“What are you trying to say or are you simply trying to provoke me with utter nonsense?” The conversation took a sudden tilt. Marcus felt himself slide into an obvious trap, with no escape route in sight.
“You take your wife to balls and don’t dance. Worse, you throw that scarred scowl of yours at any man who has the temerity to try and ask her to dance. Poor Mannerton’s heir inquired if she was enjoying the opera last week and we all thought you were going to throw the pup over the rail of your box into the orchestra pit.”
“Ridiculous. You’ve obviously had too much to drink.” His descent into Creighton’s verbal trap continued. In fact, it picked up speed. “Where do you come up with these fanciful ideas?”
“The same place you came up with the corker you brought your wife to Town to enjoy herself. You came to London for a reason, of that I am certain, but that isn’t it. Care to enlighten me?” His slouch into the soft leather cushions became more pronounced, as did his smug expression. Marcus wanted to punch him in the face.
“Has my wife expressed any displeasure in my behavior, Creighton? Are you here on her behalf, to rescue the fair maiden from the dragon she has married?” A sliver of icy rage writhed up his spine. He sat up straight and forced himself not to shrug it off. The thought of Addy appealing to his friend for help made his stomach clench.
“Certainly not.” Creighton gave a soft indignant snort. “As if she would. The poor girl is so in love with you she thinks you can do no wrong. More’s the pity.”
“More’s the… What is that supposed to mean? And don’t be an idiot. She isn’t in love with me. She’s barely out of the schoolroom. She doesn’t know what love is. If it even exists.”
Creighton raised his glass and found it instantly refilled by one of White’s ever-efficient footmen. “You’ll get no argument from me on the existence of love, my friend. Women do seem to be able to create it out of mere dust, however.” He gave Marcus a gimlet glance. “Sometimes even less than dust. You had better hope you don’t shatter her illusions with your pitiful attempts at entertaining her. There is more to this trip than meets the eye, I’ll wager. You’ve got that look in your eye, Selridge. Whatever maggot’s got into your brain, lose it. If you muck this up your little wife may very well hand you your head. If this afternoon’s performance is any indication, that is.”
The trap snapped shut and threatened to drag Marcus down into the manipulative whirlpool that was Harry Creighton’s milieu. What was the man up to? “What the devil are you going on about, Ferret? If you say one more word my head may well explode. Well?”
“I would hate for your head to explode. Your wife and mother would never forgive me.”
“Creighton.” He slammed the brandy glass down so hard the golden liquid washed over the table like a miniature tide. Two steps, the sweep of a cloth, a whisper of sound in exit and the table was clean once more.
“Some funny little man from Yorkshire stopped by your wife’s at-home this afternoon and began questioning some of the guests. Some nonsense about his dogs and his son going missing whilst we were all up for your wedding. No idea which upsets him most, but my money is on the dogs.”
“Good God. When did he arrive in London?” Marcus groaned and sank back into his chair.
“No idea. Set your mother off to say the least. I was going to intervene when Crosby stepped into the fray. Then when the old windbag began questioning Crosby, your little duchess took him up with such a fury I was afraid he would have an apoplexy.”
“Crosby was there? Where has he been all this time? He was supposed to be here weeks ago.” Marcus was on his feet before he realized it.
“He told your mother he was delayed visiting his grandmother at Rose Hill longer than he expected. He came by to apologize for missing your dinner party.” Still half-reclined in his chair, Creighton stared at Marcus with a curious smile on his face. “You needn’t worry about him. Your wife was like a lioness with one cub. She sent the silly little man into the street with a flea in his ear. Are you going somewhere?”
It took a moment for the man’s voice to penetrate the maelstrom of thoughts whirling in Marcus’s head. He’d waited all this time to see Addy and Dylan meet since the letter and now he’d missed it.
“I’m going home, Creighton. My wife may have need of me.” He started out of the room and into the hall leading to the foyer. A thought occurred to him and he turned back. “How long has Crosby been there?” A sudden flash in the man’s expression and Marcus knew he had said too much. Dammit.
