Eleven Scandals to Start to Win a Duke's Heart

by Sarah MacLean

  The table gave a collective chuckle at the words, but he barely heard it. In that moment, there was nothing he would not give to be alone with her—a fact that shook him to his core.

  “Hear hear,” said Allendale, raising his glass. “To the Duke of Leighton.”

  Around the table, glasses rose, and he avoided Juliana’s eyes lest he betray too much of his thoughts.

  “Even I shall have to rethink my opinion of you, Leighton,” Ralston said wryly. “Thank you.”

  “And now, you have been forced to accept not only our dinner invitation, but also our gratitude,” Juliana said from across the table.

  Everyone assembled laughed to break the seriousness of the moment. Everyone that is, except Juliana, who broke their eye contact, looking down at her plate.

  He considered their past, the things they had said—the ways they had lashed out, hoping to scratch if not to scar. He heard his words, the cutting way with which he had spoken to her, the way he had pushed her into a corner until she’d had no choice but to lie down or lash out.

  She had fought back, proud and magnificent.

  And suddenly, he wanted to tell her that.

  He wanted her to know that he did not find her common, or childish, or troublesome.

  He found her quite remarkable.

  And he wanted to start over.

  If for no other reason, than because she did not deserve his criticism.

  But perhaps for more than that.

  If only it were so easy.

  The door to the dining room opened, and an older servant entered, discreetly moving to Ralston. He leaned low and whispered in his master’s ear, and Ralston froze, setting his fork down audibly.

  Conversation stopped.

  Whatever the news the servant brought, it was not good.

  The marquess was ashen.

  Lady Ralston stood instantly, rounding the table toward her husband, caring nothing about her guests. About making a scene.

  Juliana spoke, concern in her voice. “What is it? Is it Nick?”

  “Gabriel?”

  Heads turned as one to the doorway, to the woman who had spoken Ralston’s given name.

  “Dio.” Juliana’s whisper was barely audible, but he heard it.

  “Who is she?” Simon did not register who asked the question. He was too focused on Juliana’s face, on the fear and anger and disbelief there.

  Too focused on her answer, whispered in Italian.

  “She is our mother.”

  She looked the same.

  Tall and lithe and as untouchable as she had been the last time Juliana had seen her.

  Instantly, Juliana was ten again, covered in chocolate from the cargo unloaded on the dock, chasing her cat through the old city and into the house, calling up to her father from the central courtyard, sunlight pouring down around her. A door opened, and her mother stepped out onto the upper balcony, the portrait of disinterest.

  “Silenzio, Juliana. Ladies do not screech.”

  “I’m sorry, Mama.”

  “You should be.” Louisa Fiori leaned over the edge of the balcony. “You are filthy. It is as though I had a son instead of a daughter.” She waved one hand lazily toward the door. “Go back to the river and wash before you come into the house.”

  She turned away, the hem of her pale pink gown disappearing through the double doors to the house beyond.

  It was the last Juliana had seen of her mother.

  Until now.

  “Gabriel?” their mother repeated, entering the room with utter poise, as though it had not been twenty-five years since she had hosted her own dinners at this very table. As though she were not being watched by a roomful of people.

  Not that such a thing would have stopped her. She had always adored attention. The more scandalous, the better.

  And this would be a scandal.

  No one would remember the Serpentine tomorrow.

  She lifted her hands. “Gabriel,” there was satisfaction in her tone. “My, what a man you have become. The marquess!”

  She was behind Juliana now, not having realized that her daughter, too, was in the room. There was a roaring in Juliana’s ears, and she closed her eyes against it. Of course her mother had not noticed. Why would she expect such a thing?

  If she had, she would have looked for Juliana. She would have said something.

  She would have wanted to see her daughter.

  Wouldn’t she?

  “Oh! It appears that I have interrupted something of a dinner party! I suppose I should have waited until morning, but I simply could not bear being away from home a moment longer.”

  Home.

  Juliana winced at the words.

  The men around the table stood, their manners arriving late but impeccable. “Oh, please, do not stand for me,” the voice came again, unrelenting, dripping with English politesse and a hint of something else—the sound of feminine guile. “I shall simply put myself in a receiving room until Gabriel has time for me.”

  The statement ended on a lilt of amusement, and Juliana opened her eyes at the grating sound, turning her head just slightly to see her brother, jaw steeled, ice in his cold blue gaze. To his left stood Callie, fists clenched, furious.

  If Juliana had not been at risk of becoming utterly unhinged, she would have been amused by her sister-in-law—ready to slay dragons for her husband.

  Their mother was a dragon if ever there was one.

  There was an enormous pause, silence screaming in the room until Callie spoke. “Bennett,” she said, with unparalleled calm, “would you escort Signora Fiori to the green parlor? I’m sure the marquess will be along momentarily.”

  The aging butler, at least, seemed to understand that he had been the harbinger of what was sure to be the biggest scandal London had seen since . . . well, since the last time London had seen Louisa Hathbourne St. John Fiori. He nearly leapt to do his mistress’s bidding.

  “Signora Fiori!” their mother said with a bright laugh—the one Juliana remembered as punctuation to a lie. “No one has called me that since I left Italy. I am still the Marchioness of Ralston, am I not?”

