Dukes, Actually: 12 Dukes of Christmas #5

by Erica Ridley

  He laughed and opened the journal marked Imports. “Remind me never to buy you a romantic novel.”

  Carole stuck out her tongue and listened to his explanation about the intricacies and differences between the Importation Act of 1812 and the Import Act of 1813.

  In no time, she began to realize that Azureford was not only surprisingly humble and droll, but also very, very clever. He scarcely needed to glance at the journal entries to quote them exactly. How many times had he gone over this material? Could he just look at things and remember them? No wonder everyone in the House of Lords seemed to want him on their committee.

  Luckily for them, Azureford seemed passionate about every one of the worthy causes blanketing his dining table. If he hadn’t been a lord, Carole rather suspected he’d have served in the House of Commons. Being born a duke was essentially carte blanche to do or have anything His Grace desired, but he wasn’t resting on inherited laurels. He was probably the single most competent representative in all of Parliament.

  She shifted in her seat. This new facet made him all the more attractive.

  Not that she dared develop a tendre for him, of course. He was shooting for the stars and she was staying put. No matter how magnetic she found his passion, her loyalty was to her family and the vow she’d made never to abandon her father.

  Well, that was putting the cream before the scone, wasn’t it? Her cheeks heated. She was here as his library inventory consultant, not to compete as a future bride.

  He paused. “I’ve lost you. What are you thinking about?”

  “Parliament,” she hedged. You being wrong for me in every way.

  “I don’t mind. Most people see it as an excuse to come to Town for the Season.” He winced as he belatedly realized most residents of this village might not share that privilege. “Oh. Have you ever had a… Have you been to London?”

  “No and no,” she answered, for the first time wondering how different her life might have been, had she made different choices. “I have a great-aunt who would have been willing to sponsor me for a proper come-out, but my place is here.”

  “You could be part of Society,” he said with astonishment, “but you said no?”

  “It’s… I couldn’t leave my father. You didn’t see him after the fever took my mother. I mean, you don’t see him now, but back then it was even worse. He was too melancholy to rise from bed, to dress, to eat. If it hadn’t been for me, I think he would have died of a broken heart. I couldn’t leave him and risk the melancholy returning. Not when there would be no one to save him this time.”

  “I am sorry,” Azureford said softly. “I do not know what it was like to be in your situation, but I do know how it feels to lose one’s parents. I would not wish it on anyone.”

  She pushed up from the table with a forced smile. “Weren’t we meant to finish packing up the library?”

  “Of course.” He rose to his feet, but his dark gaze stayed locked on her. “After you.”

  For the next hour, the only words spoken between them related to the titles she was adding to the master list, or the books Azureford swiped from the crates and carried over to his stack of rescues.

  Carole was just about to tease him about keeping Edward Gibbon’s Critical Observations on the Sixth Book of the Aeneid, when she finally caught sight of a familiar blue journal with a distinctive Q embossed on the front cover. She wrenched it from the stack and pressed it to her pounding chest with a disbelieving gasp. It was here. She’d found it!

  She resisted the temptation to flip through its pages at once, raking her eyes over her reimagined renditions of local landmarks and private parlors. It was as if a part of her heart had finally been returned. The part that believed escaping into a false reality was just as good as living in the real world. She started to tuck the sketchbook inside her reticule before Azureford noticed anything amiss, only to realize he was staring right at her. Her stomach sank as she slowly turned to face him.

  He raised his brows. “What did you find?”

  “M-my missing earring?”

  “It looks surprisingly like one of my books.”

  “Not your book.” She took a deep breath. “My book.”

  He crossed his arms, one eyebrow cocked expectantly.

  There was no good way to do this, so… out with it all at once. She held the sketchbook flat and upended her reticule. The “missing” gold-and-citrine hoop tumbled out, winking accusingly from atop the dyed leather.

  “You lost your earring,” Azureford said slowly, “inside your reticule?”

  “I lied,” she admitted, although it was obvious he’d worked that much out for himself. She put her earring back into her reticule and lifted up the sketchbook. “I lost this on the night of your party.”

  His eyes were unsmiling. “A diary of your innermost thoughts?”

  “Pictures of them,” she admitted. “It’s a sketchbook. I wasn’t going to show you, but I thought you might like—”

  “—to know the real reason you’ve been visiting?” A muscle worked at his jaw. “Yes. Thank you for telling me. You can go now.”

  “No, it wasn’t like that at… All right, yes. That was the reason I visited this year. But I came to your party last year because I wanted to get to know you better, and I still do. You’re not at all what you first seemed, and I like you so much more than I imagined I would.”

  “This apology of yours,” he said dryly. “It needs work.”

  “I want to help,” she burst out. “That’s what I’m really saying. Judith is the only other person who knows this sketchbook exists, but no one but me has ever seen the drawings. I love buildings. I love imagining how I would remodel them even more. I drew your parlor—”

  “You drew my parlor?”

