by Amelia Grey
She hesitated. Should she infiltrate it?
Maybe just a quick peek inside to satisfy her burgeoning curiosity about the man who now had control over her life.
Without further thought, she stepped over the threshold into the book room and instantly caught the mellow fragrance of beeswax, the acrid smell of burned wood, and the masculine scent of leather. She couldn’t resist turning up the lamp so she could get a better look at the contents of the room.
One side of the room held floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, completely filled. She ran her hand over first one and then another of the thick, handsome, leather-bound volumes of science, history, and poetry. Suddenly she stopped and smiled. The duke even had copies of her favourite books: thin, cheaply bound, horrid novels. It was the largest collection she’d ever seen. She couldn’t help but wonder if the duke had read them all.
A perusal of the spines told her she had read some of them, but not all. Her hand rested on the title The Forbidden Path. That one sounded like a delicious read. She slowly traced her hand across every book, seeing many titles she hadn’t read.
Having all these wonderful books at her fingertips would be heaven—if she were allowed to stay in the duke’s home. After talking to him, that didn’t seem a likely possibility, and that thought caused the same deep longing inside her to have a home of her own.
Surely he wouldn’t mind her borrowing a book to read from one of his well-stocked shelves.
She turned away from that feeling, and the books, to scan the rest of the room. On one wall was a fireplace with a stately mantel that held ornate candlesticks. Soothing warmth emanated from the banked ashes. In front of a set of windows stood the duke’s desk. She felt a little naughty and a little guilty perusing everything without his knowledge or permission, but that didn’t keep Henrietta from walking over to the desk and giving it a closer look.
Two upholstered wingback chairs had been placed in front of a richly dark mahogany desk, and an important-looking leather chair sat on the opposite side. A tall stack of ledger books and several jumbled stacks of envelopes littered the top of the desk, along with many loose sheets of vellum, foolscap, and parchment. There was no place on top of the desk where you could see the fine wood.
How could anyone live with such disarray?
No wonder the duke hadn’t known she would be arriving today! From the looks of all the unopened mail, she would guess it had been weeks, not mere days, since His Grace had tended to his correspondence. A reasonably competent secretary would have this hodgepodge of papers straightened, sorted, and properly filed or answered in no time at all.
Obviously the duke didn’t have a well-organized secretary, or could it be that he didn’t have one at all? No, he was a duke. He probably had more than one secretary taking care of him.
Henrietta remembered him telling her that a lady wasn’t capable of managing an inheritance. What nerve he had to say that when his desk looked like a winter storm had hit it!
Henrietta had no idea how someone as important as a duke could be so neglectful. If this were her desk and she didn’t go crazy from the disorderly look of the stacks of mail, she’d surely die of curiosity from wondering who had written her and what they had to say.
As she stared at the untidy heap of papers, her first impulse was to dash behind the desk to clean up and rearrange everything. She’d start by making the stacks of envelopes neat and tidy. Once that was done, she’d open each letter and scan its contents, determine its significance, and make three orderly stacks: one for things that needed immediate attention, one for things that could be handled at a later date, and one pile for informational letters that needed no reply.
The duke definitely needed a system that sorted his correspondence and a competent secretary to implement it for him.
But no, she couldn’t touch anything on his desk—as much as she wanted to. It would be the height of presumption, not to mention downright disrespectful of his kindness to her. Besides, how his desk looked was no concern of hers.
Reluctantly, she turned away from the untidy desk and focused her attention on the bookshelves again. She found The Forbidden Path, plucked it from the shelf, and tucked it under her arm, determined to leave and go to her room, and read until she fell asleep.
However, she made the mistake of looking at the desk once again and, despite every fiber of her being telling her no, she walked back over to it and stood near enough to touch it.
But she couldn’t touch one thing on the desk.
Not one.
However Blakewell maintained his affairs was none of her concern. Maybe he worked very well with such clutter around him.
