Royal Regard (51 page)

“You let me be the soldier, love. I’ll have
the king’s men and Bow Street everywhere before you know it.”

“You will tell me…” Her voice broke, and she
was forced to swallow the threatening tears again, “…as soon as you
hear anything about the duke?”

“Of course.”

Setting her on her feet outside the study
door, he took out his second pistol. From inside, they could hear
Jewel still crying softly and one of the men singing nursery
rhymes. He guided Bella away from the doorway.

“You must let me enter first, my dear.” He
rapped twice on the study door. “Smythe here.”

“Come in, Major. Three of us safe here with
Lady Julia and Lord Herrendon and Nurse.”

It had been more than six weeks
since Michelle had been dispatched, and as they did most
afternoons, Bella and Nick had retired to Charlotte’s drawing room
after luncheon, Bella to rest and build up her strength, Nick to
lend his if it were needed. Since the day he had left her to be
attacked by Michelle, he hadn’t let her out of his sight. Bella
understood his fear, even shared it to some extent, but indulging
him was starting to wear.

“Your brother is nearly finished with the men
from Bow Street,” he said, taking her hand, as had become his
habit, “if you remember anything more you’d like to add.”

“No,” Bella returned, fingers twitching in
the folds of her skirt. “I’ve given myself the megrim recalling
again what I already told them, to no good purpose. Day after day,
the same questions, and I never have anything new to report. I wish
you two wouldn’t encourage them.” She touched her fingers to her
temple, soothing the near-constant ache. “Would you be so kind as
the close the curtain?”

“Of course, sweeting.” He adjusted the blue
velvet curtains, drawing one over the other to avoid even the
slightest ray of afternoon sun from disturbing her rest. He banked
the fire and turned down the lamps, poured a glass of water in case
she should find herself thirsty. Everything he did was thoughtful.
She was beginning to feel selfish by proximity.

When he returned to her side in the darkened
drawing room, like every afternoon, he gently helped her lie back
on the soft, velvet
chaise longue
, covered her with a light
blue quilt cross-stitched with a pattern of purple irises, then
took up his stalwart position at Charlotte’s writing desk with a
wick lamp, reading the day’s papers in the reddish glow, working in
his account books, playing endless games of Patience, or just
enjoying a brandy while she rested.

Four soldiers were yet guarding the house on
shifts, and John spent his days in the Firthleys’ receiving room,
which had become an office of sorts, but the twenty Coldstream
Guards had been reassigned. The Bow Street runners had mostly
turned their attention to other crimes, but for the two Nick
retained on his payroll and insisted report to him daily. Even
Prinny was satisfied, saying the worst Malbourne’s mistress had
left behind was a trail of good Englishmen with the French pox.
Everyone said it was time for Bella to get back to normal, albeit
in black bombazine from head to toe.

As Bella woke from her nap, Nick was at her
side in an instant. Once he helped her to sit up, he offered tepid
water and inquired, almost inaudibly, as to the state of her
headache.

“I’m perfectly well, Nick. I feel much
better. You need not sit here with me every day.”

He kissed her hand. “Where else would I
be?”

In fact, she had heard from Charlotte, there
were very few other places he could go. Having been acquitted, he
was still nominally welcome in The Lords and at his clubs, but the
whispering that followed made it impossible to take up his old
life. Bella felt sick when she thought of it. For her, he’d ruined
himself before thousands of people who now believed him to be
acquitted unjustly. Even the king wouldn’t help, because Prinny was
considered the source of the injustice. It would be worse for
Bella, but she wasn’t expected to leave the house in full
mourning.

She shifted on the chaise, pulling at what
had once been a favorite peach-colored day dress, now dyed black.
As she folded the blanket, Nick took it from her to set on a chair
for a maid.

“Tea?” he asked, still in an undertone.

She looked at the grandfather clock ticking
in the corner, relieved to see its chime wouldn’t invade her senses
for another twenty minutes. Every hour on the hour, she regretted
insisting Alexander needn’t stop its workings on her account.

“No, thank you. It will be time for dinner in
just a little while. I slept much longer than I had planned. I
meant to look over the papers from Myron’s desk.”

“Papers can wait, dearest. Reading still
makes your head hurt.”

“Everything makes my head hurt,” she sighed.
“I cannot shirk forever, nor expect you and Alexander to manage my
holdings indefinitely. There are decisions to be made, and I the
only one to make them.”

“I will oversee your property as long as
you’d like, or hire a steward.”

“I will hire my own steward as soon as I am
familiar with the holdings,” she insisted.

“Are you certain you—”

“Yes!” She almost put a hand to her head, the
forceful reply setting off a sharp pain near her temple, but
stopped herself, not wanting to give any extra credence to his
argument. She lowered her voice when she added, “I am certain. I
can start tonight after dinner, if you or Alexander would be so
kind as to take me through it.”

“Of course we—But Bella—”

“Please, Nick. I feel so useless lying on a
sofa all day, and I have to make arrangements for the move.”

He turned on his heel. “Move? What move?” She
hadn’t heard so much strain in his voice since he had arrived at
Charlotte’s house after Michelle’s attack.

It was now too late to ease into the
conversation gently. At the sudden terror in his widened eyes, she
explained, “You knew I wouldn’t stay in London once Myron was
gone.”

“You can’t travel yet. It’s not safe.” His
voice grasped at straws and his fists opened and closed at his
sides. “You are still too weak. The megrims.”

“It is a headache,” she chided, “not a belly
wound, and I’ll travel by sea, not coach, which might actually
help.” In truth, she was dreading the trip, but not as much as
staying in London: living in a house filled with ghosts of the life
she might have had; reading sympathy cards addressed to her title
and wealth; fending off men who would gladly disrupt her grief, and
suffer her infamy, for a chance at her fortune; waiting for the
impossible day she would no longer be the subject of the latest
on-dit
.

