The Autumn Duke (A Duke for All Seasons Book 4)

by Jillian Eaton

  Gathering the reins, she pressed her heels to Bacon’s sides and the two took off down the drive in a swirl of stone dust, leaving the duke cursing in their wake.

  Chapter Five

  Lady Katherine Dower was impetuous.

  Stubborn.

  Rude.

  And Byron was…

  Intrigued, he admitted to himself as he rode up alongside her on a tree-lined path just wide enough for two horses. He was intrigued. And even though nothing would come of it – even though nothing could come of it – he nevertheless found himself nudging his gelding ever closer as they both eased their mounts back down to a walk.

  “That was lovely,” Katherine said, twisting in her saddle to smile at him. Her cheeks were a delightful pink, her hair – covered with nothing but dappled sunlight – a fluttering disarray of sable curls. The clear blue sky matched the color of her eyes and her lips were the pink of a sunrise just before it gave way to dawn.

  She looked like a damned forest nymph, and the sudden urge to touch her, even just a sweep of his thumb across that plump bottom lip, was so strong that Byron actually found his arm stretching across the divide between them before he realized what he was doing and awkwardly reached forward to pat his gelding’s lathered shoulder instead.

  “You’re a fine rider,” he said gruffly, not meeting her gaze. “Even without proper footwear.”

  “Thank you,” she replied, and though he couldn’t see her mischievous grin he could hear it in her voice. “You are as well. Truth be told I expected nothing less. One can only assume a duke would be very good at riding horses and…other things.”

  Byron head jerked up. He stared at Katherine for a full half minute, unable to believe a lady would dare use such a sexually explicit innuendo. Then she winked, and he did something he hadn’t done in a very, very long time.

  He laughed.

  Not the snide snicker that occasionally escaped when someone’s ineptitude amused him. But a real, deep, feel-it-in-his-belly laugh that had moisture gathering in the corners of his eyes. Wiping them dry with a knuckle, he shook his head, bemused by his reaction to this dark-haired temptress with the breeding of a lady and the mouth of a sailor.

  “Where did you come from?” he wondered aloud, the question more for his own benefit than hers. He didn’t expect an answer, but she gave him one anyways. Short on words Lady Katherine Dower was not. Something he’d come to realize within the first two minutes of their conversation in the drawing room.

  Ordinarily he found women prone to rattling off a hundred words a minute the epitome of annoyance, but for some reason when Katherine spoke he actually wanted to hear what she had to say. Her wit may have been a tad off color, but at least she was witty. Far wittier than any female he’d ever met – or male, for that matter.

  “If you are referring to my place of birth, I was born on Aberdeen Street in Berkley Square. A rather difficult labor, or so I’m told. Long and arduous and all that. I fear my mother has never truly forgiven me.” She fluttered a hand absently in the air. “But then all the best things are worth the wait, don’t you agree?”

  “That is the saying,” he allowed.

  She flashed him a grin. “You’re not a complimentary man by nature, are you Your Grace? I like that,” she continued before he could muster a response. “If I had to hear one more time how my eyes look like glittering sapphires, I think I would scream.” Rolling said eyes (which did glitter like sapphires), she took the reins in her teeth and started to pull off her gloves. Alarmed by the sudden display of ivory skin – and his very immediate, very physical reaction to it – Byron stopped his horse.

  “What are you doing?” he demanded.

  “Mmrph mmm mot,” she mumbled, her words made indecipherable by the leather in her mouth. Tucking the gloves beneath her thigh, she spat the reins back out before using them to turn her mare in a circle so they were facing one another. “It’s too hot.”

  “And? You cannot just ride around without clothes on,” he said irritably. “First your stockings, now your gloves. What’s next?”

  A winged eyebrow shot up. “My dress, if you’d like.”

  Yes, Byron would like.

  He would like very much.

  Which was the problem, wasn’t it? Because he didn’t want to like. Or yearn. Or desire. Or feel his cock swelling between his legs until it pushed painfully against the pommel of the saddle.

