“Men so seldom do,” Rebecca retorted. “Show me a man who doesn’t need a woman to point out to him the error of his ways, and I will show you a man who prefers other men.”
“Rebecca!” Hannah gasped.
Kittie laughed. “Hannah, she just said that to shock you.”
“I did not, I only said the truth. Hannah has just lived far too sheltered a life. Mr. Billings did not let her out of the house enough. Maybe her next husband will be more sociable and she can meet more interesting people.”
Biting her lip to keep from laughing, for Hannah truly did look mortified, Kittie rose as her friends slid off the bed. She hugged each in turn, relishing their presence and drawing strength from the powerful bond she felt with each. She was grateful for their support.
“Tomorrow,” she said, “I’m going to make sure Lord Orkenay knows that I will never, under any circumstance, become his mistress.”
Sleep was not going to come easily that night, she knew, but the morrow would see her make some changes in her own behavior.
• • •
Alban restlessly prowled the house early, standing up in the gallery and staring at his forbidding ancestors, wondering if any of them had ever felt as confused as he did. His own emotions and compulsions puzzled him. Why was he so fixated on Kittie Douglas, when he could have any woman he wanted as mistress or wife? He had been raised with the knowledge that his position as Duke of Alban meant that all of the distaff half of society was laid out for him like jewels on velvet, for his delectation. On one side were the sparkling, brilliant but cheap paste; those he could choose from to be his mistress. On the other side was the glittering array of society’s diamonds, there for his selection as wife.
What happened when he wanted none of them, and instead of any jewel preferred a rose growing wild in the bramble hedge? His illustrious ancestor gazed down at him, his bony, beaky nose raised in disdain at his great-great-grandson’s common tastes.
Down in the great hall, a cavernous space decorated with game heads, he heard voices and, looking over the gallery railing, saw his butler give Lord Orkenay a folded note. The earl read it. From the foreshortened view above, Alban could not see his expression, but he heard the soft yes and noted the earl’s sly demeanor. The man glanced around and then carefully placed the note, unfolded, in the silver salver on the ornate Jacobean table in the front hall. It was so calculated a move, begging for the letter to be perused. What did it mean?
When Orkenay left the hall for the breakfast room, Alban, unable to contain his curiosity, was about to descend to read the note when Sir John slipped into the hall, went directly to the note, picked it up and read it. He tapped the note against his palm and put it back in the salver. Hesitating a moment, he picked it up again, began to fold it up, but then put it back in place.
How very odd, Alban thought, watching the drama unfold. When the young baronet left the hall the duke descended, approached the note with trepidation, and picked it up. There was the faint trace of rose scent to it. Damn.
My lord Orkenay,
I have something of great import to discuss with you, and it cannot wait another moment. Would you please meet me in the rose garden of Bodenthorpe Cottage this morning?
Respectfully,
Kittie Douglas
The page dropped from Alban’s hand. What more proof of a clandestine relationship did he need but a secret note?
Though the note didn’t really sound lover-like. He picked it up, read it again, and dropped it back in the salver. What he would not give to see that meeting, just to judge for himself what their behavior was to one another. The problem was he could too easily imagine what they would need to meet for. The gentlemen were leaving soon. If she was to go with Orkenay, arrangements would need to be made, plans confirmed. She might need reassurance, or information.
He could not eavesdrop, though. How humiliating was it to even consider that?
And yet there were Sir John’s puzzling actions to consider, too. He had oft wondered about the young man’s motives for coming north with the three older men. He had never particularly been a friend of any one of them. Bart had expressed his opinion that the young man was just looking to curry favor with so powerful a political figure as the duke, but Alban had his doubts.
Undecided, he followed the two other men into the breakfast room. An hour later, when Lord Orkenay yawned and made some weak excuse to go for a walk—alone, he made sure to indicate—Alban was determined not to follow. It was beneath his dignity. It was beneath him in every way imaginable. And yet when Sir John, more convincing but still transparent to Alban, decided a solitary walk was just the thing for himself, too, it was too much for a man’s curiosity.
