Those weren’t the sorts of things that would attract a peer. Maybe a skilled tradesman. Maybe a youngest son, if she was very lucky.
And if she was younger. That was the real thing, at this point. She was twenty-five years old, and her courting days were all but done, despite what her father seemed to hope. If Eric had been interested in her, he would have approached her long ago. If anyone had.
It wasn’t meant to be. She pushed her disappointment away and focused on finding her charge. Fortunately, she finally found her in the washroom, where she’d evidently been chatting away with her friends. Nothing more than that. Charlene would keep her job for another day.
“Come, we should get back to the ball before they miss you,” Charlene said matter-of-factly.
Matilda sighed exaggeratedly. “Don’t you realize that that’s the style these days?” she asked.
Charlene quirked an eyebrow at her charge, wondering just what she meant by that. It was Miss Eleanor who responded with a quiet titter. “We let the men realize just what it is that they’re missing!” she said. “Then, when we reappear, they all clamour to dance with us.”
Charlene nearly snorted with amusement. Every year, the girls introduced to society seemed younger and younger, and every year, the rules of the game seemed to get more complicated.
But who was she to say what was good or not? She had barely had a man look twice at her in all her courting days. If these girls wanted to waste the ball as they sat around here in the washroom with their friends, then who was she to say anything?
Matilda led the way to the door, though. “The game’s spoiled now you’re here, anyway. With my chaperone here, the boys are all to think that I’ve had something happen to me!”
“We wouldn’t want that,” one of her other friends said with a giggle.
“Come back out soon, before I’m bored to death,” Matilda sighed dramatically as Charlene pulled open the door for her and ushered her back to the ballroom.
Back in the ballroom, Charlene couldn’t help but feel even more out of place, though. She felt old and frumpy, and she could barely breathe, for a moment, with how much she missed her home in Bath.
Here, the balls all seemed to be full of lovely ladies dancing with dapper gentlemen in a life that would always escape Charlene.
She wished that she could write to her father and ask him to invent some reason to call her home. Except that her father had been arrested and was facing possible execution. And there was nothing that she could do about it.
The perfect cap to her unhappiness was seeing Lord Eric sweep back into the room with Lady Annabelle following soon behind. The two of them took their place on the dance floor, moving gracefully together.
A perfect match, Charlene was sure. It made her feel sick with loss to watch them, in spite of the fact that you couldn’t lose something that you had never had in the first place.
“I should have become a midwife instead,” Charlene mused quietly to herself. She could have remained in Bath, then, put her knowledge to use, and avoided all this discomfort and unhappiness.
Of course, with her luck, she would have been there to help with the birthing of Eric’s eventual heir, borne to some other woman. Lady Annabelle, perhaps.
The thought made even that dream sour in Charlene’s mind. Everywhere she looked, her future was bleak. And the only man who could possibly have fixed all of it – her father’s situation and her own – was bowing gracefully to someone else.
Chapter 8
Lord Eric Cumberland, Duke of Havenport
Eric woke late in the morning after a night of fitful sleep. Ever since Charlene had come to visit him, he had been having a tough time sleeping.
Whether it was dreams about her and how upset she was or other, darker dreams…or dreams where she was naked beneath his body, spread out on his bed…he never seemed to sleep through the night like he would have wished.
He didn’t know how to fix that, except to gather information and hope the best when it came to her father.
Fortunately, when he finally roused himself and went downstairs, he found that news had come in about Charlene’s father. At long last.
He sat down with the reports from the mortician and Dr. Ellington’s staff, as well as the testimony of the apothecary’s assistant who had sold the doctor the drugs for Lord Henrich. He read through all of it, hoping that it would clear Dr. Ellington’s name. Instead, the reports seemed certain to damn the man.
He thought back to when he had known Dr. Ellington before. He and Charlene, as far as Eric knew, made all of their medicines themselves. But now, it sounded like the doctor was contracting out, buying his medicines from someone else.
That made a certain amount of sense, Eric supposed, if the doctor was as busy as the reports said that he was. Still, there was a certain amount of risk that came along with that. Perhaps that was the key.
However, the apothecary’s assistant swore that he had been asked for medicine meant to treat stomach parasites. What’s more, the doctor had apparently signed off on the receipt, not seeming to find anything strange in the order.
And yet Dr. Ellington had originally diagnosed the Lord as suffering from gout.
There was no reason that the man would then have prescribed the medicine that he did, knowing that the man had gout. Unless he was purposefully trying to give the man a medication that was too strong, that wasn’t what the man needed. Unless he had wanted for the lord’s spleen to rupture as it had.
Still, Eric wondered if somewhere along the line, there had been nothing more than a careless mistake.
