Sins of a Duke

by Suzanne Enoch

  “I don’t understand,” Conchita said, as she fastened the pearl necklace around Josefina’s neck. “You have two dukes courting you now?”

  “No,” Josefina returned, taking one last look into her dressing mirror before she stood, “officially, I am not being courted at all.”

  “But unofficially?”

  She smiled. “Unofficially I think one of them wants to marry me, and the other one wants to bed me.”

  “Jo—Your Highness!”

  “I would call that a very promising beginning, wouldn’t you?”

  “I wouldn’t call it any such thing.”

  Halfway out her bedchamber door, Josefina turned around. “Are you, or are you not, my confidante, Conchita?”

  The maid dipped a curtsy. “I am, of course.”

  “Then I will say such things to you, because you should know what’s going on.” She frowned briefly. “And because I certainly can’t say those things to anyone else.”

  “I apologize, Your Highness.”

  Josefina didn’t answer. After having Conchita with her for over ten years, she probably did tend to be a little over-familiar, but at the same time she wanted someone about whom she could trust.

  None of that explained why she hadn’t mentioned to her maid that Melbourne had kissed her, or that he meant to do so again tonight. If the cause of Costa Habichuela required that sacrifice of her, she would make it. Josefina touched her fingers to her lips, smiling as her heart accelerated. She would make that sacrifice gladly, and would do so several more times, if required.

  The Duke of Harek waited in the foyer as she descended the stairs. “You are lovelier than any creature on this earth,” he said reverently, bowing.

  He’d probably hunted enough of those creatures to know. “Thank you, Your Grace. Shall we go? I’m eager to see the theater.”

  Outside he handed her and Conchita into his coach, then climbed in behind them. As soon as the door closed, they rumbled down the drive.

  “Did you attend the theater in Jamaica?” the duke asked.

  “Whenever I could. The last two years, though, we were simply too busy.”

  “I’ve been a bit starved for culture, myself. Theater in Quebec consisted mainly of natives dancing about in cured deerskins.”

  “I hope we shall both be pleased, then.” Josefina was beginning to wonder whether he ever spoke a sentence that didn’t have a dead animal in it.

  “Tell me, when does your father return from Scotland, Your Highness? I confess that I’m anxious to meet the rey and begin my official duties as liaison to Costa Habichuela.”

  “You’re fulfilling them already,” she returned, “simply by allowing me to be seen. As for the rey, he meant for the trip to be a brief one, and he should be back in London by the end of next week.”

  “Splendid. Most excellent.”

  “Yes. I miss him and the queen, and we must begin purchasing supplies for our return voyage.”

  “I hope there may be room for additional passengers on that voyage,” he said with a charming smile. “I’m sure there must be a few Britons who would like to start life anew, in the company of the right…well, companion.”

  “That will be up to my father,” she returned just as smoothly. If he attempted to make his intentions any clearer, he would have to produce a pastor from his pocket.

  “Of course.” He turned the conversation to fox hunting there in England, and seemed to think it would be something she would enjoy watching, if not participating in.

  Finally the coach stopped, and he disembarked first. “I know which duke wants to marry you,” Conchita whispered as he handed them down to the ground.

  “Hush.”

  A horde of vehicles crowded the street in front of the theater. Once they made their way inside, so many people filled the lobby and flowed up the central staircase that she couldn’t even find her own feet. Princess, duke, knight, or wealthy merchant—in the lobby no one had room for a deep breath.

  And then the path in front of her cleared. “This way, Your Highness,” the Duke of Melbourne said, offering his arm.

  She took it gratefully, belatedly noticing that his brother, Charlemagne, stood just beyond him. Melbourne rarely seemed to go anywhere alone, though at the same time even a complete stranger would know who commanded the group. He wore all black tonight but for his stark white cravat, and the result was…mesmerizing. Given the other females devouring him with their eyes, she wasn’t the only one to find him so.

  “Is it always this crowded?” she asked, climbing the stairs beside him. Before them the crowd parted like a receding ocean wave. For one of the few times since this all had begun, she absolutely felt like a princess.

  “You are the toast of the Town, Your Highness,” he returned. “Everyone wants to see the Embrys, who seem to be bringing London so much good fortune.”

  “‘Seem to be’?” she returned, keeping the amused expression on her face.

  “I know you slapped me,” he pointed out, humor deepening his voice. “Who knows how many others you might have maimed.”

  “Only you, Melbourne.”

  “You may call me Sebastian, if you wish.”

  A breath shivered through her. “We’ll see.”

  The upstairs crowd wasn’t as dense, and it was there that she saw people whom she recognized from other ton gatherings. And she realized that what Melbourne had said was true—as many theater-goers gazed at her as stared at him.

  As they continued along the ever-more empty hallway, she glanced behind her to see Harek and Lord Charlemagne in step and discussing something—probably hunting—with Conchita a few feet behind them. After the crowd below, she was somewhat surprised that their party remained intact.

  “Almost there,” Melbourne said in a low, intimate voice, sending her a brief sideways glance.

  “This theater is far larger than the one at Morant Bay.”

  He nodded. “London is a larger city than Morant Bay.”