“All afternoon, Your Grace. Why?”
“Good day, Creighton.” A series of curses crossed his mind as he snatched his hat and coat from the doorman. In moments, his carriage was at the door, his coachman obviously summoned by an ever-watchful footman. Marcus continued to fume as his elegant coach sped through the streets of London. This business with Addy was not going at all as he had planned. He snorted indignantly. It was sheer folly to utter the words “Addy” and “plan” in the same sentence.
Creighton crooked his finger at the footman. After an inquiry as to what was the most choice of the chef’s offerings for the evening, he ordered a hearty dinner.
“Very good, my lord,” the servant murmured. He turned to go.
“Oh, and John?”
“Yes, my lord?”
“Put it on His Grace’s account, will you?”
“Of course, Lord Creighton.”
Creighton took up his brandy and looked at it in the firelight. “The plot thickens,” he said softly. He glanced at the ornate rosettes on the ceiling. “He’s up to something, Julius. Your brother is going to muck this up yet. Poor bastard.” Something in the chair Selridge had so hastily vacated caught his eye. He plucked it from between the seat cushion and the fat chair arm. A single page letter was closed around a smaller folded note. He opened the smaller note and recognized the handwriting at once. He quickly read through the outside letter.
“Oh, hell, Julius,” the earl muttered. “Holy hell.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Adelaide smiled and nodded briefly at the crisply uniformed maid who settled the replenished tray on the intricately carved oriental tea table. The staff at Selridge House moved in and out of company like ghosts and anticipated the needs of any occasion with an equally spooky clairvoyance. The callers who’d crowded into the downstairs drawing room all afternoon finally began to take their leave. Especially now that the fireworks were over. What must Marcus’s mother think of her?
She’d managed not to turn a hair when the Yorkshire magistrate showed up at her first at-home. However, it took nearly an hour for her to realize what Sir Delbert Finch was about as he moved around the elegantly appointed room. She should have caught on earlier. He lumbered from one cluster of her guests to another, leaving odd looks and furtive whispers in his wake. It took every ounce of her finishing school training to resist the urge to kick the man in his pompous posterior all the way down the stairs and out the front door.
However, when he’d intercepted Dylan almost as soon as Fosters announced “Mr. Crosby,” Adelaide’s restraint snapped like a debutante’s fan.
“Sir Delbert, I really must insist you cease this browbeating of my guests,” was her very proper and dignified beginning. She hurried to her friend’s side and delivered her request in a very duchess-like tone and manner. After which, the man had the audacity to refuse and to punctuate that refusal with a “my dear girl.” Twenty years of instruction on the proper behavior of a lady flew out the proverbial window.
She did not remember much about what ensued. An icy rage swept over her like a blast of Yorkshire wind. The words “odious toad,” “old windbag,” and “public menace” flew from her lips in combination with a great many others of which she had only a vague memory. The shocked gasps of her female guests chorused with the amused snorts and discomforted coughs of her gentlemen callers. The dowager duchess covered her mouth with her handkerchief and collapsed gracefully into a chair, he
r shoulders shaking.
Oh, but that was not the worst of it. Even the magistrate’s bulging eyes and near purple face as he spluttered in a fair imitation of a badly boiling tea kettle was not the worst of it. Amidst her first foray as a society hostess at large, and visits by members of some of the most influential and high-in-the-instep families of the ton, whilst she dressed down a defenseless old man, Dylan Crosby stood there grinning like a bedlamite. And Adelaide wanted to plant her fist right in the middle of his face for it.
“All in all, I think that went rather well, don’t you, dear?” Emily’s remark, laced with merriment, interrupted Adelaide’s ruminations of embarrassment and fisticuffs. The last of the guests were gone, save one. The servants withdrew and closed the door behind them.
“Absolutely, Your Grace,” Dylan, the lone straggler, agreed. He lowered himself into the green silk upholstered armchair the dowager indicated and tossed Adelaide his annoying grin. “One of the liveliest athomes I have ever attended.”
