What a Devilish Duke Desires (34 page)

Eventually they stumbled inside the mansion and made no attempt to hide their laughter.

Bell wiped the dampness off the shoulders of his coat and strolled back to the house. He might as well return home, since he’d struck out on finding a mistress. Tomorrow he would think of a new plan.

He strode through the corridor, noting someone had lit a candle branch. When he emerged, he heard a cacophony of voices coming from the dining room. He had no wish to make himself agreeable to anyone else this evening.

Bell strode toward the foyer but halted beside the stairwell upon hearing a feminine voice from the staircase. “Justin?”

He couldn’t see her from this vantage point.

He heard an odd sound beneath the stairwell. Bell looked underneath in time to see a man pushing a flask beneath it with his heel. Then footsteps clipped on the marble floor. “I’m here,” the man said, walking to the bottom of the staircase.

Bell noted he was the young man with a shock of wheat-colored hair.

“Where have you been?” a woman said in a stern tone. “I’ve looked everywhere for you.”

“Oh, we just moved about the ballroom and the adjoining rooms,” he said.

What an accomplished liar he was, Bell thought.

“Your face is flushed,” the woman said as she descended. Now Bell could see her. She was the blond woman he’d seen in the garden.

“I hope you haven’t been drinking with your friends again,” she said.

“Always suspicious,” the young man said.

“It’s late, and I wish to return home,” the blonde said.

A few minutes later, their voices receded.

Approaching footsteps alerted Bell. He turned as Lady Atherton regarded him with a knowing smile. “Are you in the habit of listening to others’ conversations, Bellingham?” she asked.

“Not if I can help it. And you?”

“I’m just the hostess of this grand squeeze,” she said.

“Who is she?” he asked.

Lady Atherton took a deep breath and slowly released it. “She’s not for the likes of you, Bell.”

He recalled the way the blonde had stared at him earlier with parted lips. “I didn’t ask if she was for me. I asked for her name.”

Lady Atherton shook her head. “Leave her be, Bellingham. She’s a widow with a boy to rear. You want no part of her life.”

“I’m afraid I am part of it, unwillingly,” he said. The blonde must be the widow his friends had mentioned, but he said nothing of that to Lady Atherton. He reached beneath the stairwell and retrieved the flask. “You see, I believe she needs to know her son is lying through his teeth.”

“Oh dear. She did say he was at a trying age.”

“That, I believe, is an understatement.”

Lady Atherton sighed and held out her hand. “Give the flask to me, and I’ll see that it’s returned.”

This was an opportunity to find out if she had meant to issue him an invitation when she’d stared at him earlier. He told himself he only wanted to warn her about her son. He told himself she had every right to know. He told himself that the boy might find himself in serious straits if he didn’t alert her. But ultimately, he knew he wouldn’t be able to get her out of his head until he spoke to her. “He’s taking advantage of her. Someone needs to put the fear of the devil in that boy.”

Lady Atherton’s eyes widened. “And you think you’re the one to do it? Hah!”

“I’m an eyewitness.” He paused and added, “I want her name.”

“Only if you swear this is about the boy and nothing else,” she said.

He felt victorious, but he hid it. “Her name and address, please.”

Lady Atherton hesitated again. “Her name is Laura Davenport. That’s Lady Chesfield to you,” she said, her expression sharp. “Her address is number ten, Grosvenor Square. And, Bellingham, I meant what I said. She’s a respectable widow and not for the likes of a rakehell like you.”

Perhaps, but he meant to find out. “She’s incredibly naïve where that boy is concerned.”

Lady Atherton clasped her hands. “Well, I agree he ought to have more respect for his stepmother.”

Bell bowed. “Thank you for an interesting evening.” Then he strode out the door.

The next afternoon

After dismissing his secretary, Bell opened the desk drawer where he’d stowed the flask last night. After retrieving it, he thought about his plans to return the flask to Lady Chesfield and reconsidered. What the devil did he expect to gain? The last thing he wanted was to become involved in the lady’s problems.

She was a stranger to him. They had not been introduced, and yet, he’d pried her name and address from Lady Atherton, who was very strict about the proprieties. He ought to have left well enough alone. Now he was obliged to return the blasted flask.

