A Heart of a Duke Regency Collection : Volume 2--A Regency Bundle Page 2

“Your further help?” Marcus winged an eyebrow up.

  Lizzie scooped up the forgotten copy of The Times and waved it about. “I believe she references her sharing of your marital intentions.”

  Their mother nodded. “Indeed, Lizzie,” she said with the same pride she might reserve a child who’d solved a complicated riddle. “For which you still haven’t thanked me, Marcus.”

  Ah, yes. Of course. “Yes, well, there is no surer way to assure a love match than to bandy about my fifty thousand pound worth,” he said dryly. He inclined his head. “Thank you.” For making every last lady in the realm know I’m in the market for a wife. For single-handedly shifting all the desperate matchmaking mamas’ consideration to me.

  She fluffed her hair. “You are quite welcome.”

  He consulted his timepiece and gave silent thanks for his previously scheduled meeting with his longtime friend, the Duke of Crawford. Marcus shoved back his chair. “If you’ll excuse me,” he said, hopping to his feet.

  The viscountess let out a startled shriek. “Wherever are you going?”

  He stifled a shudder. Goodness, it was moments such as these that made him long for the bachelor suites at his clubs. “I am going to my clubs,” he reminded her. As though following his unspoken thoughts, Lizzie gave him a don’t-you-dare-abandon-me-with-her look. “I am meeting Crawford at White’s.” Any other moment, a meeting with the illustrious, powerful, and entirely proper Duke of Crawford would have appeased his mother.

  “Today?”

  Not on this day.

  “But…”

  Which could only indicate… “Surely not…”

  She had prospective future brides assembled and ready for a morning visit.

  “Surely,” he said quickly. “Business to discuss. The estates. Investments.” Anything. Everything. As long as it wasn’t Marcus’ impending marriage, to an as of yet unselected young lady.

  “Do promise you’ll attend The Duchess’ dinner party next week.”

  Those words froze him mid-movement. Blast, damn, and bloody hell. He’d quite forgotten the Duchess of Devonshire’s annual, intimate, dinner party. His mother’s lifelong friend who also happened to be Eleanor Carlyle’s aunt. “Er…”

  His mother’s mouth fell agape. “You forgot.” She slapped an indignant hand to her chest.

  “I…” Forgot. Put it from my mind, just as he did every year, all things and anything, including anyone connected with Eleanor.

  “He forgot,” his sister supplied unhelpfully for him.

  Marcus yanked at his cravat. “I had other plans for that evening.” Plans, which included avoiding that blasted garish, pink townhouse. Just as he did. Every year.

  He made to go when his mother called out in a panicky voice, staying him.

  “Marcus,” she said with a smile he’d learned long ago to be leery of. She clasped her hands in front of her. “Promise me you’ll be there.”

  He rolled his shoulders. God, she was more tenacious than she’d been in the past five years combined of his avoiding the infernal dinner event. “I will try,” he hedged.

  By the narrowing of his mother’s eyes, she detected his deliberate attempt at evasion.

  His sister whipped her head back and forth between them, taking in the volley-like quality of the exchange.

  Mother pounced. “At the very least, stay for this morning’s visit—”

  “If you’ll excuse me?” He paused. “Again.” Ignoring his mother’s sputtering, Marcus sketched a quick bow, gave his sister a commiserative wink, and then hurried from the room, with a speed the god, Hermes, would have been impressed with. He moved with a single-minded purpose through the halls, boot steps muted on the carpeted, corridor floors.

  He’d convinced himself that in simply assuring his mother he’d see to his responsibilities as viscount that she would have been as appeased as any other proper English mama in the kingdom. He gave his head a wry shake. He should have known better where the lady was concerned. After thirty years of sorting through his mother’s peculiarly blended romantic spirit with her English peer’s sense of obligations, it was his mistake. He made a sound of disgust. A mistake, that by the front of The Times and every other gossip column, would prove a damaging one.

  Marcus turned the corridor and collided with a voluptuous figure. The young lady stumbled back on a gasp and that abrupt movement sent several midnight curls spilling over her shoulder. He shot his hands out and steadied her. “Lady Marianne,” he said politely. The lady whose Come Out had been delayed by the death of first her father and then her mother had taken Society by storm and for very obvious reasons. “Forgive me.” She possessed a dark, wickedly suggestive smile that set her apart from the other debutantes.

