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“Well, as to that, he never said he was a duke … not even to my father.”
“No doubt traveling incognito. Royals often do,” Scott offered reasonably.
The two women ignored him, and Becky asked, “Do you hate him?”
“Hate him? No, how could I, when I adore him?” Felicia said. She blew her nose with Scott’s handkerchief and plopped it on his nightstand.
He eyed her and grimaced but said nothing.
“Precisely,” Becky answered and smiled. “Precisely, madcap.”
* * *
Belowstairs, the duke attempted to calm his sister’s tirade with a series of ‘buts’ and ‘do but listens’. However, she had built up a flurry of criticisms that she needed to level at his head, and he apparently decided after a time to allow her to do just that.
When she was done describing the ordeal she had been put to over the last few days, she sank, exhausted, into a chair while he served her the tea and sweets he had apparently and she thought dearly, in his way, managed to order quietly even as she had paced, raged, and lectured him.
She sipped her tea and took stock. Her immediate thought was that her brother looked too white-faced and stricken. That was not how he usually took one of her diatribes. He always laughed off everything she had to tell him. It was most vexing, but now … now he looked absolutely sick.
She found this concerned her even more than his usual cavalier attitude with her. She studied him, wondering why this particular tirade of hers had so dampened his indomitable spirits.
Why, he looked horror-struck. She softened at once and said, “Well, after all, one cannot set all the blame at your door, Glen. It seems there is some explanation for the girl’s queer behavior. From what I was able to glean from the servants … well, I had it through my Sally, who is very good at ferreting out all the gossip—our uncle is responsible for this mess.”
“How so?” he asked, frowning.
“The old fellow wrote to her telling her he was coming to fetch her and take her off to Swindon. Of course, then he became too ill to do so, but he never wrote back, and then your letter arrived saying the duke was on its way. The child went into a veritable panic.” She sighed heavily. “Pity that. Poor young thing has been quite on her own and evidently well pleased about it. Couldn’t stomach the notion of some old duke taking her off somewhere horrible … and why the deuce would he want to take her to Swindon? She believed he was going to marry her off to a son or other, didn’t know that he lost his sons to Waterloo … didn’t know he had passed on two months ago. The whole thing has been muddled.”
“Damned if I know how this all came about, but Swindon is the name of an estate he has, nothing to do with the godforsaken village.” The duke pulled at his lower lip.
“Now tell me, Glen, you look positively ill. Why is that?”
“Because, and, Daffy, don’t ask me for details, I am the lowest of cads,” he said and hung his head.
* * *
How could he possibly tell his sister that he was the worst scoundrel that ever walked the great land of Albion? He couldn’t. It had been bad enough that he had given in to his lust and allowed himself to take a young and innocent, vulnerable young woman into his bed. He should have made her return to her room. He should not have allowed himself to sweep her away into a passion he had never known before. He wanted her for all time, but how could he take her like that? She was no doubt only infatuated with him, and that would pass with time.
What now was he to do?
Not only had she been an innocent, she was his ward, dependent on him for protection, and he was a cad. He, of course, from this moment on, would never touch her again. That was done. He would get those feelings under control. No kissing … no touching … none!
The Duke of Somerset ran his hands through his black silk waves of hair and groaned. His sister said, “What, what is wrong, Glen?”
“Scott Hanover and my ward are …”
“Are what?” his sister asked warily.
“Upstairs.”
“What? What nonsense are you at now?”
The duke’s heart and mind were at war. The battle raged silently in his brain, making all logical thought a difficult matter. What had he done? It had been bad enough of him to have taken her, an innocent, to his bed … and now, now she was his ward. Even if he thought that perhaps she could love him, how could he now ask her to be his wife when it was his duty to present her in London for a season that would allow her to meet other eligible young men?
Ask her to be his wife? Had he intended to do that? Had his heart been so captivated? It didn’t bear thinking of.
Pounding in his head was the fact that Felicia, the light in his life, was his ward. He owed it to his name to do the right thing by her and present her to the world, and what then? If he lost her to another, he would shrivel inside.
“Glen! What do you mean upstairs?” his sister persisted.
