The Dukes of Vauxhall

by Vanessa Kelly, Christi Caldwell, Theresa Romain, Shana Galen

  As soon as Patience closed the door behind her, Ailesbury grinned. “New student?”

  Godrick would not rise to that baiting. “Of a sort.” Which wasn’t a complete mistruth. Through her connection to Sam Storm, she was in a way... oh, stuff it. She was nothing of the sort. He’d not concede that to anyone... not even his closest friend. With Ailesbury standing off to the side, a knowing grin on his face, Godrick hurried to retrieve his jacket. He shrugged into the garment and then reached for his discarded cravat.

  Of course, he could not count on the other man to allow the matter to rest. “Quite unconventional methods you’re instructing on now.”

  “Go to hell,” Godrick muttered, earning a rousing guffaw of laughter from his friend. He headed for his office, leaving the other man scrambling to catch up. Though he’d never revealed Patience’s identity or his connection to her, Ailesbury was well aware that there had been a young woman in his past. One whose heart Godrick had broken and for it, had lost the right to her love, arms, or any other part that made Patience Storm who she was.

  Inside the ring, however, his body hadn’t had any discretion for honor or what was right or wrong. He’d known only that he needed to take her in his arms again.

  I am a bastard... an utter bastard.

  He stomped into his office and immediately made for the well-stocked sideboard. “Not a bloody word,” he ordered, pouring himself a drink. Setting the bottle down hard, he carried his snifter over to his desk and sat.

  His friend helped himself to a drink and then, uninvited, claimed a seat across from Godrick. As Ailesbury sipped his brandy, he eyed him over the brim. With a sigh, he lowered the glass to the arm of his chair. “Surely you don’t believe I’d walk into your sacred club to find you kissing a young woman senseless and not speak of it.”

  “Yes, actually, that is what I did believe,” he mumbled, taking another long swallow.

  “Sam Storm’s sister.”

  He nodded curtly.

  Ailesbury swirled the contents of his drink and made a show of studying it. “As I am a wagering man, I’d venture that this young woman is, in fact, the one in your past.”

  Godrick didn’t pretend to misunderstand. At thirty years of age, he didn’t partake in games. He’d already lost too much of his life and happiness for dancing around truths. He gave a brusque nod.

  “Ahh. Your late mentor’s daughter. Of course.” The other man spoke in matter-of-fact tones. “She is the one who broke your heart, then.”

  Godrick could very well easily let the matter rest with Ailesbury believing that erroneous truth. All he’d known over the years was that he’d been hopelessly in love with a woman who’d turned him away. They’d said nothing more on it. After all, gentlemen didn’t talk of these things. Or they hadn’t... until now. Damned Ailesbury and his insistence. “I broke her heart first,” he said gruffly. Shame swamped him.

  Ailesbury shot his eyebrows to his hairline. “Indeed?” He shifted forward in his seat.

  Unable to meet his friend’s eyes, Godrick proceeded to tell him the whole miserable story. Everything from the childhood betrothal he’d been entered into, to Patience and how they’d begun as friends of sorts, and then more... while he’d waited, searching for the right time to tell her about a betrothal he’d needed to disentangle himself from. A legal contract that would have resulted in lawsuits and scandal and disgrace.

  When he finished, Ailesbury’s earlier levity was replaced by a somber mask.

  “You were young.”

  “Youth doesn’t pardon dishonor.”

  “No.” His friend offered a small smile. “But it does, however, explain it.” Finishing off his drink, Ailesbury set his glass on the edge of Godrick’s desk. “Society imposes their expectations on the peerage”—he motioned between them—“to make advantageous matches. To never sully our hands in trade or”—he jerked his head back toward the door leading out into the club—“fighting. You shouldn’t have been betrothed as a child.” He shuddered. “Egad, my father was a bastard, devoted to the title above all else, and even he wasn’t so archaic.”

