Redemption of the Duke (9 page)

Lady Duncan allowed the others to stroll ahead and fell back to walk at Faith’s side.
“That must have been interesting for you, Miss Cooper. Quite an introduction to our
complicated relationships.”

“Doesn’t every family have its complications?” Faith answered, smiling, tamping down
her curiosity.

“Of course, of course, but ours . . . well, our family is far too special.”

“Lord Shenstone seems fond of Mr. Percy,” Faith began, hoping to seem polite rather
than overly curious.

“And who can blame him? Such a congenial young man one might never meet again. Hard-working,
respectful—such a shame he has nothing to his name beyond that.” She shook her head.

And that was all Faith needed to know about Lady Sophia’s response to Mr. Percy. If
there was a depth of feeling between them, it was surely being discouraged by her
family. Even Mr. Percy seemed accepting—it was Lady Sophia who appeared to bear ill
will.

“Lord Shenstone is an interesting fellow,” Lady Duncan continued. “The friendship
between my nephew and him began at school.”

“Many find their life’s friendships that way, do they not?”

“But I have never been certain Lord Shenstone is a suitable companion. As youths,
they did wild things together, as typical young men do. Adam had a difficult childhood,
and it was only natural that he find some freedom and release on his own at school.”

“A difficult childhood?”

“He was not the heir, you know, and his two older brothers—not of the same mother—did
not offer brotherly love. I still had my own household then, and was not around enough
to offer my support to Damaris and her children. But regardless, Adam decided that
drawing attention to himself in outlandish ways was the best way to keep his father’s
notice.”

“And did it work?”

“It did. His father was amused by his ‘exuberance’ for life, his pranks, his popularity.
Lord Shenstone contributed much of that, of course, and their escapades only became
more . . . adult as they grew older. The army changed all of that for Adam. He found
purpose and maturity.”

But he didn’t let go of “arrogance,” Faith thought sadly.

“I am not certain that during the intervening years of Adam’s absence, Lord Shenstone
changed in any way except to become more dissolute.”

“Surely the duke will realize that himself.”

Lady Duncan shrugged. “I hope so. It would be a shame if Adam allowed that man to
bring censure on him after all this time.”

Faith was surprised at Lady Duncan’s tone. The woman had seemed so open and unencumbered
by prejudices of any sort. Apparently, not where Lord Shenstone was concerned. And
Faith’s only thought was that both friends had courted trouble, and Lord Shenstone
could not be blamed for what His Grace had willingly done.

Chapter 8

A
fter a quiet luncheon with Lady Duncan, Faith was glad to escape Rothford Court. She
headed for Hyde Park, her usual rendezvous with the Society of Ladies’ Companions
and Chaperones, feeling trepidatious, and not just because of the dark, low-hanging
clouds over London.

Jane was the first to wave to her, and Faith waved back. “So sorry I’m late. I shared
a meal with my new employer, and she was gracious enough to allow me to have this
afternoon off, though I only just started with them yesterday.”

“You have a new situation?” Charlotte asked, eyebrows raised. “When I last saw you
with the Warburtons, they seemed content with your services.”

“Oh, they were, but as you know, I was not happy with all the work they’d assigned
me.”

“Our position as lady’s companion should not include laundry and hairstyling,” Jane
said, shaking her head with a tsk. “I am glad you made the change.”

But Charlotte was watching Faith closely.

Faith sighed. “I did not initiate the change. I struck up a conversation with Lady
Duncan, and since we shared many of the same philosophies, she asked me to be her
companion.”

Jane smiled innocently.

Charlotte frowned. “Jane, do you not realize that Lady Duncan is the aunt of the Duke
of Rothford?”

Jane’s smile faltered. “Oh dear.”

Faith forced her own smile. “Sadly, I was in Jane’s shoes, and did not realize the
truth until I had already left the Warburtons’ employ. I certainly don’t know my peerage
well enough yet. Lady Duncan has promised to help me with that.”

“Then you’re living with the duke?” Jane asked in a faint voice.

“I am employed at Rothford Court,” Faith corrected. “And if you’ve seen the mansion,
you know one could easily get lost in there, let alone see the same people each day.”

“I believe I should have resigned upon hearing that I’d been deceived,” Charlotte
said.

Faith studied her for a moment. “Perhaps in your situation, with your connections,
that would be feasible, Charlotte. But I know no one else in London, and, of course,
the Warburtons would not give me a reference since I’d left them so quickly. How would
I support myself?”

Charlotte gave an aggrieved sigh.

“And frankly, I enjoy every moment with Lady Duncan. It is a far superior position
for me. And if it doesn’t work out, I trust that she will give me a good reference.”

