A Duke in Need of a Wife

by Annie Burrows

  ‘Not at all. I don’t mind the dark, either.’ Snowball, hearing the two humans speaking to each other in friendly tones, sat down, her tail thumping gently on the floor. ‘And I totally agree that we would not wish anyone to know what we are up to. I mean,’ she corrected herself hastily, ‘not that we are doing anything wrong. Well, not all that wrong, but...’

  It was strange, but even though she could not see more than his outline, she could tell that he was smiling.

  ‘You understand that I do not want to appear to favour any of my...female guests, by openly spending more time with one, than another.’

  ‘Yes.’ They were competitive enough as it was, without him giving any of them an excuse to think they were in the lead.

  ‘But I needed to speak to you, in complete privacy, regarding Olivia.’

  ‘Olivia?’

  ‘The little girl you met in the woods this morning. The one who hid up a tree rather than speak to me. The one you shielded from any possible repercussions from her avoiding her lessons.’

  ‘Olivia,’ she echoed. Named after him. She’d seen his name, Oliver, printed on the invitation Uncle Ned had tossed on the breakfast table. If anything had been required to confirm her suspicions about her parentage, that name did it. ‘I don’t think she was hiding from you, specifically. In fact,’ she said, deciding she might as well tell him the truth, ‘I know she wasn’t. Because she told me that your guests are not supposed to know of her existence.’

  ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘I do not want her exposed to unkindness.’

  ‘Then you ought not to have let people refer to her as the Duke’s Disgrace,’ she snapped.

  ‘The...what?’ He sounded shocked.

  ‘The Duke’s Disgrace. That’s what she said she was. And that she was not supposed to talk to respectable people.’

  The Duke made a low growling noise. ‘She is not a disgrace. The disgrace, if there was any, was her mother’s.’

  ‘Oh, so now you are blaming the woman you...you...well, I suppose you are going to say it was her fault she bore your child!’

  ‘On the contrary, it took two of us to conceive my daughter. Her fault was in concealing the child from me. If I had known about her from the first...’ He moved away from Sofia and paced back and forth a couple of times. ‘I only learned of Livvy’s existence a few months ago, when one of...her mother’s colleagues brought her to my London house. Left her on my doorstep, like an unwanted package,’ he said in a tone of outrage. ‘Said there was no money left and that it was my responsibility to provide for her no matter what her mother’s wishes had been.’

  He stopped talking but, head bowed, continued pacing back and forth as though wrestling with extreme emotion. Sofia had certainly detected both outrage and hurt in what he’d told her this far. Even though she couldn’t see his face very clearly, both emotions were pouring off him in waves.

  Since it looked as though it might take him some time to regain sufficient control to be able to speak of his daughter in the cool, practical manner he liked to show the world, she looked round for somewhere to sit down. Beneath one of the window embrasures was what appeared to be a small sofa. She made for it and since she didn’t want the Duke to accidentally tread on Snowball in the dark, she snapped her fingers, making the dog come and curl up at her feet.

  ‘I do not intend to provide you with the details of the relationship I had with Livvy’s mother,’ he bit out. ‘You are an innocent and should not...’

  ‘Excuse me, but I know a great deal more about the kinds of relationships men have with ladies, outside marriage, than you might think. After my mother died, my father had a whole string of them. Living with us.’

  ‘Like a harem?’ He sounded shocked. So shocked that he stopped pacing and stood staring at her. She could just make out his features by the moonlight that was peeking in through some tiny, triangular openings high up near the roof, now that her eyes were growing used to the gloom.

  ‘What? No!’ She thought back over what she’d said. ‘He didn’t have them all living with us at once. One at a time.’

  ‘Still,’ he said. And then began pacing again, as though he was more comfortable doing that than looking at her directly while making his confession.

  ‘Livvy’s mother died only a few months ago. And apparently her dying request was that her colleagues should look after her daughter, which they did to start with, while touring the provinces.’

  ‘Ah, that explains it.’

