The slow, slightly chagrined smile that spread over the duchess’s face indicated the question was understood.
“Ah. You caught that.”
A footman’s inquiry at her elbow broke Adelaide’s reverie, but not her warm remembrance of the story Emily had told of her friendship with Adelaide’s father. The symmetry of it all had not been lost on either of them. Just as Adelaide and Julius had united against the inanities of the Marriage Mart, so had the then Emily Waterford and Williford Formsby-Smythe. It was a friendship that lasted to this day and, to Adelaide’s surprise, had always included her mother.
“Do not let your mother fool you, my dear. Henrietta is a formidable woman. Once she decided she wanted Wills, it was as good as done.” The duchess’s voice turned wistful. “She adores your father. Always has. And I, as his best friend, knew she was perfect for him.”
“She keeps him from being so serious all the time,” Adelaide said as if the thought had just occurred to her.
“Exactly. And he loves her for it, Adelaide. She saves him from himself. Just as you will my Marcus.”
“Oh, I don’t…”
“You will, Adelaide. You are your mother’s daughter. You won’t give up on him. I know it.”
Glancing at the man next to her, Adelaide felt a sense of overwhelming trepidation. What on earth was she to save him from, and what made the duchess think she was capable? What could she, a twenty-year-old, self-proclaimed hoyden offer a man of the world like Marcus?
“Adelaide, are you listening, dear?” Henrietta Formsby-Smythe’s voice was known to set hounds barking in their kennels—kennels two estates away.
“I’m sorry, Mother,” Adelaide replied, trying her best to sound contrite. “Woolgathering, I’m afraid. What did you say?”
“Woolgathering. At your betrothal dinner. Who ever heard of such a thing. Really, Adelaide, do you have any idea the honor His Grace has…”
“Your mother was saying it will be difficult to plan a grand wedding in such a short time, Adelaide. I assured her neither you nor His Grace is interested in a lot of fuss,” her father interrupted, smiling at the look of gratitude Adelaide flashed him. Her mother’s orations on the impropriety of Adelaide’s behavior were known to go on for hours.
“Why a short time? Surely His Grace isn’t holding to that ridiculous notion we marry at the end of the week. And even when we do set a date, I see no reason for a grand wedding. After Clemmie’s wedding you took to your bed for a week, Mother. Surely you don’t want to go through that again.”
Adelaide thought her answer a very practical one. She certainly did not mean to say anything outrageous. Why were they all staring at her as if she had two heads?
“Adelaide, dear…” the duchess started and then looked at Marcus expectantly.
Ah, so that was it. She had mentioned her sister’s wedding at the table of the man her sister had jilted. It was not as if they could avoid the subject forever. The expression on Marcus’s face gave her pause. Was he still in love with Clemmie? The mere thought of it made her now full stomach ache. She should never have accepted him. This was a nightmare. What made her think he could ever want a waddling duck like her when his first choice had been the elegant swan that was Clementine?
A strong, bronzed hand stole over hers and squeezed gently. “Woolgathering again?” Marcus teased.
“What? Oh, I do beg your pardon, Your Grace.” Adelaide shook her head as if to clear it of those nagging doubts. “What did you say?”
“Nothing, actually. I will, however, say if you don’t cease Your Gracing me I will be forced to take drastic measures.” He looked so young when he smiled at her like that, his sort of half smile full of mischief.
“What measures would those be… Your Grace?”
He leaned in to whisper in her ear. “I will exercise my rights as your husband and smack your bottom… Addy.”
“You are not yet my husband… Your Grace.” She looked directly into his smiling eyes and lifted her chin slightly in challenge.
“What are you two whispering about?” her mother demanded.
“I was telling Adelaide we have set a date. We will be married at the end of the week. I have sent to London for a special license. The Bishop of York will be coming down especially.”
