Of Dukes and Deceptions

by Wendy Soliman

  “And you’re the Duke of Dorchester, I collect.”

  Without waiting for a response she executed a surprisingly graceful curtsey, given that she was still clutching the rabbit. It ought to have looked ridiculous but somehow conveyed the impression of being just the opposite. She chuckled, presumably in response to his quizzical expression.

  “Don’t look so crestfallen, Your Grace. I’m Alicia Woodley, the poor relation. It’s my cousin Maria you’ve come to look over, and I can assure you she’s every bit as beautiful as the reputation which precedes her.”

  “Really!” Nick quirked a brow imperiously. “You have the advantage of me, Miss Woodley. I was under the impression I’d come to the district to observe the workings of your uncle’s stud farm.”

  She chuckled again, apparently unaffected by his display of aristocratic superiority. As she did so, Nick noticed that her lips were a perfect cupid’s bow. The tip of her tongue protruded and she moistened them unselfconsciously. He didn’t think the gesture was contrived—this girl was no flirt—and couldn’t recall the last time any female had behaved so artlessly in his presence. He regarded her with a modicum of interest.

  “Did you indeed.” Her smile was invested with a wealth of amusement. “Still, it doesn’t signify, about Maria, I mean. Unless I mistake the matter, you’re no stranger to ambitiously determined females anxious to make a favourable impression.”

  “You might well be right, but at present my path is being hindered by a different sort of female altogether. To wit, one cob intent upon the choicest pasture, mindless of the danger she causes to legitimate road-users in her determination to reach it.”

  “Oh, gracious!” Miss Woodley’s hand flew to her mouth. “Matilda must be up to her old tricks again. I apologise if she endangered your progress, Your Grace. However well I tether her, she seems to have mastered the knack of freeing herself if she desires something out of her reach. It’s a very trying habit but, you see, she was so badly treated by the farmer who previously owned her that I can’t bring myself to chastise her for her lack of manners.”

  “I quite see your difficulty.” Instead of embarking upon the lecture he’d been preparing, Nick found himself smiling. “Under the circumstance, perhaps we should be thankful that Matilda consents to be harnessed to your conveyance at all.”

  “Oh, she’s perfectly happy to make herself useful.” A capricious smile illuminated Miss Woodley’s face. “Although she doesn’t care to be hurried and prefers to attend to matters at her own pace.”

  “Then given her independent streak, might it not have been wiser to choose a wider stretch of road upon which to abandon her?”

  “I don’t see why that should concern you.” She lifted her shoulders, as though bored with the entire conversation.

  “It concerns me because it would have greatly reduced the likelihood of causing an accident.”

  “Perhaps, but I can’t be held to account for the location where poachers set their traps. Besides, this back road is so seldom used that I didn’t think she’d be in anyone’s way. I’d quite forgotten you were expected today, you see. But even if I’d remembered, I wouldn’t have anticipated your approaching from this direction.” She wrinkled her brow. “Don’t dukes automatically take the front entrance?”

  “So you hold me responsible for your own neglect.” Nick, who until that point had been enjoying the exchange, felt his anger returning. “In which case, perhaps I should beg your pardon for interrupting Matilda’s lunch.”

  “Oh, don’t concern yourself about that.” Miss Woodley waved his words aside. She didn’t seem in the least put out by his caustic tone. A tone which had been known to reduce grown men to quivering wrecks. “Matilda has a very forgiving nature.”

  For once Nick had no answer to make and concentrated instead upon quelling his surprise at her latest revelation. She’d forgotten that he was engaged to call at Ravenswing Manor. His arrival at any location was usually keenly anticipated, and he couldn’t recall when it had last been overlooked by anyone.

  “I hope no harm came to your equipage,” Miss Woodley said, almost as an afterthought.

  “None, I thank you. And my man and I escaped injury also.”

  She looked at him with an impatient expression. “Well, obviously, I can see that.”