  “Put your gloves back on,” he ordered, every inch the duke as he straightened in his seat and gave her a commanding stare that never failed to send whoever it was directed at scrambling to do his bidding. Except for Katherine. Katherine just blinked, then lifted her shoulder in an errant little shrug that had his teeth grinding together.

  “No, I don’t think I will,” she said. “But thank you for asking.”

  How was it, Byron wondered crossly, that full grown men cowered at the sight of his scowl but this little tiny slip of a female only adjusted her crown and lifted her chin?

  “Let’s just get this ride over with. We shouldn’t even be out here alone in the first place.” Clucking his tongue he sent his gelding into a brisk canter, half hoping to lose Katherine by the next bend, but when he glanced behind him she was riding directly off his left flank and gave him an impish smile that caused his head to immediately snap back around.

  Impetuous indeed, he thought silently as they loped out of the woods and into a small, sundrenched meadow filled with wildflowers. Steering his horse into the middle of the clearing, Byron dismounted. His unwanted companion did the same.

  Wordlessly they turned their mounts loose to graze and pivoted to face one another, chests rising and falling from the physical exertion of their ride...and the unspoken temptation between them. Temptation that had grown tenfold since Katherine slipped off her gloves.

  Who knew a woman’s wrists could be so bloody arousing? Delicate and fine boned, the mere sight of them had his stomach clenching in one hard knot of lust. It spread across his body like rippling fire, causing a flush of heat at the nape of his neck and a surging pulse in the center of his loins.

  His hands clenched into fists as he dragged his gaze from her wrists to her countenance. But if he’d thought to cool his growing ardor by looking at her face he’d made a fatal mistake. There was nothing cool or calming about the way she was studying him as if she were a cat and he was a particularly tasty mouse. With her head coyly tilted and eyes bright and alert beneath a sultry sweep of ebony lashes she really did look like a feline, and there was a part of him – a very small, very traitorous part he was trying desperately to ignore – that wanted to be swept beneath her paw.

  “We shouldn’t be out here alone,” he repeated, once again speaking for his benefit rather than her own. Hoping that if he said the words aloud they would snap him out of the enchantment she’d cast upon him. For surely it was a spell conjured from black magic that held him bound to the spot, unable and unwilling to look away from the source of his desire.

  “You’re the one who got off your horse,” she pointed out. “I was simply following suit.”

  He had gotten off his horse. A mistake he’d regretted even before his boots struck the ground. So why had he done it? Deep down inside, Byron knew the answer. And if the subtle curve of Katherine’s lips was any indication, she knew it as well.

  Saucy minx.

  “If a duke kisses a lady in the woods and no one is around to see it, has he really kissed her?” Those plump lips pursed. “I’m afraid I don’t know the answer. Best try it out and see, shall we?”

  Every muscle in his body tensed. “There’s only one problem with that.”

  “Oh?” She batted her lashes. “And what’s that?”

  “You’re no lady.” As he closed the distance between them in one powerful stride, Byron felt the last of his control slip away. Curling one arm around her waist, he yanked her against his chest as his other hand moved to her hair, fingers twisting with dark delight into all those thick, satiny curls.
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  “Go ahead,” she coaxed softly when he suddenly hesitated. “You’ve come this far. It would be a shame to waste all this good build-up.”

  For the first time, they agreed on something.

  With a low, rumbling growl Byron kissed her. And she kissed him back. Passionately. Wickedly. Wantonly. She nipped his mouth, and when his lips parted in surprise her tongue slipped between them. A moment’s pause and then he joined her, dragging her head back in order to deepen the kiss until they were both spinning in a cyclone of carnal seduction.

  He knew it was wrong. He knew he shouldn’t even as his hands skimmed beneath her breasts and his thumbs flicked across her nipples. But that didn’t stop him. It certainly didn’t stop her from yanking his shirt out of the waistband of his trousers and streaking her hands around his ribcage until her nails sank like tiny little claws into his back.