Out of curiosity, he opened the flask, expecting to find cheap gin, but one sniff proved the liquor was brandy. Bell sipped it and realized it was of top-notch quality. Most likely the young buck had purloined the brandy from a decanter at home.

The wayward young man wasn’t his responsibility. He could send a footman to deliver the flask, but Lady Chesfield wouldn’t know why he’d sent it. With a sigh, he drew out paper, pen, and ink, thinking he would describe what he’d seen last night. No, that was too much trouble. He would simply state in his message that he’d found her son’s flask. Whatever transpired afterward was none of his affair.

Bell started to shut the drawer when he saw the small leather sketchbook inside that had belonged to his mother. His heart drummed in his ears. A new maid had recently found it in the attic. That day, he’d looked at one page and shoved it inside the desk drawer. Bell ought to have told the maid to return it to the attic the day the sketchbook was discovered. Then it would have been out of his sight and mind forever. He walked over to the bell, intending to ring for the housekeeper. He meant to ask her to return the sketchbook to the attic. But he hesitated, because he didn’t want her to touch it.

After four years, he ought to have put the past behind him. Most of the time, he managed to shove it to the far corners of his brain, but the periodic nightmares served as a reminder of all that he’d loved and lost.

He returned to the desk, determined to shut the drawer. But something beckoned him. His ears thudded as he retrieved the sketchbook and opened it to a random page. A small boy sat on a sofa with a bundled infant. He gritted his teeth at the inscription near the bottom of the page.
Andrew, age two, holding Steven one month after birth.
His heart thumped at the sketch of him and his younger brother.

Damn it all to hell. He’d known nothing good could come of resurrecting the memories. They were gone forever.

He’d been too late all those years ago.

Bell shut the sketchbook and shoved it back inside the cubbyhole in the desk. The past no longer existed. There was only the here and now.

Gritting his teeth, he strode over to the bell rope and pulled it. When Griffith, the butler, appeared, Bell made arrangements to have his carriage brought round. He would deliver the flask to Lady Chesfield and have done with the matter once and for all.

SOULBOUND
by Kristen Callihan

After centuries of searching, Adam finally found his soul mate, only to be rejected when she desires her freedom. But when Eliza discovers she’s being hunted by someone far more dangerous, she turns to the one man who can keep her safe—even if he endangers her heart…

WHAT A DEVILISH DUKE DESIRES
by Vicky Dreiling

Fans of
New York Times
bestselling authors Julia Quinn, Sarah MacLean, and Madeline Hunter will love the third book in Vicky Dreiling’s charming, sexy, and utterly irresistible Sinful Scoundrels trilogy about a highborn man who never wanted to inherit his uncle’s title or settle down…until a beautiful, brilliant, delightfully tempting maid makes him rethink his position.

SECRET HARBOR
by Anna Sullivan

Fans of
New York Times
bestselling authors JoAnn Ross, Jill Shalvis, and Bella Andre will love the last book in Anna Sullivan’s witty contemporary romance trilogy about a young woman who left her beloved home in Maine to become an actress in Hollywood. Now a star, and beset by scandal, she wants nothing more than to surround herself with old friends…until she meets an infuriating—and sexy—stranger.

MEET ME AT THE BEACH
by V. K. Sykes

Gorgeous Lily Doyle was the only thing Aiden Flynn missed after he escaped from Seashell Bay to play pro baseball. Now that he’s back on the island, memories rush in about the night of passion they shared long ago, and everything else washes right out to sea—everything except the desire that still burns between them.

HOT
by Elizabeth Hoyt writing as Julia Harper

For Turner Hastings, being held at gunpoint during a back robbery is an opportunity in disguise. After seeing her little heist on tape, FBI Special Agent John MacKinnon knows it’s going to be an interesting case. But he doesn’t expect to develop feelings for Turner, and when bullets start flying in her direction, John finds he’ll do anything to save her.

FOR THE LOVE OF PETE
by Elizabeth Hoyt writing as Julia Harper

Dodging bullets with a loopy redhead in the passenger seat is not how Special Agent Dante Torelli imagined his day going. But Zoey Addler is determined to get her baby niece back, and no one—not even a henpecked hit man, cooking-obsessed matrons, or a relentless killer—will stand in her way.