A Duchess a Day

by Charis Michaels

  Or that was what Helena hoped she would say.

  Gran had been a proponent of darkened stables, ridiculous nightgowns, and men of dubious, groom-spy distinctions.

  Helena felt another swipe of Shaw’s mouth, and stopped thinking. Sensation shimmered over her like a net, and she knew only sound and feeling and breath.

  How could she think when she was working so very hard to keep up with his mouth? His lips were there one moment, gone the next, there again. Oh, but the last kiss did not retreat; it was prolonged softness, then less soft, then not soft at all, but thrilling. His mouth canted slightly and they fit perfectly together, two halves of a whole; then he canted left and they fit again. It was soft and slick and fast and very, very slow. Desire filled her body like steamy water filling a copper tub: fogged brain, flushed chest, her insides a swirl of liquid heat.

  While she melted, strength poured from him like a river over a wheel, and Helena spun and spun. Large hands roved her back. Her instinct was to fall back to be held, but she also wanted to climb him. He allowed for it all, holding her upright with muscled arms and thighs that felt like marble.

  With concerted effort, she remembered to breathe. There was so much to feel. She explored the smooth, roped muscles of his back, sliding searching hands along his sides. When she reached his shoulders, she hooked her arms on both sides and pulled up, straining closer to his mouth.

  When she finally turned her head to suck in air, Shaw dropped his mouth to her exposed neck, kissing a hot trail from beneath her ear to the fluffy collar of her robe.

  “This isn’t happening,” he said against her chin.

  “You have a distorted view of reality,” she gasped. “I assure you, it is happening.”

  “You’re afraid,” he said, reclaiming her mouth. “I’m scaring you away.”

  “What?” she asked, barely hearing.

  “So afraid,” he moaned.

  “Wai—” she breathed, but he captured her mouth again. Helena melted into the renewed kiss. His tongue was there now, a fascinating addition to the enterprise. She hung on and tried very hard to remember what he’d just said. Softly, in the back of her mind, his words called.

  You’re afraid.

  Had he said this? She couldn’t remember. She dropped her head against his neck and allowed him to trace hungry kisses behind her ear. He gathered her up, scooping hands beneath her bottom and pressing her to him. Helena had the errant thought that they absolutely, positively, must do all of this again, and very soon.

  Meanwhile, the more he kissed her, the louder his last mumbled statement echoed in her head.

  “Wait,” she panted, breathing out the word at last.

  Shaw’s mouth froze a heartbeat from hers. He made a slight choking noise. He pulled back. His expression went from hot and half-lidded to stricken and terrified.

  Without thinking, she pressed a hand over his mouth exactly as he had done.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” she repeated. She sounded like a stage director halting a bad scene.

  Slowly, the strings of her mind began to strum like a functioning instrument. She swallowed hard. “Did you just say that I’m frightened?”

  “Ah—” he stammered, his lips moving beneath her palm. He looked as if she’d doused him with cold water.

  “Right,” she continued. “That’s what I thought you said. First of all, shame on you. You cannot imagine how I’ve been bullied and threatened these last five years. And now you endeavor to scare me? Thank God you’re so very bad at it. There is nothing about you that scares me. I hope this does not distress or unman you, but it’s true.” She took a deep breath. She flung her braid over her shoulder.

  Shaw made another distressed sound beneath her palm, and she released him. He staggered two steps back, his brown eyes huge. He wiped his face with the back of his hand. “My lady—” he rasped.

  She held up a hand. “Was that it? You kissed me to frighten me away?”

  “I don’t—” he began.

  She continued, “If you wish to frighten me, then embody the figure of an incurious duke, sleep half the day, and stagger about at night in a drunken stupor. Have no concerns beyond your appearance and no interest beyond the next bacchanal. Then have a puppeteer uncle force us to marry. Now that would scare me.”

  Shaw walked in an agitated circle and then returned to her. He pointed a finger at her. “You are too honest, in case you are not aware.” She stared at the tip of his finger until her eyes went a little cross, and he dropped it. She chuckled.

