“See here!” Jeremy heard someone that sounded very much like Lord Blackthorne cry in a not-very-convincing tone. “Who are you and why are you here?”
Then, the couples around them began to whisper and while Jeremy could not hear what they were saying, he thought he could make out a single phrase. Two words – “Lady Peacock.”
His suspicions were confirmed when every single pair of eyes in the ballroom turned to where he stood with Dory still in his arms before they swiveled back again to where the crowd was beginning to part from the far side of the room.
And there, in the middle of everyone, was a woman who looked very much like Dory wearing Dory’s signature Lady Peacock gown and bejeweled mask.
“But it can’t be her,” Jeremy heard some gentleman whisper. “She is there! With him! Unmasked! Don’t you see?”
“But I could have sworn…after all, I mean, the gossips rags said it was so. Therefore, it must be true! Right?” That came from a woman Jeremy could not see off to his left.
“It’s not her!” someone else said, just a little louder. In the nearly silent ballroom, that man’s voice carried as loudly as a shout. “It can’t be her. Were the papers wrong? Did they like to us?”
“Had to have been wrong,” another woman said, the assembled crowd giving up all pretense of whispering. “She can’t be in both places at once.”
“They were wrong.” That came from the debutante now standing next to Jeremy, the same one whose matchmaking mama had tried to corner him when he had first arrived. “It wasn’t her.”
Finally, the imposter Lady Peacock – for this woman had to be an imposter since the real Lady Peacock was in Jeremy’s arms just now – came to a stop in front of him.
“Lover,” she purred, though to Jeremy’s ears, her tone rang a bit false. She was good though. Very good. Almost good enough to convince him that she really was Dory behind the mask. “How good it is to see you again. Such nasty business the other night, wasn’t it?”
If Jeremy hadn’t known any better, again, he really would have thought this woman was Dory. Her movements, her voice, and even her hair were almost identical to Dory’s.
But it wasn’t Dory and even though the people surrounding him couldn’t distinguish between the two – or probably couldn’t have, at least if both women had been masked – Jeremy certainly could. This woman, whoever she was, was a pale imitation of the real and quite fiery Lady Peacock.
Instinctively, Jeremy drew Dory just a bit closer to his side so that he could protect her should the need arise.
So now what did he do? This woman wasn’t Dory and he had no idea who she was. Then he remembered the note.
Play along.
So he did.
“My lady.” Jeremy gave the false Lady Peacock a slight bow. “As I told you the other night, I am afraid our association has come to an end.” He paused and she seemed to be waiting for him to say something else. But what? At this point, all he could do was guess and hope for the best. “It was an illusion. You knew the brief flirtation we shared could not last.”
“But I adore you!” the other woman cried as she attempted to fling herself into Jeremy’s arms. “I know that you said you were captivated by another, a woman more proper than I, and that you had a mind to court her and take her to wife! But I believed you were only teasing me! Do you love her? Truly? Tell me, for I must know!” Behind the familiar mask, brilliant turquoise blue eyes glittered with sharp intelligence, though the words the unknown woman had just spoken sounded more like those of a feather-brained debutante.
Once more, Jeremy felt as if he had stumbled into the middle of a play where he didn’t know the plot, the actors or the lines. Yet he had a feeling that his part in this farce had been written long ago. It was simply that no one had bothered to tell him. About any of it.
However, the lady had posed a question to him just now, a rather important one, and he had the distinct impression that he was supposed to answer her.
This was not how he had planned to confess his feelings to Dory but then, nothing about their courtship – such as it was – had been normal. Also, he had the feeling that if he didn’t confess his feelings for Dory now, he might not receive another chance. It was now or never.
“I am sorry, my dear Lady Peacock, but yes, I do love Lady Dory. More than I can possibly say.” Jeremy heard the collective gasp from the crowd behind him, but he ignored them and instead, turned to Dory. “I love her with all that I am and, though we have not known each other long, I feel as if she already owns my soul. I have loved her from the moment we met.” He turned back to the unknown woman. “I am sorry. I know you desired more from me, but I can’t give you my heart when it already belongs to another.”
