My American Duchess (10 page)

“And make certain that the tunnels are adequately ventilated and supported. But before I depart, I wished to return your ring.” Trent pulled the diamond from his pocket.

Merry’s brows drew together. “Absolutely not.”

“I was wrong to accept it from you last night.”

“Someday you will give this ring to the woman who will be your wife. Imagine what she would think upon learning that the ring that had belonged to her predecessors had been given away.”

Sunlight was pouring through a window, revealing Merry’s skin to be precisely the color of ivory, save for the smallest spray of freckles across her nose. He couldn’t help grinning at her. “Being such an avid gardener, I am surprised that you don’t have more freckles.”

“Thanks to bonnets,” Merry said, with loathing. “I have any number that fit around my face like a horse’s blinkers. My aunt has always been fearful that my freckles would multiply and I would never make an appropriate match.”

“I like them,” Trent said.

She stood before him, glowing like the most delectable apricot that ever grew on an American branch—or an English one, for that matter—and her aunt had worried about her attractiveness? No matter where she went, men would fall at her feet.

He picked up her hand and pressed the ring into her palm.

She shook her head. “Your Grace, I must insist that you take the ring.”

Before she could stop him, he slid the ring onto her finger.

“I want you to have it,” he stated, curling her fingers closed and wrapping his own around them. “My
mother
would want you to wear it.”

She didn’t attempt to break free, just looked at him with a puzzled frown. “Didn’t you say that this ring is always worn by the duchess?”

“My mother had a decided preference for Cedric,” Trent said lightly. “I assure you that the estate can more than bear the charge of another such ring for my wife.”

Merry stiffened. “Your mother had a
favorite
child?”

“Cedric was the sort of child whom a lady enjoys,” Trent explained. “Summoned to her boudoir, I was guaranteed to break something, whereas Cedric could be counted on to take an interest in her coiffure or her attire. Or both.”

Her hand felt small in his, as if he’d trapped a bird.

“Her Grace was wrong to act in such a manner,” Merry said bluntly. “A mother ought to love all her children equally.”

Trent shrugged. “It didn’t hurt me.” In reality, he thought Cedric had had the worse end of the bargain, because their mother’s constant fretting over his status as a second son ensured he never forgot it.

Merry apparently didn’t agree. She started embroidering on the theme of mothers, but Trent wasn’t listening. She had the ripest pair of lips he’d ever seen.

He’d like to kiss her until they looked bee-stung, the lips of a woman who had been bedded hard and furiously, who had—

Bloody hell. He had to take hold of himself.

“Your Grace?” the lips asked.

“I beg your pardon, Miss Pelford. I lost track of the conversation.”

A look of distinct sympathy came into Merry’s eyes. “I’m so sorry! Of course, your mother must pose a difficult subject for conversation. I should have been more sensitive.”

He could have explained that he didn’t give a damn about his mother and hadn’t since the tender age of eight, which was when he fully understood his place in the hierarchy of her affections.

But there was no real point. “Yes, well, you can see why I’ve decided that I’d prefer my wife to wear a different ring,” he said briskly, releasing her hand.

Just as they had the night before, they gazed down at the diamonds gracing her slender finger.

“I don’t know,” Merry said hesitantly.

He couldn’t stop himself; he ran his fingers lightly down the back of her hand until they reached the ring. “It belongs to you. It fits perfectly.” He felt the rightness of it deep in his gut.

Their eyes met, and he noticed with a pulse of surprise that hers were gray, but with a circle of violet at the very edge. He’d never seen eyes like that.

She licked her bottom lip and Trent froze. He couldn’t kiss her. Just because he was standing so close that he could smell her skin, and she had his ring on her finger, and she was looking at him with confusion but not denial . . .

Shit.

He had almost kissed his brother’s fiancée. Again.

“Right,” he said, taking a step back. “That’s settled, then. You are once again in possession of the ring.”

Merry turned her head away quickly but he saw a rosy flush in her cheeks.

