Arrows of Desire: Even Gods Fall in Love, Book 3

by Lynne Connolly

  The duchesse raised her brows. “Do you say? From what I’ve heard, it tends to happen, whether we know it is happening or not.”

  “And what have you heard?” Amidei demanded. He strolled across the room to the sideboard and opened a decanter holding dark red liquid. It glittered through the cut glass. “Port, anyone?”

  Even Portia took a glass. Her father was building up to something and she needed to fortify her spirits. His eyes had narrowed, as they did when he thought over a problem. He wasn’t done here.

  Although unused to port, she enjoyed the rich, fruity kick it delivered to her insides and the boost in her confidence.

  “I have heard that Jupiter married his Juno.” The duchesse took a sip of her wine.

  “Then you heard incorrectly.” Glass in hand, Amidei strolled to the window and glanced outside. “He married the woman he fell in love with. A mortal.”

  The duchesse blinked, then stared at him, eyes wide. “Is that right? Then what about Bacchus?”

  “Bacchus was trapped in the maze, not Theseus, as it was in the original legend. What do we know?” He shrugged again, and his Italian accent reappeared. “The legends may have become garbled.”

  “I see,” the duchesse said. “Then there is no reason that Suadela cannot marry Eros.”

  “Except he is married already.”

  The duchesse smiled slowly and handed her empty glass to Amidei. “I have a contract that says otherwise.”

  “A contract that should be destroyed,” Amidei said. “Do you think because we are both Olympians, I won’t fight for my friends? I consider Portia very much a friend. She has given her reputation and her love to the man who no longer remembers her. Leave them to reconcile themselves to this or I will take action.”

  “Since when did Edmund Welles have a ducal title?” her father interrupted.

  “Since always.” With a swish of silken skirts, Portia walked to her father and stood before him, but instead of bowing her head and accepting his scold, as she had all through her life so far, she faced him boldly. “I didn’t know either. I knew him as Edmund Welles, wealthy gentleman. He concealed his identity because he didn’t know you. The Titans—”

  Her father grimaced. “Yes, I know. Contrary lot, we are. Troubled souls, mostly, with a drive to control.”

  “That’s no jest,” Amidei said, but Portia didn’t take her attention from her father.

  “I have my small kingdom,” he said now, “and I’m content there. I make myself content. I want nothing to do with the trouble they’re causing. It didn’t end happily last time. But I will not stand against them. They are my spiritual brothers and sisters. In the heart, in here.” He struck his chest. “The worst of them have something to redeem them.”

  Tears stung her eyes and filled her throat. He had never spoken that way to her before. “Yes, Papa. I understand.”

  “So do I,” Amidei said softly. “You said it yourself. It’s in your nature.”

  Taking a deep breath, her father turned to confront the duchesse, who stood serenely waiting for them to notice her. Probably because she knew they would. “I like this place. I intend to stay here and bespeak rooms for my wife and daughters. They deserve a London Season. I have kept them confined too long. You may stay if you wish, or you could find a house. I daresay the best ones are spoken for.”

  The duchesse glared at him. “I could stay with my future son-in-law.”

  Portia had enough. With her father, mother and sisters staying here, plus the scheming duchesse and her ward, this was about to become a very full house indeed. “I wish you joy of it.”

  “What do you mean, miss?” her father demanded, and the room erupted once more.

  With a gesture of exasperation, Portia opened the door and went through, taking great pleasure in allowing it to slam behind her. A shame she still held a half-full glass of port, but she dumped it on the demilune table next to the door and continued on her way. Maybe one of the servants would find a bonus in the glass and return it empty. She wished him joy of that too.

  She didn’t stop until she reached her room. Her new maid was there, folding linens. She started back and dropped a curtsey as Portia swept in. “Pack my things,” she snapped. “I don’t intend to shilly-shally any longer. I’m going home.” She snapped her fingers. “Discover where the Duke of Kentmere is tonight. Don’t bother to deny it, I know you can discover that merely by asking a few pertinent questions.”

