The Duchess Diaries: The Bridal Pleasures Series (23 page)

She had deemed him deserving of her love. As a result he found himself wanting to live up to her expectations of who she thought he was. Without even realizing when it happened, he had stopped playing a role. And he would marry her with an open heart.

He should have resisted. But it was far too late. She was in his blood, under his skin. He would never be able to live the parallel life to hers that he originally had planned.

“When she looks at me…I feel like I’ve been struck with a strange fever.”

Kit glanced at him. “Maybe you have a medical condition. Would you like a surgeon to examine you?”

“No. Have him examine Devon’s head.”

“He already did,” Devon said. “He took some instrument and stuck it right into my ear and looked.”

“And?” Gideon said.

Devon shrugged. “He said everything was clear.”

Kit lifted his brow. “No. He said that he could see clear through to the other side.”

Gideon grinned and subsided into his thoughts as they began insulting each other.

Perhaps he could learn to be content. Perhaps he was content now. He hadn’t believed it possible.

Charlotte
needed
him. And in a sense that went beyond the physical.

But perhaps he needed her more, and so did his neglected daughter. He had missed so much of Sarah’s life. He could not salvage what they had lost. But he wouldn’t repeat that mistake. Not with her or with the siblings he hoped she would soon have. He thought Emily might be pleased.

He couldn’t have chosen better than Charlotte if he had spent the rest of his life searching for a woman to replace the mother his daughter had lost. Now there would be someone besides his butler and disgusted housekeeper to care whether he drank himself to death. With his marriage to Charlotte, he was gaining more than a wife. He would have a family.

“Fine,” he said, sitting up. “You’ve talked me into it. Let me off on the corner. I’ll walk the rest of the way to the academy. Charlotte probably won’t like my coming
there, but it’s her last day. I’ll just stay a few minutes. I’ll wait in one of the rooms where I won’t be a distraction.”

Miss Peppertree virtually dragged him into the house and down the hall to the formal drawing room. “Thank heavens you are here!” she cried, her spectacles sliding down the end of her nose. “Hurry! He has her alone. Well, Rankin is there, but he’s not the force that you are. I was listening at the door, for her protection, you understand, and I heard the word ‘elopement.’ That would be the end of her. The school. Of me.”

“Calm yourself, Miss Peppertree,” he said, while a haze of fury filled his mind. “You must have misunderstood. Who is with Charlotte? Sir Daniel? Her brother or one of her cousins? They might have said ‘engagement.’”

Gideon considered Phillip, but the man would be courting a death wish to force his presence on Charlotte when he’d been warned by Gideon to stay away. It couldn’t be the lout.

“There, Your Grace,” Miss Peppertree said, pulling open the door. “See for yourself.”

He froze, catching the line of what must have been a very disturbing conversation, to judge by the look of relief on Charlotte’s face when she saw him.

“This duke of yours will only break your heart.”

“No.” Gideon banged the door open with the flat of his hand, eliciting a gasp from Miss Peppertree, who had slipped around him and barely escaped being flattened to the wall. “You’re wrong. Her duke will only break every bone in your body.”

“Not in the academy!” Miss Peppertree exclaimed in horror. “I will not have it!”

Phillip turned, his smile reckless, unconcerned. “You took me off guard at the theater. I am prepared for you now.”

“Good.” Gideon wrenched off his glove and slapped Phillip as hard as he could across the cheek. Phillip did not flinch. But his eyes went black, and his mouth hardened as he turned his head to stare at Gideon’s face.

Charlotte turned pale. “Oh, no. Don’t do this.”

“He already has,” Phillip said, fingering the welt on his cheek.

Gideon flicked her an annoyed glance. “Please leave the room. This is not a matter to be settled in front of gentlewomen.”

“I—”

“Now.”

She hesitated, then lifted her dress and hastened away, sharing a shaken look with Miss Peppertree. Rankin moved to the duke’s side, assuming an air of confidence now that Gideon had taken control of the situation.

Gideon glowered at Phillip, who appeared to be shrinking, as if he finally realized what manner of enemy he had crossed. “We will meet tomorrow, sir, to settle this for once and all. Your choice of weapons?”

