by Suzi Love
He boldly and uncharacteristically snatched up Carina’s hand and kissed the backs of her fingers, noting the tell-tale signs of shock. Ah, ha! Finally, he’d disconcerted her. With leisurely movements he faced the gentleman, who watched his display with unconcealed amusement.
Max assumed his haughtiest manner. “I’m the Duke of Stirkton. To whom am I speaking?”
Snatching back her hand, Carina jumped to her feet and placed herself in direct contact with his looming body. Max felt the jolt of it to his toes. Her unique aroma tickled his nose and, like a hunter scenting prey, his nostrils flared. Hearing a loud chuckle from the as yet unidentified man, he held himself as rigid as a pole and commanded his body and its reflexive yet animalistic reactions to subside.
Unlike him, Carina didn’t give a fig about controlling her emotions. She almost snarled when, with a flick of her hand, she indicated the gentleman who had risen and who now stood watching them with a look of bemusement and amusement. Max’s fingers twitched as he suppressed the urge to unleash his inner demon and plant his fist on the supercilious expression on the man’s too-handsome face. As if knowing exactly what Max wanted to do, the man smirked and Max’s annoyance rose a notch, as if the crank had been turned on a medieval torture rack.
Carina snorted her disgust. “Maximus Meacham, the Duke of Stirkton, may I present to you my good friend, Mister Jonathon Smythe. Jonathon, apart from being a longtime friend is also my factotum.”
Max forced himself to relax and move around the desk to shake his hand. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, Smythe.” He turned to Carina. “Where did you say you met?”
“I didn’t, and nor is it any of your business.”
Jonathon chuckled. “Ah, I sense tension in the air. Thankfully, I have the advantage in our little contest, Stirkton, as I already know where you two met.”
Max looked at Carina and frowned. “I see.” He didn’t understand at all, but he hated being the odd man out and wanted even more to wipe the complacent smile off Smythe’s face.
Carina interrupted. “Jonathon knows that we met in Stirkton when we were younger. And that you’re helping launch Georgie and Lucy into London society.”
“Ah, good.” Max nodded and smiled.
“Perhaps you first assumed that I knew something more, Your Grace. Some deeper, darker secret?” Jonathon questioned with a grin. “Because my paper knife wouldn’t dent the angry atmosphere between you. I’d need sharp swords.”
Carina stomped one foot on her thick carpet, which was unfortunately for her made no satisfactory noise and she was forced to growl. “Jonathon, stop tormenting him. I think we’ve concluded our business, for this morning anyway.”
Smythe nodded. “I’ll be working upstairs for the next two hours.” He eyed Max up and down. “Call out, Carina, if you have need of assistance.”
Max bristled. “Lady Dorchester is perfectly safe with me, Smythe. Can you say the same?”
Carina stepped between them and held up a hand. “Gentlemen, please, I’ll not allow such ridiculous squabbling in my house. You’re like a pair of unruly boys wrangling over who rolls the hoop first.” She waved her hand in a shooing motion to Jonathon. “Now go, go upstairs. I’ll ring if I need you.”
As Jonathon walked to the door, he shot Max a warning. As soon as he’d departed, Max said, “Upstairs? Smythe lives in your house?”
Carina groaned. “No. Jonathon does my bookkeeping here. I keep irregular hours and, as the Earl left me several properties, we often work long into the night together. When necessary, Jonathon stays the night and we begin again early in the morning.”
Max ran a finger around his neck, under his intricately folded neckcloth.
“And you don’t consider it a threat to your virtue to have a single man—I assume Smythe is unmarried.” Carina nodded. “An unmarried and unrelated male living in your house will surely cause gossip.”
Carina stared at him, wide-eyed, before throwing back her head and laughing so hard that groped for the arm of her chair and dropped into it. “Do you realize how bizarre that statement sounds? You, being concerned over my virtue? Do you mean the virtue that you yourself robbed me of many years ago?”