“Stubble it, Dylan,” Adelaide snapped. “Emily, I am so very sorry. You must be mortified. I don’t know what came over me.” She pressed her hands to her heated cheeks. “Marcus is right. I am too young to be a duchess.”
“Pffftt!” her mother-in-law waved her hand dismissively. “You are a magnificent duchess, Adelaide. I wanted to stand up and cheer when you took that man to task. I daresay most of your guests felt the same. Don’t you agree, Mr. Crosby?”
“Completely, Your Grace. I have never seen footmen move so quickly to do their lady’s bidding.” He sat up and looked down his nose haughtily. “George, Samuel, please escort this person out of the house at once.” His perfect imitation of Adelaide’s voice and expression drew peals of laughter from Marcus’s mother. The subject of his mimicry was not amused.
“To what do we owe the dubious pleasure of your company, Dylan?” she asked as she fiddled with the objects on the tea tray. “You missed our dinner party last night.”
“You have answered your own question, Addy. I have just this morning arrived in Town. Business at Rose Hill detained me and I came by to apologize profusely for disappointing my hostess last night.”
Whilst Emily smiled at him indulgently, Adelaide rolled her eyes. Mothers always fell for Dylan Crosby’s boyish charm. She had been immune to it from the time she was ten. Her mother-in-law rose and moved to the door in a graceful rustle of organza and lace. She waved Dylan back into his seat.
“I am going to take my leave now, my dear,” she said. The salon door opened on cue. The footmen of Selridge House must have the ears of hounds. All these weeks in residence and Adelaide could count on one hand the number of times she had opened a door for herself. She stood and crossed the oriental carpeted floor to kiss Emily’s cheek.
“Thank you so much for being here. I fear it might have fallen into a complete disaster without you.”
“Nonsense. It was a perfectly lovely afternoon. My son is the most fortunate of men to have you. Please tell him I said so when he comes home.”
“I will,” Adelaide assured her. The instant the door closed she turned and stalked to stand over Dylan, who had piled a small plate with delicacies from the tea tray. “What on earth were you thinking, Dylan?” She snatched the plate from his hand and plunked it onto the table.
“That I was hungry?” He peered up at her with his best boyish expression.
“That is not what I mean and you know it.” She sat on the sofa with a huff. “You should have left as soon as you realized Sir Delbert was here. You just stood there and let him question you like a common criminal. Thank God Marcus wasn’t here.”
Dylan grabbed several biscuits from the plate. “In a manner of speaking I am a common criminal. As are you, Your Grace. I take it you haven’t told your husband about your premarital activities.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively. Addy threw a scone at him in answer.
“No, I have not. As I have no intention of continuing such activities there really is no point in my telling him, is there?” She did not intend to blurt it out like that. In fact, she had just decided. Marriages were best built on trust. Her mission to win Marcus’s heart was not best served by keeping things from him. There were secrets enough between them with the ones he kept locked inside him.
“I see.” A familiar mask dropped over Dylan’s face. It was the same one he wore whenever he was asked about his brother. She learned to see through it long ago. “So, your husband has brought you in line in only a few months. I commend him. I wish I’d had the to opportunity to observe his methods. I have no doubt they would prove useful in breaking any number of high-spirited creatures.”
“Stop it, Dylan. It isn’t like that and you know it. I am a married woman now. I have responsibilities, to my husband and to the family name.” She reached across the table and covered his hand with her own. “You knew this could not go on forever. Sir Delbert’s inquisition is ample evidence of that.”
He smiled bitterly and withdrew his hand. “We’ve weathered worse than that old blowhard. It would seem marriage vows supersede those made between lifelong friends.” He stood and walked to the fireplace, turning his back on her.
“That is unfair and beneath you. I have made good on my vow to you.” She knew her announcement stunned and hurt him. “Just as you have honored your pledge to your sister. She would not want you to be ruined for her sake. Think what will happen should anyone find out.”
