The Duke of a Thousand Desires

by Jillian Hunter

  “You look worn,” she said with a worried frown. “Where is your coat?”

  “I misplaced it last night. I need to change after our talk, anyway. I shall be gone for the rest of the day. Perhaps even the night. You should know I’ve considered sending you away. Out of England.”

  “You have what?” she asked in shock.

  The skin across his high cheekbones tightened. “It was to be a temporary solution. I considered sending you to my brother in Austria. He and his wife would take care of you.”

  The sky darkened. Ravenna raised her face to his. “It is my duty to stay with you. I won’t be banished. Really, Simon.” Her blue eyes clouded with rebellion. “I’m right back where I started.”

  “I will do what I must.”

  “Travel poses its own risks,” she quickly argued. “Aunt Glynnis could contract a fever. She is recovering right now from a chest infection. We could be set upon by river pirates or footpads on a lonely road.”

  “Indeed,” he said, a note of compromise in his voice. “A trek across Germany is no light undertaking for even an intrepid duchess.” He lowered his head to hers. “And I would miss you so.”

  “There are hundreds of hideaways in the kingdom,” she said. “Smugglers’ coves, churches, Jane’s antechambers, or a castle in Wales.”

  He straightened resolutely. “I would like you and Glynnis to pack your belongings while I’m out today. It’s my intention to reach Essex at the end of the week.” He offered her his hand. “I shall be your castle.”

  “And my umbrella?” She rose gingerly to escape the rain that spattered down with increasing force. “I suppose this will please my aunt. She went into near hysterics over that letter suggesting my demise. I wish she had not read it.”

  “It cannot be dismissed, no matter who sent it.” His eyes glittered with renewed fury. “Bruxton took my sister’s life, and not only is he walking free, but he has every hope of running for Parliament. Men of a certain criminal nature do not believe they will ever be caught. You will not become his or your former betrothed’s victim.”

  Isolde and Timpkins reached a truce in the midst of the preparations to leave London. Aunt Glynnis took charge of closing up the townhouse and packing for an undetermined length of time in Simon’s villa. She scribbled off farewell letters to friends new and old. She might have sent a notice to the newspapers advising the editors of their departure had Isolde not tactfully reminded her that the duke did not want to advertise his whereabouts.

  “I am old and forgetful,” Glynnis said regretfully.

  Isolde hastened to assure her otherwise. “You are trusting, madam. It is not your fault an evil man has forced us to take furtive measures. This should be a season to celebrate, not hide like badgers.”

  “You will be careful going out today?” Glynnis said as she gave a resounding honk into her handkerchief. “This dreadful cold has made me unfit company for even a dog.”

  “Poor madam.”

  “Do buy a book for our sojourn. Something to stimulate the nerves and distract the mind.”

  “On the lurid side?”

  “Oh, please. Heaving bosoms or a ghostly tale. Preferably both in the same novel. I do need a good story to help me forget our worries.”

  Although Isolde contrived to conceal her distress, as any young woman of a refined nature should, the reason for their covert leave-taking infuriated her. She would not hesitate to take action against anyone who threatened her employers. She might not be as skilled with a pistol as was the duchess or Lord Rhys, but she carried a small dagger on her person for protection.

  Isolde was confident her master and mistress would likewise defend her. Indeed, she grew quite emotional at the thought of some miscreant menacing Lady Ravenna.

  Hence, it was with her loyalty at the ready, a full line of the duke’s credit at her disposal and the roguish Timpkins in attendance, that she called on a few exclusive shops to purchase another slew of bonnets, gloves, stockings, and cotton shifts that the duchess might require in the country.

  It was a blessing to be a lady’s maid who closely matched her mistress’s coloring and measurements. Isolde boasted a wardrobe that a viscountess would envy.

  She had neatly dressed her black hair and donned one of the duchess’s older gowns in her haste. The quilted mauve satin lent her an aristocratic mien, perhaps, and as if to confirm this image, a gentleman on horseback stared overlong at her before he trotted off into the traffic.