Oh, he was sure that the doctor had done something wrong – but was it as malicious as his jurors seemed to think? Perhaps it was an honest mistake.
The doctor was busy, and he had a number of patients in his care at any given time, men and women who were drawn to the spas of Bath and its waters as a cure-all for their ailments.
Had he forgotten what it was that he had diagnosed Lord Henrich with originally, or had he accidentally incorrectly relayed his original prescription to the apothecary’s assistant?
Was there anything to be won by arguing that he hadn’t done anything on purpose? He had still killed a lord, with his carelessness if not out of some political motive.
Anyway, it wasn’t as though Eric himself could help to argue the man’s case. Dr. Ellington had lawyers who would do that for him, and Eric was sure they would be looking at all the same information that he had in front of himself now, and then some.
They would argue the same way that the young duke was thinking: that the doctor shouldn’t be executed because what he had done was accidental. Still, Dr. Ellington would never be allowed to practice medicine again. The trial would ruin his family either way.
Again, Eric found himself wondering how Charlene was handling things. He had seen her briefly at the latest ball here in London. She had been there again with her young charge, Miss Matilda. Eric had tried to catch Charlene’s eye.
There was something inside of himself that told him that he should talk to her again. To let her know that in spite of his uncertainty that he should get involved in her situation (after all, what could he do? He wasn’t a lawyer), he was seeking information regarding her father’s arrest.
That he was doing his best. He wasn’t sure why it mattered to him that she know that he was doing his best. He wasn’t sure why he thought that might matter at all to her. But he wanted her to know.
Instead, he had been waylaid by Lady Annabelle. The woman was nice enough, but she was a little overzealous in her affection for Eric, and for whatever reason, he just couldn’t find it in himself to be interested in her. Not as a wife, anyway.
Now, Eric wished that he had talked more to Charlene at the ball. She seemed certain that her father was innocent, and he wanted to know what it was that made her feel that way. Maybe she knew something more than what his sources had turned up.
Maybe she could shed some light on what was really happening with her fat
her.
Because at the end of the day, Eric had to admit that he believed Charlene. No matter how damning the information that was in front of him now, he was sure that she was right when she said that her father was wrongfully accused.
There was some other part of the story that he was missing. And he wouldn’t know what it was unless he had a moment to chat with Charlene herself.
How to go about that, though? He could hardly summon her here, nor could he just show up at her aunt’s home unannounced. He was a duke, and that meant that people gossiped about him all the time. His visit to Lady Helene’s wouldn’t go unnoticed.
Not only that, but there was no way that he would be able to talk to her in private, freely, if he showed up at her home. Talking freely with her would be even more impossible if he scheduled an official visit, though.
And yet more impossible still if he tried to meet with her at the next ball, whenever he happened to see her at another society event. She had her charge to look after, and sneaking off once to meet with him at the library had been risky enough.
He wished, suddenly, that things were simpler. That he wasn’t the duke, or at least not yet.
But of course, that in itself had been the common refrain ever since his father’s death: he wished that he had had just a little while longer to bring himself around to the idea that he was going to one day be duke.
Of course, it was the position that he had been brought up into, his whole life. At the same time, it felt like his responsibilities had come on to him too soon. He was only twenty-seven years old, but already he felt tired.
He sighed and set aside the information on the doctor, wishing that he knew what to do. Finally, he decided that if the information in front of him was still damning, it meant that he needed more information about the man.
Somewhere out there, there had to be something that proved the doctor’s innocence, he was sure of it.
Charlene believed that her father was innocent, and Charlene was smart. If she was willing to risk her reputation by being caught alone in a library with him, the young duke, then it meant that there was something that she wanted him to know, something that she wanted the world to know. Something that proved her father’s innocence.
Just then, one of his servants poked his head into the room, cutting off his train of thought. “Duke?” the man asked. “Lady Annabelle is here, and she would like to speak with you.” The man looked a little frazzled, and Eric couldn’t help but feel pity for the man.
No doubt the man had tried to fend her off, reminding her that she didn’t have an appointment with the busy duke. Eric knew that his servants had done their best to help him since he had taken over his father’s position.
They had been his father’s servants before they became his, and Eric was sure that they knew more about being a duke than he himself did.
Eric had realized, soon after becoming duke, that if he allowed everyone to have a piece of his time as they seemed to feel that they had a right to, then he wouldn’t last long. He would go mad, or he would allow his subjects to drive him into the ground.
But Lady Annabelle just wouldn’t take no for an answer.
In his head, Eric knew that the viscount’s daughter would make a perfect match for him. Not only that, but logically, he knew that the woman was attractive, sexy, accomplished. He should want for nothing in a wife if he would but court her.
