The only man’s esteem she desired—had ever desired—stood but a few feet from her. A man far beyond her reach, she knew full well. A man she measured all others against, which was truly unfair, for it was impossible for anyone else to compete with the duke. In her mind, at least.
A man whose elevated station required Papa’s deference, but also a man of whom her father would never approve. The Duke of Sutcliffe was precisely the kind of man Papa disdained—one who lived for pleasure alone, or so her father claimed. Honestly, she didn’t think he admired anyone other than clergymen, and none other would do for his daughters.
The wind whistled between the tombstones, and the duke leaned down to retrieve his coat and hat. Dusk was fully upon them now, and the candlelight shining from the windows of the parsonage lent a welcoming glow to the graveyard.
Theadosia sent him a short, speaking glance before lowering her attention to her feet in what Papa would assume was diffident behavior, but was, in fact, the only hint she could give the Duke of Sutcliffe.
She couldn’t move lest the bottle be revealed.
If Papa discovered his grace had been imbibing hard spirits whilst on Church grounds, he’d have an apoplexy. It wouldn’t do for her father to ban the most powerful man in the county from All Saints Church. Nor would it do for Papa to offend the newly returned duke. And it most assuredly would not do for her to be caught hiding the bottle.
Papa’s wrath, though rare, was terrifying.
Sutcliffe draped his coat over his forearm and, holding his beaver hat between his forefinger and thumb, pondered his father’s grave.
“I beg your indulgence, though the hour grows late. I would appreciate a few more moments’ privacy.”
Papa pressed his lips together in sympathetic understanding and nodded.
“Yes, of course. Mr. Leadford, let’s enjoy a glass of port in the salon before supper, shall we? I do believe I smelled chicken fricassee and cherry pie earlier.” He waved the other clergyman before him and paused to glance over his shoulder. “I look forward to seeing you and your mother Sunday morning.”
“It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Mr. Leadford repeated as he bent to retrieve the discarded basket. He’d clearly discerned who it belonged to, and it appeared he intended to be the gallant.
Beaming his approval, Papa didn’t even ask why she’d abandoned the basket.
Praise the Almighty for small favors.
As soon as her father faced away, Mr. Leadford’s attention sank to her bosoms, then lower still, and her stomach clenched.
Now her nape hairs stood straight up and wiggled about, and she resisted the urge to retreat from his frank perusal.
Pray to God Mr. Leadford wasn’t Papa’s choice of a husband for her.
At twenty, Theadosia couldn’t hope to continue to claim she was too young to wed, and that Papa intended to select a man of his own ilk for his younger two daughters became more apparent every day.
It was her own fault she wanted more than spiritual companionship.
No, her friend, Nicolette, was partially to blame for sneaking Theadosia romance novels to read. They lay tucked beneath a floorboard under the bed she and Jessica shared. Nicolette had promised to lend her latest books when Theadosia saw her next.
God help her if Papa ever learned of them. He wasn’t a harsh or unreasonable man; he simply had a very strict moral code he vehemently enforced. More so since Althea had eloped.
Sutcliffe inclined his head before turning his attention to Theadosia and bidding her farewell with a nod and a penetrating look.
“Miss Brentwood.”
“Your Grace.” She curtsied but didn’t move.
Papa was too close.
Without a doubt, though evening was upon them, he’d see the bright green bottle.
“Theadosia, why are you standing there?” Giving her the gimlet eye, her father pressed his mouth into a stern line. “His grace requested privacy. Hurry inside. Your mother and sister need your assistance with supper. Come along now.”
Speaking low to Mr. Leadford, Papa angled in the direction of the Church, and the duke seized the opportunity to drop his hat—right at her feet.
“I beg your pardon.”
His mouth twitched with concealed amusement.
She neatly stepped aside as he squatted and retrieved the hat whilst tucking the bottle beneath the folds of his coat with his other hand.
“Oh, well done, you,” she whispered, quite enjoying their colluding.
“Thank you for saving me much embarrassment.” His confidential tone heated her to her toes. “And for telling me about my father’s illness.”
