The Duke's Disaster (R) (23 page)

“Ever heard of a woman named Violette Cartier?” Corbett asked.

Marliss set her teacup down precisely in the center of its saucer. “Corbett, what sort of question is that? A proper lady doesn’t admit knowledge of such creatures.”

A proper sister just had, for dear Violette—Violet Carter, not too long ago—had once flown the flag of a paid companion, and had thus been an invaluable source of information about Anselm’s new duchess.

A memory tried to swim up through the gin sloshing about in Corbett’s brain, something about the damned duke.

“Toast, Corbett?” Marliss held the rack out to him, as if she really gave a hearty goddamn whether Corbett lived or died.

“No bloody thank you,” Corbett said, foul language being one of a brother’s most trusted means of aggravating an overly cheerful sister in the morning.

“No need to be mean,” Marliss said, popping a strawberry in her mouth. “You’d best vacate Papa’s chair too. He’s been in quite a taking lately over your bills with the trades.”

The encounter with Violette Cartier had been cheering in the extreme, and not that expensive. Weeks of lurking in clubs and gaming hells, listening for a shred of ill will toward Thea Collins had yielded nothing.

Corbett had been looking in the wrong places. His chance encounter with Henrietta Whitlow had reminded him of a pertinent fact.
Women
had the worst tattle and were the most willing to share it. No notions of honor troubled the fairer sex, bless their avaricious little hearts.

Another swallow of coffee finished the cup. Corbett rose, a bit unsteady from the night’s activities. He fumbled at his waist for his watch, then recalled he’d lost it on a bet with Eggerdon.

A tattoo sounded in the hallway above the breakfast parlor, the ring of heels on hard wood hitting Corbett’s headache like so many gunshots. His satisfaction with the evening’s work dimmed, because the watch had belonged to some old dead viscount up the family line, and Papa would be vexed that Corbett had lost it.

Papa was always vexed, while Corbett’s situation was about to come right. A duchess with secrets was a woman at risk for blackmail, after all.

“That’s the maid with Mama’s morning tray,” Marliss said as the footsteps above faded. “Best hare off, Corbett. If Mama’s awake, Papa will be down soon, and you do not want to provoke him with your debts to Bond Street.”

Debts. The word obliterated Corbett’s good mood like an ill-behaved dog scatters geese in the park.

“Anselm has my vowels.” Eggerdon had passed that news along sometime between the theater and the first gaming hell. “Shite.”

“Corbett, leave if you can’t be civil. I’ll have a tray sent up.”

He rose from his father’s chair and headed for the door, nearly catching the toe of his boot on the edge of the carpet. He did not need the drama his parents would ring down on his head in the next hour if they caught him below stairs.

Corbett did, however, need to think, to expand his plans for the Duke of sodding Anselm, and his blasted, damned duchess.

Twenty-two

“The new governess is Dutch,” Erikson said, a blush heating his ears. “Of course I prefer her influence on my little scientists to the nursery maids who are always making calf’s eyes at strange men.”

“Maryanne is the only one with a follower,” Thea said. “She seems content to walk out with him.”

“Frequently, and when she should be at her tasks,” Erikson said. “Ask Davies about this, and you will be unhappy with the answer.”

Very little could make Thea unhappy at the moment. She’d slept wonderfully in the ducal bed.

And in the ducal embrace.

“I won’t ask them to peach on each other.” Thea rose from her stool and set her teacup down. “We’ll ask Miss Miller to begin her post as governess with the girls in September. I’ll give her your direction so she can correspond with you regarding curriculum.”

“Curriculum? Oh, certainly.” Erikson was smiling a charming, bashful smile, one that reminded Thea he was a handsome man, and—thank you, Penelope—a virtuosic kisser.

Thea also smiled as she took her leave, and she had her own virtuosic kisser to thank for her good spirits. Noah had lectured and stomped and fumed and carried on as he’d stolen half her breakfast that morning, and the subject of his rant had been how much more sense it made for them to sleep in his bed.

Exclusively.

“Then I won’t have to fetch that knife of yours from bed to bed, either,” he’d finished. “You take my point, as it were?”

“Husband.” Thea patted the spot beside her on the bed. “Come share my toast and my tea.”

“That isn’t an answer,” Noah groused, but he’d come to bed, as she’d known he would.

Thea had put down her tea and looked him right in his gorgeous blue eyes. “I feel safer sleeping with you than I have at any time since I was a young girl too innocent to know better. There is nowhere else I’d like to sleep, ever again.”

“You say that because I don’t begrudge you your knife.”

Thea moved the tea tray off her lap and took Noah’s hand. “I say that because you had sense enough to get me the knife in the first place, and generosity enough to show me how to use it.”

“Simple courtesy. Why are you keeping my tea from me?”

Oh, right. His
tea
. “You’ll have my things moved in here. We’ll share a dressing room?”

“Today, if you insist. My tea, if you please?”

“I insist,” Thea said, passing the half cup remaining but keeping Noah’s hand wrapped in hers too.

They held hands frequently after that, though Thea would not have said it was a conscious choice—it just seemed to happen, when they strolled the gardens with their guests before dinner; when they walked out to the stables early in the morning; when they visited the little girls in the afternoons.