Yet… perhaps she would just put the lid on the jar of ink so it wouldn’t dry out, or worse, be spilled on an important document. Yes, leaving an open jar of ink around valuable papers was very dangerous.
“The duke would want me to cap it,” she said to herself as she carefully pushed some papers aside and placed the lamp and book she’d been holding on the edge of the desk.
She reached over a stack of letters, picked up the lid, and carefully secured it on the ink container.
“There,” she said. “That one small thing makes the desk look a little better and safer.”
And maybe she could just straighten the stacks of letters and put them in some kind of order for him. Surely the duke wouldn’t care if she just made them a little neater.
And perhaps she should look through the mail stacks just to see if there was indeed a letter from Mr. Milton. She wouldn’t open it, of course. That would be inexcusable, but if it was there, His Grace would be happy she’d found it for him and put it on the top of a very neat stack.
Wouldn’t he?
Three
My Dearest Lucien,
You may want to recall these wise words from Lord Chesterfield and study on them as you go about your daily duties: “Every man does not pretend to be a poet, a mathematician, or a statesman and considered as such; but every man pretends to common sense.”
Your loving Grandmother,
Lady Elder
BLAKE PULLED ON THE REINS AND SLOWED HIS GELDING to a trot as a group of men standing at the far end of Rotten Row came into view. Dark gray and purple clouds of dusk hung low in the wide blue sky. The fresh, rich smell of early spring foliage and a breezy chill stirred the late afternoon air. Perfect weather for a horse race, but thanks to Miss Tweed, Blake seemed to have missed the entire competition.
His cousin Morgan was easy to spot, not only because he was taller than most of the men standing around him, but because he was the one accepting handshakes and claps on the back, a sure sign that his thoroughbred had won again. Blake wasn’t surprised. Morgan had an eye for good horseflesh, and he seldom bought a loser.
The chestnut-colored stallion stood behind Morgan, stomping and pawing at the earth as if he was ready to run again. The high-strung animal wasn’t accepting his congratulatory pats as graciously as his owner.
Off to the side Blake saw his other cousin, Race. He was talking to the loser and no doubt trying to make the poor fellow and his cronies feel a little better about how much money they had lost.
Blake was friendly enough with his two cousins, but an unspoken rivalry had always simmered just below the surface of their relationships.
To the ton, the three grandsons of Lady Elder always appeared united, taking up for each other if need arose. But when they were alone, it wasn’t unusual for one to try to best the others, be it at shooting, racing, or fencing, though they never admitted to the competition unless it was to gain the favor of a young miss.
They all had their strengths and their weaknesses. The one thing none of them wanted to do first was marry. This unstated vow among them had grown out of frustration with their grandmother’s continuous machinations while she was alive.
Everyone in the ton knew that, before her death, their grandmother had tried many times, by fair means and foul, to force her grandsons to marry. After all, she had
been happily wed four times. Each time she took a husband, she elevated her station in life until finally, late in life, she became the Earl of Elder’s countess. But not even vast fortunes had tempted Blake or his two cousins to propose matrimony to any of the young ladies who fancied them.
Decades earlier, Lady Elder had successfully married off each of her three daughters to titled gentlemen, making her the most famous woman of her time. In turn, each daughter had given her a grandson, all in the same year. The firstborn grandson was Lucas Randolph Morgandale, who became the ninth Earl of Morgandale. The second was Alexander Mitchell Raceworth, who became fourth Marquis of Raceworth.
Blake was the youngest grandson by nine months, and Race and Morgan had never let him forget it, even after his father died and he became a duke, outranking them both.
All three cousins were tall, handsome, and available. They were continually sought after by young misses, aging widows, and beautiful heiresses, but all three men happily remained bachelors in the beginning of their thirtieth years.
