The Unclaimed Duchess

by Jenna Petersen

  Malvina shrugged one shoulder. “Lady Anne…Your Grace…”

  “You needn’t keep correcting yourself,” Anne said. “In private I see no harm in the old forms of address.”

  The servant flushed with pleasure before she continued, “Lady Anne, you are dealing with a man of ice, you’ve known that for years. For whatever reason you believe he has a heart under it all, but you aren’t going to reach it in a week of marriage. It might take years to break through that nasty façade and find the man within.”

  Anne nodded. It was true, Rhys Carlisle had a reputation for being distant, cold, and obsessed with maintaining the sanctity of rank. Everyone knew that, many had suffered from it. And while she had occasionally seen glimpses of more within the man—glimpses that had helped her develop greater feeling for him over the long years of their engagement—she wasn’t so naïve as to think that he wouldn’t be a difficult nut to crack when it came to making him love her. To making him see her as more than the “perfect” duchess and more like the love of his life.

  “You are right, Mally,” she mused. “But luckily I have all the rest of our lives to change his mind.”

  “Hmph,” Malvina huffed as she unfolded the last garment from the trunk. She snapped the lid shut. “I suppose.”

  Anne ignored the incredulous tone of her maid’s voice as she smoothed her hair. By now Simon would likely be gone, and perhaps she could have a few moments alone with Rhys.

  She slipped from the room and down the stairway. She had visited this house so often that the turns of each hallway were like second nature to her. She had memorized them, memorized everything about the life she would one day live here, since she was a girl.

  She found the parlor where they had met with Simon, but when she opened the door it was empty. She moved to Rhys’s office a few doors away, but it, too, showed no signs of its master. She frowned and called for Gilmour.

  When the butler arrived, she smiled at him. “Gilmour, will you tell me where I can find His Grace?”

  The butler’s gaze flickered down a fraction, but not before Anne saw a brief glimpse of pity in his stare. She cocked her head. Why in the world would the servant pity her?

  “I’m sorry, Your Grace. Not half an hour ago Lord Waverly called for his horse and rode off. I have no idea where he has gone or when he will return.”

  Chapter 2 Three days. It had been three days since Anne’s husband of a week had gotten on his horse and abandoned her. In that time she had hardly eaten and rarely slept, watching and waiting for his return and pondering all the worst scenarios of what could have happened to him. But after all these years of careful observation, Anne knew Rhys. If she set out on a full-scale search for him it would cause the gossip he abhorred, and that was the last thing her husband would want.

  So that was how Anne found herself in a beautifully appointed carriage with the Waverly crest emblazoned upon its door to declare to the world its inhabitants, pulling up on the drive of the London home of Simon Crathorne, Duke of Billingham.

  She was unannounced and uninvited, but that was how Anne had planned it. Simon was the last person who had seen her husband, she didn’t want to give her friend a chance to concoct some story that wasn’t true if he knew why Rhys had left.

  Left her.

  The servant who greeted her didn’t seem put off by her unannounced appearance and led her to a cheery parlor to wait while he fetched his master. Anne paced the room, wringing her hands as she pondered what she would say to Simon when she saw him.

  What she wanted to do was fly at him, beat her hands on his chest, and demand he tell her where her husband had gone. But she wouldn’t. Her near-hysteria wouldn’t give her the answers she desired and would only increase her humiliation.

  The door behind her clicked as it opened and Anne spun around and moved forward a step. But to her surprise and disappointment, it wasn’t Simon who met her, but Lillian, his new wife.

  Normally Anne would have been happy to see the pretty blond woman, for in the weeks before her wedding, the two had begun a friendship Anne was sure would bloom and grow. But in the fraction of the first moment Lillian saw her, Anne noticed her friend’s golden hazel eyes flash pity and sorrow.

  It took all of Anne’s strength not to burst into tears right then and there.

  “Good afternoon, Your Grace,” Lillian said as she entered the room and shut the door behind her. “I didn’t expect you today, but I’m pleased to see you.”

