaux return to town?"

  The viscount shot to his feet. "How do you know that name?"

  "She spoke to me this morning when Lady Alison and I were out shopping."

  "She didn't!" He gasped, his expression mortified. C

  She did. And not very kindly."

  Thomas cleared his throat, and for a moment she
thought that he wouldn't answer. "She came back two days after you . . . left for Crestley," he finally said.

  Katherine felt like crying, and took a deep breath to steady herself. "Is he seeing her again?"

  "It depends on who you ask," Thomas said shortly.

  "According to Josette he is; according to Nick it's no one's bloody business." He came forward again and sat beside her, taking her hand in his. "I didn't come here to discuss Nick either, however."

  "No?" Katherine asked, wondering whether Nicholas looked at the lovely Josette and his other mistresses in the same way that he had looked at her, and whether his parting gift to her for amusing him had been the return of Crestley Hall.

  "No. I've come to ask you to be my wife." Abruptly Thomas was on his knees in front of her, his eyes on her face and his expression earnest.

  "To marry you?" Katherine repeated, completely astonished.

  "I know that you don't love me," he went on hurriedly, "but I'm certain that you could grow to." She opened her mouth, but he kept going. "Don't answer now. Think about it, please. All right?"

  "Are you doing this to try to save my reputation?" she asked, smiling sadly.

  He cleared his throat again. "Not entirely."

  "And are you aware that Althaea Hillary has been in love with you for quite some time?"

  He stood again, blushing wildly. "Althaea? She's not—"

  Katherine nodded. "She is."

  Obviously flustered, Thomas began pacing about the room again. "I don't mean to back out," he said abruptly. "Say that you will seriously consider my offer."

  "I will seriously consider your offer," she affirmed,

  "Well, then, I shall take my leave of you." He started for the door, then hesitated, turned back, and leaned down to kiss her lightly on the lips. "Good day, Kate."

  "Good day, Thomas."

  She sat in the drawing room for a long time after the viscount left. If she had had any doubts before about her feelings for Thomas, the kiss had answered them for her. He was a friend, and she would never be able to think of him as anything else. And, unless she missed her guess, her friend was in love with Althaea Hillary.