Behind him, Jeremy heard a few older women, mostly matchmaking Mamas, mumbling under their breath, most of them angry that their title-grasping daughters would likely not have the chance to snare London’s newest duke. Even if he hadn’t been a duke, even if he had only ever remained plain Lord Jeremy Dunn, they never would have had a chance with him.
For only Dory had ever seen him for the man he was – and hopefully loved him for it.
Before the false Lady Peacock could reply, Lord Candlewood strode into the middle of the fray in what was likely another well-rehearsed scene from this bizarre little play. His presence also managed to quiet everyone who was already beginning to gossip about the scene taking place before them.
“Madam, what are you doing here?” he thundered. The woman cowered but up close? Jeremy could tell she wasn’t really afraid. Actually, it seemed as if she was enjoying this. “I thought I tossed you out on your arse a quarter hour ago!”
“I had to see him again!” the other woman cried. “I needed to see Lord Wyncliffe! After what has been said in the papers about me?”
“I don’t bloody well care!” the duke roared, seemingly relishing this opportunity to act out. “Parrington! Get over here!”
The earl, who had sometimes frequented Dionysus’ masquerades in the past, was there in a moment. As if he had simply been waiting for his cue to step into the fray. “Yes, your grace?”
“I think this chit sneaked in yet again when I was distracted by your lot! Therefore, she is your problem now! Escort her out!” the Bloody Duke bellowed. “You know people on Bow Street! I want her taken there immediately! I do NOT want her back in my home this evening!” He said the word “not” with so much vehemence that the chandelier high above them quivered, the reflective crystals tinkling as they bumped against one another.
Parrington took the woman by the arm firmly, though it was not a hard grasp, Jeremy noted, but more of a familiar one. As if he had no real wish to hurt her. He simply wanted to make it look as if he was.
“Of course, your grace.” The earl readjusted his grasp on the woman slightly, and again, far more gently than Jeremy suspected he might have had she been a true party crasher. “I shall see you on the ‘morrow.”
Then Parrington was gone, dragging the still protesting – but not protesting too much – woman behind him.
When they were gone, Candlewood turned back to Jeremy. “My apologies. However, I consider this business concluded. As you were.” Then he too was gone, vanishing into the crowd and probably making his way back to his wife. Or wherever it was he went to hide during these balls.
Jeremy knew as soon as the duke quit the room because everyone began talking at once, crowding around him and Dory as if they were the most important people in the ballroom. Afraid he was going to lose her in the crush, he pulled Dory closer and began looking for an escape route. Thankfully, Lord Blackthorne was there to provide one. Yet more proof that this entire evening had been a set-up of some sort.
“This way. Out the back.” The man used his sizable body to push his way through the crowd, all but dragging Jeremy and Dory with him.
It worried Jeremy a little that Dory hadn’t said a word throughout this entire exchange, but at the moment, he had more pressing matters
to worry about. Such as fleeing this ballroom without being crushed to death.
As soon as they reached the terrace doors, Blackthorne yanked one of them open and shoved Jeremy and Dory out into the night without asking. Then, as the cacophony of voices grew, Jeremy heard the decisive click of the door being locked from the inside and the clatter of a key being tossed away. They were alone. But probably not for long.
“Come,” he said, not waiting for Dory’s answer. Just because they were alone now didn’t mean they would be for much longer. After all, Candlewood’s house had any number of ways a person could reach the garden. It was unlikely they were all locked. “We need to speak.
We need to speak.
That was something of an understatement, Dory thought as she allowed Jeremy to drag her through Nick’s well-appointed gardens. She didn’t even protest as he took her beyond the lantern-lined pathways and into the darkness where only the silvery light of the full moon shone down to illuminate their way.