Phillip swallowed. “I’d be a fool to ask a student of Fenton’s for anything except pistols.”

“You were a fool to set foot in this house after I gave you the chance to escape with your life.” Gideon glanced around, at the sound of footsteps, astonished to see Kit and Devon entering the room. “What are you doing here?”

“Devon recognized Phillip’s servant standing outside,” Kit said, shaking his head. “He thought there might be trouble. I take it there is.”

Gideon nodded. “We are meeting tomorrow to clear the air. I will be in contact with you, sir, about the particulars.”

“You fool,” Devon said unsympathetically to Phillip. “You deserve whatever he dishes out. I am tempted to settle this myself. She is my cousin.”

Phillip did not answer, striding from the room in tight-lipped silence. If he regretted angering Gideon he concealed it. And if he wasn’t sorry yet, Gideon thought, he would be tomorrow.

Charlotte came to a halt in the middle of the hall, Miss Peppertree at her heels. “The girls must
not
hear of this. It mustn’t happen. I have to stop it.”

“I agree,” Miss Peppertree said. “If you don’t it will be the absolute ruin of us. There will be witnesses and a recounting in the papers. And if the duel ends badly for either man…well, I shudder to think of it.”

“I
shall
have to stop them,” Charlotte said with a growing sense that she would not succeed.

“How?”

“What do you suggest?” Charlotte asked. “I can’t think. Why do men act like this? Please, Daphne, give me your advice. What can I do to intervene?”

Miss Peppertree’s eyes narrowed behind her glasses. “You could invite the duke to supper and drug his wine.”

“Were you reading that book on the Borgias again? Why are you drawn to these morbid subjects?”

“I don’t know,” Daphne said, wrinkling her brow. “Why are you drawn to dangerous men?”

Charlotte didn’t have an answer.

It
had
been dangerous to fall in love with the man she
had made him to be in her diary. A man she could manipulate at will. But the Duke of Wynfield was neither a dream lover nor a complete wastrel. He was something real.

She had dreamed up so many happy endings. She had dreamed that a dark-haired duke would notice her in a crowd and never look at another woman again. She’d had to keep him secret. And now that romance had found her she understood why no one in her family acted with any logic whatsoever once that right person appeared and threw everything off course.

“Perhaps you should reason with His Grace,” Daphne suggested.

“That would be my preference, but I’m afraid he is not in a reasonable mood. Did you not sense his wrath? Do you think a man of his nature would appreciate a lecture at this point? He would not forgive me.”

And as if to confirm this statement Gideon emerged from the drawing room to stride past the two ladies with only a curt nod to acknowledge their presence. Kit and Devon followed at safe distances moments later.

“I see what you mean,” Miss Peppertree murmured. “He is a formidable man when aroused.” She pressed her hand to her mouth. “I meant when his passions are…Well, not that sort of passion.”

“I understand what you meant,” Charlotte said. “But I have to try to stop him.”

Miss Peppertree blinked like a barn owl. “I know what I would do under the circumstances.”

“You…” Charlotte studied her with fresh interest. “Would you?”

The woman gave a stiff nod. “A lady must use all means at her disposal to avoid an unpleasant outcome. I daresay a duel to the death qualifies as such.”

“To the death.” Charlotte bit her lip. “And I am the cause.”

“Then you must be the solution.”

“Oh, Daphne. I never realized that you understood these affairs.”

“Understanding and approving of them are two different matters altogether. You are caught in the middle of this. Perhaps you can prevent the worst.”

Charlotte drew in a breath. “I can only try.”

I
t was almost midnight. Gideon had settled down in his study with a brandy. A letter had arrived earlier in the day from his daughter’s governess. Mrs. Stearns wanted to inform Gideon that she and Lady Sarah had left Wynfield House and did not expect to arrive in London before the wedding due to travel delays; assuming that the weather remained mild, they hoped to be there shortly afterward, though.

Gideon sighed. The fusty woman was never going to let him forget that she had caught him in bed with one of his neighbors, a widow whose lust and aversion to remarrying
had exceeded his own. Well, he’d have the last laugh once he introduced her to Charlotte. Mrs. Stearns would not believe her eyes. And maybe she would be the one to laugh at him. Maybe she wouldn’t even recognize him. He was unknown to himself these days.