  “You are not.” Ralston’s voice was brittle with anger.

  “You are married? How wonderful! I shall simply have to do with Dowager Marchioness, then!”

  And with that simple sentence, Juliana was unable to breathe. Her mother had just renounced a decade of marriage, a husband, a life in Italy.

  And her own daughter.

  In front of a dozen others who would not hesitate to recount the tale.

  Juliana closed her eyes, willing herself to remain calm.

  Focusing on her breath, rather than the fact that her legitimacy had, with a few words from a long-forgotten woman, been thrown into question.

  When she reopened her eyes, it was to meet the one gaze she did not wish to find.

  The Duke of Leighton was not looking at her mother. He was watching Juliana. And she hated what she saw in his normally cold, unreadable amber eyes.

  Pity.

  Embarrassment and shame coursed through her, straightening her spine and reddening her cheeks.

  She was going to be ill.

  She could not remain in the room a moment longer.

  She had to leave.

  Before she did something thoroughly unacceptable.

  She stood, pushing back her chair, not caring that ladies did not leave the dinner table midmeal, not caring that she was breaking every rule of this ridiculous country’s ridiculous etiquette.

  And she fled.

  The dinner party disbanded almost immediately upon the arrival of the Dowager Marchioness or Signora Fiori or whoever she was, and the rest of the attendees had made hasty retreats, ostensibly to allow the family time and space with which to address her devastating arrival, but much more likely to have been in the foul hope of spreading their first-person accounts of tonight’s dramatics.

  Simon could think only of Juliana: of her face as she listened to h
er mother’s high-pitched cackle; of her enormous, soulful eyes as the wicked woman had made her scandalous pronouncement that she was not a Fiori, but a St. John; of the way she’d left the room, all square shoulders and straight spine, with stunning, remarkable pride.

  He watched the other guests’ conveyances trundle down the street, listening with half an ear as the Duke and Duchess of Rivington discussed whether or not they should remain or leave their family in peace.

  As they climbed into their coach, Simon heard the duchess ask quietly, “Should we at least look in on Juliana?”

  “Leave her for tonight, love,” was Rivington’s idiotic reply before the door closed, and the carriage set off in the direction of their home.

  Simon clenched his teeth. Of course they should have sought out Juliana. Someone had to make sure that the girl was not planning a midnight return to Italy.

  Not him, of course.

  He climbed up into his own coach—full with the memory of her on another scandalous evening.

  She was not his concern.

  He could not afford the scandal. He had his own family to worry about. Juliana was fine. Would be, at least. The woman had to be impervious to embarrassment by now.

  And if she wasn’t?

  With a wicked curse, he rapped on the ceiling of the coach and instructed the coachman to turn around. He did not even question his destination.

  She was in the stables.

  There were several stableboys loitering outside, and they came immediately to their feet at the sight of the Duke of Leighton. He waved them back and entered the building, thinking of nothing but finding her.

  He did not hide his footsteps as he made his way down the long row of stalls to where she was, following the soft whispers of Italian and the smooth rustle of her clothes.

  He stopped just outside the stall door, transfixed by her.

  Her back was to him, and she was brushing her horse with a hard-bristled brush, each short, firm stroke coming on a little puff of breath. Periodically, the mare would shuffle and lean toward her mistress, turning her head for extra attention. When Juliana stroked the animal’s long, white muzzle, the horse was unable to contain its pleasure, nuzzling Juliana’s shoulder with a snort.

  Simon could not blame the animal for preening under the affection.

  “She did not even know I was there,” Juliana whispered in Italian as she worked her way down the mare’s broad back. “And if I hadn’t been, if I’d never come here, she would not have acknowledged her time with me at all.”

  There was a pause, the only sound the light rustle of her bold, silk gown, entirely counter to her soft, sad whisper, and his heart went out to her. It was one thing to be deserted by a mother, but what a crushing blow it must have been to have her mother reject the life they had shared?

  The sound of the brush slowed. “Not that I care if she acknowledges it at all.”

  He heard the lie in the words, and something deep in his chest constricted, making it difficult to breathe.

  “Perhaps now we can return to Italy, Lucrezia.” She put her forehead to the high black shoulder of the horse. “Perhaps now Gabriel will see that my staying was a terrible idea.”

  The whispered words, so honest, so rife with sorrow and regret, were nearly his undoing. From the moment he’d met her, he’d thought she enjoyed the scandal that followed her everywhere. Thought she embraced it, invited it.

  But as he stood in this darkened stable, watching her brush her enormous horse, dressed in a devastatingly beautiful gown and desperate for some way to escape the events of the evening, Simon was overcome with a single realization.

  Scandal was not her choice.

  It was her burden.

  Her bold words and her brave face were not borne out of pleasure but out of self-preservation.

  She was as much a victim of circumstance as he was.

  The awareness hit him like a fist to the gut.

  But it changed nothing.

  “I would not place a wager on your brother allowing you to leave,” he said in Italian.

  Juliana spun toward him, and he registered the fear and nervousness in her wide blue eyes an instant before it was gone, replaced with irritation.