  “It is not necessary,” he continued, “to share your every experience with me. I am reeling, in fact, from your great wealth of heartfelt revelations.”

  “You’re angry?” she asked. “Angry? Because you failed to frighten me with a kiss? Stop.”

  She shoved from the table. “I suppose I may stop worrying you think I was trying to seduce you.”

  He made another choking sound. “I beg your pardon?”

  She began winding her way through the carriages. “I’d asked you for the favor,” she reminded. “But I would never cajole you by . . . by doing what we’ve just done.”

  “I do not feel cajoled,” he bit out.

  A lone window glowed moonlight on the far wall, and she went to it. “I would never try to manipulate you through . . . er, seduction.” It could not be said enough.

  “Rest easy, sweetheart, I cannot be seduced.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. He did not look unseducible. His hair was tussled, his tunic was askew, his expression was strained. He looked like a bear staggering out of hibernation.

  “Good,” she said. There was a door beside the window, and she hurried to it.

  “I know that you know that I wasn’t plying you with my, er, charms.”

  “You’re beautiful, my lady,” he sighed, “but not that beautiful.”

  Helena paused with her hand an inch from the doorknob. She turned back to him. “I beg your pardon?”

  “Nothing.” A growl.

  “That was unnecessarily rude.”

  “That was the point,” he mumbled. “I am rude. I am terrible. I am not to be trifled with. I am . . .”

  He muttered to himself and spun away, mussing his disheveled hair again. He snatched a coil of rope from a carriage and tossed it on a bench. He clamped his hands behind his head and turned away.

  “You should go,” he said, spinning back. “How did you leave the house?”

  She glared and reached again for the door. “Good night, Mr. Shaw.”

  The cold moonlight hit her like a slap, and she sucked in a little breath. She looked right and left, checking the alley, and then picked her way along the side of the stable.

  He followed. “It’s risky for me to escort you, but I can follow from a distance. Tell me your plan.”

  “Go to the devil.”

  “My lady . . .”

  She sighed. “There is a side door that leads to the cellar.”

  “Of course,” he breathed. “Did you leave it unlocked?”

  “Of course,” she mimicked.

  They reached the low wall that lined the Lusk garden and she said, “I’m expecting your help tomorrow. Pray, do not disappoint me.”

  Before he could answer, she scuttled over the wall. She heard him swear softly into the night.

  “Take care inside the dark house,” he called in a whisper. “Go immediately to bed. This never happened.”

  Helena ignored him. She crept through the moonlit garden and around the side of the terrace. Her mind was full. Her chest felt uneven; corners and crevices were rearranging themselves inside her heart. The cellar steps descended behind a stone ledge, and she hit them at a run, not looking back. She felt Declan Shaw’s gaze on her until the heavy cellar door closed out the night.

  What she did not know, what even Declan Shaw did not know, was that they were not alone. He was not the only one who watched her. A third person lurked in the garden that night, unseen to Helena or Declan or the squi
rrels burrowing in the ivy. A cloaked figure, shoulders down, face obscured, quietly took in the impetuous heiress and the surly groom-spy and their fraught, silent, longing-filled good-bye.

  Chapter Six

  Declan waited all night to be sacked.

  When morning dawned with no summons, he waited to be hauled to jail.

  What in God’s name have I done? The question beat in time to his breath, his footsteps, his heartbeat.

  He’d left the stable in a haze, worried about Helena’s progress and cagey with unsated desire. After the worry and the desire, regret slowly dawned—like misty cliffs seen from the deck of a boat. By the time the haze burned away, he was colliding with rock.

  What. Have. I. Done?

  He’d put his hands on a client. As violations went, it was previously unthinkable. He’d never once dallied with the provocative daughters of out-of-town merchants, nor the bored, aggressive wives of negligent dignitaries. Oh no, he’d waited until he was guarding the daughter of a bloody earl, and his job was to marry her off. And then he’d—

  What have I done?

  Gone and gotten yourself sacked, that’s what.

