A Family Affair (7 page)

Sebastian nodded in full agreement. “I say we watch them closely, but let them have a little room for a possible proposal. If what you say about Devlin is true, Rake, then she couldn’t do any better.”

“Agreed?” Rake asked, and the other three men nodded silently. They would let Devlin in a bit closer than anyone else, but every last one of them made a silent promise to make sure nothing out of the ordinary ever happened between the two.

Sin lifted Fanny into his arms, and with a short “Night” he walked out of the room and carried her up the stairs to her bedroom, where he gently placed her on her bed and tucked a comforter around her.

“Good night, sweet pea,” he whispered as he quietly closed the door behind him.

Chapter 6

The Hereford townhouse at Grosvenor Square stood cold and dark when Devlin entered it at three o’clock in the morning.

Quietly, he closed the door before he went on into the large hallway, where a footman slept in a chair. Devlin took off his heavy coat and laid it on one of the marble benches at the side of the enormous room.

Someone with regrettably bad taste had ordered the townhouse built more than two hundred years before Devlin’s birth, and he had many times wished he could rip it apart, the whole house, and build a new one. Something more elegant and sober and not so overwhelmingly large, and especially not stuffed with expensive but tasteless artifacts.

His own father, the fifteenth Duke of Hereford, had made it clear he thought this house was the essence of nobility. Everyone who entered the front door got the message of power and wealth.

To Devlin, the townhouse said more about his father as a person than about the standing of the Ross family.

Conan Ross had been a selfish man, a brutal and unloving father, and an abusive husband, and even though Devlin never spent any time in London as a boy, the house still reminded him too much of all the horrible years under his father’s thumb.

The memories of Conan hadn’t been the easiest to erase, as his wickedness had spread everywhere, even down to the lowest scullery maid. It had taken Devlin six months merely to get the servants to look at him, as they were too used to crawling in front of Conan, too aware of what he would do to them if he saw something he thought was wrong. Living with Conan had been like living in the darkness under a large, unyielding, smothering blanket.

However, this evening Devlin had seen the light of Lady Francesca Darling.

She had been something special as a child, so filled with energy and so utterly stubborn. Her childish crush on him had embarrassed her relatives, but for him it had been heaven to be adored like that.

No one had ever wanted him the way she had.

He slowly climbed the grand staircase and proceeded to his bedroom, where it was cozier, thanks to the large fire spreading its warmth through the room.

“Had a nice time?”

Devlin looked up as his valet appeared from a dark corner.

Bear was a gigantic man with broad shoulders, limbs like tree trunks, and waist-long brown hair.

Devlin had met him his first day in France when he happened to come upon the cheering group of enemy soldiers who had caught Bear. Without a second thought, he had made an attempt to save the big Englishman.

Due to his inexperience, he had failed miserably.

Instead, he too had been caught and had to listen to Bear repeatedly sighing over his stupidity until they finally were able to escape.

To Devlin’s surprise, Bear did not leave his side. Somehow Devlin had won the trust of the beast, and they had been inseparable ever since.

“What do you think?” Devlin rolled his eyes, and Bear chuckled in response.

“That fun, eh?”

“We had more fun the time we were snowed in at the hut in the French Alps. I keep forgetting how philistine the members of the
ton
are.”

Devlin took off his clothes and washed quickly before he put on a robe and sat down by the fireplace.

“Want something to wash all the tittle-tattle away?”

“Why, yes,” Devlin breathed, and soon he had a glass of brandy in his hand, as did Bear, who seated himself in the other chair.

The giant put his feet on a pallet before he leaned back with a growl that made Devlin shake his head with a chuckle. Sometimes Bear seemed more like a force of nature than the youngest son of an earl, but Devlin didn’t mind.

In fact, he embraced Bear’s directness and honesty.

There was not a person on this earth he trusted more than the man who sat beside him. Bear would always tell him the truth, no matter what. In war or in peacetime, loyalty and honesty were the best traits.

