Mastered By Love (6 page)

 

He wished he didn’t, but he had to know, and she was the only one he could ask. He focused on the pen in his hand—his father’s. “How did my father die?”

 

She stilled. He didn’t look up, but waited; he sensed she was ordering her thoughts. Then she said, “He had a seizure. He was perfectly well earlier—we met over breakfast—then he went into the library as he always did on Sunday mornings to read the news sheets. We don’t know when he was struck down, but when he didn’t ring for his elevenses, as he invariably did, the cook sent Jeffers to check. Jeffers found him lying on the floor behind his desk. He’d tried to reach the bellpull, but had collapsed.”

 

She paused, then went on, “Retford summoned me. I stayed with your father while they sent for the doctor and made a stretcher to carry him to his room. But he didn’t last that long.”

 

Royce glanced up. Her gaze was far away, unfocused. “You were with him when he died?”

 

She nodded.

 

He looked down, turned the pen in his fingers. “Did he say anything?”

 

“He was unconscious until quite close to the end. Then he stirred, and asked for you.”

 

“Me?” He looked up. “Not my sisters?”

 

“No—he’d forgotten. He thought you were here, at Wolverstone. I had to tell him you weren’t.” She refocused
on him. “He passed away quite peacefully—if he had been in pain, it was before we found him.”

 

He nodded, not quite meeting her eyes. “Thank you.” After a moment, he asked, “Have you told the others?”

 

She knew to whom he was referring—his father’s illegitimate children.

 

“The girls are on one or other of the estates, so I sent letters out yesterday. Other than O’Loughlin, to whom I sent word, the males are out of reach—I’ll pen letters once we know the bequests, and you can sign them.” She looked at him. “Or Handley could do it, if you wish.”

 

“No. I’d appreciate it if you would handle that. You know them—Handley doesn’t. But leave O’Loughlin to me. I don’t want to start mysteriously losing sheep.”

 

She rose. “He wouldn’t, would he?”

 

“He would, if nothing else to gain my attention. I’ll deal with him.”

 

“Very well. If there’s nothing more you need from me, I’ll start planning the funeral, so once your sisters arrive we can proceed without delay.”

 

He nodded curtly. “Please God.”

 

He heard a soft chuckle as she glided to the door. Then she left, and he could, at last, focus on picking up the dukedom’s reins.

 

 

He spent the next two hours going over her lists and the notes he’d made, then penning letters—short, to-the-point scrawls; he was already missing Handley.

 

Jeffers proved invaluable, knowing the fastest route to fly his communications to each of his holdings; it appeared he needed a personal footman after all. Through Jeffers he arranged to meet with Wolverstone’s steward, Falwell, and Kelso, the agent, the following morning; both lived in Harbottle, so had to be summoned.

 

After that…once Jeffers had left with the last of his missives, Royce found himself standing at the window behind the desk, looking north toward the Cheviots and the
border. The gorge through which the Coquet ran was visible here and there through the trees. A race had been cut into the steep bank some way north of the castle, channeling water to the castle mill; only the mill’s slate roof was visible from the study. After the mill, the race widened into an ornamental stream, a series of pools and ponds slowing the pummeling torrent until it flowed peacefully into the large manmade lake south of the castle.

 

Royce followed the line of the stream, his gaze fixing on the last pool before the view was cut off by the castle’s north wing. In his mind, he continued along the banks, to where the stream reached the lake, then farther around the western bank…to where the icehouse stood back from the shore in a grove of sheltering willows.

 

He stood for a while more, feeling rather than thinking. Then accepting the inevitable, he turned and walked to the door. Stepping out, he looked at Jeffers. “I’m going for a walk. If Miss Chesterton looks for me, tell her I’ll see her at dinner.”

 

“Yes, Your Grace.”

 

He turned and started walking. He supposed he’d get used to the form of address, yet…it wasn’t supposed to have been like this.

 

 

The evening, blissfully quiet though it was, felt like the lull before a storm; after dinner, sitting in the library watching Minerva embroider, Royce could sense the pressures building.

