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Marco’s mind swirled in a whirlwind of questions. He wondered if the Duke had a distant family member he had not heard of. He understood the old goat had no children. He almost choked on his drink as realization hit.
“Are you saying that woman is the Duke of Fitzroy's daughter?” Marco asked as he coughed.
“Yes, of course,” Giovanni said, clapping Marco on the back. “How have you not heard of this, Marco? It was a great scandal and has been on everyone's lips for months on end."
Marco had been too preoccupied with his own troubles to pay attention to the fleeting scandals of the ton.Now he wished he had spent at least a little time reading the society papers and sheets. He again stared at the ravishing young lady and tried to see hints of her father in her face but found none.
How could a man with such an ugly soul have sired such a beautiful woman?
“I must have missed the gossip. I was unaware the Duke had any heirs,” Marco stammered.
“She's illegitimate,” Beatrice whispered. “Apparently, the old man had been bedding his housekeeper for years, and Alice was the result. They were both servants in his home until last year when he married the housekeeper and acknowledged his daughter practically on his deathbed."
“He waited that long to claim them?” Marco whispered back, utterly scandalized. He could not be surprised. The kind of man who burned down his competition's factory, endangering countless lives, would have no problem cruelly hiding his child below stairs for years. “And she was given a sizeable dowry, I assume.”
“More than that,” Anna said quietly. “She inherited everything. Although she is not titled, the old Duke did get the Prince Regent to decree that her son would be the next Duke of Fitzroy."
Marco’s mind was in turmoil. He had taken meager comfort in the knowledge that the Fitzroy line ended with the death of the Duke. Even if he could not get his revenge, at least no other man would ever ascend to the title.Thatwas a sort of revenge. He thought the man who murdered Thomas had gone to his grave thinking he had failed in the one thing the aristocracy cared about: siring an heir. Now he realized the man had managed to find a way around that.
“If she can find anyone to marry her,” Giovanni said.
“And why should she not?” Anna demanded, and Marco couldn’thelp but echo her sentiments. After all, she was undoubtedly lovely and apparently wealthy. “She is uncommonly beautiful. I am sure she would be considered a diamond of the first water if not for her unfortunate background.”
“That is indeed one of the biggest reasons she has not had a serious suitor,” Beatrice sighed. “The men wonderwhether the prize of a duchy for their son is worth the stigma of marrying a former kitchen maid. As if her birth circumstances had any bearing on it.” The disdain in her voice was quite clear to everyone.
“It is not only that, my dear. The lady has made it quite plain that she does not wish to be courted,” Giovanni said, shaking his head. “Though I am sure some lord will eventually get over himself and make her a good enough proposition to entice her into marriage. But I doubt she could ever make a love match."
Marco did not care if the lady made a love match at all. But he did care if she produced a son. He could not stop thinking about Thomas’ last moments. Of the letter he gave Marco before his last breath. And the Fitzroy seal on that note.
He recalled the intense heat of the fire on his face. He could feel splinters in his hands and strained muscles in his back from wrenching the burning beam away from the doorway. He recounted carrying Thomas out of the building and praying in vain for his survival.
Marco's rage was rekindled brutally, racing through him like the fire that killed Thomas. There was a price to pay for that life. A debt that the Duke was able to discharge with his death. But Marco could still exact his revenge. He could prevent the Duke from having an heir. The only way to accomplish this was to seduce his daughter. She couldn't marry and have a son if she was ruined. The Duke would not gethis one and only wish, and his precious line willhave died with him.
Marco did not relish making an innocent the means of his revenge, but he would do it. For Thomas, he would do anything. Perhaps the lady would be happier as a spinster if she genuinely had no wish to marry any of these dandies. Marco could be doing her a favor in the long run. He internally chastised himself for that thought. No, he would not pretend that his motives were anything more than they were. He wanted revenge, and this woman would be the tool he would use to get it. He saw Thomas's bloody face in his mind and hardened his resolve. He would see justice done even if he had to destroy this lovely creature to do it.
“I am surprised you have not heard of it, Alegria. Isn’t your factory located very near Fitzroy's lands?” Silas said, his eyes fixed on Marco as if seeing something in his face that gave him pause.
“It is, indeed,” Marco said, setting down his drink on a nearby table and straightening his cuffs. He was not very practiced in the art of courtship, but he didn't really need to be for his plans. He could be charming when he wished to be, and that would be all he needed to seduce the chit. "I am afraid my inattention to local gossip has made me remiss. As a prominent business owner in that county, I should have paid my respects to the ladies long ago. I will rectify that error at once."
CHAPTERFOUR
“We should not have come,” Alice’s mother whispered in her ear as they stood against the ballroom wall. “We would have been better off staying home.”
Alice noticed scornful looks and ugly whispers all around them. She had grown accustomed to being the target of ridicule. She sighed quietly.
At first, she had stupidly thought that her mother’s new position as the Dowager Duchess of Fitzroy would offer them some protection from the derision of theton. Of course, that had been naive. The members of the nobility poured disdain upon her poor mother not only for being a former servant but for the crime of loving a man she was not married to. And they despised Alice for her low birth and background.
When she first entered society, she had tried valiantly to fit in. She wore fashionable gowns in pale, washed-out colors, bowed her head, and curtsied deeply. She ignored the pointed glances and whispered comments with a sweet smile. Her demure behavior had done no good. It only seemed to increase people's viciousness. They believed her reserved countenance gave them leave to step on her. She swiftly learned that no amount of politeness or display of gentility would remove the stain of her birth. So she no longer tried.
Alice wore the style of dress she liked. Gowns that she knew people would find scandalous for an unmarried girl. She met their nasty looks with cold glares and returned any vulgar comments she heard with retorts sharp enough to draw blood. She refused to allow these people to get away with slighting her or her mother, so she showed them that their opinions did not matter, which enraged them more.
She sometimes imagined herself as a marble statue with a heart of pure stone. For that was the only way she could carry on. And she blamed her father for this. Alice did not see her wealth and rise in status as a boon. She despised being a part of this contrived world, and every morning she woke up and cursed the Duke for forcing her into it.
“I will not be cowed by such fools,” Alice snapped, giving a young girl staring at her openly a wrathful glance. The girl gasped and hid her face behind her fan, breathlessly whispering to her friends, the ridiculous miss.
Alice could only imagine the words being spoken about her: She is so cold! How can someone with her prospects be so unpleasant?She had heard that and worse before. She would not allow it to penetrate her heart.
“Please, Alice, they are your betters and...”
