Love Letters From a Duke (23 page)

And she didn’t care who saw her.

“Duchess?” Tally whispered gently to her sister. “Duchess, are you well?”

Felicity barely heard her, hardly nodded her head to respond as Thatcher led her into the sitting room. He settled her onto the settee, and she looked up at him, expecting to find him bemused by her distress.

But there was no mirth there in his eyes, only concern, and
that made her unhappiness all that much more distressing.

Of course
he
was concerned. He was honorable and noble and loyal and everything a man should be. Everything her duke was not.

“Thatcher,” Tally was saying, “could you please fetch us some more tea?”

“Certainly,” he said. “Is there anything else you need, Miss Langley?”

Felicity shook her head. She couldn’t even look at him. He’d held her on the steps as she cried and hadn’t said a word of remonstration. As he could have, most likely should have.

When she glanced up, he was gone and Tally and Pippin sat opposite her, their expressions mirroring her own shock over Lord Stewart’s revelations. Aunt Minty sat near the fire, knitting furiously, while Jamilla lolled on the other end of the settee, glancing wistfully at the picked over tea tray.

Hollindrake a wolf in sheep’s clothing? How could this be? Certainly she’d heard some rumors about his past, but hadn’t Mad Jack Tremont been much the same in his youth? And he turned out to be noble and heroic.

There are things a man can’t undo
,
that a man can’t disavow. But time has a way of making one see what is important
,
what is necessary and how change isn’t always the bitter potion it is made out to be.

Hollindrake had written her those words, hadn’t he? She rose absently and moved to her desk.

“Felicity, are you sure Thatcher can’t get you something more?” Pippin said. “Some nice jam and bread, perhaps?”

“A bit o’ warm brandy?” Aunt Minty suggested.

“Another footman?” Jamilla offered.

She shook her head and settled into her familiar chair. Pulling at the chain around her neck, she drew out the key that hung there and tried to work it into the lock of her
writing box. But her hand shook so badly, she couldn’t manage it.

Instead she slumped and started to cry again. Oh, what had she done? Aligned herself to the man who was quite likely the worst libertine in the history of London.

Why couldn’t he be more like…
like Thatcher.

This made her tears flow even harder. How was it in two days’ time she’d gone from being singularly confident in her choice to this? Curses on Lord Stewart and Mr. Mudgett. And Thatcher as well. He shouldn’t have insisted she go skating. Or drink Turkish coffee. Or worst of all, kissed her and turned her world upside down.

No, she thought, mustering what remained of her pride and confidence. There was still time to prove them all wrong. Prove to herself that she was right about Hollindrake.

“What do you need, dearling?” Tally asked, having moved softly to her side.

She pointed at the writing box that held all of her letters.

His letters.
They’d prove her point. Make everyone see the truth as she did.

Tally pulled a pin from her hair, tucked it into the lock and opened the box faster than if she had used the key. With a mildly apologetic shrug, she hastily opened the box, lifted the writing tray out, then moved the blank sheets of paper aside. With a quick tap on the hinge, the hidden compartment opened and she retrieved the bundle of letters tied in a blue ribbon. “Are these what you are looking for?”

Felicity nodded, catching hold of them and shuffling through the worn and well-read pages until she came to the one she was looking for.

Swiping at her tears, she scanned the lines, searching for the paragraphs she remembered. “Here, Tally, read this.” When Tally read it silently to herself, Felicity shook her head. “No, aloud.”

“If you think I should,” her sister said.

Felicity nodded for her to begin, so she did:

“‘I suppose by now you have heard the rumors of my misspent youth. They are mostly true.’” Tally stopped and glanced up at her sister, wide-eyed.

Felicity waved at her. “Read on.”

Taking a deep breath, Tally did just that. “‘But my sweet girl, you must realize that such days were well before I met you. And that your letters, your vivacity, your innocence, your spirited discourse have left me with only one thought—to make amends where I can and attend to my obligations with nothing less than an equal measure of your determination. I stand in awe that one as young as you should use your time to such better use—’”

She stopped and glanced at her sister.