The only thing Bear didn’t share with him was his reason for pretending to be a valet instead of taking his rightful place among the
ton
.

Devlin did wonder, but out of respect to Bear he didn’t ask. Some things you needed to keep to yourself, and he knew Bear would tell him when he was ready.

“I met my friend Rake today, a nice surprise. I haven’t seen him since my father’s funeral, and then was neither the time nor the place to get reacquainted.”

“I guess it wasn’t a complete waste, attending the ball?”

“Not completely.” Devlin grinned. “However, I will never understand why most of our peers find these functions so important. The same old people gather at the same old places, gossiping about the same old things, and no one finds this strange or boring. The only difference is the latest debutantes, but even they share the same mission as debutantes from earlier years: catch an eligible husband.”

“Oh, come on—” Bear laughed—”There is more to the social season than a boring repetition of last year.”

“You think?”

“Yes, I do. However, I haven’t been around the
ton
for quite some years now, and I guess things might have changed.”

“Probably not,” Devlin chuckled as he ducked to avoid being hit by the boot Bear threw at him.

“Come to think about it,” Bear continued, without acknowledging his boot, which Devlin held a little too close to the fire crackling in the fireplace, “The only good thing about the Season was all the ladies who were more than willing to lift their bedspreads for me.”

“Really? I certainly didn’t meet any of those today. I was surrounded by desperate mamas and the offspring they kept shoving in my direction. Lord, I felt for the poor girls. They looked just as uncomfortable as I felt.”

“Surrounded by mamas with a mission? I must say I owe you an apology. It must have felt like hell, being caught in the middle of all those dimwitted young misses. Debutantes are extremely boring, and I prefer them much more when they have been married for a couple of years, had their heirs, and are free to roam. Then they are interesting indeed.”

“Now you’re exaggerating,” Devlin objected with more force than he had intended. “Some of them happen to be all right.”

“Oh,” Bear breathed with a knowing smile. “You met a lady.”

“No,” Devlin growled. “I did not. I only disagree with you when you say they all are the same, because there could be some poor young lady out there among them who happens to be both nice and intelligent.”

Bear didn’t answer but gave his friend a look that told Devlin exactly how pathetic he sounded.

Oh, for the fires of hell, he thought. Why not share the truth with Bear? The pretend-to-be valet knew everything about him anyway, so why bother to hide something that might affect both their lives in the future?

“I might have.”

“Really?”

Devlin sighed. “Yes, really.”

“I have to admit I find this hilarious. Here you have been sulking the whole day because you felt you had no choice but to attend this—as you called it—bloody ball. And then you go and meet some little eye-batter who makes it all worth the while.”

“The ball still was a bloody nuisance,” Devlin snorted. “My opinion about the Season and all its must-go-to assemblies stays the same. What happened tonight is that I might have met someone who puts a little interest into joining my peers and doing the social twirl, just to be able to get to know her better. And maybe—and it’s an enormous maybe—she could be the right woman for me to marry.”

Bear took a sip of his brandy, but Devlin still could see the faint smile he tried to hide behind the crystal glass.

Oh, bloody hell.

He was the Duke of Hereford, and he was assumed to be a part of the London society. Even though he hated his deceased father, he still didn’t want his own future heirs to have less social standing than he had, just because he found the socialites stupid as sheep.

Deep inside, he felt obliged to act like an aristocrat, and dress up in some uncomfortable evening clothes to join the
ton
during these short months until summer. And this was the only reason he had crossed the small park in the middle of Grosvenor Square to enter the Easton townhouse.

The footmen were too occupied with all the shiny carriages arriving to notice him as he slunk past them. Beside the stables, a small gate led into the darkness of the garden, and he arrived unseen and unannounced.

He stood for some time alone, watching the couples sneaking in and out through the balcony doors. He was quite bored and on the verge of sneaking back the same way he’d arrived when Fanny tiptoed past him, and, without thinking, he saved her from disgrace.