  Anne drew in a shuddering breath. She had long been raised to be polite, ladylike, and those lessons were difficult to forget. She smiled as brightly as she could manage.

  “I-I do apologize for coming unannounced, Lillian,” she choked past dry lips. “But I’m afraid I have a matter of great import on my mind.”

  Lillian hesitated, staring at her before she motioned to two chairs beside the fire. Anne ignored her offer.

  “You do seem troubled,” Lillian said softly. “Is there something I can do?”

  “Not you, unfortunately. I came to see Simon,” Anne whispered, her gaze flitting to the door. “In fact, I’m certain it was he I asked for when I inquired as to your residence to your servant. Please, is he home?”

  Lillian stepped closer, but it was a wary movement. In that moment Anne could only imagine how she looked, eyes wild, face pale. Her anger, her fear, her utter confusion clawed at her at present. She felt those emotions throbbing as powerfully as she felt her own heartbeat.

  She dragged in a gasping breath and clenched her fists at her sides. She had to control these feelings. She didn’t want to show them to Lillian or to Simon or to anyone else. Hadn’t she been humiliated enough?

  “Anne,” Lillian said softly.

  “I…want…to see…Simon,” Anne gasped out. Blood heated her face at the raised, broken tone of her voice, but her patience and propriety had finally reached its frayed end. “I need to see him, immediately!”

  Almost as if on cue the door to the parlor opened and Simon himself entered the room. His face was bright with a welcoming smile as his gaze fell on her, but it was less than a moment before it vanished. He rushed to her in three long strides and caught her hand.

  “Great God, Anne, are you well?”

  She wrenched her fingers from his, unable to bear his touch in her current state. It felt like sandpaper on her skin when all she wanted was the truth, not some empty show of comfort.

  “You should know,” she whispered. “You saw him last. Where is he? What did you do? What did you say?”

  Lillian and Simon exchanged a brief, confused, and concerned look before Simon returned his attention to her.

  “I’m sorry, Anne, I don’t understand your question. Please, be seated, calm yourself and let us talk about what is troubling you. I want to help, but—”

  “Help? How can you help me? You did this. You—you did this,” Anne repeated, but now she did sit down. Collapsed was more like it. The entire situation was like a weight, constantly crushing down upon her. She couldn’t breathe, she could hardly think.

  Simon sucked in a sudden breath and sank down into his own chair. Lillian moved behind him and pressed a hand to his shoulder in a gesture of support and love. Anne flinched away from it, from the closeness she had never had and was beginning to believe was no longer possible in her own young marriage.

  “Anne, tell me what has happened and I’ll do my best to assist you any way I can,” Simon said, his tone low and soothing.

  She clenched her fists in her lap and stared at him evenly. Simon did seem genuinely confused, and who could blame him? She was ranting and raving in the middle of his parlor. Clearly she hadn’t explained herself well enough. With much effort, she took a deep breath and started over, determined to make Simon understand and then obtain the answers she required.

  “Three days past you came to my home. What did you say to my husband?”

  In an unguarded reaction, Simon physically recoiled from her before he regained his composure. He
shot a brief glance up at Lillian and then slowly shook his head.

  “I’m sorry, Anne. You know I view you as quite my own sister, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable in sharing that conversation with you. You should ask Rhys.”

  All attempts at calm vanished as Anne flew to her feet. “Ask Rhys?”

  Both Simon and Lillian leaned back at Anne’s unexpectedly violent reaction. Simon was on his feet in an instant, reaching for her as if he feared she would topple over in her current state, but Anne jerked away.

  “Yes,” he said, watching her. “I think it would be best if you take this up with your husband.

  Anne barked out a laugh, but it was inspired by anything but humor. “I would do if I knew where he was! Tell me, Simon. Tell me what you said to him that sent him flying from our home with no explanation and no return? That sent him from London, apparently. From all of his estates! Please tell me what you said, what you did, to make him disappear like this!”