Max felt his neck and face heat. “I meant...” He ran his hands through his hair. “Damn it all, I’ve no idea what I mean. Yes, I do know. I’m stunned and horrified that you’d allow Smythe to remain overnight, tarnish the reputation of your household and further hamper your sisters’ chances of holding their heads high in society.”
Carina sighed. “Georgie’s life was destroyed and her name sullied years ago when she was sold into marriage by her guardian. I hoped that being seen in your company might erase some of that nastiness from people’s memories and allow her to create at a new life.”
“I’m confused. I understood that your sister was a widow.”
“I suppose it’s better you hear the story from me, rather than someone else’s version of the truth. Georgie’s husband died of consumption nine months ago, after which her husband’s family returned her to our stepbrother.”
“Returned her? She sounds like a trading commodity they purchased and returned because they were dissatisfied with the merchandise.”
“That’s exactly what happened. They purchased her to bear a child for their sickly son, the second son of a viscount. Unfortunately, he couldn’t give them their heir.”
“He was incapable of performing his marital duties?”
“Yes. He tried at first, but he wasn’t strong. Rather than apportion blame where it belonged, they condemned his wife. They forced Georgie to visit his sick bed, to try to encourage him...”
“To arouse him?”
“Yes. However, she failed.”
“So they returned her?”
“It was better that they sent her back, because I can now try to protect her.”
“What does she need protection from?”
“Not what, but whom. Her husband’s relatives were cruel, and if she’d continued living with them...well, who knows what would have happened? One cousin, also titled, had decided that as Georgie was available and living close by in his uncle’s house, he needn’t exert himself. Choosing a bride could wait because he had a pretty woman readily available whenever he was forced into seclusion in the country to escape debt collectors. It would be a simple task later to take over his cousin’s wife because, after all, he’d arranged Georgie’s first marriage to his cousin, for a share of her dowry of course, but also because Peter, our stepbrother, has some hold over him. I don’t know what yet.”
“Would it be so terrible if Georgiana was married to this cousin, especially if he’s to inherit a title one day?”
“You don’t understand. The family didn’t treat Georgie well.”
“You mean her husband mistreated her? Is that why she was afraid of me touching her in the carriage last night?”
“No, not her husband, because he wasn’t strong enough to be violent. Besides which, he mainly avoided his wife as he didn’t like women very much, if you grasp my meaning.”
Carina’s frankness shocked Max. He’d been involved in plenty of crude male conversations which discussed sex, including the illegal practices between men, but hearing a woman speak of them was disconcerting, despite his own upbringing. “I take your meaning, though it’s not something a woman would normally be familiar with.”
“Ah, but you forget, Your Grace, that I’m not the usual sort of young woman. You and your grandfather made certain of that.”
He flinched under the weight of the truths she spoke so casually. “I never forget, not for one moment.” He struggled to regain his composure. For some reason, her poisonous barbs struck home, each and every time. “So if Georgiana was mistreated, I assume you mean that she was reprimanded.”
“Reprimanded! Her eldest brother-in-law punished her every month that she failed to become enceinte. More than once, she suffered broken ribs. He damaged her hearing by boxing her ears, and twice he twiste
d her wrist so badly that until she fainted with pain.”
“Good Lord. And nobody stopped him?”
“Who? For much of that time, I was in Dorchester trying to survive myself.”
As Carina paced and revealed more of Georgie’s history, Max blamed himself more and more.
“And, as you explained when we first spoke, Max, men view women as interchangeable. A wife belongs to her husband and has no rights of her own. Isn’t that how English law works?”
He turned away. English law stole women’s rights and allowed men absolute power. Men could inflict pain, destroy lives, and with no interference or repercussions. Dukes were even less likely to be accused of assault than other peers. He didn’t agree with it, but if he spoke up in parliament and tried to change those laws, his peers would think him insane.
“I’m sorry,” he finally managed.
