The Wild Duchess/The Willful Duchess (The Duchess Club Book 1) (21 page)

“Yes. I would love to play again.”

T
alon pushed
his food around his plate, a vague memory of one of his nannies making him wonder what the tyrant would have said if she could see him now. A grown man hiding his vegetables under an ignored piece of beef. He looked up to steal a glance at Dawson who was as expressionless as a golem.
No one seems poised to slap my hand with a ruler…

God, I want this dinner long over.

“You should see the house now, Your Grace! Our estate is so near to yours, I cannot imagine how we have seen so little of you. But I think you would hardly know our home from all the improvements Lord Gastonbury has made to it in the last few years. We added a Grecian style temple to the island at the lake’s center and it is—well, if I may boast a bit—so picturesque that every master painter in England will clamor to capture it on canvas.” The countess was in rare form as she made up for his silences. “Not that we would ever invite such people onto our land. Can you imagine it? The sight of bohemians camping in our gardens? What a ridiculous notion!”

He sighed. He didn’t want to see the atrocity of a Greek Folly in the middle of Gastonbury’s lake. Talon was fairly certain that he would rather take a beating.

“The hunting was so good this year. Did I mention that Lavinia has an excellent seat when it comes to riding? You should come out and accompany her. I know I can trust her safety and well-being entirely to you, Your Grace. Have you been hunting recently?”

Talon put down his fork and knife, abandoning the pretense of eating. “No. I prefer to ride without all the commotion of baying hounds and someone blowing a horn. It’s unsettling to gallop in a mob.”

“Oh!” Lady Gastonbury’s shock was hard to disguise. All gentlemen hunted. All gentlemen did little else when in the country. He could see her struggling to come up with a polite reply. “I-I had not thought of it that way before, Your Grace. How insightful of you! Naturally a peaceful ride is like the poet’s balm to the soul, is it not?”

She’s unflappable. I thought I had her on that one.

He looked over to Lady Lavinia to see where things stood.

She was gazing at him the way a dog would look at a plate of mutton. She fluttered her eyelashes in a coquettish display and smiled before gracefully spearing a carrot with her fork. Her fashions were impeccable, her skin so pale she was practically translucent and the fact that she had no chin to speak of only highlighted the length of her delicate neck. She was as ugly a duckling as had ever paddled across a pond and he knew that for all that London society cared, her looks were irrelevant. She had ties to the royal family through her paternal uncle, a dowry large enough to choke a gryphon and would carry her father’s estates forward if she produced a male heir.

“Your Grace, have you seen the craftsmanship of the locket that my darling Lavinia is wearing? Do you recognize the piece?”

The question was so unexpected, he had to catch himself from snapping out the wrong reply. Talon took a deep breath and answered as levelly as he could. “I did not and no, I apologize, it does not look familiar to me.” He looked back at Lavinia and was rewarded with the strange sight of Lady Lavinia leaning over her plate to better display the large gold locket at her throat but also to give him a good showing of her ample cleavage.

“Do step closer, Your Grace,” Lady Gastonbury encouraged him.

“Mother!” Lavinia protested weakly. “I would not have him think me so forward.”

Forward? You are an inch from pushing your bosom into the ratatouille. God, I’m in a farce.

He pushed back from his chair, ignoring the voices of reason that were screaming for him not to move a single muscle. Talon dutifully drew nearer, but not too near. It was a gold locket, filigreed with silver wire and on its edges were small rose-cut garnets.

Wait. I have seen that before. Where have I seen that before?

“It is…vaguely familiar now that I make a study of it.”

Lavinia’s breasts took on a rosy hue as she basked in the attention. “As well it should, Your Grace. It was your mother’s.”

“My mother’s. You have my mother’s locket?” He straightened up in surprise. “How is it that it came into your possession?”

“Show him, Lavinia. I’m sure he’ll be very touched,” the countess said.