  A dog came hurtling out of the undergrowth, barking at Nick and simultaneously wagging its truncated tail. Nick had seldom seen a more pathetic specimen. Another of her lost causes, presumably. The creature possessed a shaggy brown coat, was missing half an ear and had a twisted hind paw which caused him to limp. But he seemed healthy enough, if one overlooked his injuries and lack of breeding, and was now intent upon jumping up at Nick.

  “Jasper,” Miss Woodley chided with no real conviction in her voice. “Don’t make His Grace all muddy.”

  “It’s a little late for that.” Nick glanced down at his boots as he tickled the dog’s head behind his good ear. “Another rescuee?”

  “Yes. The way some people treat their animals is too barbaric for words.”

  “Then they’re fortunate to have you as their champion.”

  “I do what I can but it’s precious little.”

  He extended a hand and helped her climb from the riverbank onto firmer ground. They walked side by side toward the road.

  “Are we far from your uncle’s estate?”

  “It’s less than two miles yonder. The road to the front drive lies in that direction,” she added with significant emphasis, waving her hand to a left-hand fork in the road ahead.

  They stopped beside the recalcitrant Matilda. The cob offered her mistress one of her incurious glances and snatched a final mouthful of grass before being guided back to the road by Will. It was a feat which Gibson, with years’ worth of experience as head groom at Dorchester Park, hadn’t been able to accomplish.

  Nick again offered his hand to Miss Woodley, this time to assist her onto the gig’s seat. “Then I look forward to seeing you again in a short time. And I trust you’ll have made the patient comfortable in the meantime.”

  “Oh, she’ll do very well.” Miss Woodley looked down at the twitching nose protruding from the shawl. “I’ve cured much more serious injuries than hers with my herbal remedies.” She nodded toward Nick’s team. Gibson was leading them up and down the lane to keep them warm. “They’re magnificent,” she said, looking them over with an obviously professional eye.

  Passing the rabbit carefully to Will, she picked up the reins and clicked her tongue at Matilda, who plodded forward at a painfully slow pace. As he watched her go, Nick realised she still hadn’t bothered to thank him. He chuckled, imagining her embarrassment when she recalled her lack of manners later.

  “Good day, Your Grace.” She called the words over her shoulder, almost as an afterthought.

  “What was that all about?” Gibson asked.

  “What indeed.”

  Nick reclaimed his place on the box seat without making a more complete response since he’d yet to work out the answer for himself. He waited patiently for Miss Woodley and Matilda to get clear before setting his team to a steady trot on the road to Ravenswing Manor. Only then did he briefly explain the remarkable scene on the riverbank.

  Gibson guffawed. “The nerve of the chit! Still, it makes a change from all that grovelling you have to put up with. It’s about time someone other than me treated you like a real person.”

  “You forget yourself, Gibson, and I’ll probably have to dismiss you tomorrow as a consequence.”

  Gibson, who was engaged in rubbing his stubbly chin, appeared unmoved by this dire threat to his livelihood. “Still, she’s a lively little piece, right enough. The poor relation, you say? Hmm.”

  “Leave her alone.” Nick spoke more sharply than he’d intended. “She’s mine. Besides, you’re old enough to be her father.” He paused, flashing a brief grin at his henchman. “No, on second thoughts, make that her grandfather.”

  “There’s no occasion for pu
lling rank, nor for issuing insults neither. You ain’t so big and grand that I can’t still tan that backside of yours, if I’ve a mind to. Anyway, what’s wrong with sharing? We’ve done it often enough in the past.”

  Nick shook his head emphatically. “Not this time.”

  Gibson cast a thoughtful glance in his direction. “Have a care, guv’nor. You said yerself she’s related to the family. If you get caught, they’ll have yer ring on her finger before you can pull yer breeches back up. It ain’t worth it just ’cos she’s got spirit and you’re bored. Besides, unless I read her all wrong, she ain’t the type to be impressed by a bit of finery.”

  “Really.” Nick quirked a brow. “Care to have a wager on that?”

  “Sure, our usual terms?”

  Nick’s attention was on his team as he negotiated a turn in the road that was barely wide enough to accommodate his carriage. He merely nodded once, already relishing the prospect of breaching Alicia Woodley’s defences.

