The Black Duke's Prize (2 page)

It was Timms,
one of the few remaining members of the staff, who scratched at her door the
next morning to carry her baggage downstairs. The old butler lifted the two valises
and turned toward the doorway, then stopped and cleared his throat. "Miss
Kate?"

"Yes,
Timms?" she responded, looking away reluctantly from what might be her
last view out of her window at the failing gardens and the meadow and woods
beyond.

"Take
care, milady."

"Thank
you, Timms," she responded, forcing a smile. Downstairs she found her
uncle waiting by the front door, and her spirits sank even further. She had
hoped that he wouldn't bother to rise. She did not want her last sight of
Crestley Hall to include him. There seemed to be no avoiding it, however, for
though she passed by him without a word, he turned and followed her outside
and down the front steps to the waiting hack.

She stopped and
turned to face him, wishing she had inherited some of her father's height.
"If one piece of furniture, one candlestick. one teacup is removed from
Crestley Hall in my absence, I will carve the value of it out of your hide with
my father's sword."

"You mind
the Baron and Baroness like a good girl, Kate, and I might even inquire as to
their working on trying to find you a husband, if anyone'd have a shrew like
you." He pointed a finger at her. "Crestley Hall's a long way from
London, and London's a bad place to be all on your own. You watch
yourself."

Katherine
stared at him for a moment, sudden uneasiness vying with her indignation and
anger at his insult. If he meant his concluding words as a threat, it was the
first time he had handed her one openly. He was up to something.

Timms handed
her into the carriage. The hack would take her to the Red Boar Inn, where she
would meet the mail stage to London. As they left the long drive she looked
back at Crestley, already showing signs of the neglect her uncle had forced on
it. And standing at the foot of the front steps, watching her out of sight, was
Simon Ralston. Whatever he was planning, she would be back, and she would claim
what was hers.

2

"A
nother hand,
Sommesby," Francis DuPres deAmanded, leaning forward and digging the pads
of his fingers into the wood table.

Unmoved by the
plea, Nicholas Varon, Duke of Sommesby, continued his push away from the gaming
table and stood. "Sorry, gentlemen, but despite rumors to the contrary,
occasionally even I need sleep."

"Sleep has nothing to do with your taking your winnings and
leaving."

"No, I
don't believe it does." His gray eyes holding DuPres's close-set brown ones;
he plucked a chip out of the pile and flipped it at the other man without
bothering to check its value. "My compliments."

Beside him
Thomas Elder, the Viscount of Sheresford, chuckled. "Quit complaining,
DuPres. That chip's worth more than you won all evening." He scooped what
remained of his evening's losses into his own hand. "Any of those for me?"
he asked, gesturing at the substantial pile before Nicholas.

Stifling a yawn
that wasn't entirely feigned, Nicholas summoned one of the clerks to cash him
in. "Not a chance, Thomas," he retorted with a smile. "And I'm
hoping this will serve to dissuade you from wasting your blunt on that brown
nag you've been eyeing." He straightened his cravat with its black onyx
pin, then flicked an imaginary speck of dust off the sleeve of his black
jacket.

"I think
not a chance' is a rather accurate description of the evening," DuPres
commented.

Nicholas
stiffened. "Care to explain that remark?" he said quietly, wondering
if he was on his way to setting a record for trouble this Season. Two days
before, he had rather spectacularly parted ways with the exquisitely devious
Josette Bettreaux, and now this. The Season was new, the nights at White's
still slow and lazy. DuPres had been an unwelcome participant in what had been
a friendly game of faro, and now for some reason it appeared that he wished to
test the rumors about the Varon black temper. Nicholas was more than willing to
oblige.

"You know
what I'm talking about." Francis DuPres got to his feet, apparently
overconfident, or drunk, enough to press the issue.

''Don't be a
fool." Captain Reg Hillary, second of four sons in the prolific Hillary
family, placed a hand on DuPres's shoulder and tried to push him back into his
seat.

When DuPres
remained standing, Nicholas set his gloves down again and leaned his knuckles
into the table. "Make the accusation, then," he murmured. Those who
knew him would have recognized the danger signs of the quiet voice and the gray
eyes that now flashed with emerald highlights. Thomas did, for he stepped back
from the table. Reg likewise removed himself from Francis's side. The sound in
the crowded gaming hall died as the other patrons turned to view the
excitement. DuPres paled, but held his ground.

"You've
lost barely a hand all evening, Sommesby," the small man whined. He
glanced about, to find everyone staring at him. "I don't see why anyone
should be surprised." He looked back at Nicholas. "Everyone knows
your. Repu―"

The rest of his
sentence was lost as Nicholas planted a fist full into his face. DuPres went
backward over his chair, crashed into the table behind that, and ended up
sprawled on the floor with the contents of several drinks doing various degrees
of damage to his jacket and garish gold waistcoat. He likely wasn't aware of
the results of his fall, for he was plainly unconscious, blood welling from his
lip and making his already pasty features look even more pale.

"Damn
me," Thomas muttered with something like awe in his voice as he looked
down at DuPres's crumpled form. "One punch."

Nicholas looked
around the room, his eyes narrowed.