  “And I always had a chaperone with me,” she continued. “Is that why your brother is here? To protect you?”

  “From you, I suppose?”

  “Who else are you afraid of?”

  A heart-stopping smile touched his mouth. “My brother is here to keep Harek occupied, in case you should need me to show you to a private closet.”

  “And what if I don’t require that?”

  “I leave it up to you, Your Highness.”

  “You’re that confident, are you?”

  He moved a fraction closer to her. “I suppose we’ll find out.” Melbourne straightened again. “Here we are. After you.” Pulling aside the rich red curtain, he gestured her to step inside his private box.

  She felt as though she’d stepped into another world. This theater was easily triple the size of the one she’d frequented in Morant Bay. And the rows of theater-goers below looked like a glittering, multicolored ocean. And all of those people would see her sitting with two dukes and a lord. She smiled. Even her father couldn’t have dreamed of loftier heights.

  “Your Highness, you and Harek take the front chairs,” Melbourne was saying. “Shay and I bow to your popularity.”

  But she’d wanted to sit beside him. Three chairs sat at the front of the box, another four behind. Conchita had already claimed the least visible one in the corner. She didn’t suppose, though, that Lord Charlemagne would wish to sit in the second row by himself.

  Melbourne held her chair for her. “You’ll have to imagine me sitting behind you, gazing at you, at the soft curve of your ear,” he murmured as she sat.

  She twisted her neck to look up at him. “I daresay I’ll scarcely remember that you’re there,” she whispered back.

  He bowed, almost brushing her cheek with his lips, but not quite. “Liar,” he breathed, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

  Whatever his doubts about Melbourne’s motives, Harek was obviously pleased as a cat with a ball of twine to be seen sitting beside her in the front o
f the theater’s best box. Behind her, Melbourne and Lord Charlemagne were quietly discussing something about a birthday party and acrobats, though she couldn’t overhear all of the conversation in the midst of the chattering that surrounded them.

  Harek leaned toward her. “As a word of warning, this play is so blasted long that we won’t see intermission for nearly two hours. Luckily falling asleep’s not a sin, as long as you don’t fall out of your chair.”

  “I don’t think I shall have to worry about that, but thank you.”

  As he leaned over the edge of the box to greet someone below, she distinctly heard Melbourne’s brother mutter the word “buffoon.” That troubled her; not that Harek seemed anything but a buffoon to her, either, but that the haute ton in general might think him one. She certainly didn’t need that sentiment joined in any way to her family.

  A moment later the curtain lifted and the play began. Though she’d read Hamlet in the course of her studies, she’d never seen it performed before. She sat forward.

  Twenty minutes later she heard a soft snore beside her, and turned to look. Sunk down in his chair, arms crossed and his head tilted back, Harek had at least braced himself so that he wouldn’t succumb to his own sin of falling out of his chair.

  The box behind her was silent, but she knew without any doubt that Melbourne remained wide awake. He would be gazing at her, he’d said. Her skin prickled. Dammit, he’d said that she would be thinking about him, about how he wanted to kiss her again. It wasn’t just that, though, that started warmth between her thighs.

  He wanted to do more than kiss her, and it would be in the best interest of her father’s plans to allow him to do so. As for her own best interest, she knew with an abrupt clarity that she wanted him to be her first. Every other man she knew would settle for a kingdom and seconds, but not Melbourne.

  She had no wish to sit next to a snoring buffoon for four hours—not when she could spend at least a little of that time being kissed by a man whom her cause needed, a man who heated her from the inside out. She rose.

  “Excuse me for a few moments,” she whispered, moving to the back of the box as Conchita stood.

  “I’ll show you the way,” Melbourne said easily, getting to his feet. “Shay, might I get you a port?”

  “If you don’t mind,” his brother replied in the same low voice, rising halfway to his feet and then sitting again as she passed by him. “I’ll make sure our guest doesn’t lose his balance.”

  The candlelit hallway seemed bright after the dimness of the theater, and Josefina blinked as they emerged. “This way,” Melbourne said, leading her a short distance to one of the curtained privacy alcoves. Then he slowed, drawing even with the maid. “What’s your name?”

  “Conchita, Your Grace.”

  “Conchita, you will wait exactly there,” he said, indicating the wall several yards away. “You will ensure Her Highness’s privacy, and you will not hear anything. Is that clear?”

  The maid sent Josefina a nervous look. “Your Highness?”

  “Do as you’re told, Conchita.”

  With a curtsy the maid moved away to where Melbourne had indicated. The duke glanced up and down the empty hall, then held the half-open curtain aside. “After you.”

  Even if she’d wanted to refuse him, she wasn’t certain she would have been willing to argue with that tone. He stepped in behind her and pulled the curtain closed. Echoing dimly from inside she could hear the play continuing.

  “He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders

  Of his affection to me.”

  “I have to say,” she whispered, facing him in the tiny alcove lit only by a single candle, “this is quite bold of you.”

  He continued to gaze at her, the sensation disconcerting. As he took a slow step closer her breathing deepened. For heaven’s sake, she’d grown up practically surrounded by soldiers and their silly attempts at seduction. Why, then, did having the Duke of Melbourne look at her make her knees weak?

