“Oh, come now,” he said bracingly. “Surely you cannot hate her. Besides, you will help me pick her out. Now,” he brushed her cheek offhandedly, “what shall she be like?”
Her lower lip protruded as she digested the content of their discussion. And then she raised herself up a little loftily, just as he had taught her, and resolved not to show her heart. “Well, she will be a very great lady,” she said disinterestedly, “with airs and graces and all that is proper.”
“Good grief!” he cried. “Next you will tell me she will have a few megrims and need her vinaigrette at least once a day for some vapourish upset.”
“It is likely,” she said down her nose. “These fashionable women are not used to bearing the least little discomfort. You will be very busy, I am afraid, making sure her pet pug has his paws washed before he enters her boudoir. And Molly,” she said dourly, “will be turned off almost as fast as Jim. I suppose I will have to make accommodations for them.” She sighed wearily.
“You depress me. I do not suppose we could agree that she will be very lively and easy to live with?”
“What? And be a Marchioness?” She scoffed at him with her eyes.
“I suppose you are right. She will have to be somewhat queenly in her attitude to be believable. But can she at least play a charming pianoforte?”
“The harp,” she said cuttingly, “and only the harp. And be ready for some fawning, womanish dancing master to set up house at Treehill, along with a portraitist, the modiste, two or three ladies maids, and a pug — but I have already mentioned him.”
“Egad!” he sputtered. “I do not think I can tolerate it!”
“Well you will have to,” she said darkly.
They walked out past the gate house now, turning away from Greenly and down the road to the west. The shadows of the trees on the lane gave them cover, and they walked with unhappy determination to the beat of their own hard thoughts. When at last they reached a patch of sunlight far from the eyes of anyone, he pulled up short and turned to face her. “Can you not take any pity on me, Rabbit?”
Again, her eyes threatened to spill a storm of tears, and once again she visibly stemmed the flow. “You know I will forever be your friend, but whether we can be as dear to one another as we are now is very doubtful…impossible! once you have a wife.”
“Unless I find someone agreeable. Can I not find a sweet country miss? Is there no one who is much like you…?”
She gasped in utter disbelief. “Like me? There is no lady much like me!”
He took her chin. “No,” he said kindly, “there is no one like you, Rabbit,” he kissed her very lightly on the lips, “no one in the world that is as much my darling.”
Mary Fanley stood in the lane, blinking in the sun, thoroughly stunned. “Come,” he said patiently. He turned her around and forcibly walked her directly back home. Once at Greenly, he called for Barker to saddle up Caesar with his man’s saddle, placing Mary directly onto a charming bench in the garden.
“Do not move from here,” he warned her, “or I will run you down with your very own horse.”
She was still too much speechless to resist. Upon his return, he forced her to swallow a little wine from a flask, before he lifted her up onto Caesar and leapt into the saddle behind her. Whether the groom was much scandalized or not, he did not care.
“We are for Treehill,” he said with authority, “and we may be very late in returning.”
Mary sat in front of him as a frozen statue until they were gone a full mile, when he felt her crumple into him as a sign of ultimate despair.
“There now,” he said, soothingly, to both his horse and his beloved. And then to Mary alone he said with a small chuckle, “I rather like you this quiet, Mary.”
He felt her stir but stayed her speech with a finger to her lips. “I will let you speak in time, but not just yet. You will do me the favour of hearing me out first, and I’ve a place in mind to say what I must.”
While she was silent, he knew she was weeping, so he gave her the first of the three handkerchiefs he had thought to bring with him.
Caesar angled into the glade, glad to be near a little stream and grazing in the long grass. They were in a forgotten glen at the back of the mansion, a fern-covered forest where dappled light came and went. His Lordship slipped out of the saddle and reached up for Mary, who fell, as if by habit, into his embrace. While in form she was pliable, her mind was gathering in strength and determination. As he spread out a rug in a patch of light by the stream, she spoke with resolution.
“You cannot do this.”
“I can and I will. And,” he said a little ferociously, “you will refrain from telling me how to go about plighting my troth.”
“But we are such an unequal match!” she pleaded, undeterred by his thunderous looks.
“Come,” he clucked, motioning for her with his hand. “You are overwrought. Of course we are uneven. I am a convicted felon and you are the grandniece of an Earl. Can you, do you think, overlook it just for a moment?”