“You don’t understand, Addy. I thought you did, but you don’t.” The tint of old grief in his voice tugged at her heart. The death of his little sister when she was ten and he was sixteen had changed Dylan forever. It seemed he might never recover.
“I do understand. Truly I do.” She crossed the room to his side. “Can’t you at least try to understand how important Marcus is to me?”
The face he turned to her was the old Dylan once more, rakish and full of the devil. “Well, old thing, when you put it that way, I guess I must. Although what you see in the stuffy old soldier, I’ll never know.”
“Marcus is not in the least bit stuffy,” she said as she slapped his arm playfully. “You have no idea how unstuffy my husband can be.”
“Oh really?” Dylan arched an eyebrow at her. Adelaide blushed to her toes.
“Stop that this instant, you horrible man.” She led him back to the tea table. Once they were seated, she poured them both a cup of tea. “How are Sir Delbert’s dogs?”
He laughed. “Fat and sassy at this point. It was a very near thing according to Wickenshire’s aunt. Declared them the worst she’d ever seen actually.”
“And what of Dickie? Did I kill him?” She held her breath.
“Of course not. He was breathing and moving when we left him. This is all some ruse on his part to avoid his father’s displeasure.”
She shook her head and took a sip of her tea. They sat in silence for a few more minutes before she realized he was studying her over his teacup.
“What is it?”
“What do you mean?” he answered casually.
“You are staring at me, you ninny. What do you want?”
“Why should I want anything?”
“Dylan.”
“You know it is dashed inconvenient to try and carry on a conversation with a woman who has known you since you were in nappies.” His exasperation made her laugh. “I did come here with a purpose actually, but your little declaration has made it a rather moot point. That isn’t why I was staring, however.”
She knew he was up to something, just as she knew he did not drop by to apologize for missing her dinner party. Her familiarity with him was not an inconvenience for her at all. Her ability to tell what he and her brothers were thinking had saved her from their machinations more than once. She just wished her powers extended to understanding her husband. “Why were you staring then?”
“You look different.” He cocked his head to one side. “I can’t put my finger on it, and I don’t know if I like it either. You just don’t look
like yourself.”
“Then who do I look like?” He really was becoming as annoying as her brothers.
“I’ll let you know when I ferret it out.” Dylan stood and dusted the crumbs from his shirtfront. “And as you are now a boring old married lady, I will leave you to your knitting.”
“You said you had a purpose in coming here, lummox. What was it?” She would very probably regret questioning him further.
“You don’t want to know, Duchess.” He leaned over her and whispered conspiratorially. “It has to do with dogs in trouble.” With a deep bow and a wink, he turned to go.
“Dylan Crosby, don’t you dare get cryptic with me. Tell me what you are talking about this instant.” Adelaide stamped her foot and kicked the tea table in the process.
“Come to Hyde Park tomorrow at five and see. Good afternoon, Your Grace.”
“Oooh!” Adelaide sat down heavily in the chair he had just vacated and propped her foot up on the table. She rubbed her toe through her soft leather slippers. “If he thinks he can pull me back into this business with a vague hint like that after what happened this afternoon he is dicked in the nob.” Her use of one of Sully’s favorite terms made her shake her head. “Some duchess you are, Adelaide.” She propped her elbows on her knees and settled her chin into her hands. “When Marcus hears about this he is going to kill me.”
Marcus. She suddenly remembered the cause of their argument before they left Yorkshire. He was adamant she end her friendship with Dylan. They had not, in fact, spoken of it since that night until a week ago.
“I thought Crosby was supposed to be in Town,” Marcus had announced one morning at breakfast. No preamble, no discussion, just a rather icy statement. Or was it a question?
“I’m sure I don’t know, Selridge. Why do you ask?” Adelaide paused only a moment and then returned to buttering her toast.
“I was certain he would have called on you by now. Perhaps you should send an invitation around to Wessex Place for our dinner party. That is where he stays when he is in Town, isn’t it? No danger of him running into his brother there.”
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