  “—when I dashed off to the retiring room for a few minutes. On my way back, someone bumped into me and my sketchbook skidded into your library. I didn’t want to look like I was stealing one of your books, or call attention to its contents…”

  “You drew my parlor in ‘a few minutes?’”

  There was only one way to prove to him that she possessed the skills he needed most. Carole took a deep breath. She was going to have to trust him. A little. And hope that the duke’s infamous hauteur and reticence meant he was much too proper to gossip—not that he had close friends in town to share scandalbroth with anyway.

  “Here.” She ignored the shaking of her hands. “I’ll show you. It’s the last one. It’s unfinished.” She flipped to the right page and shoved the sketchbook in his direction.

  After an agonizing moment, he stepped forward and accepted the small volume. He studied the illustration in extended silence before finally looking up. “Why is my parlor filled with drunken, cheroot-smoking women?”

  “They’re not drunk,” she protested.

  “They’re carrying tankards of ale and flintlock pistols. At any moment, one of them is going to slur, ‘I wager I can shoot that bonnet right off of your head’ and the next thing you know, there’ll be a bullet hole in my favorite framed kilt.”

  “You have a favorite kilt?” she stammered.

  “Apparently. You’ve drawn one on my wall.” He held up the sketch, eyebrows raised.

  “I was going through a Scottish phase.” She waved a hand. “But if you take away the pistols and the cheroots and the extraneous kilt, this is exactly your parlor. Not how it does look, but how it could look.”

  “If I were insane,” he agreed. “What’s your point?”

  “My point is, I can do this. I can turn your library into a billiard room.”

  “Anyone can turn a library into a billiard room. Step one: Get rid of the books. Step two: Install billiards. I’ve already received estimates from the best craftsmen in the area.”

  “Anyone can purchase a table,” she parroted. Good God, he needed her far more than he knew. “Not everyone can create an experience. The best table your money can buy might be the centerpiece, but that doesn’t mean just tossing it
in the middle of the room.”

  “It doesn’t?”

  “No! Have you even played billiards? Lighting is fundamental. Daytime play is best with natural illumination. Evening play requires a custom-crafted framework of three to six oil lamps positioned at the proper angle.”

  He nodded. “I remember. Ninety degrees.”

  “That was buttresses, not billiards. Receptacles will catch the oil so that it doesn’t fall onto your freshly ironed baize, and the cabinetry to house your cues, maces, and ball box need to—”

  “May I?” Azureford’s finger hovered just beneath the prior page.

  Carole sighed. She could recognize a no. “Please do.”

  Her skin crawled with invisible ants as he slowly paged back through each drawing. Occasionally his lips would quirk or a brow would raise, but he otherwise kept his silence.

  “You want to do this the right way, don’t you?” she burst out when she couldn’t stand the anticipation any longer. “You said I could help you with your party. Let me help.”

  He glanced up from her sketchbook. “How?”

  “Look.” She flipped the inventory journal to a blank page and started to draw. “These walls have a fixed height and length, don’t they? The fireplace is here, and the windows are here and here. We’d rip out the shelves. Presuming cabinetry like… that, and a billiard table like… that, then this is a rough approximation of how I would alter this room to maximize its attributes.”

  The duke exchanged her sketchbook for the inventory journal.

  She tried to make him see. “You dream of making the best possible impression on your future duchess, and I dream of being allowed to do a project like this just once in my life. To design and decorate as I see fit. This isn’t only our best attempt at making your billiard room be all that it can be, but each of us, too. We’ll grant two wishes at once. Not bad, is it?”

  Her heart twisted. He was going to say no. He was still angry about her deception. She had one chance to resolve this. No matter what it took.

  “Help me help you…” She took a shaky breath. “…to marry someone else.”

  Chapter 7

  Adam sat in the dappled sunlight of the wooden-latticed belvedere in his rear garden and tried to escape into the book in his hand. It was no use. He moved a ribbon to mark his page and glared at the pretty flowers blooming in the Quincys’ garden.

  He could be disappointed that Miss Quincy’s sudden interest was due to ulterior motives, but he couldn’t be angry at her. He’d had ulterior motives of his own, did he not? Realizing he’d wished to “practice” with the entire village before removing to the Town he really cared about could not have been any more complimentary than learning the only reason Miss Quincy kept coming over was to retrieve her sketchbook.

  Truly, what if anything, had changed? Earring, sketchbook, billiard room... She still wanted something, and so did he. If she could help him reach his goal rather than flail at it awkwardly, what sort of fool would refuse the offer?

  He removed his House of Lords diary from the basket by his feet and flipped to the final page. With a pencil, he added:

  * * *

  Honest

  Reciprocates feelings

  * * *

  to the list of required qualifications for his future bride. He didn’t have feelings yet, but he was annoyed enough with himself and Miss Quincy to imagine how badly he would have felt if he fell in love only to discover the woman he hoped to make his wife was only waltzing with him because it cured her indigestion or some such.

  He tossed the pencil and journal back into the basket along with his book. Reading was no good. What he really wished he had his hands on was that sketchbook. He’d only recognized a handful of places—his parlor, the castle entrance hall and the circulating library—but he suspected most of the village had found its way into her little book. With different dressing, of course. Every single scene seemed to involve riotous women making any number of dramatic choices.