  Godrick stared into the contents of his drink. “The truth remains. I was betrothed to the lady—”

  “And she broke it off,” his friend pointed out. After all, it had been a scandal that had rocked Polite Society and was not something he’d discussed with anyone—including Ailesbury.

  It had been Edwin Storm who’d shared the truth about Godrick’s relationship with his betrothed. He flexed his jaw. Edwin had always resented Godrick for his relationship with Tom Storm, and in the end, he’d seen him suffer, as he should. “She never intended to marry me,” he shared, and surprise lit the other man’s eyes. “The day she severed the arrangement, she informed me that she’d never have lowered herself to a duke’s second son, let alone a fourth-born one.” The great irony of her rejection was still not lost on him all these years later. He chuckled. “She’d merely sought me out to thank me for providing her a reason to publicly break it off.”

  Giving his head a shake, Godrick downed his drink and then set it aside. There was so much he would have done differently. All of it. All of it, that was, with the exception of knowing Patience and spending that time with her family.

  “You care for the woman still? Storm’s sister, that is,” his friend clarified.

  Nay. I love her. Godrick nodded.

  The other man stretched his legs out and looped them at the ankles. “Well, there is no betrothal or husband or really anything keeping you apart.”

  “It is complicated,” he evaded, dusting a hand over his jaw. For even if there could be forgiveness, it had still been shattered the day he’d cost Edwin his vision.

  “Only if you allow it to be.” Ailesbury pushed back his chair and stood. “Only if you allow it.” His friend fished around inside his jacket and pulled out a thick sheet of vellum stamped with a black seal. He held it out.

  Puzzling his brow, Godrick looked at the official note and then took the page.

  “The reason for my visit,” Ailesbury explained. “Prinny is hosting a grand ball following the fight between Storm and King. I expect you’ll be attending.”

  Distaste soured his mouth. God, how he despised ton events and functions. “I shall see.” No, he would not be going. That evening marked Sam Storm’s fight... and the last time Godrick would again have reason to be with Patience. He rubbed the damned incessant ache in his chest.

  His friend inclined his head. “Of course. You were never one for balls and soirees.” Ailesbury started for the door, and he stared after him.

  That was what had brought him here? Since he’d inherited the earldom with his older brother’s passing, Ailesbury had delighted in avoiding all talk of ton gossip or news. Now, he’d paid him an express visit with talk of Prinny’s ball.

  The other man opened the door and then paused. “Oh, I should mention Prinny has issued an invite for both King and Storm, as well as their families.”

  Godrick’s heart started. Patience.

  His friend chuckled and touched an imagined brim. “I see I have your attention now. Good day.”

  And as Ailesbury took his leave, Godrick sat contemplating the other man’s optimistic musings. Could he and Patience start anew? No doubt she deserved better than a man who’d lied to her and destroyed her brother. But God help him, he wanted her anyway.

  “It is complicated.”

  “Only if you allow it to be.”

  He froze. Mayhap Ailesbury was right, after all. Mayhap he and Patience could begin again.

  But first, he had to tell her all. Godrick dropped his head into his hands.

  Chapter Seven

  * * *

  Later that evening, Patience sat beside the lone window in their rented rooms. She layered her arms on the sill and rested her cheek upon them.

  There were but seven days until the fight. The one Sam was slated to lose, and the one their family desperately needed him to win. For their security. Fo
r their pride. Everything depended upon it.

  So why did she sit here, with the summer sun disappearing over the shops across the way, thinking not of Sam’s match against King—but of Godrick?

  Because he’s all I’ve thought of for the better part of three weeks. But for the brief distraction provided during Sam’s lessons, he was always there. She touched her fingertips to her mouth. Her lips still burned with the memory of his kiss. He kissed me.

  Her heart skittered a beat, for there had been nothing gentle in that exchange. Rather, it had been two people divided by time who’d come together with an aching desire as potent as it had always been. What madness had possessed her to return his kiss? What madness, when it only weakened her further?

  “Because I was always hopeless where he was concerned,” she muttered under her breath. If she were a proper lady, she would have been horrified at being discovered in his arms by a stranger. Her mother might have been a seamstress and her father a fighter, but they’d raised her to be respectable.

