The Duke's Secret Seduction

by Donna Lea Simpson

  And now they were renewing that bond. It warmed Alban and reminded him of all the things he had missed about his aunt.

  Lady Eliza, sensing his presence, turned her face up toward him. He gazed at her steadily, looking at her eyes, milky now, when once they were so clear and steady in their gaze. “Do not stare at me to pity, Alban,” Lady Eliza said.

  Bart grinned.

  Alban sat down by his aunt. “How do you know such things?”

  Lady Eliza frowned and shook her head. “I’m not sure I understand, myself. It is a recent skill. But I do have some ideas on the subject. Have you ever watched animals, Alban?”

  What kind of nonsensical question that was, Alban could not imagine, but he would humor her. “No, I can’t say that I have.”

  “Hmm. Why am I not surprised by that? Bartholomew, have you?”

  “Yes. My sister had always loved cats, though my father could not bear the creatures. I always rather liked them and they seemed to like me, often staying by me when I chanced to be sitting with my sister and mother. So though we had them in the house, Father commanded that he never see them. Although my sister didn’t do any training that I knew of, the animals seemed to know just how to go about. Father would kick them if he saw them, so when we were all sitting in the drawing room, if footsteps were heard in the hallway, I would see the cats’ ears swivel; if it was just a footman or another of the family, they would hold their ground, but if it was Father they would slink away under the divan, or find some other hiding place. And that before he ever entered the room. I have noticed that animals use so many more senses than just their sight—hearing, smell, even something beyond any of those other senses.”

  “Good boy!” Lady Eliza cried, reaching out and patting his hand. “And that is how I have learned to know things. I cannot even tell you how I learned, but as my eyesight dimmed, everything else sharpened. The breeze on my face, the sound of a voice and what direction it comes from, what height. All of it combines, and becomes knowledge. I test it always, I try to refine it. If I am to be in darkness for the rest of my days, let me not be in ignorance, at least.”

  “What a wonder you are, my lady,” Bart said, taking her hand and kissing it. “You have accepted your blindness so readily.”

  Alban watched his aunt’s expression, the lined face suddenly weary.

  “No, it was not so easy. I never realized how much my pride would be involved in losing my sight, and how devastated I was the day I awoke to find the last vestiges of my failing vision had slipped away in the night. That was a black day; if it had not been for Kittie . . .”

  The breath caught in Alban’s throat, and his heart spasmed in pain. He crouched by her chair, reached out and took his aunt’s hands into his own; though they were rather big and bony for a woman’s, his own still engulfed them easily. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he whispered, not trusting his full voice.

  “I thought I was sparing you,” she said. “But now I know I was proud. Too proud to write you a letter to tell you. It would have felt like begging for a visit, and I knew you had other worries, other concerns.”

  He was silent, guilt scratching at him.

  “And I had a friend to help me, after all. Perhaps it is easier for a woman to turn to another woman in a time like that. She saw my worst moments and helped me to find peace.”

  As he stood, releasing his aunt’s hands from his grasp, Alban glanced over at Kittie Douglas. She was blushing prettily at something Orkenay was murmuring. What had she done to draw in a sophisticated man like the earl? Of course, he would never say anything like that to his aunt, for she was fond of the young woman, and with good cause, it seemed. But was the companion as altruistic as his aunt seemed to think? Or was she, which seemed more likely to him, looking out for herself, entrenching herself so much in Lady Eliza’s household through her sly manipulation that his aunt would not be able to do without her? Perhaps that was cynical to think that way, but in his experience, cynicism was usually well answered by the facts.

  She would bear watching, he thought. She could not possibly be as good as she was pretty, no matter what she had done for Lady Eliza.

  On the surface she appeared to be demure, retiring. He could feel the tug of attraction toward her. He liked an intelligent woman, but no woman with sense would be flattered by an idiot like Orkenay’s attention, and she seemed to be enjoying herself far too much. He also liked an alluring woman, one who went out of her way to be attractive to him, who studied his needs and wants and made herself available to him, without being provocative or vulgar. Kittie Douglas was garbed simply, as befit her station, he supposed, and she was easily embarrassed, he would have guessed. Though she seemed to be gaining ease as Orkenay persisted in his flattery. But she was none of the things he looked for in a lover.

  He turned away from the oddly disturbing sight of the earl and Kittie Douglas and back to his aunt and friend. They were chatting quietly, Bart confessing his growing desire to find a wife and marry; he had never told Alban that, the duke reflected, but maybe they hadn’t really had the opportunity for that kind of conversation in the last couple of years. They were generally in a large group.

  Had he really shut out all the people who cared for him? he wondered suddenly. His aunt, Bart . . . they were the two rocks in his world as a youth. And yet he had spent little time with either in the last three years. Maybe it was time in his life for an evaluation of all he held dear. He wished, suddenly, that he had not invited Sir John and Orkenay, but perhaps the two men would be taken up with Mrs. Douglas and her two friends, who were arriving within the next day or two.

  And how opportune was that, he thought sourly. Two more widows, with four eligible gentlemen. What a coincidence. Enough husbands for everyone, and one to spare.