No. He was mistaken.

She loved Cedric. She’d told him so several times the night before, and Merry was not a liar.

Trent cleared his throat. “I must be off. But—” The words stuck in his throat, but he forced them out. “I just wish you to know that I’m very glad that you will be my sister-in-law. I believe you will make a splendid wife for my brother.”

“Thank you,” Merry said slowly.

“I’m sure that Cedric will curtail his drinking once you are married. My comments last night were inappropriate, and I apologize.”

“Your Grace, I’d like you to consider that your worry is unwarranted. Lord Cedric mentioned at some point that you dislike both wine and spirits, and I am sure that you are very prudent in your behavior.”

“Not always,” Trent said wryly, thinking that he was a fool to have visited her.

“Most young men are not abstemious, but that does not mean they drink to excess.”

“I am aware of that,” Trent said. He didn’t know what else to say. She’d have to see it herself.

“Cedric, for example, is a consummate gentleman.” A trace of defiance edged her voice. “As I told you, I’ve never seen him even the least tipsy.”

No one had ever come to Trent’s defense the way Merry was coming to Cedric’s. Not that Trent had the faintest need for protection.

But Merry belonged to his brother, and she would make certain that Cedric didn’t harm himself while in his cups. Trent had known her less than a day, and he could say that with absolute certainty.

She was the best possible wife for his brother.

He forced himself to smile and bowed again. “I am leaving London for some weeks, Miss Pelford, but I shall look forward to seeing you and your family again upon my return.”

Just then, Mrs. Pelford trotted back into the room. It seemed the poetess could not find her seven-hundred-line poem in honor of the gazebo, but while searching her study she had fished up a sonnet sequence describing a three-sided Chinese house.

“I regret to say that I must postpone the pleasure,” Trent said, bowing over the lady’s ink-stained fingers. “I am leaving for Wales, and should have left London some hours ago.”

“You are leaving the city?” Mrs. Pelford’s face fell. “But you will return shortly, will you not?”

“In a few weeks.”

“I imagine Lord Cedric has mentioned this, Your Grace, but my husband and I are eager to return home to Boston. We have asked that the betrothal be a matter of a few months.”

That made him feel slightly cracked but Trent pushed the thought away. He wanted Merry, more than any woman he’d ever seen, but she would be the salvation of his twin. That was far more important than his response to her.

“I am happy to hear it,” he said, more firmly than he might have. The sooner Merry married Cedric, the sooner she would begin to solve his brother’s problems.

Mrs. Pelford patted his arm. “You shall come to tea again as soon as you come back, Your Grace, and I will read you the entire sonnet sequence.”

“It will be a pleasure,” he murmured, and made his escape.

It would be Cedric, and not himself, who would be obliged to endure nine hundred lines, or even more, commemorating the wedding. He had the distinct impression that Mrs. Pelford would write such a poem in a matter of a week, perhaps on the ship back to Boston.

He also had the awful feeling that he himself would have listened to all nine hundred lines, if it would make Merry happy.

Hell, he would listen to ten thousand lines, if he could sit next to her and entwine her fingers in his. And think about just what he was going to do to her in their bedchamber after the poetry reading was over.

Trent flung himself into the carriage with relief.

A slate mine could be dangerous.

But just at this moment it seemed far less dangerous than the brightly lit drawing room he had just left.

I
n the days that followed, the spark of anxiety Merry had felt about her cultivation of mind—or lack thereof—grew larger and larger. Every time she turned around, someone was gazing at her in horror.

She laughed too loudly. She slouched in her chair. She yawned when she was bored. Call her a rebel, but seven courses at one meal was insufferable, especially when one was only permitted to speak to the persons on one’s left and right but never, ever to the fascinating person across the table.

She seemed incapable of making any self-improvements whatsoever. It was enough to make her think that her governess had been right. She could still hear Miss Fairfax lamenting, “Merry has none of the discretion, modesty, or reserve required of those who marry into polite society.”