  She did not recognize him at all. He wore a riding suit, a green cap.

  And she had sensed something disturbing in his stare. Something peculiar, as though she knew him and yet she did not. Did he take her to be the duchess? Did she imagine that he had wanted to approach her? In confusion, she turned to Timpkins and did not object when he took her arm.

  “Is anything wrong, miss?”

  “I’m not sure. Perhaps there are too many people in London for my liking.”

  “We will return to Caverley House soon enough. The first master and mistress, eh?”

  For once she did not mind his presumption. She was, in truth, grateful for his company, young knave that he was.

  She did, however, mention the incident later that night to Lady Ravenna. “It meant nothing, I’m sure, but I noticed a man staring at me today while I was shopping. He might have mistaken me for your grace. I apologize if he was a personage I was expected to recognize. I did not acknowledge him.”

  “Did he approach you?”

  “No. He just … stared. I had the sense he wanted to say something, but he rode on.”

  “You are quite lovely, Isolde. Perhaps if you hadn’t lived in the castle for so long, you would have realized as much.”

  “Ha. And what good would it have done me?”

  “The time will come,” Lady Ravenna said. “You will have your day when this menace is behind us.”

  33

  Kieran ran alongside the fence of the small farm, putting the roan mare through her paces. The horse deserved a responsible owner, deprived of the care that Susannah had lavished on her favorite mount. When her ladyship died, Bruxton ordered Kieran to destroy the horse. Bruxton had accused the animal of drawing Kieran and the countess together into an adulterous conspiracy.

  Kieran convinced the earl that the mare had been slain. A stableboy swore he’d witnessed the act. In actual fact, a local farmer had taken the horse to pasture in repayment for the veterinary services that Kieran provided. Whenever he could sneak off from Bruxton Manor he would exercise the roan and tend the farmer’s animals. He was at peace during those hours.

  The earl began to question his absences. The enmity between them intensified. “I do not trust a word that rolls off your tongue, Kieran. Still, there is no better groom than you and we need one another. I am a forgiving master, am I not?”

  Indeed, the earl had grounds for his rage. Kieran had fallen in love with his master’s wife during the early days of their marriage. Susannah and Kieran had sinned behind Bruxton’s back for a year. It was the countess who had broken off the affair, urging Kieran to run away before Bruxton discovered the betrayal.

  Would it have been for the best? Aye, for Kieran, perhaps, but at the time he hadn’t believed his departure would help the countess, mistreated by her abusive husband. Kieran had half-wished he could murder the earl to set Susannah free. The possibility that she might be implicated in a crime stopped him. He loved her even if he saw that they had no future together. He’d advised her to seek protection from the duke, her elder brother.

  She said, “He wants me to do as I am told. He doesn’t even answer my letters. I don’t think he cares.”

  “He doesn’t understand. You have to tell him everything.”

  Then she was killed.

  Kieran thought about riding north, no destination in mind, on Susannah’s horse. He could find work as an itinerant trainer, or join a band of tinkers. With luck, if he accepted low pay and lived in the shadows, no one would ask questions ab
out his past. Without luck he’d be arrested as a horse thief, an attempted murderer perhaps. He had one thing to do before he left England; he was going to confess to the duke.

  Rochecliffe might not believe Kieran’s story. He might murder him on the spot or turn him over to the authorities. He had to take that chance. He couldn’t continue a life of lies, of blackmail. He would tell the truth and accept whatever punishment he was meted.

  Simon was jolted awake by the warm body that landed on his lap. His heart thundered against his breastbone.

  He must have dozed off on the couch, a gun on his knee, when Ravenna launched herself at him from the bed.

  “Good heavens,” he muttered, managing by some miracle of reflex not to shoot a hole in the plaster ceiling. “One of us could have sustained a lethal injury. What set you off?”

  “I had a nightmare that you almost died,” she said with a shiver. “I heard shots, and I was calling you in the dark.”