“Theadosia Josephine Clarice!” More than impatience tinged Papa’s voice. “Stop dawdling.”
Had he discerned her interest in the duke?
“I’m coming, Papa.”
“Mr. Brentwood?”
His grace stared past her head.
Papa turned, one grizzled brow cocked in inquiry.
“Yes?”
“I can see that my father’s grave has been well tended, and I thank you.”
Theadosia had taken on the duty, though she’d be hard put to give an excuse as to why. She’d convinced herself it was for the Duchess of Sutcliffe’s sake. Still grieving, the woman visited her husband’s grave for an hour every Sunday after services. When the weather permitted, she took lunch there too, her servants setting a table as fine as if she were dining at Windsor Castle with the king.
Poor lady.
Papa’s keen gaze slid to Theadosia again, but he merely dipped his head and didn’t reveal her secret. Curious that. It was of no matter if the duke learned of it.
“I’d deem it an honor if you and your family, and Mr. Leadford, of course,”—that last seemed an afterthought on the duke’s part—“would join us for dinner at Ridgewood Friday next.”
Fingers crossed, she held her breath. She’d have time to finish her new gown by then. A couple of months ago, Papa had permitted Mama, Jessica, and Theadosia each four new gowns, as well as a new bonnet, gloves, and slippers. They’d never been afforded such luxuries before, and now that his grace had returned, she was even more grateful she’d not have to attend supper in one of her remade garments.
An intimate dinner with the Sutcliffes.
Oh, the marvel of it.
Her dearest friends, Nicolette Twistleton, twins Ophelia and Gabriella Breckensole, and their widowed cousin Everleigh Chatterton would demand all the details about the dinner when she and Jessica next met them for tea.
Please let Papa say yes. He must. He must.
She made her way to her father’s side, but her dratted feet refused to budge an inch farther before she heard his reply.
“It would be our pleasure, Your Grace. I shall inform Marianne.”
Papa’s attention gravitated to the grand marble marker again.
Victor—that was, Sutcliffe—had found his father that awful night. He’d cut his body loose, and carried his sire into the house. Such was his anguish, afterward, he’d hacked the willow down and burned every last branch, even setting fire to the stump.
In the days following the duke’s suicide, that topic had been on everyone’s tongue except the Brentwoods’.
“If I may be of assistance in any way, do let me know. I am always available to counsel parishioners.” Papa’s offer was genuine. He truly cared for his flock and those that were suffering.
“There is one thing, if I may?” A wry smile bent the duke’s mouth up on one side as he placed his hat atop his dark head. “I should very much appreciate you performing my wedding ceremony in August.”
Theadosia flushed hot. Then cold. Then hot again.
Moisture flooded her eyes, blurring the grass she stared at.
He’s betrothed.
That was why he’d returned. Of course he’d want to get married here. Why hadn’t she considered such a thing? His homecoming wasn’t because he’d missed Colchester at all. He’d probably
leave straightaway after he exchanged vows too.
Swallowing gut-wrenching disappointment, she forced her feet to move. Stupid to have entertained fanciful hope all these years: a child’s ridiculous fantasy. Daughters of rectors couldn’t—shouldn’t—yearn for passion and adventure. That was the drivel of romance novels. No, they married men of equal station. Staid, religious fellows with nice eyes and kind faces.
But not men who leered at bosoms.
“Indeed. Congratulations.” Sincere excitement lit her father’s voice. Except for Christmastide services, he adored nothing more than performing wedding ceremonies. “Do we know your future duchess?”
Did they?
Please God, not one of my friends.
No, the girls would’ve mentioned something as monumental, and there’d not been as much as a whisper about the Duke of Sutcliffe’s upcoming nuptials.
An outsider then.
Likely some elegant, blue-blooded debutant with unblemished alabaster skin, petite feet, and a dowry so immense a team of dray horses couldn’t pull the treasure.
Theadosia’s dowry wouldn’t fill a teapot. Or a teacup, for that matter.
She couldn’t resist a last glance over her shoulder, and her gaze collided with Sutcliffe’s.