“What did you say, Max? Surely the great Duke of Stirkton isn’t apologizing to me, a mere woman. What are you sorry for? Robbing me of my innocence?”
“I don’t wish to discuss that chapter of our lives, because nothing can change what happened. Though I do regret that because of your husband, and me, and the other two men, you were unable to go to your sister when she needed you.”
Carina dropped her head and buried her face in her hands.
“Oh, no. Please don’t cry. It’s not too late. With my help, your sister will once again hold her head high in society. Assisting her is the very least I can do to try to make amends.”
She lifted her head. “I’m not crying. I never cry. Not anymore.”
“I’m pleased─”
There was a knock at the door and Carina called out her permission to enter. Her sisters hurried into the room. Lucy walked straight to Max and curtsied, a courtesy he returned with a bow. Georgie hovered closer to the door, as if she might still turn and run. Max stepped closer and bowed. “Ladies, a delight to see you this morning. I trust you enjoyed last evening’s entertainment.”
Lucy’s answered in a rush, “Oh, yes, Your Grace. And this afternoon, we shall drive in the park with Alice and several of the others from last night. Are you accompanying us?”
Max searched for a polite reply. He’d been betrothed for some months and only once had he been forced into accompanying the ladies to the park. Now he realized a refusal would reflect badly on him and, for some reason, he wasn’t comfortable with Carina always thinking the worst of him. In the past, he’d erred far too many times with women thanks to his grandfather’s strict doctrines, though in the last few years he’d worked tirelessly to make amends. He’d vowed to become a better person than his aloof and tyrannical grandfather.
He swallowed. “I’m unsure if Lady Johnston expects me to join her, but it will afford me great pleasure to accompany you.” He looked directly at Carina. “All of you.”
Georgie made an indistinct sound, leaving Max uncertain whether she was dismayed that he would be accompanying them, or pleased. Expressing emotions never came easily to him, but he gave them a small smile. “That is, if Lady Georgiana has no objections to riding in my carriage again.”
Georgie’s mouth tilted up into a soft smile, possibly the sweetest smile anyone had ever directed Max’s way. It gave him a nice, warm feeling.
“It will be wonderful to have a gentleman to protect us, Your Grace.”
When Carina and Lucy stared with gaping mouths, Max guessed that this was unusual for their sister, and a small rush of pleasure filled him that this small and scared woman had chosen him, of all men, to be her protector. He couldn’t recall any occasion when he’d undertaken the role of protector of women, apart from having a courtesan under his protection each scheduled month at Brent Street.
Those arrangements were temporary and monetary transactions, whereas he now enjoyed playing the gallant hero for a group of ladies, and if Carina noticed his smug smile and recognized it for satisfaction, he didn’t care. Hopefully, it might allow her to see him in a different light, a rescuer rather than a destroyer.
Having committed himself to driving in the park, Max seized this opportunity to ingratiate himself with Lady Alice Johnston, because if Carina forgot her promise and revealed their past, he’d need to be seen as committed to his marriage and eager for their wedding day. Alice was the wife arranged for him and he’d do everything in his power to ensure that their marriage proceeded without incident.
Until Carina had reappeared, he’d not felt a twinge of unease over the age difference between himself and Alice, or their future together. His only thoughts had been that Alice’s background and upbringing made her suitable to run his household and raise his children. Past that, he’d barely given her a thought.
His betrothed’s life had been seventeen years of preparation to become the wife of someone highly titled and wealthy—someone like him. Society and heritage required nothing more from them, and he’d grown up confident that his life would proceed as planned. Neither Carina nor her sisters would interfere with his plotted course. Wishing for something he could never have was what his plain speaking cousin would call, pissing in the wind.
Chapter Seven
Within moments of reaching the carriageway of the park, the ladies were mobbed. The ducal carriage’s emblem attracted attention, something Max regretted when he counted the number of gentlemen clustered around his coach waiting to speak to one or other of the three sisters. Even Gertie had her admirers amongst the older paraders who stopped to converse. Within moments of them pulling to a stop, Carina was asked to give permission for Lucy to stroll with a group of the younger ladies and gentlemen she’d conversed with at the previous evening’s soiree.