  “Lord Wessex.” Lady Marianne spoke in beguiling tones better reserved for skilled courtesans and not just out on the market debutantes. She collected those two loose tresses and toyed with them. “I could forgive you anything.”

  Unbidden, he dropped his gaze lower, lower to the generous cream white mounds spilling over the top of her dress. Marcus swallowed hard. No respectable miss had a place wearing such a gown. And no respectable gentleman had a place studying her so. Yet, this woman who exuded sexuality and tempted with her lips and eyes, bore no traces to the long-ago innocent who’d betrayed him.

  He hardened his heart and appreciated Lady Marianne with renewed interest; for with her seductive offer and veiled words, she was still more sincere than the last lady he’d ever trusted. Marcus picked his gaze up.

  By the narrowing of her cat-like eyes and her suggestive smile, Lady Marianne thrilled at his notice.

  “If you’ll excuse me.” He dropped a bow and made to leave.

  “Lord Wessex,” she called after him in sultry, inviting tones that brought him slowly around. The lady fingered the trim of her bodice. He gulped. “I have heard splendorous things of your secret garden and would very much welcome a tour about the grounds with you.”

  He’d not met another lady in a garden after Eleanor. Nor did he intend to. The memories of her were too potent in those floral havens. “Perhaps another time,” he managed, his voice garbled. Spinning on his heel, he continued his retreat. As he entered the foyer, he shot a glance back to see if the determined seductress followed.

  His butler, Williston, strode to meet him. “Your mount is readied.” The ghost of a smile played on his wrinkled cheeks, indicating that word had, no doubt, traveled about the viscountess’ impending visitors.

  “I am doubling your wages, Williston,” he muttered.

  A footman rushed over with Marcus’ hat and cloak. With murmured thanks, Marcus jammed the black Aylesbury hat atop his head. “Good man, Williston,” he said, shooting a glance over his shoulder as he shrugged into his cloak. No doubt, the ladies lined up by his determined mother would be arriving…

  “Any moment, Lady Elliot is to arrive.” Williston paused and gave him a pointed look. “With her daughter, my lord.”

  Marcus inclined his head. The man was worth more than all the king’s staff at the Home Office, in his ability to ferret out information. “Good day, Williston.”

  A twinkle glinted in the older servant’s eyes. “The same to you, my lord.” He sketched a bow and then walked to the door with an ease possessed of a butler thirty years younger and pulled it open.

  Hurrying outside, Marcus bound down the steps. When presented with one’s pestering mama, a gentleman had little choice but to retreat.

  At one time, he’d been unable to glimpse the neighboring ridiculously pink façade of the townhouse adjoining his own. He accepted the reins from a waiting groom and then effortlessly mounted his horse. Somewhere along the way, on his path to becoming a rogue, that pink façade had tortured him less and less, so that all the old hurts and regrets and fury had faded enough that he could move through life with a practiced grin and not as the heartbroken, shattered fool he’d been in the immediate aftermath of Eleanor’s parting. Marcus nudged his mount, Honor, onward thr
ough the crowded cobbled streets of London.

  How easy it would have been to let her betrayal destroy him. Though he would never again be the trusting man of his youth, he’d carved a new existence for himself without Eleanor in it. As Marcus rode, he lifted his head in greeting to passersby. Aside from his mother and sister, he took care to not love, to trust few, and to always be the blithe charmer Society saw him as. Life was safer that way.

  Marcus brought his horse to a stop outside the hallowed walls of White’s. He quickly dismounted and tossed the reins to a waiting servant. As he strode up the handful of steps, the door was thrown open and he stepped inside. Lifting his head in greeting to the patrons who called out, Marcus hurried to his table. A servant immediately rushed over with a bottle of brandy and a snifter. With murmured thanks, Marcus waved him off and proceeded to pour his glass to the brim. He took a long swallow and swirled the contents of his drink.

  Today was very nearly the anniversary of their first meeting. Is that why Eleanor Carlyle owned his thoughts this day?