  One to spare. Himself, certainly, for though there were reasons aplenty for him to marry, he had not made up his mind to the task yet. He stared out the window. When he did marry, he supposed he would have to brave the Season and find a young thing trained to be dutiful and grateful to someone of his stature, should he deign to court her. It was enough to make him weary, the thought of the attentions a young woman would require, at least during courtship.

  He turned and caught Kittie Douglas’s eye. She had, it seemed, been gazing intently in his direction even as she listened to Orkenay, who leered at her bosom as he murmured in her ear. She blushed and stood, suddenly, made a hasty excuse to the earl and exited the room.

  Six

  The message had come that she was to expect her two friends that very day, Kittie found, when she descended to join her employer for breakfast. Among the feelings she retained from the day before, there was a tumult of excitement at seeing the other two of the Three Widows, as they called themselves, again.

  Lady Eliza was already dressed in a pearl gray morning gown and at the table in the small wood-paneled breakfast room off the main dining room, and was making her way through the substantial breakfast she considered adequate for the start of another day. When first the older woman had gone blind, Kittie assumed her duties would include guiding Lady Eliza to the table and choosing her foods for her, but that was not to be. She descended every morning at eight thirty with the help of her chipper maid, Beacon, and though she expected Kittie to join her there by nine, she didn’t need any more help than that of her footman, Oliver, to make up her plate. All of her serving staff adored her, despite—or perhaps because of—her autocratic ways, and had adjusted splendidly to her new infirmity.

  And so the lady was dining on eggs, toast, kippered herrings and a horrible relish that Kittie could not even stand the smell of but which the lady cherished.

  “Good morning, Kittie,” Lady Eliza said as Kittie entered. “You are wearing the new green silk, I see.”

  Kittie stopped and held one hand over her heart, then said calmly, “So, Beacon told you that?”

  “No.”

  Reflecting as she sat down, Kittie tried to think how her employer would know what
gown it was. Some things had become almost a game between them since Lady Eliza had gone blind, and this was one of them. Kittie didn’t mind, because it challenged her employer’s senses and teased her own brain. Stimulation had been much needed at some points during the darkest days, and Kittie would do anything to keep Lady Eliza’s spirits from sinking to the depths they had plunged that awful morning when the woman discovered the last of her sight was gone.

  “All right, I cannot imagine how you know what dress I am wearing, unless Prissy told you, or someone else.”

  “No one told me,” Lady Eliza said, blotting her mouth with her napkin and setting it aside. “But I know that your friends are arriving today and that Prissy would have taken you that message when she drew your curtains, so it stands to reason that you would wear the new dress for their arrival.”

  “Of course!” Kittie nodded, and Oliver filled her cup with chocolate. She took a piece of toast from the rack in the middle of the table. “The simplest explanation is always the best. That was a shabby trick, though, to say it that way, my lady. I . . . I thought perhaps—”

  “That I had regained my sight. Kittie, you know better than to even imagine that possible.”

  “But you said you do still see flashes of things on occasion.”

  “Just flashes, my dear, of shadow and light, and even those are fading. Are you looking forward to your friends’ arrival?”

  “Oh, yes. I’m so grateful to you for . . .” Kittie stopped as her employer raised one hand. She knew better than to get too effusive. “Well, I am grateful, and you can’t stop me from saying so. I don’t think another employer in England would allow her companion so much.” She smeared her toast with marmalade and frowned thoughtfully at it. “I think you will like Lady Severn. I’m afraid Hannah Billings may not be to your taste, but she is good at heart, for all her occasional depression and weepiness.”

  “We will discuss your friends at length, but first, I meant to ask you yesterday what you thought of my nephew’s friends. You left the room abruptly before their visit terminated, and yet you and the earl seemed to be having a lively conversation. I did not see you much for the rest of the day, since Alban and Bart stayed with me.”

  Kittie was grateful for the delay occasioned by a large bite of toast and marmalade, which she chewed slowly. It had not been Orkenay’s attentions that made her flee, but the expression on the duke’s handsome face from across the room. He turned and caught her gazing at him, and the expression on his face was a knowing sneer. He was not the man of the painting in the dining room, she thought. That man, and the man of his letters to his aunt, was considerate and kind, loving and giving, with a gentleness of expression and tone.

  In truth he had an arrogance of mien that was most off-putting, and when he spoke he was often sarcastic. He was very much the duke of his wife’s accusatory last letter, as she told him she was deserting him. And yet Kittie could not help that her heart beat faster when he looked at her. It was most disturbing, but she could acknowledge her physical attraction to him even as she recognized his unpleasant characteristics. Perhaps his disdain would have a salutary affect on her. If it didn’t, then she was very foolish indeed.

  “You have not answered.”

  “What? Oh, I’m sorry. Uh, what was the question?”

  Lady Eliza smiled and nodded. “Never mind. I find your silence almost as interesting as an answer would be. However, tell me now about your friends.” She turned her head and raised her cup. “Oliver, more chocolate. And tell cook she finally has it right. The chocolate is finally of the right consistency and taste.”