  ‘Explains what?’ He sounded affronted.

  ‘Oh, just something Livvy said about actresses. It sounded very odd, at the time, but now I can see that it was because she has nothing but the highest regard for them.’

  ‘Regard? For creatures who couldn’t wait to wash their hands of her, the minute their troupe returned to London? Not that I mind for my own sake, but it...confused her. They appear to have treated her like a little pet while she was with them. So to deposit her with a man who was a total stranger to her...well, you can imagine what effect that had.’

  She didn’t need to imagine it. She knew almost exactly what it felt like, having gone through a similar experience herself. Maria had put on such a great show of doting on her that both she and her papa had trusted her completely. But the moment her papa had died Maria had shown her true colours. After that betrayal Sofia had found it hard to trust anyone. For a very long time.

  He stood still, his head bowed. ‘I find it hard to forgive her mother. What was she thinking?’

  ‘Well, I don’t suppose she was thinking of dying and leaving her daughter at all.’

  He made a strange, choking laugh. ‘No. She never did strike me as being the sort of woman who planned anything. Impulsive. Generous. That was Ruby.’ He suddenly stood up straighter, as though pulling himself together. ‘But it is not of her that I wish to speak with you. I wanted to know whether you had deduced that Livvy is my natural daughter and, if so...’

  ‘Of course I did. The fact that she described herself as the Duke’s Disgrace made it pretty obvious,’ she said drily. ‘Even if she were not so very like you in looks.’

  ‘To which I drew your attention this afternoon, in the portrait gallery.’

  ‘Which confirmed what I’d already suspected.’

  ‘You are not shocked? Or...disapproving?’

  ‘The only thing of which I disapprove is that someone should make her feel not good enough to mix with what she terms respectable people.’ She’d lived with that feeling herself, so knew how crushing it could be.

  ‘For which you blame me.’

  ‘Well, you are her father. You are the one who is hiding her away...’

  ‘For her own protection. You have no idea how unkind people can be to children...’

  ‘Oh, can’t I?’ Then she bit down on her lower lip. ‘That is, a child who has lost her mother is unlikely to be happy, even if the people who take her in do their very, very best.’ Which Uncle Ned and Aunt Agnes had done. It wasn’t their fault she’d been so unhappy with them to start with. She’d been mourning her father and reeling from the aftermath of losing his protection. Now that she was older, and less suspicious of everyone’s motives, she could see that they had their reasons for the way they’d acted. Reasons which she would not have understood at all had they tried to explain them to her when she’d first gone to live with them.

  But he suddenly strode forward and stood right in front of her, so that she had to crane her neck to look up at him. ‘That is why I hoped you would understand and sympathise with Livvy. You know exactly what it is like to be removed from your natural sphere and be thrust into a world for which you are not prepared.’

  ‘Yes, but...’

  ‘Livvy needs you. Someone like you, to replace the mother she lost. I cannot do it alone. I... I have no notion of what a small child needs. Let alone one who appears to have had such a
close bond with her own mother.’

  ‘But...’

  ‘I touched upon my own childhood this afternoon, did I not? I couldn’t say much in front of the others, but I don’t want Livvy to endure what I did. The moment I saw her, standing on my hearthrug, her eyes half full of fear, and half defiance, I knew exactly how she felt. It was the way I felt when one of the housemaids dropped me off in the house of my new foster parents. And there was Perceval, telling me I ought to send Livvy to the same sort of place. But how could I farm her out to people who would only take care of her because I paid them to? My instinct was to sweep her up and bring her here, and...’ He stopped. ‘Well, at that point I ran out of ideas. I did hire a governess and a nurse and a maid, but...’ He raised both hands to his head briefly before flinging them wide. ‘None of them are making up for her losing her mother. Instead of growing used to her new life, every day she seems to become increasingly unhappy.’

  Sofia wasn’t surprised, if some of the staff were telling Livvy that she was a disgrace who wasn’t fit to speak to so-called respectable people.