  His lips pulled in a grimace. What a pathetic moment of one’s life to commemorate year after year. In a world in which he’d come to appreciate, expect, and demonstrate order, the nonsensical habit of marking the day he’d met Miss Eleanor Carlyle was perhaps the antithesis of everything he valued in terms of order. Their meeting, in the real scheme of life, had been nothing more than a mere two months…just sixty days, one-thousand four-hundred and forty hours. When a gentleman was approaching his thirty-first year, why, the span of time he’d known Eleanor was insignificant. Yet, there was no explaining the heart.

  “With that scowl, are you sure you are desiring company?”

  He stiffened and glanced up at his closest, only living friend in the world. Auric, the Duke of Crawford, stood impeccably cool and perfectly ducal, as he’d been since the day their friend, Lionel, had met his end. Marcus jerked his chin to the opposite chair.

  Wordlessly, Crawford slid into the vacant seat, waving off the bottle Marcus held out as an offering. “No,” he declined. Instead, he sat there and drummed his fingertips on the immaculate, smooth surface of the mahogany table. “A bit early for brandy.”

  “Is it?” Marcus took a sip to demonstrate his thoughts on Auric’s opinion on drinking spirits in the morning. To stem the argument on the other man’s proper lips, he used the best diversionary topic at hand. “How is Daisy?” Formerly Lady Daisy Meadows, now Duchess of Crawford, the young lady was also the only sister to their now dead friend, Lionel.

  Just like that, the hard, austere lines of the other man’s usually unflappable face softened, demonstrating a warmth he’d never imagined Crawford capable of. “She is well,” he said quietly. He glanced about as though ascertaining their business was their own and then looked to Marcus. “She is expecting.”

  Marcus stared blankly at him. “Expecting what?”

  A dull flush marred Crawford’s cheeks. “A child. We will be retiring for the country within the next fortnight.”

  Another child? The couples’ first babe, a girl, Lionella, was just one. Despite himself, a vicious envy cloyed at Marcus’ insides; it ripped at him like a thousand rusty blades twisting inside. For, if life had proceeded along a different path, even now he’d be a father to some, no doubt, precocious child. And if he were honest to himself in this instance, with Crawford’s revelation laid out before him, Marcus could acknowledge—he wanted to be a father. Not the aloof, distant noblemen who turned a son’s care over to stern nursemaids and tutors, but rather the manner of sire his own father had been. A man who personally taught Marcus how to ride and shoot. A man who’d bloody senseless anyone who dared hurt his children and who loved them fiercely.

  Crawford stared expectantly at him and Marcus cleared his throat. “Congratulations.” He forced a smile. “I am happy for the both of you.” He toasted Crawford with his glass.

  His friend trained a familiar ducal frown on Marcus’ nearly empty snifter.

  Likely, his friend saw the same indolent, bored lord as the rest of Society, more interested in spirits and cards than in the happiness of his friend. In truth, Marcus would slice off his smallest fingers to have a family of his own and, through them, a purpose in the efforts he put into running his estates. Oh, he’d never begrudge Crawford and Daisy their deserved joy. With the heartache of loss they’d known in Daisy’s brother, no people were more deserving of happiness. Marcus passed his glass back and forth between his hands, eying the still unfinished amber contents within the snifter.

  Some of the tension ebbed from Crawford’s shoulders. “I understand congratulations are in order.” The ghost of a smile played on the other man’s lips.

  Marcus looked at him quizzically. What was he on about?

  “The Times, and your,” he winged an eyebrow up, “intentions toward a particular lady.”

  Of course the ton would remark upon his declarative interest in the ladies. “Bugger off,” Marcus complained. “Two dances hardly constitute an offer of marriage.” Rather, it constituted a desire to possibly pursue more with a lady. He proceeded to pour his snifter full and then took a sip.

  “Ah, so it is merely gossip then,” Crawford said, his tone more matter-of-fact, always the coolly analytical of their unlikely pair.

  “It is certainly gossip,” Marcus said with droll humor, taking another swallow. It just wasn’t necessarily untrue gossip.

