Honestly. Who needed one pair of crocodile skin gloves, let alone two? No wonder her poor father had tried to drown himself in brandy. Lord Fairchild was not the sort of man to idly indulge in spirits, but if there was one thing that made him reach for the bottle it was his wife and daughter’s penchant for spending beyond their means.
Lady Fairchild had never met a shiny bauble she didn’t like and her children, with the exception of Hannah, had all followed in her footsteps. Alice loved hats. Cadence adored reticules. And Sarah, it seemed, had recently developed a yearning for skinned reptiles.
For three weeks out of the month Lord Fairchild managed to turn a blind eye to his family’s outrageous spending, but on the fourth week – when notes were delivered in alarming quantities to their modest townhome on the outskirts of Berkeley Square – he locked himself in his study and scarcely emerged for days.
Hannah hadn’t the faintest idea how he had managed to keep the creditors at bay for this long, but she knew he wouldn’t be able to keep it up much longer. Something which Lady Fairchild seemed incapable of understanding.
“Eight new dresses?” Staring at the note from Madame Dillard's in disbelief, Hannah was tempted to reach for the brandy herself. What were her sisters thinking? She’d told them time and again that they’d have to reuse their wardrobes from last season. A negligible sacrifice, given that every gown had been worn only once and some not at all.
Biting down on the tips of her fingers – a nervous habit she’d possessed since childhood – Hannah crossed to the window and let her forehead fall against the cool glass with a dull thud. There was no getting around it this time. They were going to find themselves in the poor house for sure, or – at the very least – be forced to strip the house bare and sell off everything that wasn’t nailed down. Then re-wearing the same dress twice would be the least of her sister’s concerns.
Without a shilling to their names, they’d quickly become the laughingstock of the ton. Something Cadence could ill afford now that she’d managed to capture the attention of an earl. And what would happen to Alice and Sarah, both of whom were so looking forward to their debuts? Born only three minutes apart, the twins had been counting down their launch into society since the day they could talk. Having it taken away would devastate them, not to mention the embarrassment of which would send Lady Fairchild into an early grave.
Something had to be done.
But what?
The most obvious answer was a marriage of means, but with Cadence all but promised to the Earl of Benfield (who, while well off, was by no stretch of the imagination wealthy enough to cover the Fairchild’s outstanding debt) and the twins having yet to make their debut, that left Hannah.
Hannah, who had never met a man she was even remotely interested in marrying. Hannah, who – at the age of six and twenty – was perilously close to becoming a spinster. Hannah, who would rather attend a reading at the library than a fancy ball at Almack’s. Hannah, who, after eight miserable seasons, had failed to attract a single suitor.
Lifting her head, she scowled at her reflection in the window. A young woman with gray eyes and thick chestnut hair pinned in a loose coil at the nape of her neck scowled back. Freckles dusted her nose and cheeks, giving her a youthful appearance that was countered by the generous swell of her bosom and the prominent curve of her backside. She had a wide mouth and a narrow chin, with a neck that was slightly too long and a body that lent itself to awkwardness.
A breathtaking swan Hannah was not – unlike her sisters, all of whom were strikingly beautiful – but she didn’t mind her ordinary appearance. In fact, she rather liked it. When someone was too pretty they ran the risk of receiving attention that was less than genuine. Hannah, on the other hand, never had to worry if a gentleman was only paying attention to her because of her appearance.
Mostly because they never paid her any attention at all.
With an annoyed expulsion of breath she turned away from the window and left the study, leaving her father to sleep off the effects of his overindulgence until morning. After seeking out the housekeeper to ensure she would have a hot pot of coffee ready the moment Lord Fairfield awoke, she made her way up the creaking staircase to the bedroom she shared with Cadence. Alice and Sarah were across the way, and their parents had an adjoining chamber down the hall.
“Cadence, you’re still awake,” Hannah noted with some surprise as she tiptoed into the room and shut the door silently behind her. “I thought you’d gone to sleep ages ago.”
