Christian Seaton: Duke of Danger

by Carole Mortimer

  She would be disgraced, a laughing stock, and her poor papa would never recover from the humiliation caused by his French daughter.

  ‘How could you do such a thing?’ Her voice broke emotionally. ‘I have tried so hard to be everything that was expected of me. Have suffered through such torments with the dressmakers and milliners and dance instructor, and now it has all been for naught. I am disgraced, will have to retire to the country, become what the English call an Old Maid—’ She stopped as Christian gave another roar of laughter.

  Indeed, he laughed so loudly and for so long Lisette seriously feared for his sanity.

  ‘Your amusement at my expense is most unwelcome, Christian,’ she informed him haughtily when that laughter at last seemed to be abating.

  He gave a shake of his head. ‘One thing you will never be is an Old Maid, Lisette!’

  ‘You— What are you doing?’ she squeaked in surprise as he fell to his knees in front of her. ‘You must get up!’ She attempted—and failed utterly—to take him by the hands and pull him back up onto his perfectly shod feet. ‘I expect only a few words of apology from you, Christian, not this—this— What is it that you are doing?’ She frowned her consternation at his unusual behaviour.

  ‘I am trying to ask you to marry me. Not very successfully, I admit,’ he acknowledged drily. ‘But that could be because the object of my affections is too busy berating me to listen to me— Lisette...?’ He voiced his concern as she released his hands to stagger away from him until she could go no further, back resting against the balustrade, hand clasped to her breast. ‘Lisette—’

  ‘Remain exactly where you are!’ She now held her hands up in warning as Christian rose to his feet with the intention of going to her. ‘You— This is— I—’ She gave a shake of her head. ‘You should not play with me in this cruel manner,’ she admonished huskily. ‘It is wholly unworthy of you.’

  Christian tilted his head to one side as he studied the pallor of Lisette’s face. Unless he was mistaken, there were tears in those sapphire-blue eyes, her cheeks were pale, her bottom lip trembling slightly, as if she was barely retaining control of those tears.

  He stepped forward. ‘Maystone should have decked you out in sapphires to match your eyes rather than those pearls.’

  ‘He said—’

  ‘Yes?’

  She swallowed. ‘He said that it was the role of my future husband to give me sapphires.’

  Christian would have fought Maystone for Lisette if he’d had to do so, but he knew in that moment that he had not misunderstood the other man’s nod of approval just a short time ago; the Sutherland sapphires—earbobs, a necklace and bracelet—were always given to the new Duchess by her Duke to wear on their wedding day.

  ‘He was quite right; it is.’ Christian took another step forward, to stand only inches in front of her. ‘I do apologise most sincerely if I embarrassed you with my flamboyant method of leaving the ballroom, Lisette. My only excuse is that I was just so pleased to see you, to be with you again, that I wished to express my joy by holding you in my arms again.’

  A frown creased her brow. ‘You saw and spoke with me two hours ago when you arrived...’

  ‘I saw and spoke to Miss Lisette Maystone,’ he corrected huskily. ‘It was my Lisette whom I came here to see, and now that I have...’ He clasped both her hands in his and fell to his knees in front of her again. ‘Lisette—darling, wonderful Lisette—will you marry me and make me the happiest man in England? No, not just England—the whole world!’

  It was the second time in as many minutes that Christian had mentioned marriage to Lisette. But he could not seriously be proposing marriage to her.

  Could he...?

  Of all the people present here this evening, Christian knew her true story rather than the one that Lord Maystone had chosen to share with society: a tragic tale of love and loss, resulting in him at last being able to claim his long-lost daughter.

  Christian knew that story to be completely false. Knew too that her mother had been in the past, but was no longer, thank goodness, an enemy to both England and the Crown.

  Dukes did not marry women such as she.

  Nor, as she knew to her humiliation, did they take them as their mistress either.

  She pulled her hands free of his. ‘I have no idea why you have chosen to deliberately humiliate and hurt me in this way—perhaps as recompense for my mother’s actions last month, I do not know—but I do not deserve such mockery from you. My father certainly does not deserve for you to have behaved in such a fashion in his own home.’

  All humour had gone from his expression. ‘Your answer is no, then?’

  ‘There was never any real question, so there can be no answer either!’ She moved aside and swept past him towards the doorway, and the humiliation that would now be her lot in life.

  ‘Lisette, I love you!’

  Lisette froze in the doorway leading back into the ballroom, her breath caught in her throat, her heart pounding loudly in her chest. Seconds later she felt the heat of Christian’s body against her back as he moved to stand behind her.

  ‘Lisette, I love you,’ he repeated forcefully. ‘I want to marry you, to make you my duchess—’

  She spun around in his arms, her gloved hands pressed against his chest as she looked up searchingly into his oh-so-handsome and dearly beloved face, the love he proclaimed shining brightly, steadily in his beautiful lavender-coloured eyes.

  She swallowed. ‘You love me...?’