“Perhaps.” Another smile, this one humorless, hitched his grace’s mouth up a notch. He seemed to speak directly at her.
“I confess, I don’t know who she’ll be yet.”
The next afternoon, after suffering through a wretched head-pounding, stomach-churning morning thanks to his over-indulgence, Victor made his way to the sunroom.
The same gilded-framed portraits and paintings lined the walls, the same Aubusson rugs adorned the floors, and the same valuable trinkets and knickknacks topped the rosewood tables as he strode the wide corridor to the west wing.
Everything remained as it had been when he left, and yet nothing would ever be the same. He’d seen the very worst in himself as he tried to bury his grief and anger. Drinking, womanizing, and gaming—engaging in all the vices his sire had abstained from and denounced.
Rubbing his left brow with two finger pads, he closed his eyes for a moment. A niggling ache had settled there. Past experience had taught him the pain would remain with him for several hours. How many more hangovers must he endure before he forswore drunkenness?
How heartily disappointed Father would be. Mother too.
With justification, for until yesterday, Victor had intended to find the dowdiest, most biddable mousey miss to take to wife. And when he returned to London to resume his philandering lifestyle, he’d leave her at Ridgewood to keep Mama company. That plan hadn’t altered, but knowing Father had taken his life instead of letting cancer steal it from him had made a difference in how he felt about his sire.
Not enough of a difference to make him want to stay at Ridgewood, though the knowledge stripped him of the excuse to carouse to excess anymore.
Partially.
Now a new fear taunted him. Grandfather had also died of cancer, as had an uncle. Was Victor the disease’s next victim? Did that horror lurk in his future?
A smirk of self-reproach tipped his lips as he knocked softly on the doorframe of the sunroom’s open door.
“Do you have a moment, Mother?”
Pulling her spectacles from her nose and laying aside the volume she’d been reading, she smiled a warm greeting and patted the settee.
“Victor, darling. Of course I do. What is it you need, dearest?”
Two years past her fifth decade, with only a few silvery strands amongst her ebony hair, his mother was a lovely woman. He’d inherited her hair and mouth, but it was his father’s eyes that peered back at him in the mirror each morning.
His stomach tumbled.
Would he ever get the image of those bulging sightless orbs out of his mind?
He kissed her upturned cheek, the lightly powdered flesh soft and unlined. Nudging her raggedy cat, Primrose, out of the way, he settled onto the ruby brocade cushion beside his mother. Now his dark maroon jacket would be covered with orange and white cat hair.
Primrose cracked open her one citrine eye and yawned, baring her needle-sharp fangs before lazily stretching and hopping onto the floor. In the most immodest display, she proceeded to groom herself.
Why ever had he thought to have the mangy beast delivered to Mother when he’d found it lying injured beside a barrel on London’s wharf?
Because he knew his mother was lonely.
Her blue eyes brimming with happiness, she patted his cheek as she had when he was a small lad.
“I’m glad you’re home, Victor.”
She’d never complained about his neglect, which served to increase his guilt all the more.
Naturally, he’d written at least weekly and sent gifts too. His two sisters had visited regularly, their husbands and offspring in tow. Mother told him as much in her letters. But other than the dozen staff members who kept Ridgewood Court operating without a hitch, and her spoiled beyond redemption one-eyed cat, no one else resided in the house.
Thrice he’d directed the coach to be readied for the journey from London to Colchester. In the end, the grotesque image of his father’s dangling body slowly spiraling ’round and ’round sent him in search of strong drink instead.
Damn him for a selfish arse; if it weren’t for the stipulation in his father’s will that he marry by his seven-and-twentieth birthday, or everything unentailed, including Ridgewood Court, transferred to his cousin, Victor mightn’t have returned even now.
He’d never know why Father added that addendum only a few months before he died. At the reading of the will, Mother had been equally startled about the extra provision.
But she loved Ridgewood Court. It was here she’d come as a giddy new bride and here she’d given birth to her three children. And it was here that her husband, the man she’d adored for eight-and-twenty years, had taken his own life.