However, when he would have turned left toward the gazebo – which she knew very well could be seen from several rooms inside the house – she instead yanked him to the right and down a path that led to a small bench in the middle of one of the finest rose gardens she had ever seen. This garden was the duchess’ pride and joy and thus, strictly off-limits during parties. Still, Dory didn’t think the other woman would mind her borrowing it for a bit. Not when love was at stake.
When they were finally alone, Dory turned to Jeremy. “Was that your little production? The woman was wearing my dress.”
Actually, Dory hadn’t seen that dress in nearly a week. She had assumed Helen had tucked it away someplace so that it wouldn’t be a reminder of what Dory had lost, but apparently not.
Jeremy shook his head vehemently. “That was not my doing. I swear. All I knew was that I was to make an appearance here this evening and dance with you. All the rest?” He gestured back toward the house. “I knew nothing about any of it. I promise you, Dory. I didn’t. I would never embarrass you like that.” He paused. “And I take it you had no hand in the production either?”
She snorted. “No. That was not me. Though I suspect I know who designed that farce.”
“Candlewood?” The scene had taken place in the man’s home after all.
“Not just Nick,” Dory replied disgustedly. “But Will and Miri, Rayne and possibly my brother Frost as well.”
Dory saw Jeremy stiffen. “But not your sister Sarah.” That was not a question.
Dory looked away, unable to meet his gaze for a moment. “My sister is…not well,” she confessed. “Apparently, she was with child and then lost the babe. She has been acting out ever since. Before, with Miri and Will? That was attempted blackmail.”
“Now?” Dory was grateful for the true concern in Jeremy’s eyes. It meant he was probably willing to forgive her sister.
“I don’t know. But she is ill in the head and probably was before, as well.” She kicked a pebble with the toe of her slipper. “Not like my mother, but still…ill. Rayne only told me this afternoon. He’s taking her to their country estate tomorrow. My mother as well. He is hopeful that there, the two of them might find…well, peace I suppose. He also hopes that Sarah will recover, even though we have all come to accept that my mother will not.”
Dory watched Jeremy’s eyes close briefly and knew he felt badly for her. That warmed her inside. Perhaps he did still care for her after all.
“Dory. Sweet. I’m sorry. So very sorry.” His voice was soft now, just as it had been so often back at Dionysus. When it had only been just the two of them. “I had no idea. I knew what you had told me of course, but not the rest.”
“I didn’t know either. Not until today.” Stepping closer, she reached up to cup his face. “And all of that is a very long way of saying that Sarah lied when she spoke with you yesterday. I never said I didn’t want to see you again. In fact, I had no idea you had called at the house at all.”
Jeremy covered her hands with his. “Every day, my sweet Dory. I called upon you every day, but no one would ever allow me inside. I wanted to explain myself, but didn’t know where to start. I just wanted to see you. I wanted you to know I never meant for that morning to happen as it did. I would never have exposed you like that, Dory. I love you too much to hurt you that way.”
Everything inside Dory stilled. “You love me? You mean that wasn’t an act in there.”
Jeremy chuckled. “I told you, sweet. I had nothing to do with that. I didn’t even know what was going to happen when I came here this evening. So no, I didn’t lie. I told them – the entire bloody ballroom, actually – the truth. I love you. I think I have from the moment we met.”
Dory’s heart flipped over in her chest. These were the words she had been longing to hear. Longing to hear the outside of Dionysus’ walls so that she could trust they were real and not merely part of a fantasy. Now, she knew she hadn’t needed to hear them in any specific place after all. She had simply needed to hear them. Period.
Reaching up, Dory grasped Jeremy’s too-handsome face in her hands and pulled him down for a scorching hot kiss. “And I love you, Jeremy. My raven. I knew that first night as well, for you saw me in ways that no one else ever had. You made me feel as if I mattered.”