  Then somehow there were wildflowers in her hair and she was beneath him and his hand was on her thigh. Byron didn’t know how the devil they’d gotten here, but he was damned glad they’d arrived as Kitty arched her spine, rubbing herself against him like a cat in heat.

  Everything was a blur of sound and color and raw, unbridled passion. They rolled across the ground, their limbs tangling as the fire that had been steadily building between them turned into a raging inferno. His mouth traced a burning back down her neck to where her shoulder met her collarbone. She cried out when he nipped her there, only to mewl in satisfaction when he licked. She cupped his buttocks, fingertips kneading into hard, unyielding muscle as his arousal pressed between her legs.

  The brown mare spooked when he released a guttural snarl and lifted himself up on his arms. A good thing, as the unexpected flash of movement startled Byron enough to temporarily draw him out of the seductive fog that had blinded him to all rhyme and reason. Shaking his head to clear it, he pried himself free of Katherine’s arms with no small amount of effort and sat back on his haunches, his expression dazed, his thoughts scattered, his cock near to bursting out of his pants.

  Bloody hell. Whatever he’d been expecting, it wasn’t that.

  That had been nothing short of cataclysmic. Another minute and he would have had her skirts flipped above her waist. The lack of control he’d exhibited infuriated him, and with a hissed curse he shot to his feet as Katherine sat up on her elbows, her swollen mouth curled in a satisfied smirk.

  “Well,” she purred, “that was quite something.”

  His jaw clenched. “It’s not going to–”

  “Happen again?” Rolling her eyes, she sat all the way up and held out her hand. “I thought you’d say that or something to the same effect. Honestly, your predictability is one of your worst traits. Now be a love and help me up.”

  ‘One’ of his worst traits? Indicating he had multiple worst traits? Scowling, Byron took her hand and yanked her unceremoniously to her feet. “You’re not exactly perfect yourself, Lady Dower.”

  Her nose wrinkled. “Goodness, I would hope not. Perfect is so utterly boring. Which, thank the heavens, that kiss was not. I was afraid it might be, you know. Boring, that is. But it wasn’t. Not at all.” She paused just long enough to draw in a breath. “By the by, please do not call me Lady Dower. Lady Dower is my mother and I can assure you we would never be confused for the other. It’s Lady Katherine if you must, Kitty if you’d like.”

  As his head continued to spin, Byron took a step back and folded his arms. “I am not going to call you by your Christian name, let alone a shortened version of it. It wouldn’t be proper.”

  But it did suit her.

  Katherine was too long and severe.

  Kitty, on the other hand…Kitty was just right.

  In more ways than one.

  “Where do you fancy we go from here?” she asked with a coy flutter of lashes.

  “Nowhere,” he said shortly.

  “Nowhere?” An ebony brow arched. “I’m sorry to tell you, but that was hardly a ‘nowhere’ sort of kiss.”

  “If that kiss makes you believe I am somehow obligated to marry you–”

  “No one is obligated to marry me.” For the first time a real flash of temper sparked in her eyes, changing their color from misty gray to dark slate. “Least of all an arrogant, self-important duke who would do well to loosen his cravat before he chokes to death on his inflated sense of morality. We kissed.” She lifted her arms in a gesture of nonchalance. “It may have been the best kiss I’ve ever had, but it was just a kiss and hardly worthy of marriage.”

  She’d had other kisses? With whom? If he ever found out, he’d cheerfully rip them limb from limb. Annoyed by the unexpected wave of jealousy (and what it implied), Byron marched to his horse and swept the long stems of grass from the gelding’s mouth. “I’m escorting you back to Glenmoore,” he said shortly, “and then we need never cross paths again. It goes to say I will not speak of this encounter with anyone, and I trust you to do the same. It was a private affair that has no need to be made public knowledge.”

  Kitty’s brows gathered, his only warning that a storm was about to strike. “You see our kiss as something dirty to be kept a secret, is that it? Something you’d never dare admit because you’re ashamed to have kissed me?”