  Crawford reclined in his chair and continued to study Marcus in that assessing manner. Unable to meet his friend’s probing stare, he absently skimmed his gaze over the club. “Daisy wished me to inquire as to whether the gossip is true.” Ah, Daisy, the consummate romantic. Was every blasted body in the whole of England a romantic spirit? Even Crawford, now?

  Marcus chuckled at the other man’s bluntness. Then, when one was a duke just a step shy of royalty, there really was no need to prevaricate. He gave his head a despairing shake. “I’ve no immediate plans.” He smiled wryly. “Despite my mother’s best machinations.” After all, with a lifelong friendship and a bond built on unimaginable tragedy—the murder of their best friend—he at least owed Crawford that truth.

  Crawford studied him across the table in that very ducal manner so that all he was missing was the monocle, and then he gave a slow nod. “My wife wants your assurance that you’ll settle for nothing other than a love-match.

  And Marcus, once more, promptly choked. By God, between his mother and his best friend’s words this day, they were going to drown him. He lifted his glass in salute. “Assure our girl of the flowers that I am grateful for her concern.” Marcus gave his shoulders a roll. “When I do wed, however, it will be for the same reason every young nobleman inevitably marries.” Or will it be when I’ve finally let go of the past? He gave his drink another slow swirl. “I’ll wed a proper lady,” like Lady Marianne. “And produce the requisite heir and a spare, and then the Wessex line is secure, while I’m free to carry on as all the other peers present.”

  Silence met his response and he looked up to find Crawford’s pitying stare on him. Marcus’ neck heated and his fingers twitched with the urge to tug at his cravat. When Crawford at last spoke, he did so in hushed tones. “Surely you want more than that?”

  “No,” he said with an automaticity born of truth. “I surely do not.” He flexed one of his hands. “I’m quite content just as I am.” Marcus downed the contents of his glass. No, he’d tried love once before and the experience was as palatable as a plate of rancid kippers. “Though I applaud you and Daisy for finding that very special sentiment.”

  Alas, after Eleanor’s deception, he’d never been able to fully erase the bitter tinge in his words when speaking of love and romance, and any other foolish sentiment that schemer had ultimately killed.

  Marcus skimmed his gaze over the crowd. Several affirmed bachelors tipped their heads in a conciliatory manner. No doubt, they saw another member of their respected club prepared to willingly fall. He sighed. Except after years of visiting scanda
lous clubs and carrying on with paramours, courtesans, and widows, he was quite…tired of it all. Oh, he’d never admit as much. To do so would hopelessly ruin his name as rogue. But it had begun to feel as if he moved through life with a dull tedium, with a restlessness that dogged him.

  Not that he expected a wife to cure him of that boredom. But that woman would serve a perfunctory purpose that went with his title.

  Crawford’s frown deepened and he shifted. No doubt his desire to make sense of Marcus’ reasoning was born of years and years of being a duke beholden to no one. His friend’s chair groaned in protest as he settled his arms on the table and leaned forward. “I do not doubt you will find a woman who will value you as you deserve.” A woman like Lady Marianne who valued his fortune and title. How very empty such an existence would be and yet far better than this hell Eleanor Carlyle had left him in. Crawford cleared his throat. “A woman who will also help you…forget…” Forget.

  Crawford spoke of a world of hurts that existed beyond Eleanor. For not a soul truly knew of the two fleeting months of madness and his subsequent broken heart following the lady’s betrayal. Even his mother, who’d celebrated in their whirlwind courtship, didn’t know the extent of the hole left in his heart with Eleanor’s parting.

  Unnerved by the fresh remembrance of Eleanor Carlyle, Marcus shoved lazily to his feet. “If you’ll excuse me? I have matters of business to see to.” It was quite enough having to deal with a mother spouting of love and dying devotion of a worthy lady, that he didn’t really require it from his closest friend, too.

  “Oh?” Crawford drawled and in a manner befitting the once grinning, mischievous youth he’d been before life and loss had shaped him, he tipped back on the heels of his chair. “The whole wife-hunting business?”

  He made a crude gesture that roused a chuckle from his friend. Marcus tempered that rudeness with a grin and then started back through the clubs with his patented smile firmly in place.

  It would seem when a nobleman demonstrated interest in a lady, it signaled his intentions to wed, and there really was no escaping that news anywhere.