  Putting his hands on a client was a violation of trust and safety and the opposite of his objective on this job.

  When morning dawned with no termination, Declan embarked on the new day like a man who’d taken a dram of poison. At any moment, the deadly effects would hit.

  But then breakfast came and went, morning chores—no accusations. Girdleston called for three carriages to muster in front of the house, with feathers and silks for the horses, dress livery for the grooms.

  When they convened in Park Lane and the doors to Lusk House swung wide, family members spilled onto the stoop completely oblivious to him. He was indiscriminate groom Declan Shaw.

  No one knew.

  It felt like he’d somehow slipped from the hangman’s noose. Actually, it felt like the noose held, but the gallows had splintered and he’d scrambled away. Now he ran through the streets with a rope around his neck.

  But then Lady Helena emerged, stepping into the bright autumn sun, raising a gloved hand to shade her eyes, and all the rumination and regret drained away. Her family milled on the steps fussing over a dog, and she wound her way to the street like a bright petal dropped into a moving stream. Declan held his breath, watching her. His eyes burned and the broken-off thing in his chest sank lower, digging into his side. He reached for his metaphorical noose and tugged.

  She’d worn indigo, a dark purple meant to be regal and majestic, something befitting a duchess, but it put Declan in mind of a mythical creature. A fairy, perhaps. Or a good witch. It was the color of the innermost petal of a wild iris. Her hair was loosely swept up and her posture was upright but languid. She did not appear violated or traumatized; she appeared . . . serene. She waited pleasantly in the street, allowing her family to precede her.

  Declan forced himself not to look. He busied himself loading the women into a carriage, supporting elbows and holding parasols. He restrained the wolfhounds. Loading women into a carriage was like shoving flapping birds into a small box.

  Suddenly there she was. She turned and raised her pale-green gaze to his. Their eyes locked.

  If he thought she would ignore him or scowl, he was wrong. If he thought he would see outrage or fear, he was also wrong.

  Lady Helena fastened him with a look so familiar, so knowing and expectant, Declan glanced around to see if anyone else had seen.

  But then the moment passed, and she affected a sort of exaggerated whirl of ruffled pelisse, and slinging reticule, and bobbing hat feather. When she was on the step, she managed to press a leather satchel into Declan’s hands.

  He shot her a questioning look. She cocked one eyebrow, another expression of emphasized familiarity. If no one noticed the first time, certainly they would now. He was given little choice but to stow the satchel on his shoulder and hand her up into the carriage.

  A fellow groom offered to unburden him of the satchel, but Declan grunted some excuse. He slipped behind the carriage, heart in his throat, and opened the brass buckles.

  It would contain a letter, he thought, condemning him for assault. It would be a warrant for his arrest. It would be some equestrian item from the stable that had tangled in her nightdress or stuck to her boot.

  Instead, he found five pieces of parchment, an inkpot, and a quill. And a note.

  Shaw,

  Here are the items we discussed for taking inventory of the gifts. The weather has held, so the party will commence outside in Lady Canning’s garden. When we arrive, please report to the gift table and stand ready.

  Many thanks,

  Lady Helena Lark

  Chapter Seven

  An hour later, Helena wound her way through Lady Canning’s crowded garden, repeating the names of three potential duchesses in her head.

  Miss Tasmin Lansing . . .

  Lady Moira Ashington . . .

  Miss Lisbette Twining . . .

  She waved to her mother’s maliciously chatty friend now drifting to a footman with a tray. The woman looked almost sated in the aftermath of whispering these incredibly specific and useful details. Of course she’d gushed a host of extraneous bits, but Helena had worked to remember only what she could use. She repeated the notes in her head as she checked the gift table. Shaw lurked, a golden-liveried pillar of disgust, towering above Lady Canning’s rhododendrons and a lichen-covered statue of a satyr.

  She’d set the odds of his cooperation at less than half. And by cooperation, she meant making the list and then also relinquishing it to her when it was finished. She knew well the tactic of playing along until the crucial moment and then refusing to follow through. It was precisely her current plan with Lusk.