Lucy peered over the open side of the vehicle, talking non-stop with several young bucks. Seated beside Max, Georgie seemed more comfortable remaining under his protective wing than venturing out of the carriage and into the rowdy crowd. Again, that unaccustomed rush of protectiveness warmed him through and strengthened his determination to shield Georgie from further harm.
Georgie wasn’t his sister so he’d no legal right to interfere, yet he was going to visit his solicitor and discuss his options. If these ladies needed lawful protection from their stepbrother, he wanted to be in a position to provide assistance. Being prepared came naturally to him as he ran his business ventures and his households in an organized fashion and without any surprises. Know your opponent and his weaknesses, was his hard and fast rule.
“Lady Georgiana, feel free to remain in the coach. But if you prefer to take the air, I’ll be happy to stroll with you.” Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Carina’s stunned look as Georgie gave him another endearing and trusting smile.
“Thank you, Your Grace. I’d love to walk, if it isn’t too much trouble.”
Max assisted the ladies out of the coach and held out an arm to each. Georgie hung on to him with a tight grip, while Carina hesitated before slipping her arm through his. Yet walking with these two beautiful women gave him an inexplicable feeling of perfection. Having never lived within a close family or experienced the worries of a brother who cared for his sisters, he should be disconcerted but, instead, a weight had lifted from his shoulders and his body and soul were lighter than they had been in years. He almost laughed out loud at himself and his fanciful notions.
Two gentlemen Georgie knew from the previous evening approached and she allowed them to walk her in front, another satisfying accomplishment for his day. Lord Brendon Johnston greeted Carina with a happy smile that spoke of far too much intimacy.
“Lady Dorchester, how wonderful you look today.”
“Why, thank you, Brendon.”
“Your dress is a very becoming shade and it matches your eyes exactly.”
Max grunted. “I suppose you sprout poetry as well.”
Brendon refused to be insulted. “I do read poetry. At times, I even recite poetry to beautiful women.” He smiled at Carina with an even wider display of perfect teeth. “Do you enjoy poetry? Because I shall happily re
cite Byron to you all day long.”
Max snorted, despite never making such a crass noise in public before. “We don’t need poetry right now, thank you. Don’t you have somewhere else to be?”
“Ah, Stirkton, you cannot be trying to keep Carina all to yourself as you are engaged to my sister. What is your relationship with Lady Dorchester?”
Before Max uttered a scathing reply, Carina intervened. “His Grace is an old friend, though on occasion he oversteps the boundaries of our friendship. His intentions are honorable and he’s helping us become reacquainted with London.”
Brendon’s ingratiating smile turned Max’s stomach. “Any man would be delighted to assist so lovely a lady. My titles may not be so high as Stirkton’s, but our family is welcomed into the best of circles, and I’m more available than the Duke because I’m not occupied each day with estate matters.”
The younger man’s shrewd expression and this absurd verbal sparring annoyed Max. No time spent with the Countess would be calm and comfortable, of that he was certain. At the first whiff of her perfume or the tiniest glimpse of bare flesh, he became like the other greenhorns who clustered around the three beauties. Another bee swarming around the queen and longing to taste her honey. Max groaned. Images of a honey-pot and the various ways he’d like to sample hers produced reactions inappropriate for mixed company, especially when he was being watched like a hawk by his remarkably observant future brother-in-law.
To add to Max’s melancholy, Carina peered up at Johnston and fluttered her lashes like an experienced coquette. Her performance was most likely a trick to keep him off balance and make him appear foolish in the presence of a man destined to become his brother-in-law, but her efforts would be in vain. He’d practiced managing and manipulating people since he reached his teen years, and was devilishly adept at extracting himself from tricky situations.