Adelaide could not have been more surprised if he had said he was taking Holy Orders. The end of the week? Was he mad? A glance down the long formal dining table told her she was the only person who found this news shocking. She must learn to attend dinner conversations more. Whilst she daydreamed about her parents love story over a sinfully decadent syllabub, this group of treacherous conspirators had catapulted her down the aisle without so much as a by your leave.
“Why that’s just… ridiculous.” She hated it when she spluttered. “We are only just betrothed. Why should we have to marry at the end of the week?”
Again, they all looked at her in stunned silence.
“Adelaide,” the duchess began gently. “It would be better if you and Marcus were married before the gossip reaches London. It is monumentally unfair for you to forgo the large wedding your mother and I would love to plan. In this case, however, I think my son is right.”
Marcus rolled his eyes and Adelaide very nearly rolled hers in return. The idea of her mother planning her wedding to a duke was too terrifying to contemplate.
“As I said, Your Grace, I don’t particularly care for large weddings.”
“Splendid.” The duchess clapped her hands and beamed in delight. “Even with a few days Henrietta and I can put together something wonderfully romantic, can’t we, ‘Retta?”
“To be sure, Emily. Leave it to us, Addy, dear.”
True to form, her mother proceeded to roll over the conversation like a runaway coach and four.
“Do something,” Adelaide whispered urgently as she rose to accompany the two women to the parlor, leaving the men to their port and cigars. “Stop them.”
“Not even at gunpoint,” Marcus replied, standing to pull back her chair.
“Coward.”
“Absolutely.”
*
Marcus settled onto the stone garden bench with a sigh. Even the bravest of commanders knew when to retreat in order to regroup. In fact, the combined disapproval of Marcus’s rather formidable mother and his soon to be mother-in-law had the power to send Wellington himself scurrying for cover.
Thus it was, the lofty Duke of Selridge had gone to ground in his moonlit gardens. The other attendees of his precipitous betrothal dinner were in the parlor discussing—him, no doubt. It was enough to drive a man to drink, but as the liquor was in far too close proximity to the battlefield, he would have to settle for the intoxicating scents of the night.
Marcus would much rather be enjoying the intoxicating scent of his betrothed. However, after the way he’d botched the proposal and the ham-handed way he’d given her the betrothal ring, he was fairly certain the only thing she would allow his nose was a sharp, brief meeting with her fist. He should be horrified he found Addy intoxicating in the least, but it was simply too exhausting to deny it to himself and the rest of the world. A world which included Addy—was beginning to become quite crowded with her, in fact.
He intended to marry the young hoyden for the same reasons as Julius—to get an heir, to save her from fortune hunters, scoundrels, and spinsterhood. This overwhelming desire for her was not part of the plan. It made things complicated and unpredictable. He hated complicated and unpredictable.
Of all the women to pick to do his duty, why did it have to be Adelaide Formsby-Smythe? She was the last thing he needed in a wife. He needed someone prim and proper, someone shy and expectant of nothing. Addy expected everything. He knew it. Her appetite for life was such she would not be satisfied until she had tasted all it had to offer—twice. Marcus groaned. The vision those sentiments evoked was not helping. What was he going to do? If only Julius was here.
Julius would be laughing his head off at this point a
nd no denying it. The idea of his younger brother, the brave cavalry officer, being completely routed by a twenty-year-old girl would appeal to Julius’s sense of fun. Marcus would not be surprised in the least to know his dear brother had orchestrated the entire thing from some comfortable chair in whatever passed for a gentleman’s club in the hereafter.
“Marcus?” A voice as quiet as the night call of a dove drifted across the beds of rosebushes, their branches lifted in bare supplication to the night sky. They awaited the reawakening of spring. He would not have been startled to see them drift into bloom at Addy’s gentle tone. Eve’s voice must have sounded very like it the first time Adam heard it in the garden. The poor man never stood a chance.
“Your Grace, am I disturbing you?”
“Only with your every breath,” Marcus mumbled before turning to greet her.
The nearby fountain bubbled along quietly. It sounded very like laughter, Julius’s laughter. Marcus looked up at the stars and scowled.
This is not funny, brother, not funny at all.