  Until Godrick, that was. She’d not only given him her heart those long-ago days, but her body as well. And damn her for wanting to give him those gifts all over again.

  It was not, however, solely that embrace that occupied her thoughts. She closed her eyes.

  He had allowed her to step foot in the ring. Something not even her father had permitted. Oh, he’d allowed her to watch, had even taken pride in her knowledge of the sport. But never had she felt the thrill of the matches she’d observed, because he’d always relegated her to an observer, never a participant.

  Until this afternoon. Until Godrick.

  In the weeks they’d spent together counseling Sam, the bond they’d always shared, a natural, easy one, had stirred to life, reminding her of how it had once been.

  Only, with the passage of time, he was no longer the cocksure young man, but a grown man in full possession of himself. A man who asked for her opinion and allowed her an equal say in Sam’s training.

  And soon he would be gone. In just six days, the terms of their agreement would come to an end and—

  Her throat worked.

  “Is he ready?”

  Patience thought of Godrick’s assurances. “As ready as he’ll ever be for King,” she settled for.

  Removing her cloak, Ruth set the garment on the hook behind the door. “That isn’t an answer.”

  She closed her mouth. It was the only one she’d give. When she returned from work, it was Ruth’s custom to seek out their shared chamber and read. Instead, she drifted over. “We could always ask Godrick for help. I don’t doubt he would.”

  Help. As in a handout like they were beggars in the street. Patience cringed. “We’re not asking him for money,” she said, her tone coming sharper than she’d intended. Their father had been a rotted businessman. How many fighters had he taken on and trained and not seen a pence for? Powerful nobles. Wealthy merchants. He’d been so enamored of the prestige that came with it, he’d ultimately let his family suffer in his passing. She sighed. “He offered funds.” A fortune. Godrick had offered a fortune three weeks earlier. She’d kept that detail from her sister.

  The floorboards groaned, indicating her sister had moved. “He offered funds.” Ruth gripped her by the shoulder, forcing her around. “And you did not take them?” There was an accusation there.

  “We’re not beggars.”

  “But we will be,” Ruth said without missing a beat.

  “He is training Sam.”

  “Who will not see another fight when he loses,” Ruth said bluntly.

  Damn her sister for being right.

  “Do you know what I believe?” Her youngest sibling didn’t give her a chance to reply. “You’ve been so hurt these years that you’re not putting common sense first. We need help. Take. It.”

  “I can’t,” she cried, tossing her hands up. “He was betrothed to another,” she finally gave her sister. “He was here on a lie and led me to believe he’d marry me.”

  Ruth rocked back on her heels. “Godrick?”

  “Yes, Godrick,” she said tiredly. “His betrothed came to me. I found out from her.” She remembered the shame of that long-ago day. His delicate, blonde, future bride eyeing their then-luxuriant-to-the-Storms town house with palpable disdain.

  “But they didn’t marry.”

  At her sister’s pronouncement, Patience blinked.

  “He loved you. I do not doubt it. I was a child, but I remember you two, because I wanted to someday know that.”

  A man bound by a childhood betrothal to a woman he hadn’t known. That truth had shattered her. But his failure to ever come ’round after had served as testament enough to his feelings. Or so she’d believed.

  Yet, he’d helped her and Sam anyway. Had offered her funds. The cold, ruthless duke’s son she’d taken him for ten years earlier would have never given a jot about the fighter’s daughter he’d left behind.

  Gentle fingertips settled on Patience’s arm, and she looked at her sister’s hand resting there. “And you’ve smiled more these weeks than you have since he left us,” Ruth said softly. “Even with your worries about Sam’s fight, I see the... lightness you once had, the woman you once were, and I’d not throw that away because Godrick made a mistake long ago.”

  Throat clogged with emotion, she tried to get words forth. And failed.

  Ruth gave a slight squeeze and then, without another word, left, the faint click of the door indicating she’d found their room.