  Aside from his shock at her behavior, Simon had been cloaking his own emotions quite well during this exchange. But now…now the façade fell and his green eyes brightened with heartache.

  “Rhys is gone?” he whispered in disbelief. “I knew he was upset, but I never thought…Are you saying he’s quit London entirely?”

  Anne nodded. Somehow hearing another person state that fact out loud helped. It renewed her focus on her duty, and that duty was to find her husband. Tears and screaming and letting herself surrender to her pain would not aid in that responsibility, and might even hinder it.

  She struggled for a moment, swallowing her tears, calming her breath. Her heart slowed from its wild beating to something more natural, and that was when she finally spoke.

  “Yes, he is gone,” she whispered. “The afternoon of our return, I sought him out after you left, only to be told that he had called for his horse and ridden away with no explanation or hint of his plans to return. At first I simply waited, assuming he would come back, but when morning came, he hadn’t returned.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, ignoring the clawing panic that raged up inside her once more. “I sent word around to his clubs, discreetly inquiring if he was there, but to no avail. I even asked his mother, but she was as in the dark as I am. No one seems to know where Rhys is, and now it is three days past. And nothing. Not a word of or from him, Simon. So I ask you again, what did you say to my husband? Because before you came to visit us, Rhys seemed perfectly contented.”

  Simon shook his head. “I’m sorry, Anne. It isn’t that I don’t believe you deserve to know, but it isn’t my secret to reveal to you. Rhys must tell you, not I.”

  Anne stared at him, suddenly overcome by a rage she hadn’t even known she could feel. Simon was staring at her with such calmness, dismissing her demands as if she wasn’t owed an explanation.

  “You bastard,” Anne said. Her voice was quiet, but it shook and wavered. “Did you tell him not to love me? Not to want me? To leave me?”

  She moved toward him without realizing she was going to do it, but before she reached him, Lillian intervened, scrambling to embrace her.

  Anne tensed, not wanting to be comforted or placated, but as Lillian smoothed a hand along her back gently, Anne went limp. All the pressure and pain of the past few days, the humiliation of abandonment and the fear that she had lost her future, flooded her. She clung to Lillian, sucking in breath after breath. But she didn’t cry. She refused to cry.

  “I’m sorry,” Lillian whispered as she held her. “But trust that Simon would never hurt you. He adores you, he would never bring you pain on purpose.”

  Anne looked over Lillian’s shoulder. Simon stood, ramrod stiff, looking at her with a devastation in his eyes that reflected her own so perfectly that she felt it even more keenly. It burned in her, searing every part of her like a fire, only there was no way to put it out. No way to end it.

  Not unless she found her husband. Because in the end, as much as she cried out to Simon to tell her the truth, as much as she resented him for saying he couldn’t…it was Rhys who had left her. It was Rhys who owed her explanations for why. And transferring her feelings onto Simon as a surrogate was not satisfying.

  Although she feared confronting Rhys would be no more so.

  With a great shuddering breath, Anne removed herself from Lillian’s embrace. She touched the other woman’s arm briefly, a gesture of thanks.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, her comments directed to both the Billinghams. “I realize it must be quite shocking to have me arrive here in such a state, not to mention to have me tell you that a friend has vanished.”

  Lillian shook her head, even as she stepped back to stand beside her husband. “You deserve those feelings, Anne. I cannot imagine how I would behave if Simon disappeared.”

  Lillian shivered, and Anne nodded. “Then you understand why I’m desperate to know why he did this. Any inkling of what set Rhys off could help me determine where he might have gone.”

  It was Simon who stepped forward this time, and Anne allowed him to gently place a hand on each shoulder. He looked down at her, his gaze kind.

  “I do understand. But I have been friends with Rhys for so long, Anne. You must know I cannot betray a confidence between us.”

  Anne’s chin dipped down, and when a pained moan filled the air, she was shocked to discover it was her own.