Adelaide watched Marcus from the moment he excused himself from the parlor with a hurried bid for “fresh air.” What he meant was some escape from the consequences of his behavior at dinner. She should be hurt or at least put out with the offhand way he’d presented her with the Winfield betrothal ring. After his mother dressed him down for it, without actually saying a single word, she only felt sorry for him. Well, and a bit amused.
As she stood at the French windows and observed him, seated in the garden all alone, she felt something more. Whilst she was once drawn to the heroic image of the handsome officer; Marcus Winfield, the man, was something far more hypnotic and many times more dangerous. A girl knew how to handle an image. A real man, with all the heat and strength he exuded, was another matter entirely.
That was it. He might have come out to the gardens for the cool, fresh air, but he’d apparently used it all up. What Adelaide felt as he strode toward her was anything but cool. In fact, had she a fan she would be swishing it quite vigorously. What on earth was it about him that made her warm all over? Even the bottoms of her feet felt it. It was too ridiculous.
Blast. And now I can’t remember what I came out here to ask him.
“Did you want something, my dear?” His voice was drawn out of the darkness like the cloak of the sky. It even held stars, for its teasing timbre sparkled and winked with each word. She gave herself a quick, surreptitious pinch.
“I wanted to talk to you, Your Grace.” Looking up at him was a mistake on a grand scale. Up were his eyes and his face. She was certain snares left for rabbits were far less deadly.
“You cannot talk to His Grace at the moment. He is not at home.” The man did a very good imitation of his butler. “You may, however, speak with Marcus if you wish.”
She tilted her head to study him for a moment. At dinner, he was the duke. It appeared the outdoors had softened him. The slight grin and lethal wit were completely Marcus. Adelaide had a long way to go before she understood either of them or the reasons each appeared.
“Do I pass muster, madam?” he inquired. He offered her his arm and turned to take her out into the gardens.
“That remains to be seen… Marcus.”
“Touché, Addy. Did you come to ring a peel over me in private, or was the company inside so boring you had to seek out an old wreck for your amusement?”
“I do wish you would stop referring to yourself in this fashion. You are neither old nor a wreck. If you hope to end this betrothal by painting yourself as such, you are wasting your time.”
She felt the muscles in his arm tense under her hand and had the lowering experience of a thrill racing through her body. In all the time of their acquaintance her reaction had never changed. His physical attributes had always made being in a room with him a sensorial treat. To actually touch him was breathtaking.
“I can see now I shall have to acquire a very loud bell,” Marcus announced.
“What?” He’d startled her. Whilst she mooned over his muscles she’d obviously missed what he said. It happened all too frequently when she was in his presence. “What did you say?”
They stopped on a path painted in moonlight. The ever-efficient staff at Winfield Abbey insured the strategically placed lanterns hanging in the gardens added their glow should anyone venture there after dinner. By their light, Adelaide saw Marcus look at her in a combination of exasperation and something else. She was accustomed to his exasperation. It was the something else which danced across her skin like music heard for the first time.
“I do not recall expressing an interest in ending this betrothal,” he said, a rough quality to his voice she had not heard before. “That is what I said whilst you were off visiting the stars.”
“I was not visiting the stars,” she started indignantly. Something in his face made her stop. “Perhaps you should.”
“Should what? Visit the stars?”
“No.” Now she was exasperated. “Perhaps you should end this betrothal. Or we should.” She hurried on when he opened his mouth to speak. “You don’t have to do this, Marcus. People have been thrusting their wants and wishes on you since Waterloo. It hardly seems fair.”
He could deny it all he liked, but she had hit upon truth with her words. Such a look of affirmation crossed his face as there could be no doubt. Marcus was a man who valued control above all else and nothing about this engagement had been in his control. As much as she adored him, she would not take that away from him.
“We settled all that this afternoon, Addy. You said yes. You cannot take it back.”
Oh dear, this would never do. The duke had returned. She would simply have to rattle the duke until Marcus showed his face.