It was farcical, he chastised himself, watching from a window as Sir John, with one quick look to the left and to the right, skulked down the same path Lord Orkenay had just traversed moments before. And yet irresistible. It was a mystery now, not just what was going on between Orkenay and Kittie Douglas, but why Sir John was interested.
Damn. He wanted to know what was going on in his own house. He should just ask, but he would be faced with evasion, no doubt. Or he could catch them all in the act and confront them. That sounded better. A confrontation just about suited him now. He vaulted out of his chair and stomped to the front door, startling his butler and a maid, conversing in low tones. They watched wide-eyed as he exited, and no doubt his actions would be the talk of belowstairs. Not that it mattered in the slightest.
He hurried down the path through the woods, trying to overcome the feeling of being caught up in the farce before the opera. Ten minutes later, near the clearing, he slowed his pace, wondering where Sir John was stationed in his spying. There was the fellow; he had moved through the brush to a spot closer to the garden wall, and there, in the rose garden, was Orkenay and . . . Kittie. Alban felt his mouth go dry and a spot under his ribs hurt.
His pulse hammered, his throat constricted . . . he was acting and feeling like he was fifteen again and enamored of the village maiden to whom he had lost his virginity. And like that first love, it was merely physical, he assured himself. She was beautiful, she was lush, he wanted to make love to her; it was as simple as that. They were talking. Orkenay reached out and grabbed her hand. She didn’t shake it off. Damn. She was speaking with some earnestness and he was nodding. He reached up and pushed a stray curl behind her ear and Alban felt his blood go hot and pound in his ears. He had known Orkenay for years, but never had he seen the man so circumspect with a lady love. There was a tenderness in his gestures that surprised Alban.
Was Orkenay further along the garden path to love than he even knew? That Kittie Douglas was capable of inspiring love was no surprise to him. There was about her an aura of strength and yet sweetness, innocence and yet sensuality, that left a man breathless and aching. Alban sighed and heard a rustling. He looked to his left and Sir John was staring back at him. When their eyes met, the baronet shrugged and melted back into the woods. He would have to have a talk with that young man.
When he looked back at the garden, his heart dropped into his boots. Orkenay opened his arms and Kittie Douglas walked into them and they embraced.
• • •
He had taken it better than she had expected. Kittie watched the earl walk away and reflected on their conversation. He told her that yes, he had still hoped to convince her to come away with him, and in fact was even more enamored of her now than he had been before, seeing her every day, talking to her, finding all her little ways irresistible.
Not irresistible enough for marriage, clearly, Kittie thought with some asperity. In truth, though, her mind would have told her to accept if his proposal had been of the honorable sort, but her heart would have forced her to say no. She turned back to the house, relieved that she had left no further room for doubt—though she didn’t think she had the first time—and that there could be no more misunderstanding. She need only enjoy the last week of her friends’ visit now and look forwa
rd to the long winter ahead.
That was a sobering prospect. She would need to order more wool from Judy Boxcroft and more books from the village library. But she wouldn’t think about that right now. The gentlemen were coming that afternoon for a walk on the fells, and then back for an evening of music and cards in Bodenthorpe Cottage.
And she would see his grace, the duke. It was a prospect both to flutter her nerves and give her reason to reflect on the frailty of the human heart.
Thirteen
“So you told him in no uncertain terms and he . . .” Rebecca trailed off as she looked past Kittie and smiled.
Kittie looked up. They were standing in the garden awaiting their escorts, and the gentlemen were just arriving.
Sir John, his curly hair tousled by the breeze, went straight to Rebecca and whispered something to her. She chuckled and gave him a soft slap on the cheek. Mr. Norton, of course, headed straight to Hannah and took her arm, holding her close to him, secure.
Orkenay and Alban both headed toward Kittie and stood before her. How awkward.