  “Thank goodness you did not scream with Aunt Glynnis here. That would have left the whole house unable to sleep for a week.”

  “It’s not a joke, Simon. In the middle of my dream I almost saw the face of the man who tried to kill you. It was so convincing that the moment I woke up, I went to the window and stood on a chair, to look outside.”

  “Dear, dear God. You are right. This is not a joke.”

  “I noticed a man lurking in the yard, and I thought it was him until I realized it was a night watchman on patrol.”

  He grunted and slipped the pistol under the couch, lifting his knees to balance her. She slid down hard against his belly.

  “I want you to tell me again that you love me,” she said, arranging herself in a pose that awakened whatever part of him had still been asleep. The lace sleeves of her dressing gown tickled his bare wrist.

  “We did have this talk.”

  “I need to hear it again.” Her chin nestled against his neck. “Explain exactly what you felt for me in the past.”

  “I adored you from the moment you ran past me in that ridiculous male costume for your play. I might not have shown it.”

  “You definitely did not show it,” she said, raising her hand to his cheek, caressing his birthmark with her fingertip. “You gave me the opposite impression.”

  “I fell a little more in love with you every time I came to the castle. And now you are mine.”

  “Hold me, Simon. Kiss me.”

  “I need to sleep, my darling.”

  “May I kiss you then?”

  “Let me take you back to bed first. And do me a favor -- do not ever stand on a chair in front of the window again. If you have a nightmare, call for me. I will answer.”

  He carried her across the room, his hand cupping her backside, and deposited her in the middle of the goose-feather bed. He bent over her recumbent form with his foot planted on the floor.

  His mouth brushed her cheek in a good-night peck. “I am going back to sleep for an hour.”

  Of course one kiss led to another, and in the next moment he had untied her robe to rub his face across her silky nipples. Without thinking he slid back to strip off his shirt and pantaloons. “I am completely awake now,” he announced.

  She lowered her eyes to his heavy erection. “Yes. What a sight.”

  She turned onto her stomach with a beguiling smile, raising up on her hands and knees to offer herself to him. “Take me,” she whispered.

  “To the stars and back. That is a heavenly view if ever I’ve seen one.”

  He wrapped his arm around her ribs and fitted his penis to the crease of her cleft. She rocked forward slightly as he pushed inside her. “More,” she said, her voice catching.

  “How much more?”

  “All of you.”

  He held her securely as blood rushed through his body to obliterate his thoughts. Her hips rose, plump and enticing. Her invitation was flagrant. Not a filament of his being could refuse her. He inhaled and ran his hand over her sleek curves, her flesh like raw silk. He felt like a man who had never had sex before.

  She swayed again as he withdrew and quickened his movements. Arching her back, she released a moan that pushed him to the precipice of mortal restraint. He forgot that she was vulnerable, half his size, no match for his power. Need clawed at his self-mastery.

  “Sweet God,” he muttered. “I can feel how ready you are.”

  He pumped harder, his groin against her generous bottom, as she collapsed with a cry across the bed. Her hands splayed out at her sides in surrender. Her body trembled involuntarily. Still, he continued to thrust, his heart pounding in his chest. His back was slick with sweat when he climaxed.

  Just. One. Kiss.

  His pulse slowed. He dropped onto the bed, laughing ruefully, and gathered her to him. She smiled into his eyes as she crumbled against his chest. “I hope you can sleep now,” she said demurely.

  He rose at daybreak. The sky was clear. During his broken hours of sleep he’d decided not to postpone the move to Caverley House until the end of the week. It was safer to be on the road while the weather held. Timpkins would have to work quickly to interview additional staff members and confirm character references. The country estate and the tenantry required Simon’s personal attention. He looked forward to introducing Ravenna to his neighbors and to the house where they would raise their family.