Sitting in the middle of her bed with the blankets drawn up over her knees, Cadence set aside a well-worn copy of Ackermann’s Repository and shrugged her shoulders. “I was waiting for you. How is Father?”
“How do you think he is?” Hannah said, her tone gently chiding. Not wanting to summon their lady’s maid at such a late hour, she presented her back to Cadence and her sister automatically began to undo the long row of buttons that ran down the length of her dress. “We’re lucky he hasn’t taken what little money remains and run away to start a new life.”
“He wouldn’t do that.” Cadence’s hands stilled. “Would he?”
“No, of course not. Besides, there’s no money to be had.” She delivered a stern glare over her shoulder. “You spent it all on beaded reticules you didn’t need.”
“It wasn’t just me,” Cadence protested. “I told Sarah she didn’t need two pairs of gloves, but she wouldn’t listen.”
“She never does,” Hannah murmured as she shrugged out of her dress and carefully laid it over the back of a chair so as to avoid any unnecessary wrinkles. Whisking a long white nightgown over her head, she turned and regarded Cadence with a lifted brow. “It’s serious this time. The creditors are going to be knocking on our door by the dozens, and there’s nothing left to pay them with.”
Her sister frowned. “There has to be something left. Father is a baron, for heaven’s sake.”
“A baron with three daughters and a wife who like to spend beyond their means,” Hannah countered. “We should thank our stars if we’re not homeless by the end of the month.”
“I cannot be homeless,” Cadence exclaimed, her eyes – several shades darker than Hannah’s own and tip tilted at the corners to give her a feline appearance – widening in distress. “Where would I keep all of my dresses?”
Hannah bit her tongue.
Hard.
“When do you think Lord Benfield might present you with a proposal?” she asked after a long, heavy pause in which she struggled to rein in her exasperation. She knew her sister had only the best intentions, but just once she’d like for Cadence to take their financial predicament seriously. Heavens knew their mother and the twins weren’t going to and their father, for all that he bellowed and blustered when the bills came due, never actually did anything about his family’s atrocious spending. Which left Hannah and, to a lesser degree, Cadence, to pick up the pieces.
“I’d hope he might approach Father over the summer.” A line of annoyance formed between Cadence’s dark brows. “But he’s dragging his heels.”
A prickling of alarm swept down Hannah’s spine as she sat on the edge of her bed. Lord Benfield may not have been able to pay off all their debts, but he could at least make a significant dent. But that was only if he did, in fact, marry Cadence. “Do you think he has changed his mind?”
“About marrying me? Of course not,” said Cadence, looking insulted her sister would dare imply otherwise. “He has all but promised he will propose once his brother returns from his tour abroad.”
“And when will that be?”
“At the end of the Season.”
“At the end of the...but that’s months away!” Hannah said, aghast.
Cadence pursed her lips. “So?”
“So we need a wealthy benefactor now, Cadence. Do you think Lord Benfield might help with some of our debts as a measure of good faith?” she asked hopefully. “You said yourself that you’re practically engaged.”
�
�I said no such thing,” her sister said stiffly, “and I am not about to risk my proposal by demanding an allowance before we are even engaged. Everyone knows you wait until after you’re married to spend their money.”
“You don’t have to demand. I’m sure if you asked nicely–”
Cadence’s lips pinched together to form a hard, stubborn line. “No.”
“But–”
“I said no, and that’s the end of it. If we’re in as dire straits as you say we are–”
“We are,” Hannah interrupted.
“–then why don’t you find an earl to marry? Or, better yet, a duke?”
“A duke?” Hannah was so startled by the suggestion she couldn’t help but laugh. “Do be serious.”
“I am being serious,” Cadence insisted. “You do not give yourself enough credit, Han. If you put any effort at all into your appearance you’re actually quite pretty-”
“Thank you,” Hannah said dryly.
“–and you’re far more intelligent than I am.” Cadence frowned. “A bit too intelligent, actually. But that can be easily fixed. Our family doesn’t have so much as a hint of scandal–”
“We’re in debt up to our bonnets!”
“Yes, but no one else knows that.” She paused. “Do they?”