“We are not yet married, Your Grace. You do not decide what I can or cannot do.”
“I most certainly can. You have to be the most obstinate woman I have ever known. Do you know that? And the most unromantic.”
“Unromantic?” The idea he, who had dropped her engagement ring onto her dinner plate like a party favor, thought her unromantic was simply too insulting. “You, sir, would not know romantic if it walked up and bit you on the leg.”
“What an intriguing idea, Miss Formsby-Smythe. Do go on.” His smug expression and lofty air only served to infuriate her more.
“Go on about what, Your Grace? Your lack of romantic feeling, or the increasing necessity of ending this betrothal.”
“Your biting me on the leg actually. I find the idea quite… interesting. The subject of our ending this betrothal is closed.”
“Oooh,” she huffed. “Don’t be ridiculous. I am not going to bite you on the leg, no matter how much you deserve it.”
“And I was so looking forward to it.” There it was again. That indefinable something in his face was now in his voice as well. The music it made on her skin now sank to her very bones. His green eyes looked nearly black in this light. In black, one could detect nothing and everything all at once.
“I won’t propose again, Addy.”
Now where did that come from? “I am trying to break this betrothal not press for another one, Your Grace.”
“Stop Your Gracing me.” He actually growled at her like some grumpy old bear. “You will call me Marcus in private or nothing at all. In public, you will call me Selridge.”
She did not mean to giggle. She was not the giggling type. He was so serious when he made these ducal declarations. Singularly sincere and so terribly pompous, it was reminiscent of her father. Adelaide never obeyed her father’s edicts either.
“You’re laughing at me.”
“I am not.”
“Oh yes, you are. I heard it. You have no thought for my consequence at all, do you, Addy?” She could not decide if he was upset or simply put upon by her lack of respect.
“I’m afraid not, Marcus. But I do adore you, if that is any compensation.”
Chapter Seven
“I do adore you, if that is any compensation.”
>
Dear God, was she trying to kill him?
When she walked out into the moonlight in a whisper of green satin, his heart had stopped beating for a full minute. Her every step cut across his vision as lightening in a distant sky. How did she do it? How did Addy walking through a garden lit only by the silver of the moon and the gold of the lanterns become an erotic experience? She was light and beauty in a shimmering green gown and even her shadow had grace.
She looked up at him expectantly. One look at her wisp of a smile and his whole body hummed with the magic that was Addy.
“Are we agreed then, Marcus?” she asked quietly. So fascinated was he with her mouth, it took a moment for her question to penetrate.
“Agreed? To what?” He was thirty years old, yet his voice cracked as if he were a callow youth.
“We’ll call off the engagement. We’ll tell our parents we don’t suit and…”
“I am not proposing to you again, Adelaide.”
“I am not asking you to, Marcus.”
“I’ve already proposed three times today. You cannot expect…”
“Marcus, I don’t,” she assured him. Her dainty hand crept up to rest over his now thundering heart. “And it was five times, actually.”
He stared in wonder as her sly grin and sparkling eyes completely disarmed him. To his chagrin his hand shook slightly as he ran it through his hair in frustration.
“You would keep count, wouldn’t you?
“It is a habit, I’m afraid. I’m sorry if it annoys you.”
“No, you aren’t. You aren’t sorry at all, are you?”
Her only answer was to blink up at him, eyes wide, and whisper a sigh. The sigh was his undoing. He covered her hand with his before pulling it to his lips to kiss her trembling palm. Still clutching her hand, he struggled to settle onto his good knee.
“Marcus.” His name formed on those luscious lips, but no sound escaped. He was not surprised. Even in this dim light the quickening rise and fall of her moon-kissed décolletage was visible. A shiver of heat swept over him.
“Marry me, Addy.” He gazed into those innocent eyes. Marcus was bewitched and more alive than he ever thought possible. “Please.” He meant it. He meant it in every possible way. She stared at him for an eternity. What did she see when she looked at him?
Lost In Love (Road To Forever Series #1) Page 8