  But first things first: Shaw had turned up. He alternately frowned and stared, his expression conveying barely concealed resentment. But he had come.

  It was wrong, she knew, to feel an all-over sort of tingled rush at the sight of him. The sensations surely showed crimson or perhaps iridescent (was this possible?) on her face. She would later describe the feeling as “eruptive”—for all the good it would do her.

  What would Gran say about the fizzing, sparking regard for a man who seemed only capable, at least at the moment, of glowering?

  Miss Tasmin Lansing, Helena repeated, trying not to forget. Lady Moira Ashington, Miss Lisbette Twining . . .

  She wondered if Shaw felt iridescent or tingling. He did not look like someone who remembered their time in the stable fondly . . . nor did he look like someone who experienced eruptive thinking.

  But he’d come. She’d asked him for help, and he’d come.

  Bracing herself for any myriad reactions, Helena repeated the names in her head and strode to the gift table.

  “Chin up, Shaw,” she said, careful to maintain an expression of businesslike aplomb. “I’ve a trove of information for you.”

  He stared at her as if she’d arrived in a damp toga. Slowly, he began to shake his head.

  She chose to ignore this and eyed the many packages and parcels on the gift table. She affected an expression of Oh, I cannot wait to open these, and gingerly fingered a floppy bow.

  “Pretend I am instructing you about the gifts,” she said, “but take down, if you please: Miss Tasmin Lansing, daughter of the Baron Whitney. When in London, they are in Bruton’s Place, but she rides in Hyde Park on Wednesdays. She is determined to land a husband who outpaces the earl that her sister married. Brown hair, rather tall.”

  She sucked in a deep breath, ready for the next set of details, but he’d not moved. She whispered harshly, “Write it down. Miss Tasmin Lans—”

  Shaw swore under his breath and snatched up the quill and paper. Without looking up, he began to scribble. She was swamped with relief.

  She cleared her throat, searching her memory for the next piece. “Lady Moira Ashington, who is the daughter of Viscount Groveton. Apparently, she devotes much of her time to tr
aveling back and forth from Bath to take the waters. But she’s in London at the moment, and she makes a habit of calling on a certain country herbalist in Wandsworth. Sometimes as often as three times a week.” Helena squeezed her eyes shut, trying to remember. “She is blonde and . . . and willowy. Rather thin. The family lives in Piccadilly. Despite her interest in, er, health treatments, she apparently covets wealth, prestige, and power as much as the next girl.” Helena took a deep breath, swallowing hard.

  “Just not you,” Shaw said, still scribbling.

  “Right,” she said absently, searching her memory. “Are you getting this? There is one more. Miss Lisbette Twining, who is the daughter of a wealthy merchant in . . . in textiles. They are in Cork Street. She is very beautiful, with brown hair and blue eyes. And apparently she has some history with Lusk. He may know her from his own circle of friends.”

  Shaw nodded and reinked his pen, writing it all down. Helena let out a relieved sigh, grateful she’d remembered the details long enough to repeat them. Even more relieved that Shaw was recording it. She’d been correct all along. Well, she’d been wildly reckless, foolhardy, and self-indulgent, but she had also been correct. That is, she would be correct, if he recorded the list and then relinquished it to her.

  She repeated the names and footnotes again, speaking to the gifts. She scooped up a festooned bundle and stared at the card, trying to appear wistful and bridely.

  “You cannot hover here,” Shaw said lowly, still writing. “If you mean to lurk in the shadows, you might as well take your own dictation.”

  She replaced the bundle and tried to peek at his notes. He shot her an expression of What are you doing?

  She frowned and turned back to the garden. “I need a reprieve after . . .” She gestured to the milling party. “Just two seconds. I hate these sorts of things.”

  “I’m a servant, not your reprieve,” he said.

  “You are not fifty women who think me ungrateful and disobedient and willful.”

  “These women have come here bearing enough gifts to provision Scotland in winter,” he said. “If that’s not approval, I don’t know what it is.”