Yet he couldn’t seem to feel interested in her. And it wasn’t just that her boldness stretched the realm of propriety.
It was funny, really. He had never had a problem before with the idea of a woman be improper.
It hadn’t bothered him when Charlene had been left alone with him. When Charlene had allowed him to kiss her, back when they were younger, or when she had asked him to meet her in the library at that ball.
When Lady Annabelle arrived unexpectedly like this, however, all he could think was to remind her that the two of them shouldn’t be alone with one another, that it wasn’t right for her to be there.
He would never say that to the woman’s face, however, and he certainly wouldn’t allow his servant to relay that to her. She would see it as an insult, and even though an insult was, no doubt, exactly what was needed to get the woman to leave him alone, he had no wish to insult her.
“I’ll see her in the sitting room, James,” Eric sighed, getting up from the table and making to do just that.
“She is already waiting,” James said, sounding resigned to the fact that his master’s day was going to be interrupted, regardless of what either he or Eric hoped.
Eric smiled at him, though, hoping that he didn’t consider this a personal failing on his part. The young duke knew for himself how difficult it was to ward off the lady.
He had lost count of how many dances they had shared at the last ball, but it had seemed that every time he turned, there she was, her head thrown back as she laughed.
He had never had a chance to think about talking to Charlene again. And he doubted that he would in the future, if Lady Annabelle had her way.
Eric shook his head and went to find her. She was wearing a new dress in a bright scarlet, cut in the latest fashion. Her hair was impeccably drawn up away from her face, and she simpered at Eric as he entered.
“There you are!” she said, giggling. “I was afraid that I was interrupting something. Oh, do tell me that I wasn’t interrupting anything!”
“Nothing,” Eric promised her, knowing that if he had even hinted that she had, in fact, interrupted his day, she would want to know just what it was that he was up to at the moment.
And what would he tell her? That an old acquaintance was on trial and that he was trying to clear the man’s name? He didn’t want anyone to know about that, and especially not before he was sure that the doctor hadn’t intentionally poisoned Lord Henrich.
He paused, waiting for her to invent some excuse for being there. She smiled at him again, standing and coming close to him, brushing her fingers against his arm.
She didn’t take things any further than that, but that in itself was already more familiar than Eric would have liked. He wanted to take a step back, but again, he didn’t want to insult her. He should be interested in her, he knew that. He just couldn’t seem to find it in his heart to be.
Lady Annabelle’s smile told Eric that she knew just how much he wanted to flee the room. “Don’t look so worried!” she said. “I’m not here to seduce you. I merely wanted to tell you how much I appreciated our dancing the other night. It was a wonderful evening, all thanks to you.”
She paused, brushing her fingers along the young duke’s shoulder as she headed towards the window. “In all honesty, I don’t love London’s balls and frippery. I’m much more at home at our country estate.”
She paused, glancing over her shoulder at Eric. “I’m sure that we can both agree that with our positions in society, there are also certain responsibilities. They can be tiresome at times. It’s nice to lay those aside, away from the gossip-mongers.”
Eric stared at her, wondering what exactly she was saying. Did she want the two of them to run away to her country estate? Surely she didn’t think that that would get them away from the ‘gossip-mongers’.
If anything, that would give everyone something to talk about until, well, the end of time. Their judgements would be endless. And that was the last thing that the young duke needed now, when he had newly taken over his father’s title and responsibilities.
Eric remained silent, and Annabelle laughed, turning back to him. “I have overstepped,” she said. “I wasn’t trying to.”
She looked at him through her eyelashes. “I merely wanted to say that I enjoyed our dances the other night.” She paused. “You are someone that I feel comfortable with. Perhaps too comfortable. I simply hope that there are many more nights like the other in our futures.”
Eric knew that she was trying to get him to fall for her. That she was trying to remind him of all the things that they suppo
sedly had in common: their discomfort at those balls, their relentless responsibilities to their people, everything to do with their positions.
And in a way, he knew that she was right. Out of everyone in all of England, she was probably one of the few people who were close enough to Eric’s age and in a similar position to his. One of the few people who could really understand what he went through from day to day.
She was playing on his unhappiness, though, without giving him any hope for the future. What would happen if he threw his lot with hers?
They would only have more responsibilities, he was sure. And they had nothing in common other than those responsibilities. In spite of their positions, Eric was sure that they were very different people.
Annabelle had come here to thank him for a wonderful night at the ball, and to ask for many more. But there was only one person that Eric could imagine spending those long and wearying nights with. Annabelle wasn’t it.
Regency Diaries of Seduction Collection: A Regency Historical Romance Box Set Page 62