by Eva Devon
How to Marry
a Duke
Without Really Trying
A Duke’s Secret Novel
Book 2
by
Eva Devon
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are either the work of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
How to Marry a Duke Without Really Trying
Copyright © 2018 by Máire Creegan
Kindle Edition
All rights reserved. No redistribution is authorized.
All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any electronic or mechanical means—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without written permission.
For my sons, you are the reason.
Special thanks to:
Tracy, Scott, Lindsey, Patricia, Melissa, and Judy.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Epilogue
Other Books by Eva Devon
Prologue
Hell. They were in hell.
George Cornwall, future Duke of Harley, curled his hands into fists, willing himself to stay calm. But he could not stop the rapid beating of his heart or the feeling that in the next moments his world would be forever altered, forever blackened by despair.
The smell of burnt powder filled the air.
The earth steamed with the heat of cannon fire that had pockmarked its surface.
Somewhere, the river flowed through the vast desert as old as time. Pyramids that had been built by kings now long dead gazed upon its winding surface.
Screams of men dying in the hot sun surrounded George.
After so much time in battle, George had grown not accustomed but at least not completely shaken by the aftermath of a battle.
Today was not such a day.
He’d come to war little more than a boy to do his duty as every Harley had done for the last five hundred years. His family did not believe that men should send others to war if they had not been in its midst. Nor should they sit in a safe hallowed hall in London while English men perished on foreign soil.
So, his father had purchased him a commission.
It had all been made bearable by his group of friends. Four other heirs to a dukedom had met and united in the face of atrocity and the knowledge that, one day, they would all but rule half the world. They had become men together.
Now, he, Rafe, Rob, Tristan and Damian were searching the field littered with bodies, looking for one of their own.
Max had not come back after the last shot had been fired.
Together, he and his friends combed the field, desperate to find him.
Now, George stood, sucking in acrid breaths of relief and simultaneous horror. “He’s here!” he yelled.
He could barely take in the scene.
Max, the future Duke of Raventon, sat with vacant eyes, rocking back and forth, a ginger-haired boy clutched in his arms.
Within moments, George was joined by the others, their stained uniforms still glinting in the high sun with the brass and buttons upon their scarlet coats.
He turned slightly, looking back at the other powder-stained faces of the men he’d come to call friends. They all looked wary, tense, but ready.
“Max?” George questioned softly as he looked back to his friend who was lost in his own mind. He had to reach him, to bring him back.
Max didn’t respond. He just kept rocking the small boy.
Damian, future Duke of Drake, pointed carefully to the broken drum but a few feet away. “T-tommy.”
The stutter that had become less pronounced over the year came back now under the weight of Max’s condition.
George took in the drum and the sticks plunged into the earth. Tommy Adams was no more than twelve years old and Max had taken him in like a pet. Protecting him from the bigger rougher men in the regiment.
The boy had followed Max about like a devoted puppy and the two had seldom been out of each other’s company when Max was not at his duties. Now, the boy was dead.
His lifeless arms were slung over Max’s shoulders.
George crouched down, determined to help his friend, to pull him back to the path and away from the forest of his thoughts. “Max,” he whispered.
Max shook his head. “He’s tired.”
George’s eyes burned and he glanced back to his friends who all bore looks of horror. He refused to mirror that. If he could be calm, reasonable. . . kind. . . he would stop this. He could stop this.
They’d seen men’s minds broken by war, but he’d never have guessed it would happen to Max. Max, who’d infiltrated the Reign of Terror, and stolen people away from Madame Guillotine before she could do her nefarious work. Max had seemed like an unshakeable fortress of a man who could look upon any tragedy and give a ready quip or wise word.
Not now.
Max stroked the boy’s dirt-caked hair. “Let him sleep. We must let him sleep.”
George swallowed back the pain in his throat as he crouched down. “Yes, Tommy may sleep now,” he said gently.
Max’s tiger eyes of gold whipped up and frenzy filled them. “He’s. . . he’s not. . .”
Daring to touch his friend’s shoulder, George thought back to the guidance his father had given him over the years, his gentle firmness which had kept so many men steady. He called upon that now. George whispered, “Tommy is at rest now, Max.”
A broken sound cracked from Max’s lips. “A boy. A boy. A boy.”
“Your boy,” Rob said as he approached, his black hair tinged with blue under the white-hot sun.
They all knew it might as well have been true. For Max had become the father that Tommy never had.
Max lifted his face, his gaze darting desperately. “He can’t.”
Tristan, the future Duke of Ardore came forward then knelt beside them. “Tommy lad,” he said in his deep Scottish burr. “Ye’re free of yer duties now. So sleep as long as ye please”
Max shook his head wildly. “No.”
“Och, Max,” Ardore said gently. “It’s he who will look after you now.”
Max choked on a sob and he held Tommy tighter.
It had been hours since Tommy had died. That was clear. He must have been struck in one of the first barrages. It was essential that they lay him to rest. George did not wish Max to have memories of the boy rotting in the sun. He could protect his friend from that, at least. “Come, Max. We must give him his resting place.”
“I was meant to protect him,” Max bit out.
“You can’t protect a solider,” Rafe, the future Duke of Royland, said gently. “No matter how you long to.”
“H
e’s a boy,” Max snapped.