“Mrs. Douglas,” the duke said, “since my aunt has declined to accompany us, choosing instead to stay inside with Beacon, it appears that the numbers are uneven and you will have two escorts from whom to choose.”
What could have been a humorous observation was said with such grim tones Kittie didn’t know how to respond.
“Nonsense, Alban,” Orkenay said, taking her left arm. “Who says that we cannot share her?”
Alban stiffened and Kittie frowned at the odd tone of the earl’s words. Again, an innocuous sentence but one that seemed loaded with meaning.
“I prefer not to share a lady’s . . . company with any other man,” the duke said and stalked off alone.
The walk proceeded, but though Kittie would normally have enjoyed the experience, she was left unsettled again. She had felt calmer after her words to the earl that morning, but now she wondered, alarmed by his behavior, if he still had not understood her adequately. Though he would have to be a complete dunderhead not to.
“How has the hunting been, Lord Orkenay?” Kittie said, desperate to introduce some safe topic of conversation.
“Rather good, though I’m not much of a hunter. Most of my pursuit is confined to the boudoirs of London.” He laughed at his own jest.
Alban glared at them and Kittie began to feel angry at him again, though she had sworn to herself to try to get along with him better for Lady Eliza’s sake. But really, his look had been impartially at them both, though the earl was the one making shabby jokes. She stayed silent.
“My dear, you must allow yourself to laugh once in a while,” Orkenay said.
“I will when I find anything humorous, I promise.”
“A shot! I am hit! You are a sure huntress, in truth, Mrs. Douglas.”
They walked together through the woods, up the fell, beyond Boden House. Kittie found an excuse to break away from the earl and stalked on alone. He lagged behind, not being as much of a walker as the rest of the company. Autumn was fast approaching, stealing on silent feet across the fells and through the moors, turning the green grass to gold and the trees to crimson. A fresh wind whipped up the slope and tugged at her skirts as she crested the rise and stood looking down over the valley beyond Boden property.
“You look as if you wish you were anywhere but here.”
Kittie turned and stared up at the duke. The breeze lifted his dark hair off his forehead and out of his eyes. “Everyone wishes from time to time that they could escape their life and their choices, don’t you think?”
He stared at her, his dark eyes riveted to hers. “Do you? Do you wish you could escape your choices?”
“No,” she said, afraid suddenly of his meaning. “I’m quite happy with all of my choices.”
“Really.”
He reached out and pushed one stray curl from her tidy bun back behind her ear. She shivered at the touch of his warm bare hand brushing along her neck. The caress felt intimate, tender, beckoning. It seemed to her that the earl had done much the same thing earlier that day and yet it had held no meaning. But this . . . she swallowed. It was just physical yearning for a man’s touch. Not just any man would do, clearly. It was increasingly odd how she could feel so antagonistic toward the duke and yet be so affected by his nearness. “But it doesn’t mean I wouldn’t make other choices if I had other opportunities,” she found herself saying.
His thick eyebrows went up. “Really? And what other opportunities would you like?”
She felt as though they were speaking at cross purposes. She was merely thinking out loud that perhaps she would like to marry again, if she ever found a man in her sphere who made her feel just a little of what she felt in the duke’s presence, but she certainly could not tell him that. She had forgotten how delicious was that melting sensation when one was near a man one found attractive. How sweet it would be to fall in love again.
She looked away from the duke. Like Hannah was falling in love, she thought, for that was so clearly what was happening. Mr. Norton and Hannah were on their own, looking over the rise at the valley below and speaking earnestly. The glances between them were warm, almost incendiary. Hannah rested her cheek on her beau’s arm and he moved to put his arm around her shoulders and pull her close.
Sighing, Kittie glanced back up to the duke to find that he was watching the couple too, and there was a strange look of yearning on his face, and yet so much doubt was expressed in his clouded gaze and set lips. Kittie marveled at the complexity of the man. It was perhaps a good thing he was so far out of her sphere, for if she released her emotions she would find herself wanting to soothe that worried frown and erase those stern lines that bracketed his hard mouth.