  Her sister gone, Patience returned her attention outside and swiftly leaped sideways. Oh, God. Surely her eyes were playing tricks. Or mayhap she’d conjured him from all her musings since that afternoon. Heart racing, she crept to the edge of the window and peered down.

  Godrick stood below. In his black jacket and fitted black breeches, he had the look of sin and seduction, and she was reminded all over again why she’d forgotten everything her mother had told her years ago about guarding her virtue and holding on to respectability.

  And bloody hell, he was here. Why was he here?

  Surely not to... visit her? Gentlemen paid visits to ladies. They took tea and pastries in parlors and receiving rooms. Or mayhap he’d come to discuss next week’s fight. Patience hurriedly glanced about. She took in the small wooden table and the four mismatched chairs surrounding it. The aged sofa and shellback chair they’d brought with them, when all other furnishings and trappings had been sold off. There were no parlors or drawing rooms here.

  Humiliation spread through every corner of her being. It was one thing for him to know she lived a life of work and had never belonged to his station. It was an altogether different matter to invite him inside so he might see how they’d lived for the past years.

  Patience stole another furtive glance.

  Gone.

  Some of the tension went out of her. Not that she cared if he saw precisely her circumstances. She didn’t. It was a humble and oftentimes desperate existence, but they’d survived. Liar. You care. You don’t want him to—

  A knock sounded on the door, and she whipped about, her gaze drawn to that wood panel. Oh, God. Mayhap he’d go away. Mayhap—

  Another rap filled the small quarters. She jumped. He was decidedly not going away. Patience briefly sized the distance between abject embarrassment and the cobbles below. For all her earlier resolve for a show of bravery, there was nothing—knock—more humbling than revealing how low one had fallen from the ranks of a once-comfortable lifestyle. Why is he here?

  Knock.

  Ruth stepped out of their room. She opened her mouth—

  “Shh,” Patience whispered, shooting across the room and staying her. She touched a silencing finger to her lips. He’d go away.

  Her sister gave her a peculiar look.

  Rap, rap, rap.

  “It is Lord Godrick,” she mouthed.

  Ruth brightened. “Why didn’t you say as much?”

  Flying the rest of the way, Patience shot a hand out. “No
,” she rasped.

  Her traitorous sister drew the door open. “Godrick,” she cried with the same girlish cheer she’d had when he’d come ’round years earlier. Only, she was no longer a girl. She was a young woman with callused fingers who worked long days that stretched well into the evening. In this moment, however, with her dimpled smile that met her sparkling eyes, she bore more hint of the child she’d once been. And a selfish, ugly part of Patience’s soul wished she’d retained such youthful cheer.

  “Miss Storm,” he greeted, sketching a bow. His gaze snagged on their surroundings, and he faltered for a beat.

  Patience prayed for the floor to open up and swallow her and their revealingly frayed belongings whole.

  Then, it was as though she may have imagined that unfathomable glint in his jade eyes, because all hint of emotion was gone as quickly as it had come.

  “Have you come to see Patience?” her sister ventured.

  Oh, a traitor indeed.

  “Yes.” He dropped a bow better suited for a ballroom. “Though it is an honor to greet both Storm ladies.”

  Cheeks blooming with color, her sister giggled.

  Frowning, Patience studied their exchange as he collected her sister’s fingers and placed a kiss on them. Ruth’s blush deepened. And in this moment, she bore no hint of the child she’d been, but rather she was a young woman easily charmed and enchanted by the affable Lord Godrick Gunnery. While the two spoke with an old familiarity of long ago, something dark and unpleasant settled low in Patience’s belly. Something that felt, tasted, and burned like... jealousy.

  “What do you want?” the question burst from her lips.

  The amicably chatting pair fell instantly silent.

  She curled her toes hard. Ruth took mercy. She dipped a flawless curtsy. “I’ll leave you to speak with my sister.” Casting a quick sideways glance that saw far too much, she returned to the room she shared with Patience.