How to Deceive a Duke (13 page)

Chapter 25

H
e should go and see Angelique.

But Nicholas had no interest in visiting his mistress. When he thought of sex, only one woman came to mind.

His wife.

She’d tricked him, seduced him, insulted him, and still he wanted her—and he wanted her as he’d never wanted any other woman. And he didn’t want to think about it.

He was by nature chivalrous to women, kind and honorable, but he did not involve his emotions when dealing with them. How was this any different? He should hate her.

But she was bold, clever, passionate, and beautiful.

So were a lot of women of his acquaintance. Just not in a single package.

He slumped miserably in the leather chair, looking around the club at other men in other chairs, also drinking, and no doubt avoiding their own wives.

“I’m surprised to find you here, Temberlay, newly married as you are.”

Nicholas shut his eyes, willing whoever it was away, not wanting to discuss the fact that he’d stupidly married the wrong sister, which was probably the hottest bit of gossip in the
ton
by now.

“May I join you? I have a bit of news I think you might wish to hear.” He opened his eyes and found Stephen Ives staring down at him.

“Does it involve redheads or weddings?” Nicholas asked.

Stephen frowned, and glanced at Nicholas’s half-empty glass. “I saw your lovely wife at the theater not an hour ago with Delphine St. James, but I came to see you about a duel.”

“And why would that interest me, unless my wife—or her mother—has called me out?” Nicholas asked.

“Another officer asked me to stand as his second this morning. Some silly affair over a woman.”

“Shall we make a pact, my friend, never to shoot each other over a woman?”

“Agreed,” Stephen said as the waiter set a pint of ale in front of him.

“So what’s this duel got to do with me?”

Stephen shrugged. “Everything, or perhaps nothing. There was a doctor present, just in case he was needed. It seems he regularly offers his services at dawn in Hyde Park, and makes a pretty penny tending the injured and dying. They pay him to keep his silence, since dueling is illegal.”

“Was he at David’s duel?” Nicholas asked leaning forward.

Stephen shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s a place to start, Nick. He might have some information, if he’s paid well enough.”

“His name?” Nicholas asked. The prospect of finding a witness, someone who knew who David’s opponent was, the details of his death, made him sharp, despite the amount of drink he’d consumed.

“He didn’t give one. Kept his face covered as well. I had someone follow him.” He fished in his pocket. “Here’s his direction.”

Nicholas read the scrawl on the scrap of paper. It was the first link to discovering just what had happened to his brother.

“Thank you.” He took out his purse and laid money on the table to pay for their drinks. Stephen pushed the coin back across the table. “Keep it. You’ll need it to pay the good doctor.”

A
n hour later, Nicholas knocked at the door of a house that squatted in a neighborhood that was firmly in the shade of respectability. It was the perfect place for a man with secrets, since his neighbors likely had dark dealings of their own, and knew not to ask questions.

He bribed the maid who opened the door, and was shown into the foyer to wait.

The doctor appeared a few minutes later, a shabby man of middle years, with sharp eyes and a bland face. “Your Grace, this is most unexpected,” he said, pulling on his coat at the same time he tried to remove his spectacles. “Do come in. Sadie, bring the port at once.”

He opened the doors on a sitting room that was as dowdy as he was himself, the worn furniture many decades out of date. Stacks of books served as perches for empty wineglasses, papers, and clothing. A dead cat floating in a glass jar filled with yellow liquid regarded Nicholas in dull surprise. Other similar specimens stood on the bookcases, taking the rightful places of the books.

“Is there a matter I can help you with? I am not used to such esteemed company as a military hero like yourself. I read of your exploits in Spain, sir.” When Nicholas failed to smile, his own grin faded.

“My surgery is closed at the moment, of course, but if you come back tomorrow, or allow me to come to you in the morning, then I can certainly offer my medical opinion.”

“You attended a duel a year ago. The late Duke of Temberlay, my brother. Do you recall it?”

The doctor’s eyes shifted to the floor. “Dueling is against the law here in England, Your Grace. I understand you have been away at war for some time. Perhaps you are mistaken—”

Nicholas tossed a purse on the dusty table, and watched the doctor’s eyes widen as the guineas clinked.

“Tell me what happened to my brother.” He made it an order.

The doctor made a low sound in his throat and pushed the books off the settee and indicated the seat, but Nicholas remained standing.

The surgeon shook his head, and his jowls wobbled. “Please, Your Grace, there was nothing I could do to save him. He was wounded by all three of his opponents.”

Nicholas felt his brows shoot up in surprise. “He was fighting with
three
men?”