Blake stopped his mount not far from the excited men and jumped down from the saddle. The group had thinned to only a few as he walked his gelding toward Morgan. Now that he was closer, Blake saw that one of the men still in the park was Clayton Rockcliffe, the ninth Duke of Rockcliffe, along with his tag-along brother Lord Waldo. Blake had never considered Rockcliffe a good friend and, after a high-stakes card game a few weeks earlier in which Blake was sure the man had cheated to win, he didn’t like the fellow.
It was ridiculous the way Lord Waldo followed his brother everywhere—and that Rockcliffe tolerated it. Blake couldn’t imagine having such a constant shadow.
He had always detested the advice his grandmother sent him each month from her dear, departed friend Lord Chesterfield, but the man had hit on a few truths in his long and utterly useless letters to his son. One of them was that if a man would cheat at a game of cards, he’d cheat at everything else in his life.
Until Blake had become a duke two years earlier, Rockcliffe was the most eligible man in England since, at the time, he was the only unmarried duke. Because of his much younger age and good looks, Blake had taken the title of most-sought-after bachelor away from Rockcliffe and, in subtle ways, Rockcliffe had let him know he didn’t like having a rival.
Blake nodded to one of the men he passed, shook hands with another, and completely ignored Rockcliffe and Lord Waldo as he made his way over to Morgan and Race.
“If you were going to be so late as to miss the contest, Lucien, why show up at all?” Morgan asked as the last well-wisher walked away.
Blake frowned at his cousin and threw his horse’s reins over the saddle horn. Morgan knew Blake hated to be called by his first name, the name only his grandmother had used. He knew Morgan wasn’t happy that he had been delayed, and calling him “Lucien” was his attempt to get back at him. Morgan, the eldest of the three cousins, was a stickler for convention, and he wanted to make his annoyance clear that Blake hadn’t been there to see his horse’s latest win.
Ignoring Morgan’s pointed remark, Blake walked over and patted the warm, firm neck of the thoroughbred. The animal snorted and shook his head at the attention.
Blake never intended to be late for anything, but far too many times he seemed to arrive past the appointed hour. He wasn’t sure why, but time wasn’t something that he usually paid much attention to.
In hopes of making light of his tardiness, Blake said, “Was it Lord Chesterfield who said ‘Better late than never?’”
Morgan grunted as the wind whipped a strand of long dark hair across his face. “If he did, he was wrong about that, and he was wrong about all the other bloody things he wrote in those damn letters.”
“Don’t get so riled, Morgan,” Race said, jumping into the conversation. “And you know very well our grandmother said that herself about being late. Who the bloody hell knows where she heard it or whether she just made it up? But we all know she attributed every blasted thing she ever wrote to us or said to us as coming from her good friend Lord Chesterfield.”
Blake grinned at Race even though he didn’t need his intervention where Morgan was concerned. If there was any controversy, Race wasn’t one to be left out.
“Actually I believe the phrase was first noted in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales,” Blake offered, “but then do any of us really give a damn who first said the words?”
“Hell no, we don’t care,” Race said with a grin, “but our grandmother sure did.”
At that, Morgan grinned, too. “You’re both right; no one cares.”
“Is Gibby already gone?” Blake asked, not seeing the old man. Sir Randolph Gibson considered himself a grandfatherly figure to the three cousins, though he had no blood connection to them.
“Like you, he was a no-show,” Morgan said. “But he had manners enough to send over a note saying that he couldn’t be here.”
“That’s rare for him to miss a race,” Race said, a wrinkle forming between his brows.
“Most unusual. In his note, he mentioned he was meeting with someone who wanted him to invest in a fleet of hot-air balloons.”
“A fleet? You can’t be serious,” Race said.
“Gibby can’t be serious,” Blake added.
“There’s only one way to find out.” Morgan turned to Blake. “And I believe it’s your turn to see what the old man is up to now.”
