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One
London, England
Late August 1829
London’s loftiest lords and ladies packed the ballroom in the duke’s mansion for the wedding breakfast of Dominick Manton and his new bride, Jane. But despite the number of pretty women among them, Jeremy Keane, American artist and rumored rakehell, wanted only to flee.
He shouldn’t have attended. He should have stayed upstairs in his guest bedchamber doing preliminary sketches for his painting, even though inspiration eluded him and he still hadn’t found the right model. Anything would be better than enduring this paean to domestic bliss.
Thunderation. He hadn’t expected it to unsettle him so. Seeing a bride and groom smile adoringly at each other shouldn’t continue to bring back the past, to plague him with the guilt of knowing—
Muttering a curse, he snatched a glass off a tray held by a passing footman and downed champagne, wishing for something stronger. He couldn’t take much more of this.
With purposeful steps, he headed across the ballroom toward the entrance. He had to escape before he said or did something he regretted.
Then the woman of his imagination entered, and he stopped breathing. She was magnificent. She wore a dress of emerald silk that shimmered in a shaft of sunlight as if the heavens had opened to show her to him.
He couldn’t believe it. She was exactly the model he required for his latest work.
As he watched, the brunette glanced about her. Tall and luxuriously figured, she towered over the delicate Englishwomen simpering their way through the crowd. With her strong features, jewel-green eyes, and generous mouth, she was the very image of the Juno in Gavin Hamilton’s Juno and Jupiter. She even carried herself like that majestic Roman goddess.
She was absolutely perfect. It was not only in her looks, but her stance, at once self-effacing and imbued with drama. It was in the wariness lurking in her eyes.
He must have her. After months of looking for the right model, he deserved to have her.
That was, assuming she would agree to his proposition. She looked old enough to be her own woman, but he couldn’t tell from the cut of her ball gown if she was unattached, widowed, or married. He hoped it was one of the latter two. Because if she were a rank innocent, he’d have a devil of a time convincing her family to allow her to sit for him.
He started toward her.
“Jeremy!” cried a female voice behind him. “There you are!”
He turned to find Zoe, his distant cousin as well as the pregnant sister-in-law of the groom, waddling toward him. Damn. He was trapped. Worse yet, when he glanced back for his goddess in green, she’d vanished. Of all the blasted bad luck. In a mansion like the Duke of Lyons’s, there was no telling where she’d gone.
Stifling a curse, he faced Zoe. “Good evening, coz. Nice to see you again.”
After bussing him on each cheek, she pulled back to glare at him. “I haven’t laid eyes on you in three months and that’s the insipid welcome you give me?”
“I’m still tired from the trip,” he lied. “I just arrived from Calais yesterday evening, you know.”
“I’m so sorry you and your apprentice had to stay with Max and Lisette last night, instead of at our house. But what with the wedding—”
“You had too many other guests to juggle. I know. And there was more room here, anyway.”
That seemed to relieve her. “Thank you for understanding. But everyone is leaving this afternoon, so I do hope you’re coming back to the town house with us as planned.”
“If I can hold out until you’re ready to leave,” he said dryly.
She flashed him a veiled glance. “I’m sure wedding celebrations aren’t your favorite.”
His heart dropped into his stomach. Was she referring to Hannah? He hadn’t thought any of Zoe’s family knew about that part of his life. “What makes you say that?” he asked hoarsely.
“Well, I assume any bachelor would find weddings dull, but especially you.” She laughed gaily.
No. She didn’t know about Hannah.
Relief flooding him, he forced a sardonic smile. “Weddings are more exhausting than dull. Between fleecing all the lords in the card room and comforting all the disappointed young lovelies who missed out on snagging the groom, I’m fairly worn out.”
“Comforting? Is that what they’re calling it now?” She shook her head. “I see that your travels haven’t changed you one whit. You’re as incorrigible as ever.”
“You know me.” He somehow managed a light tone. “What’s the fun in being corrigible?”
Thank God she hadn’t guessed at the truth: that he hated weddings because they reminded him of his own over a decade ago. Which had been followed six months later by a funeral with two coffins—one for his wife and one for his stillborn son.
Regret and anger roiled in his gut. Damn it, he’d suppressed the image of those coffins for a while now. Must it rise again every time he attended some fool’s wedding?
Fortunately, Zoe didn’t seem to notice his consternation. “Anyway,” she said breezily, “I thought I should tell you that your sister and your mother are on their way to London.”
God help him. That was the last thing he needed. “I suppose they think to fetch me back home to Montague.”
Situated on the banks of the Brandywine River a few hours from Philadelphia, his family homestead held the largest of the textile mills that were the source of his family’s fortune. And now that his late, unlamented father was dead, his sister Amanda was running them all, since she possessed a half interest in the properties. He held the other half, although he’d toss it into the sea before he’d set foot on Montague land again.
The better choice, of course, was to sell Amanda his half. She wanted it, and he wanted to give it to her. But since the properties had all come from his mother’s family, Father’s will demanded that Mother agree to the sale. And so far she had refused, confound her.
She ought to know better than to think he would return to run the mills. He loved his mother and sister dearly, but Father’s death hadn’t changed a damned thing about his feelings for Montague. He would rather cut his own throat than carry on Father’s legacy. And the sooner Mother realized it, the better off everyone would be.
“When do they leave for England?” Jeremy asked. How much time did he have to prepare?
“When did they leave for England, you mean. They should arrive within a few weeks.” She ducked her gaze. “No doubt they departed as soon as they got my letter.”
“Your letter?”
Zoe stuck out her chin, though she still wouldn’t meet his eyes. “You can’t blame me for taking pity on them. You don’t keep them informed about where you’re headed.”
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Project Duchess Page 27