The Dastardly Duke (8 page)

Only it had not gone away, not in the wasted years in which he tried to forget and the recent months in which he had sought to learn once and for all if he was a bastard. He had searched everywhere for his parents’ marriage papers—the family Bible, the little French village where his mother died, even the tunnels under Sommersby Castle where he had played as a boy. He had found nothing to indicate he was a fraud. But nothing to disprove it, nothing to give him the reassurance he craved.

“
Liar
.”

With that one word, she had unknowingly summed up his world of self-deception.

Buttoned up in that high-necked traveling dress, Miss Gregory was the picture of ladylike rectitude as she perched stiffly on the seat across from him. Julian could not imagine how he had allowed himself to be moved by the sight of her legs poking out from her staid blue frock, how he had fallen prey to a moment of lust, how that kiss had scared him sufficiently to put an abrupt end to their secluded time in his hunting box.

When the spires of London came into view, Julian almost breathed a sigh of relief. Now there would be something to do besides avoid meeting his
protégé
e’s intense gray eyes. He had never been so glad to see Charles as when his friend hopped into the coach in front of his bachelor’s rooms and they set off for Claridge House.

Charles did not seem at all happy, however.

“Damn it, Julian. I do not like lying to Lucy.” He crossed his arms and expelled a sigh of disgust.

“You should have thought about that earlier,” Julian said calmly.

“What if she should find out?”

“She will not. Miss Gregory is fairly presentable, as you can see, and her story is guaranteed to generate sympathy in Lucy’s breast and perhaps even my curmudgeonly aunt’s. They will make allowances for any defects in manners and turn her out in proper style. No one will guess she is not what she seems. I will win our little wager handily.”

“I do not want to do this.”

Julian stretched out his legs and yawned. “It is too late for second thoughts. If you expose our little masquerade, I will be forced to confess that it was your idea. Lucy will not
think
kindly of you for that. I am afraid you will just have to wait and see whether Miss Gregory and I can pull this off. If society refuses to accept her, victory is yours. If it does, you will have to win your bride by other means.”

Charles glowered. “Patience, in other wo
rd
s?”

“And virtue,” Julian replied blandly. “Though I am not sufficiently familiar with either quality to judge, I have heard that some women find them quite appealing.”

“You have obviously never been in love.”

Amused in spite of himself, Julian shot his
fri
end a sidelong glance. “I am heart-whole and glad of it.”

“Even after spending three days with your
protégé
e?” Charles arched a meaningful brow.

Julian’s gaze went to Miss Gregory, who was studying the view out the window, unaware of the conversation occurring around her. “Give a man some credit, Tremaine.”

Charles eyed Julian uncertainly. “Very well,” he said in resignation. “What is this story that I, as Miss Gregory’s distant relative, am expected to confirm?”

“Not so distant, actually,” Julian corrected. “I have made her your cousin—the only child of your father’s younger brother, who put a period to his existence after losing what little funds he had in a gambling spree.”

“My
uncle
?”
Charles echoed, aghast.

Julian nodded. “It is quite a clever tale. After she became deaf, she thought to spare relatives any additional burden and went to live alone—”

“
You have killed off Uncle Erasmus
?”

Julian arched a brow. “I assumed he was already dead.”

‘The man is as healthy as a horse,” Charles sputtered. “A fine pickle this is. If he presents himself in town do you plan to introduce him to his long-lost ‘daughter’? By Jove, we are all going to be found out!”

“I doubt that.”

“He is a recluse, to be sure, and keeps to the country, but—”

“Ah, then we have nothing to worry about,” Julian replied. “The odds of your Uncle Erasmus discovering our little ruse
are negligible.”

Charles drew himself up straight. “It is not ‘our’ little ruse.”

“Oh, but it is,” Julian returned smoothly. “Here we are,” he added as the coach rolled to a stop in front of Claridge House. “As usual, my servants are ready to accommodate us. I trust we are all ready?”