  ‘So I decided I would marry and bring some female here to live with us, a woman who would know how to care for a lonely, orphaned little girl. A woman who wouldn’t despise Livvy because I hadn’t been married to her mother.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ she said. So that was why he’d suddenly started looking seriously for a wife, after so many years of appearing unattainable. Nothing to do with a feud with his stepmother at all. It was for Livvy.

  ‘But...how will you know she doesn’t? I mean...oh, dear.’ Was she going to have to tell him about Maria? Though she’d never told anyone else, she couldn’t stand back and let another little girl go through what she had, because that girl’s father had been taken in by a pretty face and a caressing manner. ‘No, no, Oliver,’ she stood up so she could put her point across, face to face. ‘You cannot trust the welfare of your daughter to anyone else. Not even a wife. Any woman could deceive you into thinking she would be kind, in order to gain the title of Duchess.’

  ‘But she needs a mother.’

  ‘No, she doesn’t. I never had one—at least, I don’t remember her—and my father was...well, actually, he did make a lot of mistakes. But I never doubted he loved me and was doing his best for me. Even if many people thought it wasn’t a very good best.’

  The Duke made a strange sound, like a choked laugh. She supposed it was on account of the very ungrammatical way she’d expressed herself.

  ‘I do need to find a duchess, though.’

  ‘Well, I’m sure you will, one day. But surely that is a separate issue from doing what’s best for Livvy?’

  ‘No, it isn’t.’ He whirled away and started pacing again. ‘It’s all bound up together. My Duchess will be the woman who, eventually, will launch Livvy into society. She needs to show her how to stand up for herself. Needs to teach her how to defend herself from the malicious gossip that the circumstances surrounding her birth are bound to cause.’

  ‘That’s all very well. But what about you?’

  ‘Me?’ He stopped pacing. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, what do you want from marriage?’

  ‘I have just told you. I want a woman who will be a mother to Livvy and a duchess upon whom I can depend.’ He turned and started pacing again. ‘I hope that my Duchess will share my political views and support me in my aims.’

  ‘And those are?’

  He paused, as though choosing his words carefully before starting to pace again. ‘Because of my childhood I have seen how the underprivileged have to live. The means they must employ simply to put food on the table. And now I am one of the wealthiest men in England. I want to... I need to have a duchess at my side who will agree that something needs to be done to address the current imbalance. In a measured, lawful manner, naturally. We don’t want our country flung into the kind of turmoil they experienced in France. Therefore, those of us who have the power to make changes need to do so before desperate men take the law into their own hands.’

  Golly. She would never have guessed, from his haughty, forbidding manner that he could feel so passionate about reform. ‘Golly,’ she said out loud.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’ He came to a dead halt and looked at her intently.

  She shook her head. ‘Oliver, you clearly have very noble ambitions. But...what about love? Oh...’ she put out her hand before he could give her a set-down ‘...I know you mistrust the emotion, but without it...’ She took a step in his direction. ‘If your wife cannot love you, she will be neither a good mother, nor a good duchess. If you must marry, you should find a woman who will love Livvy because she loves you. And who will support your work for the same reason. And more than that...’ She took a deep breath, the way she would if she was going to dive into the lower lake, since she knew she was likely to get an equally chilling reception. ‘You deserve to be loved. And don’t say it’s not true. Everyone deserves to be loved.’

  ‘You...’ He swallowed. ‘You take my breath away. I never thought...’

  And then suddenly he was right in front of her. ‘Thank you,’ he said huskily.

  The next thing she knew, he’d put his arms round her waist and was kissing her. She was so surprised that she gasped. At which point, he deepened the kiss.

  And even though she was amazed he was doing this, even though a part of her knew it was wrong to be kissing a man, in the dark, in a secluded part of the estate, it felt so amazing that she made no protest whatsoever. In fact, after grabbing hold of his waist to steady herself against the onslaught of his mouth, she slid her arms round to his back, just to have something solid to hang on to, since her head was spinning and the bones seemed to have dissolved out of her legs.