  “I can tell you that I do think what we spoke of likely did bring this situation to pass,” Simon continued. “And that…”

  He hesitated, and the uncertain tone of his voice made Anne jerk her gaze back to his face. Simon’s expression was torn, as if he was trying to make a difficult decision.

  “What is it?” Anne whispered, trying not to hope too much that he might give her some glimmer of information.

  He cleared his throat. “When he was a very young boy, Rhys’s mother used to take him and his sisters to a cottage by the sea. While deep in his cups, he once confided to me it was the one place in which he was most happy.”

  Anne drew back. Rhys must have been deep in his cups indeed to confess something about his happiness. Her husband often dismissed all emotion as weakness in one broad stroke.

  “Do you think he might have gone there?” she asked, her voice hoarse and cracking.

  Simon nodded. “If you have made inquiry at all his estates and with his clubs, then it is possible. Few know of this cottage. If Rhys was hiding to lick his wounds, I think it’s a good guess as to his whereabouts.”

  Anne let out a gasp of hope and relief. “Then I must go there. Tell me its exact location and I will depart today!”

  Simon’s eyes widened. “Anne, it is three days’ travel, two of them quite hard. You will need an escort and—”

  She shook her head. “No, Simon. You cannot deter me, though I appreciate your reasons for doing so. I must go to Rhys. And I shall do it whether you assist me or not. Ultimately I will find out where this cottage is and I’ll go there. But I’m asking you this one thing, to make my search easier.”

  Simon shut his eyes briefly and let out a low sigh. “Anne—”

  Before he could finish what was clearly going to be a statement of protest, Lillian quietly touched his arm. “Simon, tell her.”

  He shot a glance at his wife. “What?”

  Lillian nodded. “This is between them now, Simon, and I think you can see in Anne’s eyes that she is telling the truth about her determination to uncover the location of this place in one way or another. I know if it were me, it would take hell itself to stop me from finding you. You should tell her where the cottage is.”

  Anne stared at the other woman in stunned thanks. She had met Lillian Crathorne only a few weeks before, but in that moment a swell of friendship welled up in her so powerful that she realized it would never quite fade. She would feel some part of it toward the woman for the rest of her life.

  “At least let me escort you,” Simon said softly, clearly on the brink of surrender under the attack of both the women.<
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  Anne pondered that thought for a moment, but then she shook her head. “I admit it is somewhat comforting to think of you coming with me and helping me confront Rhys if he is there. But it is clear that whatever has precipitated this problem has to do with your friendship, and if you came with me, you and Rhys would have to focus on that. And for once, I don’t want my interaction with my husband to have anything to do with you or with Society or with my father or his father…”

  She clenched her fists at her sides as she trailed off. She sucked in a calming breath and continued, “As Lillian said, this confrontation must be about me and my husband. And he is my husband, whether he wants to be or not. I must go alone.”

  Simon stared at her for a long moment, and then he sighed. “Very well. But I’ll feel better if you at least allow me to send you in my carriage. My driver is very discreet, and the fewer people who know about this, the better.”

  Anne opened her mouth to object, but then shut it. Perhaps Simon was correct. She didn’t want to face the utter humiliation of having her own servants know she was chasing her husband across the country. As she would likely never see Simon’s driver again, she would never have to face the fact that he knew her pain.

  “Yes,” she said with a brief nod. “I can agree to that.”

  “And,” he added, “I want you to send word to me when you do find Rhys. If you don’t send word or you don’t return within a week, I’ll come there myself to search for you.”

  Anne’s eyes widened, and this time she had every intention of arguing, but Simon lifted a hand to silence her. “It is not open for debate, Anne. Rhys is my…”

  When Simon trailed off, Anne tilted her head. She had never seen the other man so pained. It echoed her own emotions, and she flitted her gaze away, uncomfortable.

  “He is my friend,” Simon finished, his voice cracking. “The best I have ever had. I want to be certain that you are both well.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Anne nodded. “I’ll do that. Now I shall return home and make some arrangements. Will you send your man there in an hour or so?”