He didn’t recognize her at first, and he would never have looked at her twice if she hadn’t knocked him off his feet with the way she addressed him. She spoke to him as if she knew him well, like a family member, and it vexed him enough to follow her into the ballroom. He knew he was giving the gossipy matrons something to talk about by following her like that, but it turned out to be the best thing he’d ever done.

It had been so nice to meet Rake again.

He hadn’t seen his friend since Conan’s funeral last year, when the friend came to be there for him in his time of grief. Or, as Rake put it later the same evening when he was too drunk to care about what he said, to celebrate the end of the era of Conan the Black. Rake had always been a better friend to Devlin than Devlin thought he deserved.

They had been roommates during all their years in school and had the grandest of times, playing more pranks than anyone ever found out. They were both suspended a couple of times, and only the high rank of their families caused their re-admittance.

Hannibal even paid a few bribes to keep the two of them in school. He had grunted a lot, but somehow Devlin had a feeling Rake’s old man actually was proud of them, which was kind of odd, as his own father was so embarrassed over his son’s behavior that he refused to help his son get back into school.

It had been another knife in Devlin’s young heart, as he knew how important his father considered education. The headmaster, a caring man with a wicked brain of his own, instead asked Hannibal to donate for Devlin’s sake.

And Rake’s father had paid without a word.

When school was finished, Rake went into the family businesses, enlarging the already too large Darling riches, while Devlin was sent to the military in order to straighten him out, as his father put it. What Conan didn’t know was that, directly after his arrival to the army compounds, Devlin was contacted by the War Ministry.

Basil Sinclair, the high and mighty Earl of Saxton, asked Devlin to join his league of spies and in secrecy go behind enemy lines in search of information.

Devlin immediately agreed.

The following years were spent in France, collecting information for Basil and the ministry. No one knew what he was doing, not even his own father, who got sent notes now and then from the War Ministry about Devlin’s general progress in the military.

Last year it all changed when Conan surprisingly died of pneumonia and Devlin had no choice but to return to England.

He’d had a long meeting with Lord Saxton, talking about the future, and they decided Devlin wouldn’t continue collecting information now, when he was back in England, as he wasn’t as anonymous here in London as he had been in the French countryside. Even so, they both knew he wouldn’t hesitate to throw himself into the world of secrets and betrayal he had lived in during the last decade, if he was needed.

Basil didn’t have to tell Devlin he was more valuable to them if he engaged in the months of hell—more commonly known among the
ton
as the Season—than if he hid in his townhouse or in his country home. Suddenly he had yet another solid reason to appear open and friendly.

However, now it didn’t seem such a pain.

“I thought you had sworn never to marry, so Conan’s bloodline wouldn’t continue.” Bear’s quick glance belied the mildly curious, even blasé way he spoke.

“True, but few things in the world stay the same, and now, as I am older and wiser, I have to my own surprise changed my mind.”

“Older, yes,” Bear joked to take the edge off the serious subject. “Wiser? Not so much.”

Devlin didn’t catch the joke, being too caught in his thoughts.

“I realized I would only make Conan the winner if I denied myself a wife and children. I told you how my father’s greatest pleasure was making me as miserable as possible, and by denying myself marriage, I would die just as sad and lonely as he did.”

Bear said nothing, but nodded. He found the decision admirable.

“So, what is your plan now? Marry the chit you met today, and keep her happy and pregnant the next twenty years?”

Devlin shook his head, and laughed.

“Not really, no. I thought I would settle for finding a warm and contented woman who is somewhat pleasant, and who would give me an heir or two.”

“Really?” Bear quirked an eyebrow, obviously not as impressed anymore with Devlin’s grand plan. “And why on earth do you think it will be enough for you to simply ‘settle’? Don’t you want a woman who makes your heart beat faster, who makes you smile as you do when you talk about the little one you met this evening? Don’t you want someone you can love, and who will love you back?”