  Her first kiss. Oh, it was lovely. Much, much nicer than she’d ever thought a kiss could be. It filled her whole being with a sort of fizzy joy. It made her want to run and dance, and wriggle closer to him, all at once.

  Which she must not do. It was all very well basking in all that masculine admiration, for a moment or two. But it wouldn’t do to let this amazing man keep on kissing her for very long. Or he would think she was no better than she ought to be.

  So she slid her hands to his chest and gently pushed against it, while, very regretfully, tilting her head to one side.

  ‘Oliver,’ she whispered, the moment she’d managed to untangle her lips from his. ‘We mustn’t...’

  He stiffened. ‘No, you are right. Someone is coming.’

  And then she noticed shadows dancing crazily upon the ceiling and walls. And the unmistakable sound of footsteps crunching across gravel.

  ‘Quick,’ he growled and tugged her behind the sofa, pushing her down on to the floor.

  ‘Snowball,’ she hissed. ‘Here, girl.’ The dog wriggled right under the sofa and lay down with her head on her paws as though delighted to be playing a new game which involved her mistress diving behind furniture with a duke.

  But Sofia was trembling and her heart was pounding. And not because she was afraid of being discovered in the summer house at dead of night. Or not altogether. No, she was fairly sure that it had more to do with the fact that the Duke had his arm round her waist and was breathing hotly down her ear, and in the confined space behind the sofa, they were plastered so closely together they could have been carved from one piece of wood.

  And it felt absolutely amazing, being held so closely by a man who was so hard all over. And yet so warm. And gentle, somehow, in the way he was holding her. As though he was shielding her, rather than restraining her.

  Heavens. Perhaps she really was no better than she ought to be.

  Chapter Eighteen

  She couldn’t see who it was, from behind the sofa. But whoever it was set their lantern down with a grating sound and then began to pace back and forth, just as the Duke had done earlier. She hoped it was because they were wai
ting for someone, rather than just pacing for the sake of it, or they could be here all night. And, pleasurable though it was to be held in a pair of such strong and protective arms, the floor was awfully hard and cold.

  To her relief, not long later, light flickered across the ceiling again and another person entered the summer house.

  ‘Darling,’ said the first person. A man. ‘I thought you were never going to come.’

  There was a muffled noise of clothing swishing, deep breathing, and rather sloppy sounds as though someone was sucking on a juicy orange.

  They were kissing! Oh. Had they made the same sounds when they’d been kissing? Ugh, surely not. The Duke hadn’t slobbered. His mouth had been firm and warm and determined. Just like him. Nothing sloppy about him.

  ‘It was harder to get away than I’d thought,’ said the second person, in a voice that sounded rather like Lady Elizabeth, only rather more breathy. ‘Next time I shall have to doctor Connie’s drink with laudanum to get her to go to sleep earlier. Though it wasn’t just her,’ she added resentfully, sounding much more like herself. ‘The place is crawling with footmen. Don’t Theakstone’s staff ever go to bed?’

  ‘It is hopeless, anyway,’ said the man. ‘Your family is never going to allow me to marry you.’

  ‘Never mind, darling. Once I am married, I will have far more freedom.’

  ‘No,’ the man groaned. ‘You must not marry anyone else, I couldn’t bear it.’

  ‘Well, I’m not going to elope with you. I have to think of my family. They need me to marry a wealthy man. Besides, eloping with me would destroy your prospects. It would be a disaster all round.’

  The man groaned again. Sofia envied him the freedom to do so. She was by now almost sure that the floor on which she was lying was marble. It was definitely the coldest, hardest substance she’d ever stretched out upon for this length of time.

  ‘You are going to have to be practical, my love,’ said Lady Elizabeth. ‘The Duke is not a sentimental man. He isn’t going to care what I do once I’ve given him an heir, which is why I agreed to come here, don’t forget. Theakstone will be perfect for me. I mean, for us.’