Of late, Sir Randolph Gibson’s mind seemed to be failing him when it came to good common sense and sound business decisions. This hot-air balloon idea sounded very much like two other outlandish ventures in which he had recently invested and that had ended with major financial repercussions to his income. The three cousins felt duty bound to watch out for him, not only because their grandmother had asked them to, but because Gibby had been such a constant companion to her during the last few years of her life.
“I’ll make a point of visiting him tomorrow to try to find out who’s after his fortune this time—and what I can do about it.”
“Let us know what you find out,” Race said.
“Or if you need any help,” Morgan added.
Blake nodded and then took off his hat and ran a gloved hand through his hair. “Sorry I missed the race, Morgan. I was unexpectedly tied up with something urgent this afternoon.”
“No doubt your mistress had you tied to her bed,” Race said with a laugh.
A picture of the very proper Miss Tweed flashed in Blake’s mind. No, he couldn’t see her ever being uninhibited enough to go for that kind of sport.
“Don’t answer that,” Morgan said. “We really don’t want to hear about your escapades with your latest mistress.”
“Speak for yourself, Morgan,” Race said with a mocking sparkle in his dark eyes. “I might be interested in hearing a few particulars. Not too many, Cousin, mind you, but a few details could be, shall we say, intriguing if not instructive for us.”
“Back to the reason I’m here,” Blake said, ignoring Race’s ribald comment. “Congratulations on the win, Morgan, though I never had any doubts what the outcome would be.”
Blake pulled a clump of sugar out of his pocket and held it up to Morgan with a questioning expression on his face. Morgan nodded his consent, and Blake gave the sweet to the stallion.
“And what about your winnings?” Morgan asked as his horse snorted and pulled at his bit, looking for more of the treat in Blake’s outstretched hand. “Or did you bet against me this time?”
“You know better than to even suggest that,” Race said, taking up for Blake again.
“Sorry, ole chap. I didn’t get my bets placed on this one. I had planned to do it today before coming over here, but with all that I had to do, the time just got away from me.”
“At least you can make it up to Morgan by being his partner in the card game tonight,” Race said. “Rockcliffe and Lord Waldo are coming. I know you’ve wanted to have a go at Rockcliffe for weeks now.”
Months.
“Yes, how m
uch was it you lost to him the last time you played him?” Morgan asked Blake as he handed the reins of his horse over to his groom, leaving the three of them alone.
“More than I care to remember,” he answered his oldest cousin as he looked behind him and saw Rockcliffe and Lord Waldo riding away, their impressive horses kicking up dust from the road.
“Or more than you’ll ever forget,” Race said with a grin.
“I guess it could be said that way,” Blake answered, turning to Race. “Sorry, but something has come up, and I can’t make your card game tonight.”
“Why the hell not? Are you going back to see Constance?”
“Or, perhaps you’ve finally found another mistress?” Morgan questioned.
“As a matter of fact, I am going to see Constance, but not for the reason either of you are implying.”
Both his cousins’ expressions indicated they didn’t believe him.
“I get the feeling there’s something you’re not telling us,” Morgan said.
“No. There’s something I’ve been trying to tell you ever since I got here, but the two of you seem more interested in idle chatter.”
“Then out with it,” Morgan said.
Blake wasn’t sure where he needed to start or just how much he wanted to tell his cousins, so he simply said, “A young lady showed up at my house this afternoon and promptly told me I was her guardian.”
“What?” Morgan asked.
“Are you sure?” Race echoed.
“Of course I’m sure. I haven’t seen documentation to back her claim, but she seems very credible to me.”
Morgan grunted. “There’s a scoundrel born every day who thinks he can pull the wool over a nobleman’s eyes, Blake. No doubt some man is out to make fast blunt and has put her up to something sinister.”
Blake hadn’t gotten that feeling at all. Miss Tweed appeared legitimate in every way.
“Did she have any kind of proof to back up such a claim?” Race asked.
“None with her,” Blake answered.
“Not surprising,” Morgan said. “Besides, there is no way this could be true. You’re not old enough or wise enough to be the guardian of anyone.”