Hannah shook her head. “Not that I know of, but it’s only a matter of–”
“There, you see? You are an excellent candidate for a duchess.”
“Because I am passably pretty, somewhat intelligent, and I haven’t had an affair or otherwise besmirched the family name?”
Her sister smiled. It was a devious sort of smile, the kind a cat might wear right before it pounced on an unsuspecting bird. “Precisely. Now all we have to do is find you the right duke.”
Chapter Two
Hannah hadn’t the faintest idea if the notoriously reclusive Duke of Wycliffe was the right duke, but he was a duke, and she was desperate. Desperate enough to listen to Cadence’s fool-brained idea. Desperate enough to hope it actually might work. Desperate enough to find herself in a hired hackney, gritting her teeth against every hard bump on the narrow, rocky road that led to Wycliffe Estate.
Sitting high on a hill overlooking hundreds of acres of dense wood and swampland, the aging manor house was a tired tribute to eras gone by with its cracked stone exterior, sagging roof, and dark, expressionless windows. The surrounding grounds were also in disrepair, the lawns untended and overgrown, the gardens filled with weeds, and the fountain in the middle of the drive overflowing with leaves and several inches of stagnant water.
Oh Cadence, Hannah thought in silent distress as the hackney rolled to a stop amidst a cloud of dust. What have you gotten me into this time?
Her sister had been adamant that of all the eligible dukes in England, Wycliffe was the most likely to be receptive to Hannah’s...unusual...proposal. But she’d failed to mention anything about the appalling condition of his estate, including how remote it was.
Instead, all she had said was that Wycliffe was an eligible bachelor who had suffered a grave injury as a child and as a result had spent much of his adulthood in seclusion. When Hannah had asked for more details she’d merely shrugged and said, ‘He is not married and he’s a duke. What else is there to know?’
Hannah vaguely recalled overhearing a rumor about Wycliffe a few seasons back, but having never been one to pay attention to gossip it had gone in one ear and out the other. Now, as the driver came around the side of the hackney and opened the door, she wished she had paid closer attention.
“Wait.” Elsbeth, her lady’s maid – and the only person aside from Cadence who knew that she wasn’t really visiting Great Aunt Martha in Surrey – placed a restraining hand on Hannah’s arm when she started to stand up. “Are you sure this is a good idea?”
Hannah smiled wryly at her maid, a tiny slip of a thing whose blonde hair and blue eyes revealed her German ancestry. “I’m not sure of anything, except that if this doesn’t work you are soon to be without a job and my father will be sent to debtor’s prison.”
“But what will happen if he turns us away?” Elsbeth fretted.
“Truth be told, I am more afraid of what will happen if he doesn’t.” With a strained smile that was as much for her own benefit as the maid’s, Hannah stepped down from the hackney and squared her shoulders.
It had taken them two full days and half of another to reach the duke’s isolated estate and the sun was already heavy in the sky, touching everything with a golden glow that helped to soften the manor’s harsh lines and crumbling edges.
With a bit of imagination it wasn’t hard to picture what the grand old house must have looked like before time and neglect had taken their toll, and Hannah couldn’t help but wonder if the duke was in a similar state of dishevelment. She supposed at this point there was nothing else to do but find out for herself.
Holding fast to what little courage she still possessed after traveling halfway across England on some of the most treacherous roads she’d ever had the misfortune of encountering, Hannah walked up to the front door, raised her gloved hand – which, despite the thunderous beat of her heart, was impressively steady – and knocked.
When there was no response, she bit the inside of her cheek and knocked again.
“Perhaps the butler is off today?” Elsbeth suggested, although she didn’t sound very convinced. “Or maybe the duke is not in residence. We should return home.”
Hannah frowned at the maid over her shoulder. “We are not going anywhere,” she said firmly. “And we certainly did not come all this way just to return home before I even meet him. Chin up, Elsbeth. No harm will befall us.”
“That’s precisely what people say right before harm does befall them,” Elsbeth muttered under her breath. She visibly jumped when the hackney suddenly pulled away, and Hannah couldn’t help but feel a twinge of apprehension deep in her gut as she watched the team of matching grays trot off down the drive.