  ‘I do,’ he stated firmly as he took her hands in his and pressed them to his chest, allowing Lisette to feel the rapid beating of the heart he claimed was hers. ‘So much that at this moment I am even prepared to forgive your father for being a wily old fox. Maystone is responsible for us not seeing each other this past month, Lisette,’ he explained as she frowned her lack of understanding. ‘Every time I called at Maystone House I was either told you were out or unavailable. I believe now that was on your father’s instructions.’

  She swallowed. ‘But why?’

  ‘Because he knew I love you. Marcus knows I love you. Julianna knows I love you. Damn it, I do believe everyone has known I love you except for me!’ He gave a self-disgusted shake of his head, his hands tightening about hers. ‘Could you not just love me a little bit in return, Lisette?’ He looked down at her earnestly. ‘I promise if you agree to marry me you will never have cause to regret it. As my duchess you will be the most cherished, the most loved woman in all the world—’

  ‘A duke does not marry a woman like me—’

  ‘What does that even mean?’ he dismissed impatiently. ‘You are a woman of great courage, honesty and loyalty. A woman who was not afraid to risk her own life to save mine—’

  ‘Helene has said those men were not instructed to kill, only to issue a warning.’ Lisette spoke distractedly, huskily, such hope building in her heart she was afraid to let it loose in case her chest was not large enough to contain it.

  ‘You did not know that,’ Christian insisted. ‘Any more than you knew those men would have fled by the time you reached my carriage. You came rushing out into the street anyway, staunched my wound, drove my carriage home, tended my wounds and Pierre’s—he is completely recovered, by the way. François sent word just last week.’

  ‘I am glad.’ Lisette nodded.

  ‘Lisette...darling Lisette,’ Christian groaned. ‘I have been such a fool—that arrogant, pompous ass—for not telling you, for not realising how much I love you. I believe I fell in love with you at first sight. I know I could not take my eyes from you, and that I incurred your mother’s wrath because of it.’ He gave a rueful grimace. ‘Each time we met after that I fell a little harder, a little deeper, until my love for you now consumes my every waking moment. I cannot sleep. I cannot eat. Marcus assures me I have been insufferable this past month.�
��

  The hope in Lisette’s heart grew to unbearable proportions. ‘If you marry me, the illegitimate daughter of Lord Maystone, you will be risking incurring the condemnation of society—’

  ‘I do not give a damn for what society thinks or says.’ He waved an impatient hand. ‘Besides which, none would dare to gainsay Lord Maystone, his friend the Prince Regent and all of the Dangerous Dukes.’

  Lisette looked up at him searchingly. ‘You believe your friends will publicly support you in this...this endeavour?’

  ‘I know they will,’ he asserted without hesitation. ‘And it would not matter to me if they did not. I shall marry where and with whom I choose. And I choose you, Lisette. Indeed, if you will not agree to marry me then there will be no Duchess of Sutherland.’ His gaze softened. ‘Can you not love me just a little in return, Lisette? Will you not marry me and save me from the long and unhappy life of being a Taciturn Bachelor to your Old Maid?’

  Hope burgeoned in Lisette’s chest, flying free and carrying her with it as she allowed the last of her concerns—for Christian, not for herself—to be satisfied, dismissed as if they had never been.

  Christian loved her.

  He wished to marry her.

  It was more—so very much more—than she had ever dared hope or pray for during this month of not seeing or hearing from him. Her father truly was a ‘wily old fox’.

  She looked up at him with her own love for him shining brightly in her eyes. ‘I believe I have loved you since that first night too, Christian,’ she admitted huskily. ‘I—’

  ‘You love me?’ He pounced eagerly, his hands tightening painfully about hers. ‘You love me, Lisette?’

  ‘Of course I love you, you silly man.’ She reached up to curve her hand lovingly about the hardness of his cheek. ‘I love you very much, and of course I will marry you, Christian Algernon Augustus Seaton.’

  Christian gave a shout of exultant laughter as he swept her up into his arms and began to kiss her with a thoroughness that took her breath away.

  He loved.

  And he was loved.

  By his outrageous, his darling, his wonderfully unorthodox Lisette.

  He asked for no greater happiness than that.

  Epilogue

  Six weeks later, St George’s Church,

  Hanover Square

  ‘Do stop fidgeting with your necktie, Christian; you are starting to make me feel nervous too!’

  Christian gave Worthing a baleful glance as the two of them sat at the front of the church awaiting Lisette’s arrival. His beautiful Lisette. Shortly to become his wife, his duchess and his companion for the rest of their lives together.

  ‘I seem to remember you being in just such a state on the day you married my sister Julianna,’ he drawled mockingly.

  ‘Yes. Well.’ Marcus turned to give his wife an affectionate smile. She sat on the pew just behind them, next to a heavily veiled Helene Rousseau, here today to witness her daughter’s wedding.

  Julianna had given birth three weeks early to Worthing’s son and heir, Peter Matthew Joshua Timothy Wilding. That young man had been left at home with his wet nurse today, but the three would be united following the wedding breakfast.

  Christian was amazed at how quickly his brother-in-law had taken to fatherhood, young Peter with his parents constantly when they did not have other commitments.