“But Bella, I had hoped we would…” He
straightened his stance and cleared the hint of pleading from his
throat. “I have held my tongue to give you time to adjust, but
there is no time to waste if you think you are leaving.” He turned
away, voice wavering just slightly. If he hadn’t, she suspected she
might have caught him blushing.

“I plan for us to marry shortly, to offer you
protection you will not otherwise have. It will be by special
license, considering. I’ve already acquired it, but I am willing to
wait a week or so, give you a chance to make a thing of it, should
you choose.”

“You plan for us to marry shortly?!”

“Yes. I had been willing to wait, but if you
have recovered enough to travel to Cornwall, you have recovered
enough to say vows.”

“Say vows? Are you mad? My husband only just
died, and I wasn’t even there to bury him!”

“To be fair, you were indisposed, and no one
knew for how long.”

Her voice kept rising, though it would soon
be more shrill than her headache could stand. “Everyone will think
I am increasing with your by-blow!”

He spun to face her, and when she saw his
blotchy cheeks and frantic eyes, she pulled her temper back under
control and tried to explain calmly, gently, sweetly: “It will be
months before I can agree to a betrothal.”

The blotchiness dropped from his face,
leaving it chalk-like. “You haven’t agreed to a betrothal? That has
been long settled!”

Her sweetness fled. “It has not!”

Nick stepped back, his shoulder smacking
against the wall. “You cannot mean it. I agreed with your—”
Recollecting himself, he wisely stopped before he invoked anything
he had agreed with Huntleigh on her behalf. She noticed and
inclined her head.

“Do you know,” she said, her dignity wrapped
around her like a blanket, “in all of your machinations with Myron
and the king and Parliament to secure my hand, you have left only
one thing to chance.”

He stared expectantly, and she sighed,
wishing he might recognize the dilemma without her having to spell
it out. She loved the man, but sometimes he was dense in ways only
a nobleman ever would be. She tried to restrain her exasperation,
generously recognizing the emotional limitations of his ducal
arrogance.

“You have never asked me.”

His chin jerked. “I never have?” He searched
his memory, only to confirm it for himself. He had presumed—as
everyone did—that women could be bargained for like beads, and a
duke was an irresistible prize.

“By the Devil, you are right.”

Before she could say anything more, he
dropped to one knee, face still and shocked, pulse thrumming on the
side of his neck.

He trembled slightly taking up her left hand,
kissing the fingertips, and asked, “My dearest Bella, what plans
have you for this lovely hand, now freed of the bonds of matrimony?
Might I claim it?”

Gasping and gulping concurrently caused a fit
of coughing and simultaneous thumping in her temples. Bella had
hoped to discourage his sense of immediacy, not invite him to make
an offer. She covered her lips with a handkerchief to keep from
spraying spittle across her own marriage proposal. He waited for
her to recover, smiling smugly. When she narrowed her eyes, he
dropped his, presumably to hide the widening smirk.

“Did you have plans to which we mere males
were not privy when we so rudely decided your fate?”

“Of course not,” she responded, clutching his
fingers. “Not really. Only moving away from London, and—” She
stopped, eyes darting around the room, finally resting on the
grandfather clock, now five minutes from striking.

“And?” He was not going to give an inch.

“And—” She shook her head.

He sighed, then brought her hand to his lips.
“Perhaps, then, you will share my fate?” Her eyes grew as wide and
round as the ring he took from his waistcoat. “I have had this in
my pocket since the day your husband died. It was my mother’s. Will
you become the Duchess of Wellbridge? Or more to the point, wife to
the flawed Nick Northope, who has unfortunately been saddled with a
duchy to tend?”

Her mouth opened and closed and her eyes
traversed the room, finally settling on the T’ang vase next to the
fireplace. “I—I have to—I mean, I am in mourning, Your Grace. I
cannot just—”

He kissed her fingertips again. “You may wear
black in my house as long as you’d like, though I will miss seeing
you in that sea green muslin I love so much. I know you will want
to do proper honor to your husband, but I am concerned for your
safety, and am afraid—truly afraid—someone will do you harm.
Michelle might not be the last of Malbourne’s lackeys.”

“But I was going to—” He stayed silent while
she gathered her thoughts. “I had planned to marry you. I have
always planned it, since the day you used your ducal authority to
have three barrows of cuttings delivered to me from the King’s
Gardens. But I cannot yet. I simply cannot.”

He dropped her hand, stood and paced the
room, finally stopping in front of the brandy, but only staring at
the decanter.

“Where will you go, then? Huntleigh
Hall?”

“Live alone in one hundred and fifty rooms? I
think not. I will rusticate to the house in Saltash. Briarleigh
House is small and well-suited, not a huge estate I haven’t the
first idea how to manage. I won’t have to put on airs there, as
though I am a great lady.”

“But—”

She spoke over his objections, for if he
brought up enough of them or found the right ones, he might move
her from her purpose, and that she could not allow.

“It has been empty almost ten years, but I
seem destined for empty houses, and a small village is a better
match for me than a grand manor house. Heaven forfend I should be
chatelaine to eleven castles. I would make a poor duchess.”

“I beg to differ and as a duke, am better
equipped to judge.”

Poignant tears prickled at the way his
conceit always came firmly to the fore when he was frightened,
angry, or confused. Right now, all three. He crossed the room to
come back to her, taking up her hand again. A weak smile creased
his handsome face, and she looked her fill of his green eyes, sharp
cheekbones, and patrician nose, brushing away the blond curl that
always seemed to grace his high forehead. Finally, she squeezed his
fingers, forlorn and trying to draw strength from his touch, slowly
going cold along with his eyes.