  Her maid dropped a curtsey. “Your grace, is this wise?”

  “It is none of your concern. Just do as I say.”

  Time to escalate her campaign.

  Edmund didn’t feel like going out that evening, but he was due at Lady Minshull’s. A young duke was always popular and his mantelpiece was crammed with invitations. He’d chosen a large gathering, one of the balls that heralded the start of the Season. Not because he wanted to go, but because there was more safety when a throng was present. He’d make sure he didn’t go into any quiet rooms with young ladies aspiring to become a duchess.

  It appeared he had two of those already.

  Leaving the house, he waved vaguely at the carriage. He hadn’t remembered ordering it. “I’ll walk,” he called to them. The Minshulls lived barely a step away, a street and two squares. He’d acquainted himself with this part of London by walking, one of his favourite pastimes when he had a problem to think over. He needed the time now.

  His response to the woman calling herself his wife disturbed him. He’d read of her antics in the press and admired her for it, but meeting her in person had proved more than interesting. He longed to touch her, thread her hair between his fingers and enjoy its silky shade. Stare into her eyes as he drove into her, watch her when she came.

  Those images came from a part of him that didn’t think or consider anything but his needs. He could not control them.

  And yet he was not enchanted now. He was certain of it. Bacchus had ripped all that out of him. The blow had wiped him clean.

  He mourned the time he had lost, wanted to know what had happened and why he’d behaved as he did. Pricking himself with his own arrow was only part of it, because he still—still!—desired the woman at a level so deep it was as if when they met, something clicked into place.

  He turned the corner, striding easily in the growing gloom of twilight. He would do his duty, attend the functions he was expected to, with his black armband firmly in place. After all, he’d suffered the tragic loss of his mother.

  He would have killed her himself had not someone done it for him. Having a murderess for a mother still beat at his soul—by any standards, she had murdered, and he would not excuse that to himself or anyone else. Did the human side of him have a stain because of the sins of his mother? He had no idea, but he worried about it when the night was at its darkest and he lay awake, waiting for dawn to give him the excuse to get out of bed.

  So he’d have been guilty of matricide had he done as he wished. At least he was spared that.

  Nothing of the happy, plump cherub with the toy bow and arrow remained in him, if it had ever been in place to start with. Cupid had died years ago. Only Eros remained.

  A torch set in its holder outside one of the great houses flared with a sudden gust of wind, and Edmund started. He was close now. Other houses showed signs of people coming and going, all well dressed and chattering, their voices loud in the well-tended streets.

  Watchmen sat in their boxes, as much like upright coffins covered in pitch as anything else. Boxing the watch consisted of mobs of young men turning the box around and pushing it against a wall so the occupant couldn’t get out. Since the watchmen were frequently old and frail, Edmund couldn’t see the attraction himself.

  Around another corner and he was there. Lady Minshull’s wasn’t the only house open to visitors tonight, by the look of it. Gracious buildings, white when built and
now patchy with black soot, ranged around each side of a verdant, railed-in garden, for the use of residents only, even though most of the houses here boasted gracious gardens of their own. It was as much a sign of status than anything else. And unused tonight, except by vagrants brave and nimble enough to clamber over the dangerously spiked iron fences.

  Edmund liked the way people lived cheek by jowl with all classes of life in London. In the country, at his castle in Scotland, he lived in splendour. He didn’t have to see anyone he didn’t want to from one week to the next. He could forget the unfortunate and the criminal people if he wished to. Not that he did, but his mother had preferred to keep them out of sight.

  The door of Lady Minshull’s mansion was flung wide. A flunky stood in the doorway, examining the invitations of the people thronging through, but only those who he deemed unworthy. Edmund received a low bow and a murmured, “Your grace,” as if he didn’t know his own title and needed someone to remind him.