  “Don’t let yer guard down,” Gibson said in a serious tone he seldom employed. “It seems Miss Woodley’s cousin has her sights set on you. I told you all along that this had to be a setup.”

  “You did indeed.” Nick grinned. “Don’t you ever get tired of being right, Gibson?”

  “Nah.” He waved the suggestion aside with a careless flap of one hand. “I got used to that years past.”

  “Anyway, you’re the one who encouraged me to leave Dorchester Park. Go somewhere, anywhere, were the words you used, if memory serves.”

  “Aye, well, if I hadn’t, then you’d have finished up offering for that Lady Isabel.” Gibson shook his head. “I couldn’t let you do that.”

  Nick was genuinely surprised. “I don’t see why not.”

  “So you were considering it then.” Gibson pulled a doomed face. “I knew it!”

  “You must own that she’s both beautiful and impeccably bred.”

  “Bloody hell, you make her sound like a horse.”

  “Bloodlines are just as important in selecting a wife as in breeding thoroughbreds.”

  Gibson’s jaw gaped open. “But her conversation bores you rigid.”

  Nick sighed. “I don’t mean to marry her for her conversation, Gibson. My own parents managed perfectly well without having any interests in common, or any particular feelings for one another either, for that matter.”

  “Aye, I noticed.”

  “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Oh, nothing.”

  “They understood that quality of breeding is more important for the future of the duchy than anything else. I’ve had that mantra drummed into me since I was in short coats and am hardly likely to forget my responsibilities.”

  “Bugger me, it sounds as though I got you away from Lady Isabel in the nick of time.” Gibson scratched his thigh and then dug his fingers into his shaggy thatch of silver hair. “But if you’d made yer mind up, why did you agree to leave?”

  “Because her connections were putting too much pressure on me. I won’t be bamboozled into declaring.”

  “Ah, my, ain’t love grand!”

  “Gibson!”

  “Well, just ’cos you needed to get away, I still don’t get why you accepted an invitation from an upstart wot you’ve never met in your life before. You could have gone up to town until Lady Isabel leaves Dorset.”

  “At this time of year no one worth knowing will be in town, so this will do very nicely until it’s safe to return home. Anyway, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to get a look at their Hanoverian stallion. Shalimar’s reputation is legendary.”

  Gibson’s massive shoulders jerked upward. “True enough.”

  “If it gets too much, Lord Dawson’s only an hour away. I can always decamp there.”

  “This Woodley character, wot do you suppose he meant when he said in his letter that he had a proposition to put to you?”

  “I have no idea, Gibson, but I dare say we’ll find out soon enough.”

  “Aye, well, just don’t forget wot I said about Maria Woodley.”

  “You’ve no cause for concern, Gibson. I’m only here for the horses.”

  “So you say, but it sounds like you’ve already got yer mind set on another sort of filly.”

  “Alicia Woodley?” Nick smiled and grimaced simultaneously. “If you could have seen the way she looked at that wretched rabbit, you’d understand why. She didn’t even know I was still there. I want her to look at me like that, just once, preferably when she’s spread-eagled beneath me on a feather mattress. Won’t leave this place until she does.”

  Gibson pulled another doomed face but refrained from comment.

  “Find out who she is, Gibson. Use that legendary charm of yours in the servants’ hall and let me know what they have to say about her.”

  Chapter Two

  Alicia drove the gig back to Ravenswing Manor in a highly agitated state. All she’d heard about the duke’s reputation was obviously true. He was high-handed, arrogant and dictatorial. The way he’d offered to wring the poor rabbit’s neck so condescendingly made her blood boil. His want of compassion was quite scandalous and she’d taken him in extreme dislike. The fact that most people she encountered shared his outlook didn’t absolve him from blame. He occupied an elevated position in society and ought to set a better example. She abhorred the thought of such a person lording it over them for the next few days, and she vowed to avoid his society whenever possible.