Lavinia reached up to open the locket’s small latch and reveal that inside was a miniature of Talon, painted when he was approximately eight or nine years of age. “Our mother’s exchanged portraits when they made their sweet schemes for our futures. A sentimental gesture, I know, but I have always loved this piece. I remember sitting with her when I was six and she made me promise that I would always be loyal to you. And I always have been,” Lavinia finished softly. “Mine is in a—”

“It is in the lining of a pocket watch. I found it a few years ago and confess that I didn’t know who it was or where it had come from. My mother failed to include me in the exchange.”

Lady Gastonbury sighed. “You were away at school so much, my dear man, and then she became so ill! What a tragedy! I think of her often, as I am sure you do.”

She’d died when he was ten but she had already been absent so much of his life, a disconnected elegant figure as animated as her portrait over the mantel in one of his houses. His father had passed away when he was fourteen and left only a legacy of stern lectures and a sound understanding that Talon would live and die for his duty or every ancestor he possessed would rise from the grave and murder him.

In short, he thought of his parents as little as he could manage.

The locket gleamed at her throat and Talon smiled sadly. It was a not so subtle proclamation of her claim to him and he found no pleasure in any of it. He sat back down at the head of the table and shot Dawson a look to indicate that he wished more wine.

His butler moved with the nimble speed of a man half his age and Talon sighed.

“Thank you, Dawson. I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“Y-You’re welcome, Your Grace.”

It wasn’t an apology for threatening to fire the man, but it was as close as Talon could manage.

He had told Scarlett that he did not expect to be happy in marriage. Now he faced a dinner table graced with exactly the creature his duty and his dead mother would compel him to choose—a young woman of sufficient title and connections who was so biddable that she wouldn’t argue for air if she were drowning. The truth of just how stupid he’d been hit him like a mallet to the chest. Talon sipped his wine politely and knew that he was in a Hell of his own making.

And there was probably no escape.

A
fter his dinner
guests had finally departed for their own London home, Talon had restlessly retreated to his first floor study. He was eyeing a bottle of brandy and wondering if he should compound the horrors of his life and risk feeling wretched in the morning, or if it would be better to take his medicine in an icy state of sobriety.

After all, if I deserve to suffer, wouldn’t it be a sin of weakness to try to numb myself with alcohol? If a coward drinks for courage, what does a brave man do?

There was a knock at the door downstairs and some kind of commotion as Dawson’s voice echoed up the stairs to be overtaken by a very loud and very angry Chesterton. Talon shifted in shock to head out of his study to ensure that he hadn’t lost his mind completely since the Duke of Chesterton did
not
make calls after eleven o’clock at night.

“Y-Your Grace! Please allow me to see if…it is late for calls, Your Grace and I’m—”

“Get out of my way, Dawson. I’ll see the pup and I’ll see him now. I don’t care in the slightest if he’s abed, in his bath or hanging upside down by his heels, do you hear me? Get the hell out of my way!” Chesterton was lumbering up the stairs, then stopped on the landing to catch his breath. “Damn it! Why can’t you have the normal amount of stairs in a house? What are these? Forty foot ceilings?”

Talon leaned against the railing above him. “I’ll have the first floor lowered to please you.”

Elgin looked up, his mood unimproved by the jest. “I’ve come to talk.”

“Then come.” He looked at his poor flustered butler. “That will be all, Dawson. Chesterton and I can attend to ourselves.”

Elgin finished his climb and stormed past Talon to head directly into the open study door. Talon slowly followed him, cautiously curious to learn why Chesterton would make such a call so late. Obviously, his evening was not about to improve.

“Brandy? I was just…thinking of having one,” Talon offered.

“I was at Pellham’s tonight!”

Talon went ahead and poured two brandies as if Elgin had bothered to reply. “If you danced with another debutante, I don’t think I wish to hear about it.”

“Look at me.”

Talon turned to look at his friend. “You have my complete attention.”

“The Blackwell Beauties were there.”

What did she tell him?

“What are you doing, Stafford? I was flattered at first, that you would insert yourself into things, perhaps out of worry for me when I confessed that I’d met Miss Blackwell. Then when I saw Scarlett in your arms at that ball, I wondered if a younger man might be able to seize perfection and I was secretly cheering you on to win her. I knew you were taking my place when I wasn’t up for outings. I said nothing because I—knew you would make the best of it. Even before you approached me and admitted that you had come to care for her, I knew. But I never dreamed you would…treat her so shabbily.”