None of the guests remarked it—they were too busy holding hands with their own spouses.

* * *

The family gathering was going well, and as far as Noah was concerned, the nights were going
splendidly
.

Nonetheless, when the time came to gather with the menfolk after dinner, Noah nearly tossed the decanter to James, told him to get them all drunk, and bounced up the stairs to see if the duchess was properly ensconced in their bedroom.

Theirs.
Where Thea had all but devoured Noah last night, and that was after he’d made a proper showing himself, and let her drift off to sleep. He’d fetched her knife on a whim, and Thea had swived him silly in response.

Noah had never—not once in years and years of enjoying the privileges of his age and station—been shown that degree of tenderness, caring, and fire in a sexual interlude. That one encounter with his duchess explained the mysterious looks passing between Noah’s sisters and their husbands, and probably a few mysteries more profound than that.

Like civilization, happiness on earth, and faith in a hereafter.

James, Noah concluded, knew nothing. Wives were complicated as hell, but the business of keeping them safe meant a lot to Thea, and Noah comprehended at least that much.

Which was why Noah had asked Harlan to bring the confounded note to the library after dinner.

“Gentlemen,” Noah began, “now that you have your libation, lend me thine ears, assuming they still function after all the chattering at dinner.”

They were seven, Erikson having been included, and with the exception of Grantley, Noah would have trusted any man there to guard his back. This was more serious, though.

“There’s a snake in my paradise, gentlemen. Harlan, you have the floor.”

Harlan had argued for this meeting, so Noah let him get down to business.

“
You are a harlot
,” Harlan read. “
Your uncle is a harlot, and your brother has married a harlot—or was that your father who married the harlot?
”

Silence, not a drink was lifted, for Harlan had captured everybody’s attention.

“This note was delivered anonymously to me when I visited to the west,” Harlan said. “Noah regards it as a slap of the glove to the family honor. I agree.”

“You said Thea’s a harlot?” Grantley’s voice was thoughtful, not angry. “Same thing Eggerdon said, best I can recall.”

“Meech should hear this,” James suggested. Heath and Wilson nodded in agreement. “You’re conferring with us for a reason, aren’t you, Anselm?”

“Somebody is trying to let me know he’s angry,” Noah said, “but he’s not honorable enough to simply take out a notice in the
Times
. Angry men do stupid things, and if he’s angry at me, he might strike at Thea, or the children, or any of you.”

“Or our wives,” Heath concluded. “Any idea who is in need of killing, and are we convinced it’s a man?”

“A lesson in manners, in any case,” Wilson seconded. “Preferably involving lots of privacy.”

“I can’t point any fingers,” Noah said, “but Pemberton comes to mind. He knows our family history intimately, though what his motive would be, I cannot say. One of Grantley’s familiars insulted Thea recently when in his cups, and Thea was not treated kindly by her former employer’s son. None of them have a clear motive for slandering a duchess, however.”

“Giles Pemberton has no motive beyond the next soiree, weekend party, or ride in the park,” Wilson said.

Wilson was the quiet one, the one who watched and sipped his drink and casually amassed an indecent fortune based on what crossing sweepers, flower girls, and drovers told him and his minions, season by season.

“I’m inclined to agree,” Heath said. “Pemberton seems like nothing more than a harmless, aging layabout waiting for his uncle to cock up his toes.”

“Who would resent the addition of the duchess to your family?” Erikson asked. “Both insults included her.”

“Our resident scientist asks a good question,” James said. “I think any lady who had her hopeful eye on the Duke of Anselm’s suit might wish Thea ill. You had a list of prospective duchesses, didn’t you, Anselm?”

“You know I did.” Noah had the grace to feel chagrined. A list, for God’s sake. Thea would despair of him. “My sisters each picked out four young ladies. I culled the list to six total and had them investigated. That left three, whom I stood up with a few times before settling on Marliss.”

A faultlessly rational and utterly stupid process.

“Who knew of the list?” Grantley asked. “I’m out and about quite a bit among the men who are standing up with the current crop of young ladies, and I heard nothing of it.”

“Maybe only the ladies knew,” Harlan suggested. “They can keep some things to themselves.”

“You’re suggesting our enemy is female?” Noah found the notion profoundly disconcerting. “That won’t do. One can’t call a female out, or deliver her a proper thrashing.”

“Harlan has a point,” James said. “The indirection, the use of a faceless intermediary, the reference to all the gossip Meech has provoked. That speaks to me of a lady who won’t show her hand, a female mind.”

“Not female, devious,” Wilson temporized. “A powerless mind, and scheming but lazy.”

“I don’t expect answers tonight,” Noah said. James and Wilson could argue prodigiously once they got started. “I simply wanted to alert you all to keep your ears open and your womenfolk in plain sight.”

“Hear, hear.” Heath held up a glass, and Erikson finished his entire drink.

“I don’t like this,” Erikson said, setting his glass on the sideboard. “You should tell your footmen, gardeners, and grooms, warn the housemaids of strangers who seek to flatter them in the market while asking about you or your duchess.”