“I had written him about our campaign to have mandatory knitting hour each evening,” Felicity explained, “so we could make socks to send to Wellington for his troops.”

Pippin laughed. “Did you also tell him that you begged Miss Emery to let us do that so you didn’t have to spend the hour reading aloud from
Fordyce’s Sermons
?”

Felicity laughed as well, swiping the last of the tears from her eyes. “No, I neglected that point. But don’t you all see? He isn’t the same man as the one Lord Stewart described.”

Biting her lower lip and not willing to look her sister in the eye, Tally lowered her voice and said, “That may be true, but the point is that you have never met him and Lord Stewart has. He sounds rather…”

“Rakish,” Pippin offered.

“A devil to boot,” Aunt Minty added.

“Divine!” Jamilla declared. “Your Hollindrake sounds absolutely divine! A man with experience, he shall please you, little Duchess! He will know how to carry you to the heights of heaven—and such a man is—” She made a purr
ing noise in the back of her throat and ended her discourse with a drawn-out, breathy sigh.

“Well, there is that,” Tally agreed.

“Yes, so he can please a woman, but how will I ever please him?” Felicity shot back. Then her mouth dropped open as she realized what she had just said. “Oh bother, I don’t care how improper that sounds. What if the duke finds me dull in the marital sense and decides to seek solace elsewhere?” She began to cry again, this time in great choking sobs. “I won’t know what to do.”

“Well, you kissed Tha—” Tally started to say, then clapped her hand over her lips to stop from blabbering her sister’s secret. But it was too late.

“Thatcher?” Pippin finished, hurling herself off the settee and coming to sit on the footstool beside Felicity. “You kissed him?”

Felicity covered her face with her hands and started to cry again. She didn’t know why she was turning into such a watering pot other than the fact that kissing Thatcher had most likely ruined any chance she had at securing Hollindrake. Why, if he found out…

“Did you really kiss him?” Pippin asked again. After a few more sobs, Felicity nodded. “That’s wonderful! Why he’s perfect! And so much better than Hollindrake, for Mr. Thatcher is likely ten times more handsome and so very heroic.”

“Perfect? Perfectly unacceptable,” Felicity shot back, her hands dropping to clutch two fistfuls of her gown. “I am nearly betrothed! What was I thinking when I let him—” A devilish warmth ran threw her limbs and she wished with all her heart she could forget his kiss.

But she doubted she ever would, curse the man!

“He is a handsome devil,” Tally noted.

“Very handsome. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has some
noble blood in him,” Pippin said. “For he’s been nothing but kind these past two days—saving us from Miss Browne and then helping us with Lady Lumby. It’s almost like he can’t help himself but be heroic.” She paused and her eyes grew wide, her mouth opening into a wide moue. “Oh, Tally, that can be our new play—‘The Lost Duke.’ The man is working as a footman when it is discovered that he is actually a duke who was kidnapped as a child…” Pippin paused and her fingers fluttered against her lips as she considered the next point.

“By pirates,”
Tally provided.

“That’s perfect,” Pippin agreed quite readily. “And he has utterly and completely forgotten his aristocratic beginnings.”

Oh, yes, Felicity thought. Just as she’d predicted. They’d found a way to use Thatcher in one of their ridiculous plays—and had just as quickly forgotten her very important and very real plight.

As if to prove the point, Tally leaned over and grabbed up a dozen or so sheets of writing paper and nudged Felicity out of her chair. “Oh, I have the perfect subtitle: ‘The Noble Spirit Uncovered.’”

Pippin clapped her hands together. “’Tis perfect! The first act must take place at sea.”

“No, no, no! A prologue—of his kidnapping, his mother begging the pirates not to take her precious child, her only son.” Uncorking the bottle of ink, Tally hastily dipped the quill and began to scratch away at the pages. Pippin turned and brought over the plate of leftover cakes, settling them on her lap and happily dictating between bites of currant scones.