There was no turning back now. Not with the nearest inn a full day’s walk and nightfall rapidly approaching. Turning back towards the door, she knocked with renewed vigor. “I am sure there is a perfectly good explanation as to why no one...oh,” she gasped as the door was abruptly yanked open to reveal a man standing on the other side of it, his towering frame draped in shadow and his mouth curled in a sneer.
“What do you want?” he growled, his voice as rough as the roads they’d travelled to get here.
“I…” As her carefully crafted speech – the one she’d spent the past two days rehearsing over and over again until every word was burned into her mind – vanished in a puff of proverbial smoke, Hannah could only gape at the stranger in stunned silence. And pray, as she’d never prayed before, that he was the butler. Or the footman. Or even the cook. Anyone, anyone, but the Duke of Wycliffe. “I…”
“Are you deaf?” he said, black eyes glittering with thinly veiled fury as his gaze swept across her. “I asked you a question and I expect an answer. What do you want?”
Elsbeth squeaked and scurried to the edge of the fountain.
Coward, Hannah thought silently.
The man started to shut the door. Without thinking, Hannah stuck her foot out.
“Wait!” she cried. “I – I should very much like to speak to the Duke of Wycliffe.”
His black eyes narrowed. “There’s no duke here.”
“Are – are you certain?” Her gaze slid to the gold buttons on his waistcoat. “Because–”
“I’m positive,” he snapped and Hannah barely had time to yank her worn ankle boot out of the way before he slammed the door with so much force the windows rattled. Jaw sagging, she stared at the door in stunned disbelief. Was that whom she’d come all this way to marry? If so, Cadence had quite a bit of explaining to do!
“Well you heard him,” Elsbeth piped up. “The duke isn’t in. If we leave now, maybe we could catch up with the hackney.”
“Elsbeth, that was the duke.” Raising her fist, Han
nah began to pummel the door with renewed vigor, unable to believe anyone – least of all a duke! – could be so unforgivably rude. “Excuse me!” she called out, raising her voice to a near shout. “Excuse me, but I was not done speaking. If you would be so kind as to open the door–”
“Will you stop that incessant pounding? You’re giving me a bloody headache.” Yanking the door open, the duke glared down at Hannah. Fisting her hands on her hips, Hannah glared up at the duke. When it became clear that neither one was willing to back down, Wycliffe muttered something indecipherable under his breath and stepped out into the muted sunlight.
“Who are you?” he demanded, folding his arms across his chest. Tall and rangy, he towered over her by at least six inches, forcing her to tilt her head all the way back in order to look him in the eye.
“Who are you?” she countered. “I’ve come to speak to the Duke of Wycliffe, and–”
“You’re speaking to him.” A muscle ticked in his jaw, inadvertently drawing her gaze to a large puckered knot of flesh on the right side of his face. She hadn’t seen the scar before when he’d been standing in the shadows. Stark white against his golden complexion, it began at the top of his ear and extended all the way down to the edge of his chin. Seeing the direction of her stare, the duke’s expression grew shuttered. “Should I bend down so you can get a closer look?” he said caustically.
“No. No, I…” Finding herself at a loss of words, she bit her lip. “I am sorry.”
“Don’t be.” His shoulder jerked, shrugging away the scar as it were nothing more than a papercut instead of something that must have caused him immense physical and emotional pain. “It happened a long time ago.”
“Does it still hurt?” she asked without thinking.
Looking slightly taken aback at the personal question, the duke frowned and gave a curt shake of his head. A wavy lock of hair as black as his eyes tumbled over his brow and he pushed it aside with an impatient flick of his wrist. “No. It doesn’t.”
“That – that’s good.” He had strong features, Hannah noted. Not handsome. The angles of his cheekbones and the prominent cut of his nose were far too sharp to be handsome. Then there was the scar to contend with. But what was beauty, if not imperfect?
The Autumn Duchess (A Duchess for All Seasons Book 4) Page 2