“Because you do matter,” he signed into her mouth, drawing her down on the nearby bench. “You matter to me more than my own life. More than my club or my reputation or any of it. Because you cared for me before I was a duke. Before I was Wyncliffe. You cared for me when I was just Jeremy.”
“I love you,” she said again. “I don’t care who that woman was or why Nick felt the need for that display. If that is what it took for us to confess our love? Then I will thank him for it the next time I see him.”
It’s now or never, Jeremy thought to himself.
“How would feel if it took some time to see him again, sweet? A month? Perhaps more?” Jeremy could only pray that she went along with his suggestion. If she didn’t? Well, he would think of something else. All he knew was that he was never letting her go. Not ever again.
Dory looked at him in adorable confusion and he couldn’t resist kissing her again. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”
“Marry me, Dory. Tonight. Or as soon as we reach Scotland, anyway.” God, he hoped and prayed she said yes.
“But what about Maggie?” Dory asked, her head spinning.
Jeremy had an answer already waiting. “She is safe with her nanny for now and besides, I have already spoken with her about the possibility of marrying you. While she doesn’t know you, she knows that you like Mr. Okey’s plush ducks and that seems to be quite enough to make her enamored of you already.”
It had been a risk to speak with Maggie about marrying Dory, especially if Dory said no, but a risk that Jeremy had felt was necessary. Especially if, as he hoped, Dory would become Maggie’s new mother. Surprisingly, Maggie had rather liked the idea, even though she had never met Dory. Then again, she was a child and fairly flexible in that regard.
“So what do you say, my sweet peacock? Will you run away with me to Scotland?” Dear Lord, Jeremy hoped and prayed she said yes.
“Elope with you?” Dory wanted to be certain she was hearing him correctly.
Jeremy nodded eagerly. “Now. Tonight. With Maggie’s blessing. Before anyone knows we are gone and might stop us. Before the papers come out again and the gossip begins anew. You know that we will be on the front page of every gossip rag out there as it is. Why not give them something real and true to gossip about?”
Dory hesitated, but only for a moment. She loved this man. She wanted him. And this was just the sort of impetuous thing the old Dory – the notorious hellion – would do. Jeremy was giving her a chance to be herself one last time before she settled down with him into respectability. After all, a duchess could not be running off willy-nilly. Could she?
Well, Dory supposed she would find out soon enough.
“Yes, Jeremy,” she whispered wi
th a sly smile as she rose from the bench, pulling him with her. “Yes, I will marry you. Now. Tonight. As soon as we reach Scotland.”
He grinned at her for a moment before sweeping her into his arms. “Then what are we waiting for?”
Jeremy took off in the direction of the mews and Dory couldn’t help but be a little bit suspicious.
“Did you plan this?” she asked. “Not that I care, for I think it’s terribly romantic, but I am assuming there is a carriage waiting for us back here?”
“There is,” he confirmed. “And no, I didn’t plan this. Well, not exactly. Though I had hoped you might agree to my proposal.”
“And if I didn’t?” Not that Dory would have turned him down, of course, for she wanted nothing more than to become Jeremy’s wife.
For a brief moment, she saw the old, familiar “Devil of Sin” smile again. “Well, then I would have just kidnapped you and not given you a choice in the matter.” Then he sobered. “I love you, Dory, and had I been forced to live without you? Well, I’m not sure how I would have done so.”
“I don’t know either,” she confessed as she snuggled into his arms. “But now? We never have to find out.”
“I love you, Dory,” Jeremy sighed as he lifted her into the waiting carriage. “And I shall spend the rest of my life proving that to you.”
And several hours later, at an inn along the Great North Road, he did just that.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Town Tattler
(Very Early Morning – so early it’s indecent! – Supplemental Edition)
All is well that ends well, dear readers! Isn’t that how the saying goes?
As of this morning, I am told that Lady Dory and Lord Wyncliffe might already be husband and wife. More than just a new duke and duchess in Town, we have another love match!
His Temporary Mistress Page 30