Did Mother know Father had cancer?
She would suffer no more loss or pain if Victor could prevent it. For certain she would not lose her home, which meant he had just over a month to locate a suitable bride. He’d chosen to return to Colchester, to his boyhood home, hoping there or somewhere in Essex, he could find a woman content to remain at Ridgewood while he resumed his life in London.
Small likelihood of that if he wanted an heir. But did he after all, given the cancer that ran in the family line? Even less possibility he’d be anywhere near as happy as his parents had been, for theirs had been a love match.
In fact, if he stood any chance of meeting his father’s deadline, he would have to enlist Mother’s help. He shouldn’t have waited this long to come back to Ridgewood, but every time he considered returning home, the vision of his father’s lifeless body stopped him.
Even now the image tormented him.
The corpse had been warm when Victor found him.
If only he’d been a few moments sooner he might have saved his father’s life. But he hadn’t known about the cancer either. Would watching his father die a slow, agonizingly painful death truly have been better?
Mother clasped Victor’s hand and gave his fingers a tiny squeeze.
“Victor? What is it? You look troubled, and it’s only your first day home.”
“Mother, there’s something about Father’s death you might not know.”
Her blank expression revealed what he suspected. She hadn’t known either.
“He didn’t just—” He paused and covered her hand with his. “Father had stomach cancer.”
She gasped, pressing a palm to her throat as tears welled. Struggling for control, she withdrew a lacy scrap from her sleeve and dabbed at her eyes. At last, she collected herself and raised grief-ravaged eyes to his.
“I suspected he was ill, but when I questioned him, he said it was nothing to fret about. When and how did you find out?”
“Yesterday, at All Saint’s Church. Theadosia Brentwood told me. She overheard her fathe
r some time ago and feared speaking of it. I’m glad she did. It was the not knowing why that ate away at me.”
“Trust me, darling, I well understand that.” She gave a tremulous, fragile smile. Sniffing, she touched the handkerchief to the corner of her eye again. “Cancer.” She nodded, lips pressed tight. “Yes, he wouldn’t have wanted to die that way, the way his uncle did. It was awful.”
Hanging himself was so much better?
Victor shook off his morbid mental musings and forced a cheerful smile.
“I hope it’s not an imposition, but while visiting Father’s grave yesterday, I invited the Brentwoods and the new curate to dine with us next Friday.”
Best not tell Mama he’d been a maudlin drunk when Thea came upon him.
Thea.
He’d nearly been struck dumb upon seeing her. Her soft brown eyes, the color of lightly burnt sugar—as sweet and warm too—had lit up in delight when she recognized him. An answering joy had peeled inside his soul as well.
By God, she’d grown into a beauty.
Even soused as he had been, he noticed the glow of her ivory skin, her finely arched brows, that pert pink rosebud mouth, and those jaunty reddish-blonde curls framing her oval face.
No timid mouse there.
She most definitely did not fit into his well thought out scheme of marrying and abandoning his bride.
Now where had that thought come from? It was ridiculous, surely.
“We’ve plenty of time to prepare. It’s not an imposition at all. In fact, with your permission, I’d like to have a house party in a couple of weeks or so.” Mama’s eyes glittered, and she clapped her hands twice in excitement. “Oh, let’s do have a ball too, Victor. That is if you’re agreeable. It’s been a long while since music and gaiety filled Ridgewood. Your sisters could come stay as well.”
How could he deny her?
Relaxing against the back of the settee while hooking his ankle across his knee, he nodded.
“Yes, I think that’s a grand idea. Do invite the Brentwoods, won’t you?”
“All right darling, but I doubt they’ll attend.”
He stopped toying with the tapestry pillow. “Why?”
“I don’t think you’re aware, but the eldest Brentwood girl eloped a couple of years ago. With a traveling musician or acrobat or some such unpromising person.” She waved her hand casually. “It caused quite a stir. You should be aware the reverend won’t speak of her at all, nor will he permit others to. His daughters are rarely permitted social functions that aren’t church related. He may not allow them to attend the house party or ball.”
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