Felicity threw her hands up in the air. “Oh, you two are incorrigible! My life is in ruins and you want to write another one of your foolish plays?”

Neither of them heard her, but there was a gentle tug at her elbow. She turned to find Jamilla leading her away from the engrossed pair.

“They cannot help you, little Duchess,” she said. “But I can see you are troubled by all this. Why, I am not so sure, but you are worried and Jamilla is here to help.”

Help yourself to our unwitting hospitality, larder, and social standing,
Felicity thought. But then again, right now she’d take any advice she could get.

Besides, if there was one subject Jamilla could be called upon to offer advice, it was men.

“The duke has so much experience—”

“And that is a good thing,” Jamilla assured her, leading her to the settee before the fire and settling them both down before the warmth of the coals.

Their last bit of coals, Felicity thought, but at least she needn’t worry about them freezing now that Lady Rhoda had promised them enough to get them through the end of the month.

“There is nothing wrong with a man who has experience in the arts of
l’amour
,” Jamilla told her.

“But I have none,” Felicity said. “And what if he expects—”

“He will expect nothing of you,” she said. “These Englishmen are fools—they want their brides to be innocent and wide-eyed and then they are bored. And you Englishwomen, you want love and fidelity. Bah! How can you accomplish such a thing when you are dull and unwilling to explore your own passions. But you, little Duchess, shall be the exception for your duke.”

Felicity shook her head. “However will I do that?”

“Your footman, darling!” Jamilla declared. “It is how all women of the world practice their arts.”

“Thatcher?” she sputtered “You want me to kiss him again?”

“Not just kiss him, little Duchess,” Jamilla announced. “Your footman has a wicked gleam in his eyes—believe me when I tell you this, he will know what to do. Let your Thatcher love you and you will go to your duke a woman
with experience.”

Thatcher stood in the hallway, his mouth hanging open. What had he just heard?

He needn’t have asked, for that demmed woman repeated herself.

“Felicity, so unbecoming—you resemble a fish at market when you gape so. You heard me correctly, let this Thatcher make love to you.”

This was how the princess thought to help? He could well imagine the ruin of London society if all nannies were like this Jamilla.

“Do you think so?” Felicity said with a curious, dare he say it, hopeful, note to her voice that had his head shooting up and staring at the open door in shock.

In that same instant, he saw exactly that.
Felicity atop his bed
,
naked
,
splendidly so
,
her blond hair released from those infernal pins that held its honeyed depths imprisoned. Lithe
,
long limbs reaching out for him
,
welcoming his hard body
,
his ragged needs.

But as fast as his fantasy had his blood pounding through his veins, he realized something else. Despite having listened to Stewie’s dire warnings about Hollindrake’s character, Felicity was still intent on marrying her “noble duke,” so much so that she’d ruin herself with a footman to ensure she was capable of satisfying her rakish husband.

He turned quickly and marched down the steps, for the irony that he was one and the same didn’t escape him.

It wasn’t until he was out of the house and in the middle of the alley that he finally came to a stop. The twist in his gut was something he’d never felt—well, not over a woman—and he knew exactly what it was. Jealousy. Jealous of himself. Or rather that wretched Hollindrake his grandfather and Mr. Gibbens had created and could never exist. Certainly no
man could be such a paragon of virtue and nobility.

He certainly wasn’t. Look at him now! Standing in the middle of an alleyway, having fled the house like the greenest of recruits. Then again, what sort of man wanted to stand about eavesdropping as his almost betrothed plotted her seduction of another man?

Now, that wasn’t done. Wasn’t proper. The eavesdropping or the seducing part.

Raking a hand through his hair, Thatcher began to laugh. He doubted even Thalia and Pippin could contrive such a misadventure.

Oh gads, he was in a terrible muddle. Taking a deep breath, he looked up at the darkened skies, the snow twirling hypnotically down from the heavens. And as the snowflakes fell around him, so did images from the day.