“Do not laugh at me!” she commanded, truly in distress. “I blush to think of it. It is so very unseemly. I cannot aspire to marchioness, and…I do not want to think beyond it!”
He instantly came to rescue her from what looked to be an impending faint, and forced her to sit on the rug. “You mean you do not want to be a duchess. I cannot blame you. I do not want to be a duke. There,” he said, offering her another sip of wine, “we are agreed.” He sat down in a brotherly fashion next to her and watched Caesar contentedly filling his stomach. “But do you have no love for me, truly, Rabbit? Look in your heart. Can you not see how I have loved you now for more than a year?”
Her resolve deserted her and she fell to weeping. He handed her a second kerchief, and spoke harshly. “There is nothing for it, then. I am determined to have you and you are understandably set against me. So, do your hardest, girl. Refuse me.”
As he had known it would be, this was the fatal blow. Mary Fanley raised her eyes to his, utterly stricken to her soul, and fell into his open arms. “I cannot do it!” she sobbed.
“Of course you cannot. You are too good and I am too much your slave.” And there, in the forgotten glade by the stream, he alternately supported and embraced her through the agony of his proposal for a sinful hour.
“You cannot have thought this out,” she said, musing in his arms. “You are simply giving way under the immediate pressure. I think you should take some time to consider-”
“You force me to remember nine months at Warren House when I did nothing but think about this moment.”
She blushed hotly and begged his pardon, but continued to argue with him. When she at last ran out of objections on the subject of their respective stations, she turned hopefully to yet another obstacle. “My Lord Eversham?”
“He has given his consent.”
“That is impossible!”
“Well, if you claim it is impossible, I suppose I will have to tell him he must retract his approval.”
“But I don’t believe it. Lord Eversham finds me suitable?”
He kissed away her frown. “Infinitely. He loves you, I think. I have never known him to give anyone a gift you know.”
“Not even you?”
“Especially not me.”
Mary could find no answer to this unexpected news, and he finally pressed her. “So, do you think you can throw yourself into the ravine of my protection, your grace?”
She stiffened. “Well I certainly never will if you tease me with that…title.”
“But you will wear it so well.” He kissed her yet again. “And your papa will find it very droll to mention to the Himmels that his daughter is the Lost Duchess…”
She stood very abruptly. “Papa!” she wailed. “I have never thought of him! Oh, by Christ the Saviour! He will never let me go! I cannot leave him! You must…I must…for God’s sake, Robert! I must go home!”
He stood immediately with his full temper now arou
sed. “If you are going to invoke the Almighty, then so shall I. Good God, Mary, do you suppose I did not speak to him first?!”
Bewildered and childlike, she looked up at him in his wrath, and he took her arms and shook her a little. “Will you not ask me how it went? No? I will tell you. He was angry and father-like that I would think of touching you, and in the very same breath, incensed that I took so long to come to the point, Faith, you Fanleys! I despair. I have never had so much work to do to make a simple offer!”
“Oh, Robert, forgive me,” she said in a little sob, shaken out of her nonsensical fit by the obvious end of his rope. “I know I have made this so hard for you.” She took his face in her hands. “I am not good. Not good at all! I am such a wicked tease and…so stubborn!…and…and I do talk so very much and…”
“And there is no reason in the world why I love you so much,” he growled. But he kissed her a little triumphantly nonetheless. “I suppose you want me on my knees, Rabbit,” he growled.
She sighed very blissfully, lifted her chin and looked down her nose. “I suppose I do, my lord.”
About the Author & Acknowledgements
Although The Dangerous Duke is Arabella Sheraton’s first Regency Romance, she has been steeped in Regency writers since her teens. From Jane Austen to Georgette Heyer, Arabella has found both enjoyment and inspiration in sparkling, witty Regency novels. Arabella wrote her first Regency romance to entertain her aged mom who loves the genre. She was delighted when her ‘fun project’ The Dangerous Duke was published. Arabella is honored to share the adventures of her heroes and heroines with readers. Right now Arabella is working on her second Regency Romance entitled Married at Midnight. As the name implies, it’s chockful of secrecy and romance.
My particular thanks go to my editor Celina Summers for her constant encouragement and excellent editing, and to my mom for being my biggest fan.
Website: regencyromances.webs.com
Facebook:
www.facebook.com/pages/Regency-Romances/164413240285705
Table of Contents
title page
Copyright Information
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
About the Author & Acknowledgements
Grace Gibson Page 19