  Inside the well-lit hall, several people bowed to him and he returned their greeting, but didn’t linger. He handed his hat and gloves to the footman and strode upstairs to the main rooms.

  People danced and chatted. Edmund prepared to meet them. His title meant he must keep in touch with people who would help him maintain his position.

  Since the death of his mother, that had become more imperative. The nature of her death meant a great deal of gossip and speculation. He’d given her a better funeral than she deserved.

  “Dear sir,” gushed a particularly attentive matron, “it is so good to see you back in London. We assume we will see you at other events?”

  “Of course. Why should I not?”

  “With all your gallivanting abroad.” The lady flicked open her fan. She affected a heavy maquillage, the white mask of her face already cracking under the heat of a hundred candles. The improved weather had led to warmer nights and perilous situations for the avid wearers of heavy makeup and black patches.

  During the course of an evening the patches tended to head south, with sometimes amusing results, but smiling would have been a sin. This lady’s patch depicting a coach and horses looked as if it was headed over a cliff, tilted alarmingly forward over one of the deeper cracks.

  He wished he had someone to share the sight with. The loneliness that had plagued him for most of his life threatened to come to the fore again.

  He smiled and tried to remember the lady’s name. At public events the guests were sometimes announced, but this was a private function. Everyone was supposed to know everyone else, even a man who’d grown up on a Scottish estate and then spent a year abroad.

  He did not. Choosing the safer way, he addressed her in a way acceptable to most ladies, from beggar to queen. “I must take my duties more seriously, ma’am.”

  “Does that include governing your wife a little closer? Are the reports in the press correct, sir?”

  Edmund gritted his teeth. “To an extent, ma’am. My wife can be headstrong, but she has a sound base.”

  A voice sounded at Edmund’s elbow. One he knew deep in his soul. “Headstrong, sir? The remedy is in your hands. Merely apologise for your unconsidered comments in the country.”

  He almost knocked the fan out of her hand when he jerked around to face her. “Portia!” No other words would come to him, however hard he tried. Instead, all he could do was gape at her like a landed fish.

  She tinkled a laugh. Very pretty. She opened her fan with a tight snap and faced the matron. “I am so sorry, but I must ask my husband to introduce us. I have spent most of my life in the country. My parents were particularly protective of myself and my sisters. When he commanded me to remain in the country so soon after our marriage, I fear I rebelled. Of course, he had matters to attend to, but when I considered he had been alone too long I ventured to join him. He ordered me back to the country. I refused.” A pulse in her throat flickered into life. So she wasn’t so confident, after all.

  Edmund swallowed, then coughed into his hand. At least he could make a sound that way. What in hell was he supposed to do? Introduce her as his duchess? What are you doing?

  The matron was gaping quite as much as he had. Only Portia seemed unaffected. “I believe my husband has something in his throat. We must find him a drink to clear it.” She dropped a curtsey. “Please excuse us, ma’am.”

  She’d used the “ma’am” ploy as well, but she had more reason. She couldn’t be expected to know the identity of—Lady Forrest, that was it. Relief swept into him, but it didn’t last long. What was remembering one woman’s name next to the dilemma of having a woman claiming to be his wife following him into a fashionable ballroom?

  Lady Forrest was still gaping as Portia turned him, laid her hand on his arm and tugged. He had no option but to accompany her. “I’ll say you’re a madwoman,” he murmured through his teeth as he smiled at the company. “I’ll have you locked up.”

  The rumour spread. He could feel it, see it, rippling over the crowded room like the tide coming in. At least a hundred people packed this space. By day it would be a gracious salon, but with the furniture removed or pushed back and a quartet scraping away in the corner it had become a ballroom.

  She ignored his threat. “Maybe we should dance. Then we won’t have to speak to anyone.”

  He jerked his chin to his arm. “I’m in mourning.”

  Understanding filled her eyes, and then her mouth tightened and her eyes widened. “I forgot. I should have one, should I not?”

  “Yes, you should.”