Aunt Bess had only laughed and said that when it came to marriage, a fortune trumped discretion.

“
That
is an American belief,” Miss Fairfax had retorted. “Ladylike accomplishments are more important than worldly goods, and your niece has none.”

“Well, spit,” Merry had protested. “You’ve taught me how to embroider
and
how to make wax flowers.”

Miss Fairfax’s yelp of anguish had probably been heard in London itself. “No lady would allow such a vulgarity as ‘spit’ to pass her lips!”

Her governess’s criticisms had usually bounced off Merry like rain from a tin roof. But that one had stuck, and night after night she lay awake, wondering if she and Cedric could be happy together. Clearly, he expected his wife to excel at something more refined than molding wax flowers.

Absurdly, sometimes she found herself wondering what it would be like to be a duchess. The very idea was ridiculous: a duke might flirt on a balcony, but he wouldn’t consider actually marrying a woman like her. He would marry someone like Lady Caroline, a noblewoman who knew the ins and outs of society.

Not that she would ever want a position like that anyway. All eyes followed a duchess. She could scarcely imagine the storm of gossip that would result if a duchess made a faux pas, the kind she made every day.

But then the duke hadn’t seemed to be as concerned about etiquette as Cedric was. She even thought he might join a conversation across the table, though that was probably wishful thinking on her part.

And irrelevant, of course.

In desperation, she began to compile a list of etiquette rules that included the correct use of sugar tongs, as well as a reminder to never say “spit.” A young lady at a musicale
had practically swooned when Merry growled it after tearing her hem.

Two weeks into her betrothal, the list had grown to four pages. When she had questions—Why
are
morning calls often conducted in the afternoon?—Cedric was happy to elucidate.

“No one is awake in the morning,” he explained. “Except servants, of course, which reminds me that you mustn’t greet your butler with such familiarity. I realize that you value Jenkins. But we show our respect by keeping a certain distance.”

Even an hour with her fiancé was liable to result in one or two new rules.

Not that she saw Cedric very often. If she’d had her way, she would have liked to spend part of every day with him. To her dismay, Cedric was rarely free, and when he was, he often seemed to be late for an important appointment.

Still, he always put his name down for two dances at every ball. He never failed to bring her a glass of canary wine, a gleam of conspiratorial mischief in his eyes. He seemed amused by the idea that his fiancée was too sophisticated for lemonade. Cedric had a marvelously world-weary, sardonic manner that Merry was trying, albeit with little success, to imitate.

She watched her fiancé for signs of inebriation, but never saw any. Which meant that she spent more time thinking about when the duke would return from Wales than she ought, but only because she looked forward to setting him straight about his brother.

And it was only out of dutiful family feeling for her future brother-in-law that she daily scoured her uncle’s newspapers, to reassure herself that there had been no mining accidents in Wales.

After an uneasy fortnight, she had to admit that the
twinges of doubt she felt could no longer honestly be called “twinges.” She was at a crossroads. She could become a selfish, vacillating woman, who fell in and out of love as casually as she changed her gloves, casting men to the side as she might a boring novel.

Or she could become a true wife to Cedric, loving and loyal in the way that Aunt Bess was to Uncle Thaddeus.

Merry’s challenge was not to mimic an English lady. No: she had to become a better person. The duke would return any day—not that his return was relevant—and sometime after that, she and Cedric would marry.

Sometime? There was a precise date set now, in June. It was easy to forget, because Bess had hired a secretary to manage all the details. Still, Merry was due for a second fitting of her wedding dress, an idea that made her feel a little faint.

In the end, she wrote a strongly worded note to Cedric, asking him to join her for a morning ride in Hyde Park. They
had
to spend more time together before they vowed to love each other to the end of their days.

Besides, it would give her a chance to practice being a better person.

The next morning Cedric appeared at the prescribed time in an extremely elegant riding coat, and they set out for Rotten Row in Hyde Park. He wasn’t precisely cheerful—Cedric was clearly not a morning person—but she appreciated the fact that he made the effort.