Charlotte had changed everything.

He put the letter back on the table.

Charlotte had changed
him.

Unfortunately she had not changed his possessive nature or his tendency to act on his anger. In fact, Charlotte seemed to bring out the best and worst of him, sometimes at once.

Apparently she had the same effect on other men. Look at the country bumpkin Gideon would have to take down a peg tomorrow. Gideon would give the man credit if he had the ballocks to show up.

“Your Grace?”

“Yes, Shelby,” he said moodily, without turning to the door.

“Will there be anything else tonight?”

“Everything is ready for tomorrow?”

“Absolutely,” Shelby said with an enthusiasm he rarely showed. “Your dueling pistols have been checked and your boots have been polished to a high sheen. The carriage will collect Sir Christopher on the way. I will accompany Your Grace, I assume?”

Gideon chuckled. “You need not anticipate the event with such relish, Shelby. It hasn’t been that long since the last duel.”

“I have respect for tradition, Your Grace. We must not allow modern times to make us lose sight of where we began.”

Gideon smiled, staring into the fire. “Admit it. You are happy to see me leg-shackled again.”

“It will be a relief to see you settled down, Your Grace. And, if I may add, the staff is gratified that you are doing the right thing by Miss Boscastle as well as by Lady Sarah. It is high time, too, I must add.”

“Good God, you are impertinent—” Gideon broke off, realizing that Shelby had dropped that last remark like a grenade and then wisely disappeared. What could Gideon say? He, too, was anxious to make amends to Sarah. He removed his jacket and vest. He loosened his neck cloth and started to unbutton his shirt.

He rubbed his face. He had been abrupt with Charlotte today. He had barreled past her in the hall without a word, because the only words that came to him at the time had been obscene. But she could hardly expect him to care about etiquette when he’d caught another man attempting to lure her away. And when he thought about how that man had insulted her and caused her grief before he was in her life to protect her…

He had to put her out of his mind until after the duel or he would be tempted to murder his opponent, when his intention was only to wound him as a warning. He needed to relax. But it took effort to keep his thoughts from wandering.

It was as if she had become part of him, as if she were standing behind him, as if she were whispering in his ear—

“Gideon.”

“What the hell?”

He surged to his feet, knocking his knee into the table that sat beside his chair. It was a blessing that he’d emptied
his glass, as it rolled across the carpet. “Damnation! What in the devil’s name are you doing here again at this time of night? Am I dreaming? Am I losing my mind? Are you out of yours?”

He shook his head. Nothing changed. It
was
her, in the flesh and not a figment of his imagination. It was his betrothed, swathed from throat to ankle in her blue evening cloak, her eyes widening in dismay—as if he had startled her out of her wits and not the other way around. He swore again, threw up his hands, and circled her.

“Your Grace, control yourself this instant,” she said, virtually imprisoned by his circling. “I will not tolerate such shameful language in my presence.”

“In your presence!” he bellowed. He ground his teeth. “Control myself?” He chased her around the chair. “You’re the one who needs to be brought under control. I hope you did not come here by yourself. Because if you did I shall seriously have to contemplate building a stone tower in which to protect you when we are apart.”

She blinked, her gaze dropping and flying back to his face. “You are half-dressed.”

“Am I?” He yanked off his neck cloth and tossed it in the air. “I do not sit about all hours of the night in a top hat and long-tailed coat waiting for the next woman to burst in unannounced.”

“Oh? Is that right?”

“Don’t ‘oh’ me. Yes. I’m half-dressed. And when I go to bed, I take off the rest of my clothes. Sometimes I sleep in my raw state. What do you expect when you sneak into a man’s castle this late at night?”

She blinked again.

“How did you arrive here?” he demanded, taking a step forward.

“Devon brought me. Harriet is with him, too.”

“Where is he? I’ve had enough of his interference.”

“I’m not sure where he is,” she said, looking insulted. “I asked him to come back for me in two hours. You can’t go outside like that, anyway.”