The doctor looked grim. “He challenged them all at the same time. It was, I believe, something about the honor of a young lady, and His Grace—your brother—seemed to feel he’d been swindled in some way.”

Nicholas shut his eyes.

“I trust he fought them one at a time, and was wounded by each?” The David he remembered was not much of a swordsman.

The doctor fished a handkerchief out of his pocket and mopped his florid face. “No, he fought them all at once. They declared that since the challenge had insulted all three of them, that your brother must meet them at the same time.”

Nicholas imagined David beset, desperate. He had lost the entire Temberlay fortune through a foolish investment. Then Julia had come to break their betrothal, telling him she was with child. David had died just two days after her visit.

Nicholas felt sick to his stomach. Duels were affairs of honor. There had been nothing honorable about the match that ended David’s life.

“Who were the gentlemen who fought my brother?”

The surgeon shrugged uneasily. “Men of rank, Your Grace, but I don’t recall their names.”

Nicholas drew his sword, and pointed it at the doctor’s throat, dimpling the second and third chins that hung over his wrinkled cravat. “Now do you recall?” he asked.

The doctor swallowed carefully. “I seem to remember Lord Charles Wilton being present,” he said.

Wilton? He had no idea that David even knew him.

“And the others?” The doctor tried to step backward, but Nicholas followed. “I assure you, I am far better with a blade than my brother.”

“Lord Augustus Howard!” the surgeon squeaked. “And the Earl of Wycliffe.”

Wycliffe?
The doctor whimpered as the blade slipped.

“That’s all I know, Your Grace, I swear! I did my best to save him, but Lord Wilton’s blade pierced his lung, and Lord Howard skewered his liver!”

Nicholas lowered his sword an inch.

“And where did Wycliffe’s blade land?”

“He merely grazed His Grace’s hand, and refused to do more. He was sick, there in the grass, and was crying like a babe when they led him away.”

“Who was my brother’s second?” Nicholas asked.

“He was a gray-haired man, Your Grace, short of stature, older. He was quite dismayed when your brother was struck down. I didn’t catch his name, but I make it my business to avoid introductions.”

The maid appeared in the doorway bearing a tray of port. She gaped at the sight of the weapon poised at her master’s throat.

Nicholas sheathed his sword. He took the tray from her shivering hands and set it on the table. “Thank you, Doctor. You’ve been most helpful. I won’t stay for the port, but do have a glass yourself.”

The doctor put a hand to his throat. “Oh, I will, Your Grace. I do believe I will.”

Nicholas let himself out.

He got into the coach and shut his eyes. “Home, Rogers,” he ordered.

The Earl of Wycliffe. Marguerite’s father.

Did she know? His chest tightened at the thought that this was one more part of her deception.

Granddame would never forgive anyone who had a part in the death of her beloved grandson. Wycliffe had deloped, turned away, refused to lay a killing blow. And he had died soon after. Of what? Guilt? Or had Wilton and Howard taken deadly exception to his cowardice?

He knew the names of the investors now, and possibly one of them had been Julia’s seducer, but what concerned him most was how much his wife knew. Was it enough to win him an end to their sham marriage?

He needed more information, something solid to base any accusations upon, something even Granddame couldn’t refute.

He pondered what the doctor had said about David’s second. Tobias Simmons, David’s valet, fit the description. He would have done anything for David, was more like a second father to him, a beloved uncle. Simmons had been there at the end, holding David’s hand. Granddame had granted him a pension, given him a cottage at Temberlay for his services.

Nicholas ordered Hannibal saddled as soon as he arrived home. He stood in the shadow of the stable and looked up at his wife’s bedroom window. It was dark. Was she there, lying in her bed, waiting for him to come to her?

Until he had answers, he could not face her, or his grandmother.

“Please advise Mr. Gardiner I will be at Temberlay Castle,” he told the groom, and rode out into the darkness.

Chapter 26

“G
ood evening, Gardiner,” Meg greeted the butler when he came to collect the pearl necklace to return it to the safe. “Is His Grace at home?”

“He left earlier this evening for Temberlay Castle,” he said.

“Temberlay?” she murmured. “Did he say how long he’d be gone?”

“No, Your Grace.” He took the jewels and left the room.

Meg went to bed, and lay in the dark, listening to the silence.

He’d gone without leaving word for her.

What did that mean?

He hadn’t forgiven her after all. Kisses didn’t make anything right. They just made things more confusing.

Chapter 27

T
emberlay Castle sat on several hundred prime acres of Derbyshire countryside. Each duke since the sixteenth century had added to the original keep, until red stone towers dominated the horizon for miles.