Overnight rain had scrubbed the coal smoke from the sky, and for once London smelled fresh and clean. The sky had the color and shimmer of mother-of-pearl, as if the very air was made of water.

The only sound was that of hooves squelching in the puddles that dotted the paths, and occasional plops as drops found their way from leaves above to the ground.

Merry couldn’t stop smiling, even though Cedric was grumbling because her “summons,” as he put it, had rousted him from bed. No one of note could be seen on the Row this early, and indeed, they passed only a couple of grooms exercising horses.

Most unhappily for Cedric, a small gust blew just as they rode under a particularly low-hanging branch, sending rainwater cascading onto his hat and splashing in all directions, making it look as if his head were a tiny fountain. Merry laughed, but stopped immediately, because naturally Cedric’s headache was worsened by this indignity.

“Perhaps we could gallop for a few minutes,” she suggested. “We haven’t seen a soul other than those grooms, so no one would be affronted to see me riding above a trot.”

“That is because no one of countenance is out of bed. If you think that I will ever ride with you again at this hour, you are mistaken. I am mortified to discover that I am in the company of servants.”

Well, spit. He really was annoyed.

“Shall we try a gallop, Cedric?” Merry asked again.

“What you don’t seem to understand,
Miss Pelford
,” Cedric said with dreadful emphasis, “is that a lady is a lady all the time, not merely when she is within view of polite society. Gentility must needs be internal. Even though we find ourselves in a throng of servants, it behooves us to behave with utmost circumspection.”

They were hardly in a “throng”; in fact, the grooms had apparently taken themselves back to the mews, and there wasn’t a soul to be seen in the park.

Cedric warmed up to his topic while Merry reminded herself that his irritability was entirely understandable. He had asked her repeatedly to address him by his title in public and she kept forgetting.

She nodded, and nodded again. And when she frowned,
it was merely because she heard something other than Cedric’s nettled—if well-bred—tones. She pulled up her mare, Dessie, and strained to listen.

Cedric didn’t notice, riding on with one gloved hand waving in the air as he emphasized his point about the delicacy of the British temperament.

There it was again—a whimpering sound, like an animal in distress.

“Why have you stopped?” Cedric said, turning about. “Oh bother, this damp has entirely wilted my neck cloth! I shall look no better than a milkman.”

Merry slid off her mare and draped the reins over the pommel. Dessie shook her head and stamped her hoof a few times, but stayed put, so Merry headed toward the hedgerow lining the south side of the Row.

“What on earth are you doing? Don’t touch those branches; you’ll become wet.”

“I think I heard something,” Merry explained, pulling a branch aside. Rainwater bounced off the leaves and splashed over her.

“What did I tell you?” Cedric demanded. “I suppose we’ll have to return home so that you can change.”

Before she could answer, she heard another scrabbling noise, and a plaintive whine that sounded like pain. She ignored Cedric, bent down, and pulled another branch aside.

Through the foliage she could see a small space within the hedge, and within it, a black-and-brown puppy, about the size of a loaf of bread. It must be trapped by its collar, because its round rump was wiggling in the air as it tried to free itself.

Cautiously, she reached through the dense branches until she touched wet fur. Rolls of loose skin moved under her fingers. The puppy whined again and twisted around to lick Merry’s wrist.

“Hello, little one,” she crooned. “You mustn’t worry. We’ll have you out of this hedge in a trice.”

She managed to get a firm grip around his middle, and gave a tug. This made him squeal with pain, so she stopped and gave him a pat. Her shoulder jogged the branches above her, sending rainwater onto her bonnet, which lost its shape and molded itself unpleasantly to her neck.

“Cedric,” she called. “I need help. There’s a puppy!”

She couldn’t turn her head far, because her arm was inside the hedge, but after a moment Cedric appeared in her line of sight. He had dismounted and was tying his reins to an overhanging bough. “A puppy,” he said with disgust. “You sound like a schoolgirl.”