  She reached the sanctity of her barn and was able to give her full attention to the injured rabbit. She soon became absorbed but, for reasons that escaped her, was unable to completely banish thoughts of their visitor from her head. However hard she tried, images of his handsome profile kept slipping beneath her guard. When she recalled the insolent manner in which his eyes had scrutinised her person, doubtless finding fault with all he saw, her resentment increased.

  And as to the shockingly familiar way in which his eyes had lingered on her features…well, she ought to be outraged. But instead she felt warm all over. It wasn’t an unpleasant sensation, but it vexed her because she didn’t want to feel anything for the duke, other than antipathy. Maria had been in transports of expectation since he’d surprised them by accepting her uncle’s invitation, and one Miss Woodley making a show of her family was quite enough.

  “Put her in that spare pen over there, Will.” Alicia dragged her mind back to the matter in hand. “I’ll make up a herbal poultice for that leg and we’ll have her as good as new in no time.”

  “Very good, miss.”

  Alicia lost herself in the work she loved best. She dealt with the poor rabbit and checked on the progress of the rest of her patients. She administered medicines, offered soothing words and issued Will instructions for each one’s continued care. Satisfied all was as it should be, she adjourned to the barn next door where her permanent residents—the ones that had been too severely injured to be able to fend for themselves in the wild—lived together in unlikely harmony.

  “You’re full of yourself today.” She stroked a lame sheep’s woolly head as it joined Jasper and jostled for the position closest to her.

  The door opened and Janet, her maid, bustled in.

  “Ah, there you are, pet.”

  “Where else would I be?”

  “Where indeed!” Janet rolled her eyes. “But you’ve lost all track of time, as usual. You ought to have come in half an hour since to get changed.”

  “Should I?” Surprised, Alicia raised a brow. “What hour is it?”

  “It wants but ten minutes to five o’clock.”

  “Then there’s plenty of time yet.”

  “Don’t forget that your uncle’s distinguished visitor arrived this afternoon so I’ve been charged with ensuring your punctuality.”

  “I can’t think why. It’s not me the duke’s come to see.”

  “Perhaps not, but your uncle wants the whole family to make a good impression. His cause won’t be aided if you’re late for dinner
and the whole meal is held up.”

  “I won’t be late, Janet. Lay out my cream muslin and I’ll be there directly.”

  “No cream muslin.” Janet placed her hands on her ample hips, her expression resolute. “It’s a special occasion. You’ll wear your emerald silk and I intend to dress your hair properly, so you’d best come inside straight away.”

  Alicia knew there was no arguing with her maid when she was in such an intransigent mood. “Oh, very well!”

  She capitulated with good grace, wiped her hands on a cloth and put away her medicines in a cupboard beyond the reach of even her most inquisitive patient. She took one last look round the barn, absently stroking the three-legged cat perched on a bale of straw industriously washing its face. Satisfied everything was in order, she wished her charges a cheery good-night and followed her maid into the yard.

  “There,” Janet said, “that wasn’t so difficult, was it now?”

  “I don’t understand all the fuss. It’s Maria who wishes to make an impression upon His Grace, not I.”

  “Maybe so, but I’ll not have you show me up.”

  “I wasn’t aware that my appearance was as bad as all that.” Alicia looked down at her mud-splattered gown and grinned.

  Janet followed the direction of her gaze and shook a finger at her mistress. “Saints preserve us, what’ve you been up to this time?”

  “Stop fussing so! His Grace won’t even notice I’m there, not with Maria and Elsbeth doing the pretty. Besides, I’ve already offended him so he won’t wish to have anything to do with me.”

  “You’ve already met him.” Janet stopped dead in her tracks and bestowed a suspicious scowl upon her. “Why didn’t you say so before?”

  Alicia explained. “He wanted to wring the poor rabbit’s neck. Can you imagine such callousness?”

  “And I suppose you gave him a piece of your mind.”

  Alicia grinned. “Actually, I told him he was an idiot.”

  Janet groaned. “Good grief, I wouldn’t be in your shoes if your uncle learns of your discourtesy.”

  “How will he find out?”

  “Oh, there are ways.”