The marble hall rang with footsteps as the staff hurried to greet Nicholas.

“Lord Nicholas—rather, Your Grace!” the housekeeper said, looking fondly at him as if he were still the child she’d known. “It is lovely to see you home at last.”

“Hello, Mrs. Dunne. I apologize for arriving unannounced.”

She looked over his shoulder. “Is your new bride with you? We read the announcements, and of course Her Grace sent us word. I’ll have your mother’s apartments ready in no time at all—”

“I came alone. Just for a few days.”

“I see,” Mrs. Dunne said, masking her disappointment behind a wan smile.

He looked around the grand entry hall, at the carved wood, painted plaster, and marble. Two staircases twined upward toward the glorious ceiling his father had commissioned. The goddess of the dawn bore his mother’s gentle face. The naughty cherub teasing a dove at her feet was himself at the age of three. Cupid had David’s eight-year-old face, and was gazing at the painted Derbyshire landscape that would someday be his inheritance, while his father as Zeus pointed out a distant copse of trees. The perfect family—until his parents had died the following year in a carriage accident and Granddame had stepped in as guardian and decided that her grandsons needed a stricter upbringing.

He knew Mrs. Dunne was hoping for those dulcet days of family happiness back again at Temberlay Castle, especially now he was married.

“All in good time,” he promised her.

She searched his face, no doubt about to ask him about his bride.

He changed the subject. “Have you any treacle tarts, by chance? I’m starving.”

She puffed proudly. “Of course. Go through to the library and I’ll bring you tea, and something to eat. Some good beef stew first, mind you, before treacle tarts.”

He smiled his thanks. “I understand Tobias Simmons retired to Temberlay. Is his cottage nearby?”

“Oh yes—at the end of the village, near the river. He comes up to visit us in the kitchen on occasion, but he mostly keeps to himself, does a bit of gardening. He’ll be glad to see you, sir. He was dreadfully upset by Lord David’s death. Cried like a babe at the funeral. We all did.”

“I’ll visit him tomorrow,” he said.

He went into the library. David’s portrait regarded him soberly from above the fireplace, a new addition since he’d last been here, painted while he was at war. His grandmother had probably placed it here instead of the gallery. David never liked the library or books, but she knew that when Nicholas returned to Temberlay, this would be the first room he’d come to. No doubt she’d wanted him to look into the sad, gentle face of the brother he’d betrayed and feel shame.

He studied his brother’s face for a long moment. He felt sorrow, resentment, and confusion, in that order.

He left the library and explored the empty castle, taking the long way to his boyhood rooms, listening for ghosts as he passed the portraits of nine generations of earls and dukes of Temberlay. His own ducal portrait would hang here one day, and the children he sired would add their likenesses. Would they be happy with the title, and the life that went with it? He stared into his grandmother’s proud painted eyes, felt his lips twist bitterly. Happiness was not important to her. She had raised her grandsons to believe that duty, power, and tradition were the only things that mattered. To her, a child of his would be simply another portrait to hang on the wall.

Nicholas had been fortunate. Since he’d never expected to be the Duke of Temberlay, he’d been allowed to make his own happiness. He looked at the childhood portrait of himself and his brother. He was a smiling imp while David was dull and sober even then. Had David ever been happy?

He’d never know. He hadn’t exchanged a single letter with his brother while he was in Spain. His quarterly allowance had been paid regularly, but there’d been no news from his family until he received his grandmother’s terse letter informing him of David’s death and demanding that he return at once to take up his responsibilities.

Responsibilities.
How he hated that word.

He opened the doors to the ducal apartments. The room stood in shadow, the furnishings draped as if mourning for David. Time stood still. Even the clock on the mantel had stopped. Were his brother’s clothes still in the wardrobe?

He shuddered. The room was a tomb. He remembered how David had cried when Granddame insisted he move out of the nursery and into these rooms just days after their parents’ death.

Nicholas backed out and shut the doors. He could not sleep here. He tried to imagine Marguerite in his grandmother’s rooms, or their children in the nursery upstairs. That room too had been a silent, lonely place after David had been moved downstairs. He hadn’t been alone long. Granddame sent him away to school.

When—if—he had children, they could fill the whole castle with noise. He would not allow them to be raised as David had been. They would know joy as well as pride, he decided as he opened the door to his old rooms, still filled with books and boyhood collections. He opened the drapes and looked out over the magnificent fells. He’d always loved this view. It had reminded him that there was another world beyond these walls, freedom.

He shut his eyes. Now everything he could see was his
responsibility
, and he didn’t want it.

Turning on his heel he made his way down to the kitchens where there was life and laughter.