“Those are good suggestions, Erikson,” James said. “I second them.”

“I am surrounded by nannies.” Noah tipped his chin toward James. “Heckendorn’s on the nest. You, Erikson, have no excuse.”

“I am rational,” Erikson said. “A man of science, and I suggest only prudent precautions. You have treasures here, Anselm. Treasures you can’t replace with coin.”

He bowed with Continental flourish and left.

“Listen to him,” James said when the room began to buzz with several conversations at once. “You’ve said your wife has a past, and maybe it’s her past dredging up this ill will.”

“You’re saying I ought to interrogate her on the subject of enemies, my wife of less than three months?”

“Not enemies,” James said, softly. “Safety. Speak to her of safety.”

* * *

Three long days later, Noah found his wife out behind the stables, where she usually was when the other ladies were taking an afternoon nap. The little dagger hit the post so hard the handle vibrated, but Thea wasn’t smiling.

“I could get you a set of them,” Noah said, standing at her shoulder, “so you could toss a half dozen before you had to retrieve them from your target.”

“I’d walk funny, with three knives strapped to each knee,” Thea said, and from her tone, she was serious. “Besides, each knife would feel different. I’d rather practice six times as often with only the one.”

Noah slipped an arm around Thea’s waist. “With a knife, you have to make the first throw count, rather like marriage.”

Barn swallows were flitting in and out of the stables’ cupola with an industry that suggested nestlings awaited them.

“Interesting analogy,” Thea said.

“You might like a bullwhip.” Noah kept his arm around her lest she go stomping off to inspect bouquets or something of equally earthshaking importance. “You can lay about with it and not lose it to your target.”

“I might like that.” And still, Thea wasn’t joking.

“Have you practiced enough?” Noah slid his hand down Thea’s arm to lace his fingers with hers. A soft breeze whispered through the nearby oaks, while horses in the adjoining pasture swished at flies and dozed. “I’ve hardly seen you these past days, so busy do our guests keep us.”

“It’s going well, though, isn’t it?” Thea brushed a strand of hair back with her free wrist, but Noah saw the worry in her eyes, the uncertainty. “We’re half done with this gathering, and so far, no great mishaps.”

The breeze stirred the lock of hair Thea had just put to rights.

“You don’t consider Harlan’s friends making calf eyes at Patience’s lady’s maid a mishap?”

“She’s making them right back, but, yes, that worried me.”

“Because?”

Again, Thea swiped at the errant lock of hair. “Because the maids and companions and governesses and younger sons at these infernal gatherings can create a host of mischief.”

She sheathed her knife, giving Noah a mouthwatering glimpse of knee and calf.

“You were a companion for years,” he said. “You would know.”

A shadow clouded Thea’s eyes, and Noah knew the urge to howl—or ruck up her skirts and rut. Thea had fallen into bed exhausted for the past few nights, and he hadn’t had the heart to wake her.

And now, the day was lovely, peaceful, and perfect for a leisurely marital nap.

“Shouldn’t the men be doing something with you while the ladies are resting?” Thea asked.

Thea’s innocence was exceeded only by her testiness of late. “The men
are
doing something, at least my brothers-in-law are, while the ladies are resting.”

Thea dropped Noah’s hand. “Your sisters suggest otherwise.”

Being married to Thea became more interesting by the day.

“What do my sisters suggest?” If a brother-in-law strayed, Noah would have to thrash him, at least. Marriages were private, of course, he understood that now as he hadn’t previously, but the man who cheated on a sister of Noah’s wasn’t deserving of privacy.

A duke was a logical creature.

“Patience and Pen both complained that they were feeling neglected because their spouses were so considerate of their conditions,” Thea said.

“While Wilson, the quiet one, provokes no complaints,” Noah said. “Regardless what that lot is doing with their privacy, Thea, haven’t you felt a need to go to our rooms and shut out the world for a bit?”

“You mean, reading or doing embroidery?”

“No, I do not.”

She twitched her skirts, though the outline of the sheath for her knife was apparent upon close inspection.

“I am not much of one for contemplative prayer, Husband.”

“Come with me, and I’ll show you what I contemplate.” Noah didn’t leer, and he didn’t wiggle his eyebrows, because he wasn’t teasing.

“Of course.” Then Thea’s chin came up, as if she were being called upon to recite. “I have neglected you, and your manly whatevers are probably in evidence.”

“My manly something.”

But try as Noah might, kiss and fondle and caress as he might, when he got Thea to their bed, her preoccupation with menus and maids and the ball at the end of the week came with them. Noah lay beside her, his breeding organs singing a dirge to marital consideration.

“What’s wrong?” Thea was up on her elbow, regarding Noah worriedly.

Naked in the light of day, but worried.

“Come here, Wife.” Noah curled an arm around her and dragged her over his chest. “Nothing is wrong, except my duchess is beset with worries. I’ve told you those belong to me now, haven’t I?”

“Then to whom do your worries belong?”

“You’d like an even trade?” Already Thea bargained like a Winters. Noah searched out the pins in her hair, withdrawing them carefully one by one. “I’ll trade you a worry for a worry. You go first.”