  She stopped and turned to face him. “I thought I’d considered everything. Now they’ll consider me a forward hussy, won’t they? I was so careful! And I suggested dancing?” Horror widened her eyes and tightened the lines about her mouth.

  Theoretically, he had a choice. He could abandon her to her fate or he could support her. That was in theory. Turning his back and letting her cope with the situation on her own didn’t take much effort on his part. All he had to do was walk away.

  Except that would be the most difficult task in the world. How could he do that to her?

  Would he take that course with anyone else? Most certainly. He was a duke, and for all his unconventional origins, he’d been brought up to act like one. Except for a few weeks in Dover, when he’d become someone else entirely.

  Or had he? Was he the title, or was the title just one part of him?

  Gazing at her, he reached behind his head and unfastened the black velvet tie that decorated his hair. Tonight his new valet, ever efficient, had tied a thinner ribbon around it before he’d fastened the more elaborate one over the top so his hair wouldn’t fall down in an untidy cascade.

  “Hold still.” Swiftly he fastened the ribbon around her arm, finishing with a small bow and letting the ends trail loose. “It’s the best I can do.”

  “Thank you.” She spoke in a whisper, her voice barely there.

  It was as if all the courage that had brought her here had evaporated with that one simple mistake. They could have excused it, said she’d lost her armband somewhere, but he wanted her reassured. Wanted to protect her, God save him.

  “Come. We’ll find something to drink,” he said.

  Her smile killed him. She’d forced it, but she was reviving after her setback. This time he took her hand and laid it on his arm, instead of her taking it, and he led her towards the next room. “You look particularly charming tonight.”

  She did. She wore plum, richly embroidered. When she moved, brilliants flashed from the hearts of the lighter embroidery that adorned the hem. The lace ruffle around her throat only emphasised the delicacy of her skin, and intriguingly, she hadn’t powdered her hair. He liked it.

  “Thank you. You’re not the only person with a new servant. Mine is a wood nymph.”

  Nobody was close enough to hear him murmur, “I have a faun.”

  The inti
mate moment felt strangely right. People were watching them, and yet he felt he and Portia were enclosed in a personal bubble nobody else belonged in. Remnants of the spell? He didn’t think so. Perhaps they were merely joining together as immortals.

  She smiled. “You think too much.”

  Oh yes, she’d regained her confidence. She probably didn’t need the glass of chilled white wine he found for her. He certainly needed his.

  They paused by the table that groaned with delicacies. People were approaching once more. Word must have spread by now. Several bore down on them. He felt trapped. “Shall we leave?”

  “No!” She sounded scandalized. “We’ve only just arrived. We cannot behave so arrogantly.”

  “Why not? You’re a duchess, after all.”

  He heard his own words with a kind of detached wonder. When he’d been havering, his mind seemed to have decided on its own, with no help from him. Her shock reverberated through his head. When had she contacted him with her mind? Maybe the reaction was instinctive. Certainly now that she had contacted him, he reciprocated. What else could I do?

  Humiliate me.

  She’d walked into this room knowing a number of things. That once she’d declared herself Edmund’s duchess, she couldn’t go back. No retiring to the country and claiming to be the widow of one Edmund Welles. No denying their marriage. He had only one way to honour that bravery.

  His mouth turned up at the corners and he sipped his wine. “You think so little of me you believed I’d do that?”

  “You thought about it, did you not?”

  So quick with her responses, he’d almost missed the glimmer of uncertainty. She deserved an honest answer. “The thought came into my mind, but I didn’t consider it. That would have been the act of an utter cad.”

  “And you aren’t an utter cad?”

  He gave a mock-wince that wasn’t altogether feigned. “I repeat. Do you think so little of me?”

  She touched the glass to her lips, but did no more than wet them with the wine. When she drew the glass away, a bead of moisture remained on her lower lip. He yearned to touch his tongue there and taste it. That plump sweetness would taste better than the oldest vintage. “It appears I don’t know you as well as I thought.”