  “Well,” Kittie said, swallowing another bite. “There is Lady Rebecca DeVere Severn. Her first husband was a dashing French comte who fell in love with her at first sight; she was only fifteen. Her family could not say no to such a good match, though Rebecca, from what she tells me, was very frightened to go back to France with him; it was a horrifying time in her life. He was lost in the revolution. She was a widow for the first time at sixteen.”

  “Sixteen! How sad to be widowed so young.”

  “Ah, but Rebecca was not one to be daunted. She was poor and had to live with a relative for a while, but she quickly decided that she needed a rich husband. Not only rich though. Frightened by her experiences, she also wanted one who lived a calm, safe life. And so she settled on an elderly brewer who already had four children who were older than she, and married him.”

  “Did she never have children?”

  “No. But she says her husband’s grown children were very good to her, and their children have entertained her well enough. She still maintains a good relationship with them, even after her husband’s death.”

  “I like your Lady Severn! She sounds like a very decisive character.”

  “She is.” Kittie held up her cup and Oliver refilled it. “I met her when I married my husband—she was already married to her brewer—and we were all very gay together in London that spring we met. Rebecca has great determination, and she had decided that she wanted to be Lady Severn. She was Comtesse DeVere, you know, and retained her title even after marriage, but to many of our countrymen a French title is worse than no title at all. So she went about pushing and prodding her husband—poor lamb; all he wanted to do was sit by the fire with a pipe, but she forced him into court attire, and he made an address to the king—until he was knighted, and she became Lady Rebecca Severn.”

  “And her husband?”

  “Oh, she allowed him to go back to his fire, then, once she had achieved her objective. He only died a couple of years ago. For all her social instincts, she was a very good wife to poor old Sir William. More nurse than wife for the last years.”

  “You said I should not like the other one so much . . . was the name Mrs. Billings?”

  “I shouldn’t have said it that way, my lady. I love Hannah dearly, but she suffers often from a depression of spirits. I just thought you—”

  “Might become impatient with such a person?”

  Kittie smiled. How perspicacious her employer was. “With your own troubles, I thought you might not sympathize with someone whose real trouble was a lack of any perceptible backbone.”

  Lady Eliza chuckled and put down her chocolate, finally. “You know me too well, Kittie, and it sounds as if you know your friend too well, too. But there must be something about her you value or you would not care so much for her.”

  Kittie toyed with her plate, delivered as she spoke to Lady Eliza and laden with eggs and ham. “I love Hannah dearly. When . . . when Roger died five years ago, Hannah took me in for a while. She couldn’t afford to. She has two sons, now twelve and thirteen—they are currently at school, of course—and her circumstances are straitened, to say the least, but she took me in. She had only been widowed a year herself and was still in mourning.”

  “I understand,” Lady Eliza said.

  Kittie felt that she did.

  A clatter sounded from the hall, and a woman’s laugh floated through to the breakfast room.

  “Rebecca!” Kittie cried, rising and racing to the front hall.

  Her friends had arrived.

  “Kittie, dearest child!” Lady Rebecca Severn, glowing brilliantly in a scarlet cloak that was, she assured her friend immediately, bang up to the mark, hugged Kittie fiercely as servants bustled in with trunks and bags.

  Enveloped in velvet too heavy for the mild autumn air that streamed in the open front door, Rebecca’s perfume wafting around them, Kittie’s heart swelled with joy at the familiar embrace. But she fought her way out of her older friend’s fierce hug and whirled, peering through the darkness.

  “Hannah!” she cried. “Don’t slink away, dearest, come to me!”

  Her friend, slight and pale, was leaning against the balustrade as if for support. Kittie moved toward her and Hannah fell on her neck, weeping.

  “Oh, Kittie, dearest, dearest Kittie! I thought I would never see you again! How I have missed you!”

  Tears satur
ated Kittie’s dress neck, and she looked over Hannah’s head to see Rebecca winking at her.

  “For the first miles of our journey she cried because we had delivered her boys back to their school. They had to go early for some reason or another, I have no idea what. It was a very affecting scene, I assure you, with Hannah weeping and the boys sighing and I tapping my foot. Then she rallied for a while, but she has been crying again for the last fifty miles. And that was just because she could not believe you were . . . what did she say? Mired in such desolate country?”

  Hannah gasped and straightened. “Rebecca, how could you tell her that?”

  “Because it is true, darling, though so ridiculous. Yorkshire is frightfully romantic . . . like the dark forest of Germany, I always think.”

  “How nonsensical you are, Rebecca,” Kittie said, hugging her again. “And how I have missed you. How I have missed you both.”

  “Ahem!”

  Kittie whirled to see her employer standing in the doorway from the breakfast room. “Oh! Lady Eliza, I wish to introduce—”

  “Why do we not move to the morning parlor, Kittie,” Lady Eliza interrupted, “while Prissy and Oliver take these ladies’ luggage up to their rooms?”

  Settling her nerves, Kittie guided them into the parlor as Lady Eliza moved, on her own, to her familiar seat by the window. Introductions affected, Kittie added, “I must thank you again, Lady Eliza, for allowing me to have company in this way. I know how unusual it is and I’m very grateful.”