 

Viewing the body laid out in the icehouse hadn’t changed anything. His father had aged, yet was recognizably the same man who’d banished him—his only son—for sixteen years, the same man from whom he’d inherited name, title and estate, his height and ruthless temperament, and not much else. Yet temper, temperament, made the man; looking down on his father’s no longer animate face, harsh featured even in death, he’d wondered how different they truly were. His father had been a ruthless despot; at heart, so was he.

 

Sunk in the large armchair angled before the hearth wherein a small fire burned incongruously bright, he sipped the fine malt whisky Retford had poured him, and pretended that the ancient, luxurious yet comfortable surroundings had relaxed him.

 

Even if he hadn’t sensed storms on his horizon, having his chatelaine in the same room guaranteed he wouldn’t—couldn’t—relax.

 

His eyes seemed incapable of shifting for any length of time away from her; his gaze again drawn to her as she sat on the chaise, eyes on her needlework, the firelight gilding her upswept hair and casting a rosy sheen over her cheeks, he wondered anew at the oddity—the inconvenient fact—that she wasn’t attracted to him, that he apparently didn’t impinge on her awareness while he—every sense he possessed—was increasingly fixated on her.

 

The arrogance of the thought occurred to him, yet in his case was nothing more than the truth. Most ladies found him attractive; he usually simply took his pick of those offering, crooked his finger, and that lady was his for however long he wanted her.

 

He wanted his chatelaine with an intensity that surprised him, yet her disinterest precluded him from having her. He’d never pursued a woman, actively seduced a woman, in his life, and at his age didn’t intend to start.

 

After dressing for dinner—mentally thanking Trevor who had foreseen the necessity—he’d gone to the drawing room armed with a catechism designed to distract them both. She’d been happy to oblige, filling in the minutes before Retford had summoned them to the dining room, then continuing through the meal, reminding him of the local families, both ton and gentry, casting her net as far as Alnwick and the Percys, before segueing into describing the changes in local society—who were now the principal opinion makers, which families had faded into obscurity.

 

Not that much had changed; with minor adjustments, his previous view of this part of the world still prevailed.

 

Then Retford had drawn the covers and she’d risen, intending to leave him to a solitary glass of port. He’d opted instead to follow her to the library and the whisky his father had kept there.

 

Prolonging the torture of being in her presence, yet he hadn’t wanted to be alone.

 

When he’d commented on her using the library instead of the drawing room, she’d told him that after his mother’s death, his father had preferred her to sit with him there…suddenly recalling it was he, not his father, walking beside her, she’d halted. Before she could ask if he’d rather she repaired to the drawing room, he’d said he had further questions and waved her on.

 

On reaching the library, they’d sat; while Retford had fetched the whisky, he’d asked about the London house. That topic hadn’t taken long to exhaust; other than having to rethink his notion of having his butler Hamilton take over as butler there, all else was as he’d supposed.

 

A strangely comfortable silence had ensued; she was, it seemed, one of those rare females who didn’t need to fill every silence with chatter.

 

Then again, she’d spent the last three years’ evenings sitting with his father; hardly surprising she’d grown used to long silences.

 

Unfortunately, while the silence normally would have suited him, tonight it left him prey to increasingly illicit thoughts of her; those currently prevailing involved stripping her slowly of her weeds, unwrapping her curves, her graceful limbs, and investigating her hollows.

 

All of which seemed guiltily wrong, almost dishonorable.

 

He inwardly frowned at her—a picture of ladylike decorum as, entirely oblivious of the pain she was causing him, needle flashing she worked on a piece of the same sort of embroidery his mother had favored, petit point he thought it was called. Technically, her living unchaperoned under his roof might be termed scandalous, yet given her position and how long she’d resided there…“How long have you been
chatelaine here?”

 

She glanced up, then returned to her work. “Eleven years. I took on the duties when I turned eighteen, but neither your mother nor your father would consent to me to being titled chatelaine, not until I turned twenty-five and they finally accepted I wouldn’t wed.”

 

“They’d expected you to marry.” So had he. “Why didn’t you?”