  All of the Dangerous Dukes were present in the church today, along with their wives.

  Zachary Black, the Duke of Hawkesmere, and his lovely duchess Georgianna, their baby son also at home with his nanny.

  Darian Hunter, the Duke of Wolfingham, along with his beautiful duchess Mariah, their first child due to arrive on Christmas Day.

  Rufus Drake, the Duke of Northamptonshire, and his mischievous duchess Anna. Those two had recently learned that their family was also to increase in the spring.

  Griffin Stone, the Duke of Rotherham; often too serious in the past, Griffin had at last found true happiness with his duchess Bea. And, from the look of Bea’s glow today, Christian would not be at all surprised if the two of them very shortly shared news of their own increasing family.

  All of them were here—all of the women having become fast friends, all of the gentlemen having survived their years as agents for the Crown, before just as happily retiring from that endeavour now they had become married men. Some of them were battle-scarred, admittedly, but they had survived and without exception had found their true, their real happiness in the women they loved and who loved them in return.

  As Christian had with Lisette.

  Which was why he was becoming more and more agitated as the seconds ticked by after the appointed time of twelve o’clock for their wedding ceremony to begin. Where was she—?

  Ah.

  Christian breathed a sigh of relief as the organ music began to play in announcement of his bride’s arrival, he and Worthing both standing as the Vicar moved into his place at the altar.

  It was too much to expect Christian not to turn and look at the woman he loved and who had consented to become his wife, his duchess.

  Lisette walked slowly, gracefully on her proudly beaming father’s arm, a vision in white, the smile upon her lips only for Christian. The love glowing in her eyes only for him.

  His Lisette.

  The woman he loved and was about to happily pledge to love and cherish for the rest of their lives together.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from THE SOLDIER’S REBEL LOVER by Marguerite Kaye.

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  The Soldier's Rebel Lover

  by Marguerite Kaye

  Chapter One

  Basque Country, Spain—July 1813

  Major Finlay Urquhart of the Ninety-Second Regiment of Foot scanned the rough terrain through the eyepiece of his field telescope, his senses on full alert. ‘Got ye!’ he whispered to himself with grim satisfaction.

  The French arms dump was partially concealed, set in the lee of a nearby hillock. It was obviously a large cache and therefore a strategically important discovery, especially if it could be destroyed before Wellington began his siege of the nearby fortress at San Sebastian. There were no guards present that he could discern, but they could not be far away, and might return at any time. The French army was severely stretched in the aftermath of the Battle of Vitoria, where they had sustained heavy losses, but even against their presumably depleted defences, any planned assault on the arms cache would carry significant risk, since it was located some distance behind enemy lines.

  As was he, Finlay reminded himself. The light was fading fast, and with it any chance of making it back to base tonight, for his journey would take him through some treacherous and hostile terrain. It would be much more prudent to hole up for the night under cover in the small, heavily wooded copse a couple of miles distant where he’d tethered his horse.

  ‘Aye, and Prudence is my middle name, right enough,’ Finlay muttered to himself. Despite the perilous nature of his situation, he couldn’t help grinning at his own joke. With any luck, he could be back in camp and feastin
g on a hot breakfast not long after sunrise.

  He could not have said what it was that put him on his guard. A change in the quality of the silence, perhaps. Maybe the fact that the hairs on the back of his neck were standing up. A sense, acute and undeniable, that he was not alone. Definitely. Finlay’s hand moved automatically to the holster that held his pistol, but the failing light, and fear of the sound it would make when he primed it, made him hesitate and reach instead for his dirk, the lethal Scottish dagger he carried in his belt.

  His ears pricked, Finlay listened intently. A faint scrabbling was coming from the ditch on the other side of the rough track. A rat? No, it sounded like something much larger. He waited on high alert, crouched in his own ditch, and was rewarded by the faint outline of a man’s head peering cautiously out. No cap, but it could only be a French sentry, for who else would be concealed here, so close to the arms cache? He could wait it out and pray he was not discovered, but sixteen years in the army had taught Finlay the value of the pre-emptive strike. Taking the sgian-dubh, the other, shorter dagger he carried tucked into his hose, in his other hand, he launched himself at the enemy.

  The Frenchman was in the act of aiming his pistol as Finlay threw himself at him, knocking his arm high and sending the gun spiralling harmlessly into the air. The man fought like a dervish despite his slight physique, but Finlay had experience and his own considerable brawn on his side. Within moments, he had the man subdued, wrists yanked painfully together behind his back, the glittering blade of the dirk only a hair’s breadth from the French soldier’s throat.

  ‘Make one sound and, by all that is holy, I promise you it will be your last,’ Finlay growled in guttural French.

  His captive strained in Finlay’s iron grasp. He tightened his grip on the man’s wrists, noting with surprise how slender and delicate they were. Now that he was close up, Finlay could see he was not, in fact, wearing a French uniform. What was more, as he struggled frantically to free himself, it became clear that there was something much more profoundly incongruous about his captive.