  For someone as outgoing as Miss Quincy, she’d certainly managed to hide an intense inner world.

  “There you are, Your Grace.” Swinton swept into view with a large silver tray, which he placed upon a small wooden table inside the belvedere. “Biscuits, lemonade, and a note from Mr. Paterson.”

  Adam’s man of business. He reached for that letter first before the lemonade.

  * * *

  Your Grace,

  I’ve shown the sketch to architects and builders as you requested. Other than enlarging the windows as seen in the illustration, most of the changes are cosmetic, and as such, not structural engineers’ particular strength. They all seemed to find it as fine a suggestion as any.

  I took the liberty of sharing the drawing with the same craftsmen who provided proposals for the billiard table. They exclaimed over the use of light, the recessed cabinetry where the library shelves once were, and the intricate lighting system. The design is brilliant. One workman even claimed the billiard table in the drawing almost perfectly matches the design and dimensions of the table in his proposal, making it a perfect match.

  I enclose the sketch. Please advise.

  Paterson

  * * *

  Adam fished in the basket for the report containing the craftsmen’s proposals, and flipped through them until he found the one his man of business had referenced. It had been provided by John Thurston of Catherine Street in London. Not a local laborer at all, but England’s most renowned maker of billiard equipment, according to Paterson.

  According to Miss Quincy, too, by the look of it.

  He didn’t have to check his notes to know that choosing London’s most celebrated expert would exponentially increase both the cost and time required.

  But as Miss Quincy had said—he wanted to do this the right way. To make the best impression. The last thing he needed was to have his guests standing about talking about how stingy he’d been with the materials or how much foresight he’d failed to give the question of lighting. Which he hadn’t even known was an important question to ask until their argument.

  Whatever flaws she might possess, one thing Adam couldn’t help but admire was her willingness to try, no matter how unlikely the chances seemed for success. What would happen if he set her up to win? He was Project Billiards committee leader, not the entirety of the committee. With his resources and her expertise, Adam’s billiard room would not simply be a nice touch, but possibly the talk of the town. In a good way.

  He drew out the journal one more time.

  * * *

  Knows what she wants

  Does everything she can to achieve it

  * * *

  “I just need one more!”

  “Hold on, I’m getting it.”

  Adam shut the book and stared through the lattice at his neighbors’ garden.

  Miss Quincy stood near a waist-high row of blooming rapeseed with a pair of shears, talking to one of the little girls that lived nearby. Both wore crowns of bright yellow flowers atop their heads and matching yellow necklaces at their throats. In the little girl’s outstretched hand was a fifth loop of braided flowers.

  “Five golden rings,” he growled in disgust. “You’re bamming me.”

  As if she’d heard him mutter, Miss Quincy glanced up and met his eyes. Rather than shouting to him as she might once have done, she gave a tentative little wave.

  “When you’re done dusting yourself with pollen,” he called out, “meet me in the library.”

  Although he was too far away to discern the sparkle returning to her eyes, Adam swore he could feel them twinkling at him.

  “Five minutes,” she yelled back. “This band is for Annie’s father.”

  Annie held it aloft as though the ring of yellow flowers was the Crown Jewels for a king.

  “The finest rapeseed headwear I’ve ever seen,” he assured the little girl as he exited the belvedere with the basket on one arm.

  She gave him a gap-toothed grin.

  Adam entered
the library and began organizing the basket’s contents back into their neat piles. General correspondence, House of Lords, Billiards Committee. He had barely finished when Miss Quincy burst through the door.

  He spun toward her. “What happened to five minutes?”

  “It’s been ten.” She glanced over his shoulder, not at the table but at the lone stack of books on his otherwise empty shelves. “Those are your can’t-live-withouts?”

  He lifted a palm in acquiescence.

  She ran over to the books to inspect the titles. “If these are your favorites, why are they in such terrible condition? If you bent the page-corners of one of my books, I would smite you with a plague of locusts. Or spiders. Whichever you hate the most.”

  “They aren’t my books,” he admitted. When she spun to face him with a question in her eyes, he explained, “They belonged to my father. They’re his favorites. We used to argue about cracking spines and bending corners, but now those flaws are the things I love most about those books. It’s proof he lived, he loved, he was happy. When I touch them, it feels like he’s still here.”

  She touched a hand to her chest and gave a tight nod. “I know what you mean.”

  He leaned against the table. “That’s not why I summoned you.”

  “Is it because you’re in the market for a rapeseed crown?” she guessed. “I know a girl. We can arrange it.”

  “I know a girl, too.” He corrected himself, “A woman. Some might say, an expert in designing the perfect billiard room.”

  Her hazel eyes widened. “Who says that besides me?”

  “Me.” He lifted the most recent letter. “And Paterson, my man of business.” He brandished the winning proposal. “And some fellow called John… the Worst? John Thirsty? John—”

  “John Thurston said I know how to design the perfect billiard room?”