Talon’s face became hot, his temper flaring defensively. Pain made him prickly and irrational. “Shabbily?”

“You insulted her and I’ll hear the full story from your lips and no one else’s, Stafford.”

“I don’t have to tell you anything.”

“No? I who have been your steadfast friend? Your mentor? I who have stood by you since you were sixteen and nearly overrun with bullying solicitors and financial parasites?”

Talon swallowed hard. “I did not insult her. I told her I loved her. I offered her a life full of every luxury and every indulgence. I offered her everything I could within the dictates of my rank and title.”

“Within the dictates of your rank and title? What in God’s name does that mean?”

“I am not free to marry a commoner, Elgin and frankly, neither are you.”

“Don’t impose your nonsense on me. When I was younger I may have matched your arrogance but I’m a wiser man now.”

Talon crossed his arms defensively. “It is not arrogance. I fully accept the responsibilities of—”

“Are you bankrupt?”

“What?”

“Are your accounts unsound? Have you squandered your fortunes? Are there mortgages on your estates and houses that I was not aware of?”

“There are not! I do not squander my incomes and never have. I am extremely cautious with my investments and unlike many, I have avoided financial schemes and—”

“So you are not induced to marry for money?”

“No.”

“What do you really know of Mr. Ashe Blackwell?”

“I…His grandfather was in trade.”

“Really? That’s all you have? Gordon Blackwell was a visionary in the industrial advances of our age and had strong ties to the American tycoons and their steel production, railroads and even oil. As his only grandson became involved after sewing his wild oats in India, Ashe then inherited the bulk of the businesses and the Blackwell fortunes have grown
exponentially
. His wife is an American who is passionate about reform and has founded a university for women. She is quite remarkable and has instilled a great deal of her revolutionary moxie into her daughters.”

“I respect Mrs. Blackwell and have come to appreciate the notion of women’s education far more than I ever thought possible. I have nothing but admiration for the Blackwells but they are in trade, Elgin. This is not—”

“Lord Winters is a close friend of theirs and the Blackwells are welcomed in every circle, including the lofty ones I first met them in. But as you sputter over there about your superior position, Talon, I wonder what the earl would say to your proposition to his dear friend’s child.”

“I didn’t intend to ask the man.”

“No? Well, if her father gets wind of it, I don’t think you’ll have a choice. I suspect every friend that Blackwell possesses will struggle to refrain from spitting in your face.”

“You are deliberately being dramatic. I care about Scarlett very much. It is not unprecedented to make a mutually beneficial arrangement to—”

“Stop talking!” Elgin shook his head. “You say you care about Scarlett? Not enough! You care more for wagging tongues and what they’d say if you had the audacity to marry for love.” He put up a hand, cutting off Talon’s protest. “By all means, marry where duty alone dictates and let misery be your comfort for it. You don’t deserve Scarlett Blackwell.”

“And you do?” He regretted the words the instant they flew past his lips. “Be honest. You were
never
going to marry her! You can bark at me all you want about how open-minded you are but it’s all a ruse. You did all of it just to rattle the Old Guard and make a show of defiance but we are cut from the same cloth. Admit it.”

“It may have started out as a lark. You have me there, but that’s not where it stands.” Elgin squared his shoulders. “I am the the ninth Duke of Chesterton and a respected Peer in this realm. When and if I marry, I will marry where I wish and I don’t give a damn what anyone in the entire British Empire has to say on the matter. But no, we are not cut from the same cloth. Because yes, Talon, you could say I deserve her. Courage will outpace cowardice any day of the week—and at any age.”

The accusation cut him in ways he couldn’t deny. He’d just been bandying about the same damn word before Elgin had come in…but hearing spoken aloud by a man he respected so completely made him want to lash out. “I am
not
a coward.”

“Tell yourself that when you disintegrate like newspaper in a rainstorm and marry that bat-faced girl. Just don’t be surprised when she comes to hate you as much as you will come to hate yourself.” Elgin walked to the door, hesitating briefly to look back over his shoulder, his eyes as cold as ice. “Good-bye, Stafford.”