The earl, who had been climbing the rather steep hill behind them, crested the rise, puffing and huffing. He leaned over, hands on his knees. “All this for a bloody view? Pardon me, ladies, for my language, but I’m going back down to Boden for a drink.” He turned abruptly and headed back down the hill. Sir John and Rebecca, returning from a brief exploration of some rocky outcropping, both laughed.
Alban’s expression relaxed for the first time, and he chuckled. He held out his arm to Kittie. “May I escort you, Mrs. Douglas? I have a feeling your erstwhile swain will be galloping on the way down.”
“Thank you, your grace. Let us proceed back.”
• • •
They were all gathered at Boden that evening, Alban’s aunt well entertained by the witty Sir John and rascally Lady Severn as they sat together by the fire. Bart had apologized to Alban for being so oblivious to the requirements of company over the past weeks. With a rare jot of humor he said that now that he was completely in love and not just falling, he would endeavor to find more time to be a good guest. To that end he and Hannah were paired with Orkenay and Kittie, playing whist at a table by the window.
And Alban, alone, sat at his ease and stared at Kittie. She was gowned simply in pale green, but the cloth lovingly hugged her curves and the color accented her coil of ruddy curls that draped seductively down over one shoulder. She made him hunger for her, but he had yet to discover how she did it. That there was some seductive force at work he had no doubt, but what it was was still a mystery.
He wanted her, and not just for her delectable body, but to tame her, to master her, to consume her. He wanted, for once, her gaze to soften while they spoke; instead everything he said seemed to antagonize her and she fought him, defied him. It was a novel and not welcome feeling to be at conflict with a woman he wanted so badly. Their walk that day had left him even more confused, not only as to his own feelings but as to hers, too. Was she signaling to him that she would be willing to change from the earl to the duke if he asked her to be his mistress? It had almost seemed that way when she had spoken of perhaps making other choices if she had other opportunities. Was he that other choice?
Did he want to be that other choice?
His original reason for not pursuing her
had been that he would not take her away from his aunt, affecting her comfort so devastatingly. But surely that reasoning no longer held, for he had no further doubt as to whether she was going away with Orkenay at the end of his stay or not. That little scene in the garden that morning was the confirmation he needed. Should he bend his efforts at seduction? They would only be there a little less than a week. Once she had left with Orkenay, he would not feel right in taking her away from the man, but he didn’t think they had actually consummated their illicit relationship yet.
And Orkenay had flouted his host’s request that he stay away from Kittie Douglas. That breach of etiquette alone had earned the man no consideration. He would have to find a way to make up to his aunt for the heartache she would inevitably suffer when Kittie Douglas left her. That reminded him of what a tricky position he would be in when Lady Eliza found out that he had taken Kittie as a mistress. Would she be angry at him? Or would she understand, when he explained that one way or the other she would have been bereft of a companion?
Kittie had gotten up from the game and was bending over Lady Eliza, asking her something. That woman had her face turned up to her companion and their hands were clasped. There was such love shining on his aunt’s face that he was jolted from his contemplation. She adored her companion as more than just a valued employee; Kittie Douglas had become so much more.
She would never forgive him.
Sighing heavily, he knew in his heart that he just could not do that to her. He loved his aunt far too much and it would be the merest bit of sophistry to pass off his actions as anything other than immoral, given how she felt about her companion and how he claimed to feel about his aunt. Though the first breach of ethics would not be his, but would be Orkenay and Kittie’s, surely.
He didn’t think he’d be able to conquer this desire he had for Kittie Douglas without having her at least once, nor would he be able to reconcile such an action with the care and consideration for his aunt’s feelings that he claimed to himself and others was the basis of his actions. It was a dilemma with no easy resolution, but while he was figuring it out, he could at least talk to her some more and try to gauge her feelings. He stood and stretched, then ambled over to his aunt.
The Duke's Secret Seduction Page 15