  Her fire was not gone.

  “How long have you been there?” she asked in English, taking a step back, pressing herself against the side of the horse, who sidestepped once and gave a little, distraught nicker.

  He stilled, as though moving closer to her would scare her off. “Long enough.”

  Her gaze darted around the stall, as though she were looking for an escape route. As though she were terrified of him. And then she seemed to remember that she wasn’t terrified of anything.

  Her eyes narrowed on him, blue and beautiful. “Eavesdropping is a terrible habit.”

  He leaned against the doorjamb, giving her space. “You may add it to my list of unpleasant traits.”

  “There isn’t enough paper in England to list them all.”

  He raised a brow. “You wound me.”

  She scowled, turning back to the horse. “If only it were so. Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

  So it was to be this way. She did not want to discuss the events of the evening. He watched as she resumed the long, firm strokes of the horse’s flanks. “I was invited to a dinner party, but it ended early.”

  “It sounds like it was a terrible bore,” she said, her voice dry as sand. “Shouldn’t you be at your club? Recounting the devastating blow to our reputation to other arrogant aristocrats in a cloud of cheroot smoke as you drink scotch stolen from the North Country?”

  “What do you know about cheroot smoke?”

  She tossed him a look over her shoulder. “We do not have such restrictive rules in Italy.”

  It was his turn for dryness. “Really? I had not noticed.”

  “I am quite serious. Surely you have something better to do than stand in the stables and watch me groom my horse.”

  “In an evening gown.”

  The most incredible gown he’d ever seen.

  She gave one of her little shrugs. “Don’t tell me there’s a rule about that, too.”

  “A rule about ladies wearing evening gowns to groom horses?”

  “Yes.”

  “Not in so many words, no.”

  “Excellent.” She did not stop her movements.

  “That said, I must say I have never witnessed a lady so well attired grooming a horse.”

  “You still haven’t.”

  He paused. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You still haven’t witnessed a lady doing so. I think tonight has made it quite clear that I am no lady, don’t you?” She leaned down and tapped the mare’s forelock, inspecting one hoof. “I don’t have the kind of stock required for the honor.”

  And with that, the conversation turned, and the air in the room grew heavy.

  She turned back to him, meeting his gaze with complete seriousness. “Why did you come looking for me?”

  Damned if he knew.

  “Did you think that now that our mother is back, you could come to me in the stables, and I would behave the way she always did?” The words hung between them, brash and unpleasant, and Simon wanted to shake her for saying them. For cheapening his concern. For suggesting that she was nothing better than her mother had been.

  She pressed on. “Or perhaps you could not resist the opportunity to enumerate the additional ways that I am damaged goods after tonight? I assure you, there is nothing you could say that I have not already considered myself.”

  He deserved it, he supposed, but he could not help but defend himself. Did she really think that he would take this opportunity—this night—to set her down? “Juliana, I—” He took a step toward her, and she put up a hand to stay his movement.

  “Don’t tell me this has changed everything, Leighton.”

  She had never called him that. Your Grace, in that mocking tone that set him instantly on edge. Or Simon. But now, in al
l seriousness, she used his title. The shift unsettled him.

  She laughed, the sound cold and brittle and altogether unlike her. “Of course it hasn’t. This has merely underscored all that you already know. All that you’ve known since the beginning. How is it you say it? I am a scandal waiting to happen?” She tilted her head, feigning deep thought. “Perhaps I have already happened. But, if there were any doubt, the woman standing in that dining room is more than enough, isn’t she?” There was a long silence before she added, in Italian, so softly that he was almost unsure he heard it, “She’s ruined everything. Again.”

  There was a devastating sadness in the words, a sadness that echoed around them until he could not bear it. “She’s not you,” he said in her language, as though speaking it in Italian could make her believe it.

  She wouldn’t believe it, of course.

  But he did.

  “Sciocchezze!” Her eyes glistened with angry tears as she resisted his words, calling them nonsense as she turned away, presenting him with her back. He almost didn’t hear the rest of the statement, lost in the harsh hiss of the brush. “She is what I come from. She is what I shall become, isn’t that how it goes?”

  The words sliced through him, making him unreasonably furious with her for thinking them, and he reached for her, unable to stop himself. Turned her toward him, met her wide eyes. “Why would you say that?” He heard the roughness in his tone. Tried to clear it. Failed. “Why would you think that?”

  She laughed, the sound harsh and without humor. “I’m not the only one. Isn’t that what you believe? Aren’t those the words by which aristocrats like you live? Come now, Your Grace. I’ve met your mother.” Then, in English, “Blood will out, will it not?”

  He stopped. They were words that he had heard countless times—one of his mother’s favorite sayings. “Did she say that to you?”

  “Haven’t you said it to me?” She lifted her chin, proud and defiant.

  “No.”

  One side of her mouth kicked up. “Not in so many words. It bears true for you, doesn’t it? Looking down at the lesser creatures from up on high. Blood will out—the very motto of the Duke of Disdain.”

  The Duke of Disdain.

  He’d heard it before, of course, the epithet that was whispered as he passed. He’d simply never given it much thought. Never realized the aptness of the name. Never realized the truth of it.