  “No, that’s not what I–”

  “You know, now that I think about it, maybe this wasn’t the best kiss I’ve ever had.” Retrieving her own horse, Kitty shook out her hair and straightened her dress before grasping the saddle and swinging herself up into it. “There’s no need to escort me, Your Grace. I know the way.” Spinning the mare in a circle, she dug in her heels and galloped away.

  Chapter Six

  Well that hadn’t gone as she’d hoped it would.

  The kissing, yes. The kissing had far exceeded her expectations. But as for the rest…

  Huffing out a breath, Kitty threw herself down on her bed and kicked her legs in the air. What exactly had she been expecting? For the Duke of Wakefield to be so overcome by her beauty and charm and wit that as soon as they rode off together he would halt, get down on bended knee, and ask her to marry him while trumpets sounded in the distance and swans paraded across the field?

  Yes, she thought with an absent jerk of her shoulder. That was precisely what she’d expected would happen. And why not? It had happened before. Three – no, four times. Or was it five? Truth be told, she’d lost count. Not out of arrogance or conceit. Oh all right, well maybe a little dash of arrogance. But mostly because all of those men might as well have been proposing to themselves.

  They didn’t want her. She could have been anyone. They just wanted her dowry, and her lineage, and to boast of having a marquess for a father-in-law. Which made the proposals hardly worth remembering. In fact, she’d done her best to forget them. Particularly the one that had come courtesy of Lord Haymire and included a dead trout, a fishing pole, and a ring inside the poor dead trout’s mouth.

  She still shuddered to think of it.

  Yet when she found a man actually worthy of proposing, he did the exact opposite. Not only had Byron made it clear he wanted nothing to do with her after their kiss (which was embarrassing enough), he’d gone out of his way to make certain she didn’t tell anyone about it. And just who did he think she’d tell? Besides Regina, there was no one she trusted not to twist the event into something more and ruin her reputation in the process. But surely Byron must have – or at least, should have – known that she wouldn’t go running about willy nilly crying out to anyone who would listen that she’d kissed a duke in a field and he’d…he’d rejected her.

  Curling her hand into a fist, she dropped it onto the ivory coverlet in a fit of frustration. Men did not reject Katherine Dower. She rejected men. And it was a blow to her not-entirely-small ego that Byron hadn’t played by the rules.

  Rolling onto her back, she stared up at the ceiling, her brow furrowed until she remembered that furrows caused lines and lines caused wrinkles and she immediately relaxed her facial muscles. The last thing she needed to come ou
t of all this was a wrinkle. How awful that would be! As well as entirely the duke’s fault. If he’d just fallen in love with her like he should have, she wouldn’t be feeling sorry for herself locked away in her room while he did….well, whatever it was he did. Honestly, she hadn’t the faintest idea.

  Which gave her an idea.

  If Byron wouldn’t come to her, then she could come to him.

  And she had the perfect way to do it.

  “A house party,” Lady Margaret repeated, glancing uneasily at her two sisters sitting on either side of her before she refocused her gaze on Kitty. “Are you certain? Our brother isn’t really the…social sort.”

  Mary – or was it Madeline? Kitty was having a hard time keeping track – let out a loud snort. “That’s putting it nicely. He abhors public functions of any kind and would absolutely murder us if he found we were planning to host a house party at the estate.” She paused. “Which is why I think it is an excellent idea.”

  Mary, Kitty decided. Definitely Mary.

  The most outspoken of the three siblings as well as the eldest, she hadn’t hesitated to usher Kitty into the front parlor when she’d arrived unannounced and requested an audience with all of the sisters. The moment they’d sat down she had laid out her plan in no uncertain terms. She wished to marry their brother – something which had caused Margaret, the shyest of the trio, to gasp in delight – and she wanted them to have a house party so she might have the opportunity to woo the duke into proposing.

  It was the only way she could think of to get herself underfoot. In a traditional house party the guests actually lived in the house for an undetermined length of time. Everyone dined together, played games together, and spent time together – time she intended to use to show Byron their attraction was much more than just physical.