“So you plan to leave as soon as possible?” Charlotte asked. “The duke’s motives are
highly questionable, given his conduct and his secrecy.”

“I understand your concern, dear friend”—and she partially said that to remind Charlotte
of their relationship—“but he has distanced himself since he feels he’s now done what
he must for the sister of a man he’d wronged.”

They all fell silent for a moment, and Faith regretted the strain on their once-easy
friendship. Another wrong to attribute to the duke. She brought up the health of Jane’s
employer, and the woman launched into a long-winded recitation. But Faith saw that
Charlotte’s lips remained in a thin line of disapproval.

A
t dinner that night gathered a table full of women, including Lady Sophia’s friend,
Lady Emmeline, who’d allowed herself to be “persuaded” to join them for the meal.
The duke was absent, and Faith hadn’t missed the fleeting glimpse of Lady Emmeline’s
disappointment before she’d settled down for a conversation with Lady Sophia.

Lady Duncan casually asked about the friends Faith visited, and before she knew it,
she was discussing how she’d met Jane and Charlotte. She laughed as she told Lady
Duncan their pet name for themselves.

“Excuse me, I didn’t quite hear that, Miss Cooper,” the duchess said, from her place
at the head of the table.

Faith swallowed, realizing everyone was staring at her. “I’m sorry, Your Grace, I
was simply telling Lady Duncan the amusing name my friends and I have for ourselves.”

“And it is?”

“The Society of Ladies’ Companions and Chaperones. There are so many different societies
in London, we thought we . . . deserved . . . to be one. In jest, of course.”

Lady Tunbridge arched a dark brow. “I would think you had more common sense, more—shame,
shall we say.”

“Shame?” Faith echoed, sitting up straighter. “Why should we be ashamed of necessary
occupations?”

“I don’t know how ‘necessary’ it is for Lady Duncan to have a companion, Miss Cooper,
when she has us,” the duchess said, casting wounded eyes upon her sister by marriage.

Lady Duncan sighed.

But Faith didn’t want the woman to have to manufacture a tale to cover up the duke’s
manipulations. “Your Grace, whatever you believe of the need for my presence in this
household, there are many other places where companions do the work the family can’t—or
won’t. My friend Jane is the companion to an elderly, bedridden woman, whose family
cannot be bothered to visit her more than once a month. Jane is the only friend this
woman has left.”

“Is she a
friend
if she’s paid to be there?” Lady Tunbridge asked.

“Yes, she’s a friend,” Faith said coldly. “She’s there to comfort the old woman in
the middle of the night—and that is not the description of her position. She helps
feed her, dress her, because no one is overseeing the maid, so she hurries, hurting
the dear old lady. All that woman has is Jane between her and total isolation. I don’t
think there’s any shame in that.”

There was a moment’s awkward silence.

And then Faith saw the duke standing just outside the dining room, his focus on her
as potent as if he’d touched her. Her throat went dry, and she realized that because
of her display of disrespect to his mother, the woman could very well insist she be
dismissed. And then the duke might fight for her position, which would look terrible.
All she had to do was stay quiet and out of the way—out of
everyone’s
way.

The duke stepped back, enveloped in darkness once more.

Faith swallowed, mortification growing. To the duchess, she said, “Please forgive
my outburst, Your Grace.”

“You don’t need to ask anyone’s forgiveness,” Lady Duncan said, slamming her hand
down on the table. Her bracelets rattled together.

“Hear, hear!” said Lady Sophia, who smiled at her friend.

Lady Emmeline cast a quick glance at the duchess before letting her own smile grow.

“We did not mean to attack your situation, Miss Cooper,” the duchess said stiffly,
sending an unreadable glance at her daughter-in-law. “I was simply curious about your
pet name.”

“I—I thank you for your interest. My other friend, Miss Charlotte Atherstone, is not
so fond of the name. She is a respected chaperone of good birth and very well connected,
who has seen at least a dozen young ladies through successful seasons.”

“I have heard of her,” said the duchess. “Her talent and discretion are well known.”

Faith nodded, and went back to her roast hare, eyes downcast. To her surprise, Lady
Sophia reached beneath the table and squeezed her hand where it rested in her lap.
She didn’t risk smiling at the thoughtful young woman.

T
hat evening, after enjoying needlework with Lady Duncan in the private drawing room,
Faith escorted the woman to her bedroom, walked the few doors down to her own, and
found herself standing on the rug before the hearth, wide awake.

The room was lovely, a coal fire glowing, the grate ticking softly. Although the bed
was not turned down, Faith did not mind Ellen skipping that duty. In fact, she was
nowhere to be found, but that was just fine. Faith had been given leave to treat Rothford
Court as her home, so if she couldn’t sleep, she would explore the library, something
she was dying to do. She lit an oil lamp and carried it through the shrouded corridors,
where other lamps already lit the way, making hers unnecessary.