Charles stared morosely at the impressive stone town house that rose like a grande dame above the lesser houses around it, the line of servants waiting to see to their every need, and the beautiful female who tripped gaily down the steps to greet them.

“Lucy,” Charles murmured with the tone of a condemned man as the vision of loveliness broke out in answering smiles.

Julian turned to Hannah, who sat perfectly still, her hands crossed primly in her lap. She appeared the picture of assurance, until he stole a look into her gray eyes. They were filled with uncertainty.

“Not you, too,” he admonished. “Come, now, Miss Gregory. Attitude is everything—especially in the matter of fooling the world. Shall we begin?”

With a self-assured smile, he extended his arm. She regarded him with considerable distaste.

“I think, Your Grace,” she said at last, “that my ‘cousin’ should be the one to escort me to your sister. It would not do to have anyone form an untoward impression about my relationship with you.”

Julian glowered as she descended from the carriage and took Charles’s arm, leaving him quite alone in the carriage.

“No,” he muttered, eyes narrowing at her retreating figure. “It would not do at all.”

Chapter
Eight

The lady in puce with a matching gauze demi-turban stared at Hannah as if she were a queerish museum exhibit. With a frankly appalled expression, the woman raised a jeweled lorgnette and subjected her to unnerving scrutiny. Hannah realized that this must be Lady Huff
ing
ton, the duke’s formidable aunt.

Hannah’s graceful curtsy betrayed no signs of her inner misgivings, but she held the woman’s censorious gaze rather longer than was strictly necessary, which caused the countess to arch her thin eyebrows in reproof.

In contrast, the duke’s sister, Lady Lucille, wore a friendly smile. She chattered so rapidly that Hannah could not even begin to make out the words.

Though Hannah held her head high, she felt small and insignificant in this grand house. The duke expected her to move about these folk as if she had every right to do so, but the gulf between her station and theirs was so large it would take a ship of the line to cross it. Nothing underscored the ducal grandeur so much as the startling sculptures flanking the main stairway—twin gold-leafed sphinxes that seemed to be staring right back at her.

Conducting the introductions with perfect aplomb, the duke did not convey by so much as a shrug that she was different from any other invited guest. If he was not precisely overflowing with warmth toward her, neither did he display the coldness he had shown after that disastrous kiss. Hannah did not understand how he could kiss her fervently one moment, rain condemnation upon her the next, then ignore her completely as he had done during the carriage ride here. She had comforted herself with the thought that he probably held little charity for any woman. That notion was dispelled, however, by the affectionate kiss with which he greeted his sister.

Dejected, Hannah held back as the others moved into the large parlor on the ground floor. She was not ready to face this grand assemblage. The duke must have read her mind, for a firm hand at the small of her back gave her a gentle but definite push. He turned her around.

“Attitude, Miss Gregory,” he admonished. “And please do not act as if you have never seen a respectable home.” Hannah could almost imagine his arrogant, no-nonsense tone.

“But I have never encountered anything this grand,” Hannah protested, eyeing the enormous marble staircase that soared upward in kingly fashion. He quickly moved to obscure her view of anything else but him.

“No, I imagine the air in Covent Garden is not so rarefied, but I did not take you for a coward.”

“Nor am I one,” she returned indignantly. “But did you see the manner in which your aunt stared at me? I believe she must suspect—”

“Aunt Eleanor would disdain the king himself. She is suspicious, judgmental, and as unsympathetic as any jailer you will meet in Newgate when you arrive there someday. I suspect her cold heart turned to stone long ago.”

His comment about Newgate affected her less than the image of his aunt turning her censorious glare on the king. Sheer nervousness made Hannah giggle. The vaulted ceiling must have amplified the sound, for in the next instant the stem-faced servant who had attended Lady Huffington arrived in the foyer to say that the countess wished to have the sherry poured and requested him to ask that they not tarry further. Glowering, he left them.