 

She glanced up, flashed a light smile. “Not for want of offers, but no suitor offered anything I valued enough to grant him my hand—enough to change the life I had.”

 

“So you’re satisfied being Wolverstone’s chatelaine?”

 

Unsurprised by the bald question, Minerva shrugged. She would willingly answer any question he asked—anything to disrupt the effect that him sitting there, at his languid, long-legged ease in a sprawl that was so quintessentially masculine—broad shoulders against the high back of the chair, forearms resting along the padded arms, the long fingers of one hand cradling a cut-crystal tumbler, powerful thighs spread apart—was having on her benighted senses. Her nerves were so taut his presence made them flicker and twang like violin strings. “I won’t be chatelaine forever—once you marry, your duchess will take up the reins, and then I plan to travel.”

 

“Travel? Where to?”

 

Somewhere a long way from him
. She studied the rose she must have just embroidered; she couldn’t remember doing it. “Egypt, perhaps.”

 

“Egypt?” He didn’t sound impressed by her choice. “Why there?”

 

“Pyramids.”

 

The darkly brooding look he’d had before he’d asked when she’d become chatelaine returned. “From all I’ve heard, the area around the pyramids is rife with Berber tribesmen, barbarians who wouldn’t hesitate to kidnap a lady. You can’t go there.”

 

She imagined informing him that she’d long had a dream
of being kidnapped by a barbarian, tossed over his shoulder, and carted into his tent, there to be dropped on a silk-draped pallet and thoroughly ravished—of course he’d been the barbarian in question—and then pointing out that he had no authority over where she went. Instead, she settled for a response he’d like even less. Smiling gently, she looked back at her work. “We’ll see.”

 

No, they wouldn’t.
She wasn’t going anywhere near Egypt, or any other country seething with danger. Royce toyed with lecturing her that his parents hadn’t raised her to have her throw her life away on some misguided adventure…but with his temper so uncertain, and her response guaranteed to only escalate the tension, he kept his lips shut and swallowed the words.

 

To his intense relief, she slipped her needle into her work, then rolled the piece up and placed it into a tapestry bag that apparently lived beneath one end of the chaise. Leaning down, she tucked the bag back into position, then straightened and looked at him. “I’m going to retire.” She rose. “Don’t stir—I’ll see you tomorrow. Good night.”

 

He managed a growled “good night” in reply. His eyes followed her to the door—while he fought to remain in the chair and let her go. Her idea about Egypt hadn’t helped, stirring something primitive—even more primitive—within him. Sexual hunger was a tangible ache as the door shut softly behind her.

 

Her room would be in the keep, somewhere not far from his new rooms; despite the ever-increasing temptation, he wasn’t going there.

 

She was his chatelaine, and he needed her.

 

Until he was solidly established as duke, the reins firmly in his hands, she was his best, most well-informed, reliable, and trustworthy source of information. He would avoid her as much as possible—Falwell and Kelso would help with that—but he would still need to see her, speak with her, on a daily basis.

 

He’d see her at meals, too; this was her home after all.

 

Both his parents had been committed to raising her; he had every intention of honoring that commitment even though they were gone. Although not formally a ward of the dukedom, she stood in much the same position…perhaps he could cast himself as
in loco parentis
?

 

That would excuse the protectiveness he felt—that he knew he would continue to feel.

 

Regardless, he would have to bear with her being always around, until, as she’d pointed out, he married.

 

That was something else he would have to arrange.

 

Marriage for him, as for all dukes of Wolverstone, indeed, for all Variseys, would be a cold-bloodedly negotiated affair. His parents’ and sisters’ marriages had been that, and had worked as such alliances were meant to; the men took lovers whenever they wished, and once heirs were produced, the women did the same, and the unions remained stable and their estates prospered.

 

His marriage would follow that course. Neither he nor any Varisey was likely to indulge in the recent fashion for love matches, not least because, as was recognized by all who knew them, Variseys, as a breed, did not love.

 

Not within marriage, and not, as far as anyone knew, in any other capacity, either.

 

Of course, once he was wed, he’d be free to take a mistress, a long-term one, one he could keep by his side…