Though the second floor of the library rose above her into darkness, there were lamps
on several of the tables and gaslights on the walls near the massive bookshelves.
With a sigh of happiness, she gave the globe a spin—

And heard a feminine gasp from below.

Startled, Faith bent, looked beneath the table, and saw her lamp gleam in a pair of
frightened eyes. Faith let out her breath, holding back a nervous chuckle.

“Lady Frances, is that you?”

The girl crawled out of her hiding place, wearing a dressing gown over her nightdress.
She crossed her arms over her chest and looked mutinous. “Go ahead and tattle. It
won’t matter.”

“I don’t plan to tattle. I, too, am seeking solace in the library. What is wrong with
that?”

Frances looked uncertainly past Faith, as if she thought someone would jump out at
them. “I’m supposed to be in bed.”

“Me, too. I imagine we’ll each find a book and take it back to our rooms. No one needs
to know but us.”

“I—very well, thank you,” she added in too polite a voice.

She snatched the first book off the first shelf she could reach and fled. Faith stared
after her, then, on a hunch, knelt down and looked beneath the table to find a collection
of rock crystals piled neatly. So the girl hadn’t just come for a book. But of course,
that was none of her business.

“Hiding?”

Faith started at the deep male voice, dropping her head with a wince before slowly
rising to her feet. Twice today the duke had overheard her speaking far above her
station. She didn’t want to come to his notice at all, didn’t like being beholden
to him.

But then she raised her gaze to his face, and once more, she felt the unsettled, nervous
flutter in her stomach. She told herself it was because he now had power over her.
His coat was gone, which seemed vaguely scandalous. His shirtsleeves looked so very
white against the somber brown of his satin waistcoat.

“No,” he said, smiling. “I know you’re not hiding. I saw who ran out of here. I keep
overhearing you with members of my household today.”

She thought of the way she’d overstepped her bounds by talking back to his rude sister-in-law.

“Is Frances well?” he asked, looking thoughtful as he glanced at the door where she’d
disappeared.

“I don’t know,” Faith answered. “She was quite upset thinking I might tell her mother—”

“As if you have anything you want to say to Lady Tunbridge.”

Faith felt herself blush. “She’s a little girl who feels safe in a library. I will
certainly not ruin that for her. Will you?” she asked boldly.

“Of course not.”

She took a deep breath. “As for her mother . . . I imagine you were quite shocked
when you heard our discussion. I should not have—”

“Yes, you should have. She deserved your set down. I almost applauded, but I worried
that upon discovering me, Lady Emmeline might chase me down the corridor.”

Faith covered her mouth before a laugh could escape.

“Ah, you
do
have a sense of humor. I was beginning to wonder.”

She tried to recapture her distance. “And I should let down my guard with you?”

His smile faded. “No. No, you should not do that.”

He was studying her too closely, too thoroughly, and she was glad for her poorly styled
hair and awful gowns. She didn’t want him to
truly
see her, to think he could know things about her. They shouldn’t be speaking at all.

But she couldn’t make herself leave. “I like your library.”

His smile returned, but faintly this time, his eyes still too intense. “I’m certain
my ancestors appreciate that.”

A silence too full of awareness rose between them—and she was also vastly aware of
the chasm in consequence, in fortune, in everything that mattered in Society.

“Did you see the conservatory?”

She inhaled sharply. “You have one here in the city?”

“Of course. What self-respecting ducal mansion doesn’t?” He walked to the far end
of the library and threw open a set of double doors.

Faith moved forward as if in a dream, inhaling the rich scent of damp earth, then
the sweet scents of exotic flowers. When she stepped across the threshold, the air
grew moist and warm, and trees rose up above her as if to touch the sky through the
panes of glass in their cast-iron frames. Gas-lamp globes seemed to hover in line
along curving gravel pathways. Ferns swayed as they passed. Straight ahead rose a
fountain that gently splashed like music, its basin a tiled pool with golden carp
swimming amid conch shells.

As they stood there in peaceful silence, she felt strange being shoulder-to-shoulder
with such a man, a duke. Yet he never made her feel inferior to him. She wondered
if this, too, had to do with his military service, his grief at his mistakes, or if
perhaps as a younger son, he’d never acquired the “airs of an heir.” Thinking that
almost made her laugh, and he glanced at her from beneath his light brown wavy hair,
which seemed burnished in the low light.

“What is it?” he asked.

“Nothing, really, it’s just . . . I would not have imagined myself like this just
a few short weeks ago.”