“That was Higgins, my aunt’s majordomo,” the duke explained, his lips curling in sardonic amusement. “His goal is to make life miserable for those with the bad luck to displease his employer—that is to say, everyone Aunt Eleanor encounters.” The duke stared after Higgins with an expression that made Hannah thankful she was not in that man’s shoes. “His presence here prompted my own butler to give notice,” he continued darkly. “The only reason I have not had him drawn and quartered is that my aunt plans to return with him to her home when the season is over. I do not know how Yorkshire endures the both of them.”

Hannah could not imagine that the duke would suffer anyone he did not find tolerable, but perhaps he had his reasons. The subject vanished from her mind, however, as he eyed her expectantly. The time for delay had passed. Hannah took a deep breath and moved toward the parlor, feeling much like a condemned prisoner.

“That is the way.” To her surprise, his eyes gleamed with something that might have been encouragement.

He extended his arm, as if she were any lady he had the pleasure of escorting to meeting his family. Gingerly, Hannah touched his sleeve. He promptly covered her hand with his, as if he suspected she might flee unless he had a hold on her. She was dismayed at the decidedly masculine warmth that penetrated the soft kid of her new gloves.

And even more dismayed as those mischievous butterflies returned to her stomach.

“We shall not
fin
d any decent young man to overlook her glaring deficiency.” Lady Huffington wrinkled her nose with distaste, studying Hannah as if she were a piece of week-old fish.

Marshaling her temper, Hannah told herself that the countess had only spoken the truth. No man wanted a deaf wife. Still, she had no wish to be judged so harshly by a woman she did not even know. She hoped that good manners would prompt someone to change the subject, but before anyone else could speak, the countess held up the lorgnette and fixed her with a dour gaze.

“If she had a dowry, that would be helpful, of course. But since she has nothing, I fail to see why we must create a spectacle by introducing her to society as if she were any other female.” Then Lady Huffington yawned.

Hannah blinked. Had anyone else thought the woman’s pronouncement excessively rude? Sir Charles, for one, appeared speechless, but he had been excessively tongue-tied since their arrival. Lady Lucille was frowning. The duke merely studied both Hannah and his aunt with an unreadable gaze. The intimidating Higgins stood stiffly in the
corner
, like a statue whose dour lines had been etched by a sculptor with no skill at subtlety.

If she had truly been Sir Charles’s cousin and had entered this house desperate to win acceptance and find a husband, Hannah probably would have burst into tears at such a harsh, unfeeling treatment.

But at twenty-one, she had seen far more of the world and its cruelty than Lady Huffington could possibly cast her way. More importantly, she had survived.

“Do you not think,” she said, leveling a gaze at the countess, “that only those people with inferior minds will regard me as exceptional?”

Lady Huffington, in the act of fiddling with the side knot of her turban, froze.

“Though some persist in viewing deafness as indicative of a deficiency of the brain,” Hannah continued, “in my experience it is only the most ignorant who do so. Others are sufficiently intelligent to discover that I am rather like any other female.” She slanted a look at the duke, whose brows arched skyward.

“In point of fact, I read lips quite well,” she added, returning her gaze to his aunt. “My understanding is not at all diminished.”

Now they were all staring at her. Lady Lucille wore a smile that broadened as her friendly eyes met Hannah’s. The duke’s lips twitched, and Sir Charles’s intrigued gaze shot from Hannah to the duke and back again.

Lady Huffington was red-faced. “My sherry,” she commanded weakly.

Higgins hurried to oblige as the countess rapidly fanned herself. She took a long sip, closed her eyes, and quickly downed the rest of the amber liquid. Then her eyes shot open and she regarded Hannah sternly.

“Perhaps deafness is God’s punishment for your sharp tongue, Miss—”

“Gregory,” Hannah supplied with a decidedly martial air. The countess’s comment put her in mind of Reverend McGougal’s chafing axioms. Her blood began to boil anew.