No one else
came forward to confront him. As he watched his fellow patrons eyeing him
warily, a dark, cynical smile touched his lips. Unless he misjudged badly,
which he rarely did, no one would be accusing him of anything for a while.

He flipped a
chip of excessive value at the club's nervous manager, watching the man's
expression ease, and then another onto DuPres's chest. "Should cover the
cost of replacing that rag," he murmured. When he turned to leave, Thomas
followed.

The other
patrons of White's stepped aside, and then he and Thomas were out in the cold
predawn air. His residence was only a short walk away and so he waved his
coach on, preferring to walk off his mood and the considerable amount of
liquor he had consumed. The viscount hesitated a moment before he followed.

"You
shouldn't have done that," Sheresford commented, tucking his hands into
the armpits of his dark brown jacket.

"Shouldn't
I have?" Nicholas responded.

"DuPres
might act like a fool, Nick, but he's a cunning sort. Now you've insulted him
twice over."

"Didn't
look so cunning lying there on the floor." Nicholas looked over at the
younger man. "And I was not going to let him get away with saying that
about me."

"He
fancies himself a nonesuch. Now everyone'll be laughing at him."

"He's a
fop with about as much fashion sense as I have skill with a needle."

Grinning,
Thomas placed a hand on Nicholas's shoulder.

"I've
heard you've mended a tear or two in an emergency." He glanced down at
Nicholas's splendid superfine jacket. "We can't all be you," he said
ruefully.

This time
Nicholas laughed aloud, though he deliberately chose to misread the viscount's
remark. ''Thank Lucifer for that."

"Bah,"
Thomas spat out, scowling. "I don't know why I bother."

"Neither
do I," Nicholas returned, and resumed his long-strided walk. "I don't
recall ever encouraging you."

"Why don't
you listen to me once in a while?" Thomas continued, though he made no
move to follow.

"I'm not
hiring for a conscience at the moment, Thomas, but I'll let you know if I
do," he said over his shoulder, not bothering to slow his pace.

"You've
made an enemy of DuPres, Nick. Be careful." This time Nicholas ignored him
completely.

"Damn you,
Varon," Thomas called out, and turned back to his own coach.

''Too
late," Nicholas retorted under his breath, and continued on alone in the
dark.

Nicholas arose
earlier than he would have liked the next morning, driven from sleep both by
the pounding of his skull and by the loud squabbling of a pair of carriage drivers
who had apparently collided in the street below. He summoned his valet and
dressed, then made his way downstairs for a cup of tea.

The sound of
the front door opening came to his ears as he settled into the chair in his
study to go through the previous day's mail and write his regrets to most of
the invitations he had received. Briefly he wondered how many hostesses would
wish they had not sent them out after hearing of the second scandal he had
caused. It seemed, though, that the worse the spectacle the more invitations he
received. With a sigh he glanced up at the clock on the mantel. Nine o'clock in
the morning on the fifth day of the Season, and he was again a disgrace to the
family name.

"Nicky,
you're a disgrace."

Nicholas turned
to look at the petite, dark-haired woman standing in the doorway. Julia Varon
was, as always, beautifully attired, this morning in a light-green muslin that
served to bring out the emerald highlights in her dark-gray eyes. "You
look fetching, Mama," he responded, rising.

She waved a
hand at him. "Fetching is for those pretty young things you cause so much
misery. I believe I have matured to the point of being what is called
'elegant.' "

"You look
elegant, Mama," Nicholas amended, grinning in the way that had become
famous for setting fetching hearts fluttering.

"Mon dieu,
Nicky, will you never outgrow this
desire to cause trouble?" She poured herself a cup of tea from the tray
that had magically appeared almost simultaneously with her arrival, and sat in
one of the chairs before the fire.

"I didn't
cause the trouble this time," he retorted, leaning over the back of the
chair to kiss her on the cheek. "I was merely defending the family
name."

"And
Josette Bettreaux?"

Nicholas
straightened, and turned toward the window. "That wasn't my fault either."

"No?"

"No. I
didn't send her out to find some schoolboy and encourage him to shoot me. That
was all her idea." In fact, if he had known what kind of plot that devious
female would cook up to try to arouse his jealousy that night, he would have
stayed at home.

His mother
frowned at him and added a small teaspoon of sugar to her tea. "A little
early to be drinking, yes?"

He glanced down
to see that he was fiddling with the decanter of brandy at his elbow.
Misreading him was unusual for her, but she was likely furious at him to begin
with. "Anything else?" he asked quietly, annoyed, and deliberately
lifted the decanter to pour himself a drink. He took a swallow, gazing at her
over the snifter's rim and daring her to comment further.

"That
DuPres, now that you've humiliated him, you aren't going to call him out and
kill him, are you?" Though Julia Varon spoke English flawlessly, she still
tended to arrange her sentences in the manner of her native France. That did
not mean that she couldn't be as direct and to the point as anyone Nicholas
had ever cared to meet.

"I' remember when you would have been concerned over
my
well-being,"
he answered.

"That was
when you were concerned," she responded with deceptive mildness, sipping
at her tea.

. "I think
DuPres's learned his lesson. And since I've encouraged Josette to take a
holiday in France, I believe she will become enlightened as well."

"Man dieu,
however could you have chosen such a
one as that, anyway? She has no honor at all."