The little dog had begun snuffling her hand, and a floppy ear, as soft as cashmere, fell on Merry’s wrist. “We’re going to rescue you,” she promised, stroking the mounds of soft fur covering his middle. “How long have you been stuck here, poor baby?”

“How is he trapped?” Cedric asked, making no attempt to help.

She inched her hand forward until it reached a piece of cord tied around the puppy’s neck, caught so tightly that she couldn’t get even a single finger under it. It must be cutting viciously into his skin.

“There’s a cord around his neck,” she said, giving the puppy another pat before removing her arm from the bush. “Can you try to break it, Cedric? I’m not strong enough.”

Her drenched bonnet was funneling rainwater down her back and soaking her to the skin. Though her fingers were cold, she managed to undo its strings and toss it on top of the hedge. Its fashionable ruffled brim was ruined, and it looked like nothing so much as an old tea cloth.

Cedric peered through the branches. The puppy had begun whimpering again.

“Don’t worry, darling,” Merry said. “I won’t leave you. We are going to save you.” She could see one trustful brown eye looking up at her. It was rather bulging, but in an adorable way.

“He must have run under the hedge to get out of the rain,” she said, turning to Cedric. “And now he’s caught fast. Can you break him free?”

“Not if there’s a cord around his neck,” Cedric said. “I’d probably strangle him. We shall inform the parish constable and he will send someone with a knife. Come along. I’ll pay the man to make sure he finds a home for the animal afterward.”

“Oh, Cedric, we can’t leave him!” Merry cried.

Her fiancé’s mouth tightened and she remembered—again—that she was to address him as Lord Cedric out of doors. “Of course we can,” he said, straightening. “It’s about to start raining again, and there’s nothing we can do for the animal.” Another whimper came from inside the hedge. “We are merely prolonging his agony.”

“I’ll stay, and you go,” Merry said, turning her head as a horse came into sight, galloping toward them. “Or perhaps we can send whoever this is to get help. It’s probably another groom exercising a horse.”

Lord knew, no one other than a groom would dare to take his horse above a trot, what with all those rules that Cedric had laid out for her about not galloping in Hyde Park and never, ever putting a horse on a lead line.

She said none of this aloud, though, because she was practicing prudence and restraint.

“If you insist, we will instruct the groom to remain with the animal until the constable arrives.”

“No, I will stay here until he’s free.” She reached into the hedge again and caught up one of the puppy’s ears.

“I must ask you not to squat on the common roadside,”
Cedric said stiffly. “I could not leave you here unprotected.”

“Don’t be absurd!” Merry cried, exasperated. “What harm could possibly come to me in broad daylight?” A warm tongue licked her hand again. “Oh, you are a sweetheart, aren’t you?” she breathed. “You’ll be out of there in no time and I’ll ask Cook to give you some scraps of beef. You would like that, wouldn’t you?”

The horse and rider were still pounding down the path toward them. Merry tried again to get a finger under the cord, but it must have hurt as the puppy uttered a little yip.

“Lord Cedric!” she called, “Do you see anything sharp we could cut the cord with? Perhaps a rock?”

“A
rock
?” her fiancé answered, managing to sound bored and irate at the same time—quite a feat, though his accent was a great help. Merry had observed that an aristocratic accent lent itself to expressions of irritability.

“Thrashing about in the sand is ruining your skirts,” Cedric added. “Get up.”

“If I let go, he’ll begin crying again,” Merry replied, her voice becoming a bit sharp despite herself.

Cedric looked over her head. “Well, well, what a surprise. It seems it wasn’t a groom riding in such a reckless fashion.”

She heard the thud of boots hitting the sandy path as the rider dismounted, though she couldn’t turn her head far enough to see him and still keep her hand on the puppy. “Could whoever just arrived
please
fetch a constable so we can cut this poor animal free?” she called.