  He was tempted to rouse her and insist they travel right after breakfast. But she was resting like a storybook princess, her mouth red from ardour, her hands clasped above her breasts. What manner of husband was he to give her nightmares? What good was he as a guardian if she rescued him even in her sleep?

  He watched her as he shaved and dressed. It would be unkind to awaken her. He went back to the bed to kiss her, then reminded himself why that would be a mistake. Her tumbled curls framed a face of perfect repose. She sighed as if she sensed him but did not open her eyes.

  She was a lady to inspire a man to slay dragons, one of who had come to his door while he fiddled about like a fool making plans he could not complete.

  34

  Simon was deeply glad Ravenna had not accompanied him to the formal drawing room as he recognized the gentleman who turned to greet him. His mind returned to the vision of her lying vulnerable and tranquil in their bed. Let him be rid of this bastard before she awakened.

  “Bruxton, this is a surprise.”

  He could not force a single note of respect into his voice. He struggled to be polite. In light of how he despised the earl that had to suffice.

  Bruxton disregarded the cold welcome. He took a chair while Simon stood, allowing the silence to mount.

  A frown shadowed the earl’s face. “I should have sent word earlier, but this required an intimate meeting. I know you are still in the early days of marriage, and I hesitated to call. I regret I am again the bearer of bad news.”

  Simon waited. He trusted that by now the under butler had alerted Timpkins as to the identity of their caller and that he would put the household on alert until the end of this interview. “I thought you’d left London. What is the news?”

  “You remember my Irish groom?” Bruxton asked.

  “Yes. I’ve met him a few times. He seems to be a capable young man.” Had Kieran been incapacitated in a race, or while training a stallion? How convenient that would be for the earl. Simon now believed that the groomsman held the key to the truth about Susannah. Yet not even Heath had been able to trace him.

  Bruxton shook his head. His fair hair was wind-swept, his narrow face flushed from a presumably hard ride. “He’s gone missing with a stolen bridle and saddle from my stables. Some of my personal papers have been taken. A man on the run must be considered a dangerous individual.”

  “Why would this concern me?”

  “His disappearance is connected to Susannah. There’s no gentle way to disclose what I have to say. I would not do so at all unless I felt it imperative that you understand my side of the story.”

  “Which is?” Simon asked
in an impassive voice.

  “Your sister was having an affair with her groom. I suspected it months before her death, but I held out hope that I was wrong. I didn’t want it to be true. I was mortified to think that the other servants knew.”

  There was a ring of truth to Bruxton’s words that Simon could not deny, although his first impulse was to defend Susannah. Indeed, she was the last woman he would believe capable of immorality. “How did you find out?” he asked.

  “Kieran confessed to me before he vanished.”

  Simon stared at him in disdain. “And you think he would come to me for protection?”

  “It’s no secret that you dislike me,” Bruxton said. “I’m afraid he might try to blackmail one of us. Your sister’s name must not be enmired in disgrace at all costs.”

  “Nor yours, Bruxton?”

  “It doesn’t cast any of us in a favorable light. Do you want your sister’s memory slurred?”

  Simon paused to listen to the footsteps outside the room. Had Bruxton brought support, or was that Timpkins, waiting for Simon to call for help?

  No one entered.

  “This is an upsetting revelation,” he said. “But I have to ask again why you are concerned enough to have come here.”

  Bruxton glanced at the door. “Do you think it is easy to admit I was cuckholded? To have to tell you that your sister gave herself to a servant? There is humiliation and dishonor in such an affair. I know you loved her. But what she did was a sin.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Perhaps?”

  “She isn’t here to deny your accusations. What do you expect me to say? I cannot speak against her without evidence. The shy sister I remember would not have deceived anyone on earth.”

  “People do not remain the same,” the earl said.

  “Nor do circumstances,” Simon replied. “Oftentimes we are forced into a position over which we have lost control. Our will is tested. And for some of us it is broken.”

  “It is possible you didn’t know what was in her heart. She shocked me. You surprised me with your marriage. Susannah accused you of abandoning her.”