  “I do not know, my lord, what I should think.”

  She could tell herself it was because she needed to secure his cooperation and his influence, but no business she’d ever engaged in made her feel like this. “What are you waiting for? We haven’t much time.”

  “Do you know who John Rice-Able is?” he finally uttered.

  “What? I’m not here to be quizzed about acquaintances.” She ran a finger along his lapel. “Kiss me, or go away so I can return to the play.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  This close she had to look up at him to meet his gaze. That dark hair with the upturn at his collar, that mouth—if he ever relaxed from the hard place he held himself, she didn’t think she would ever want to leave his presence. If only those eyes of his didn’t…trouble her soul, as well as arouse her body.

  “I do know

  When the blood burns, how prodigal the sou

  Lends the tongue vow.”

  “No, I don’t know him. Why? Is he an investor?”

  “He’s an author. I thought you might have been introduced.”

  Josefina brushed his black sleeve with her fingers. Not touching him seemed absurdly difficult. “No. Are you jealous of him?”

  “Not if you’ve never met.” Finally lifting one of his hands, he touched her chin, lowering his face toward hers. When only a breath separated them, he stopped again. “Say my name,” he murmured.

  “Melbourne.”

  “No.” His gaze lowered to her mouth. “Say my Christian name.”

  “In few, Ophelia,

  Do not believe his vows, for they are brokers…”

  “Sebastian,” she breathed.

  He kissed her. Josefina wrapped her arms behind his neck, breathing him in. Silently he pushed her against the side wall, his mouth hot and hungry as it sought and captured hers again and again. His hands brushed her hips, and then his grip firmed, holding her hard against him.

  “I want more,” she rasped, clinging against him and not having to fake the sincerity and urgency in her voice. “I want you, Sebastian.”

  Again silently, he slid a hand up from her waist to her shoulders, the pressure of his fingers against the outside of her right breast making her gasp. With those clever fingers he lowered the shoulder of her burgundy gown, his lips following the trail of his hand.

  “…Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds,

  The better to beguile.”

  He lowered the strap to her elbow, freeing her breast. For a heartbeat he gazed at the flesh he’d exposed, then lifted his gray eyes to her face. “It’s been a very long time for me,” he said, his voice shaking.

  The loneliness and longing in his tone seared straight through to her heart. This was what she’d worried about, that he would want more of her than she even possessed. She’d already leapt into the fire, though, and her skin burned. “It’s been a lifetime for me,” she returned.

  He kissed her again, those same clever fingers drawing feather-light, breath-stealing circles closer and closer around her breast until his short nails flicked across her nipple. She felt it all the way down between her thighs, and gasped again.

  “Tell me where you’ll live in San Saturus,” he ordered, his mouth trailing down her shoulder and then clamping over her breast.

  “Good…God,” she managed, digging her fingers into his dark hair. “Why?”

  “I want to hear you talk about it.”

  “I’ve only seen it…ah, once,” she said in a shaking whisper. Her knees wanted to give way as he peeled the cloth from her left shoulder and began caressing her other breast, as well.

  “What color is it?”

  “White…white stone, with tall…mm mmm…windows to let in the ocean breeze.”

  “How many rooms?”

  Was he thinking of moving in? Oh, God, she hoped so, if only so he would do this to her every night. “Hundreds. Enough for the royal guard and every cabinet minister.”

  He straightened, taking her lips again. “Do you wa
nt to know something?” he whispered against her mouth, his fingers still caressing her breasts.

  “Tell me,” she panted, pressing against his hands.

  “I think you’re lying.” With another rough kiss he returned her sleeves to her shoulders and stepped back.

  Josefina’s mind was a puddle of lust and surprise and dawning frustration. “What? What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t know what it is, exactly,” he continued, his voice still not quite steady, “but something’s going on.”

  “The air bites shrowdly, it is very cold.”

  “The only thing that’s going on, you bastard,” she snapped, adjusting the front of her gown, “is that you’ve proven that you’re not good enough for me.” She pushed past him and grabbed the curtain.

  Melbourne clamped a hand on her shoulder, his grip like iron. “We’re not finished,” he rumbled, turning her to face him. “How do you do it?”

  Half panicked, she jerked free. “Do what? I have no idea what you’re—”

  “How do you make me…want you like this? Is it your perfume, or some drug on your skin? What—”

  “So you think you must be drugged to feel attracted to me? We are finished here, sir.” She yanked the curtain aside and stepped through, into the hallway.

  Conchita immediately hurried forward. “Your Highness? Are you—”

  Josefina brushed her away. With every fiber of her being she wanted to flee the building, flee London, flee her own skin, which was still hot and sensitive from his touch. So he thought he was being used, or seduced, that she was lying. But didn’t everyone lie and seduce to get that what they wanted or needed? Oh, she hated Melbourne right now—and she still wanted him, damn it all. And damn him.

  Chapter 9

  Sebastian closed the privacy curtain again as Josefina and her maid returned to the box. As for himself, both caution and propriety demanded that he remain in hiding for another few minutes.