George softly held Max’s shoulder “Don’t dishonor him, Max. He was a soldier and he did you proud, just as he wanted to.”
“We must lay him down with all respect,” Tristan added kindly. “Will ye no’ give him that, Max?”
Max let Tommy’s face slip away from his chest and he looked down to the boy’s visage. He swallowed, the muscles of his throat working. “He’s gone. He’s really gone.”
“Yes,” George said, his throat tight. “Come, Max. Let us help you carry him. Let us pay Tommy the deepest of honors.”
Carefully, George slipped his arms around the drummer boy and lifted him so that Max could stagger to his feet. The boy weighed nothing, like a small bird, its colors faded.
And then as one, the six future most powerful men of England crossed the battlefield, a drummer boy in their hearts.
In that moment, George knew Max would never be the same. None of them would. The last of their innocence would be laid to rest with the small red-haired boy who had beat his drum as he marched into battle.
And the only thing that was going to save them all was each other.
Chapter 1
Fear stole through George’s heart. No, not fear. Terror. In his rather short years, he’d never experienced anything of this incredible and formidable magnitude. Not charging into battle at the head of his regiment, cannonballs flying overhead. Not facing French cavalry or the French column, lead balls whizzing past, men falling beside him. Not even on the very first day of school away from the cocoon of his family, facing a horde of young, titled boys all ready to establish who was the best amongst them, all knowing they were born great and feeling the importance of doing their family line proud.
No, this was far more vast than any of those harrowing moments. In fact, as George sat stiffly beside his father’s bed, he felt as if, any moment, the polished wood floor, covered in a red and blue Persian rug which had been there for one hundred years, would yawn open and swallow him whole.
It might be preferable if it did.
For there was one inescapable truth encompassing him at this particular moment.
The great Duke of Harley, the most powerful duke in all of England, was. . . dying.
There was no denying it. The doctors had whispered in horrified voices in the corridor, breaking the news to both George and his mother. But one didn’t need to speak to a doctor to know. One needed but to look at the man wasting away on pressed linen to know how soon it would be.
George loved his mother. Barbara, Duchess of Harley, was a woman of great worth, kindness, and strength. Few had her spirit, tenacity or devotion to her family. She had been a beacon of love for her children, a veritable lioness in their rearing. But to George, it was this man who now lay wasted and fragile in his massive bed who had been his loadstar.
William Randolph Angus Cornwall, present Duke of Harley, had been a most uncommon father. While the majority of men of power rarely saw their children, the Duke of Harley had made a distinct point of being there for every important moment and for most of the unimportant ones, too.
The great duke had been present when George had taken his first toddling steps not in the nursery but in the long hall decorated with the previous dukes and duchesses that had come before. His father had swung him onto his broad, strong shoulders, and carried him over the immense Harley lands, making a grand adventure of it all. He had taught George to ride a pony, heels down, back straight. To love his letters. There wasn’t a day that went by wherein George did not read one hundred pages of a novel. The duke had even helped teach him how to dance, that art in which one could transport a young lady and himself into the feel of flying about the room. He had been there when George had crossed that strange land that a boy must navigate to manhood, teaching him to respect and enjoy women as his equal. With patience and encouragement, the duke had nurtured his son’s independence and told him to go to war and learn the sacrifices of his ancestors. Men that had made England great.
For it was imperative that all Harley men made their marks in the fabric of England’s history. And so, he had sent his son into battle to learn what it meant to be a duke of old. It had been a great risk with no spare, but Harleys did not shirk from their duty to their country or in the mantle of greatness.
Now, the Duke of Harley was teaching his son one last lesson. The most painful of all, George knew. For it was the lesson of saying goodbye and George did not think he could bear it.
Surely, he could not surpass his father. Not even in years.
It was too soon. Far too soon for such a thing to even be imagined. Its occurrence was an impossibility. For his father was not an old man. He had yet to achieve fifty years. This moment had only been one he knew would come in a metaphysical sort of way. Everyone had to die, after all. But George had been certain that the years his father lived would match the greatness of the life he lived.
Instead, brutal, unforgiving illness had claimed his father and would not shake its cruel grasp. No, it was crushing him, and dragging him away from this world.
George took his father’s bony hand, determined that if he just held on, his father would not slip away. He stared at the gaunt figure who struggled for every breath with a burning need not to look away. If he looked away, his father might disappear. But there was no denying that the duke’s cheeks were grey and sunken. A sheen of sweat dotted his once perfect brow, and his now hollow chest rose and fell quickly.
The immense ducal bed swallowed up the man who had seemed, to George, larger than life. His long form, once so imposing, barely showed under the counterpane.
“Please,” George whispered to his father. “Please,” he begged, his voice as lost as it was when as a child he’d awoken from terrifying dreams. It had not been the nanny who had comforted him. But this man. And now, he prayed he’d be comforted again.
George swallowed and managed to confess, “I’m not ready.”
His father, who had been staring vacantly, his eyes feverish and unfocused, now turned to him. A look of such startling clarity came to those blue orbs that Harley gasped.
“Papa?” he asked, his own voice near breaking as he leaned forward. “I cannot do this. It is not time. You have much more to teach me. Please do not go.”
The Duke of Harley squeezed his hand and with a wisdom that seemed as if he had already seen the other side, he said with surprising firmness, “We are never ready, my boy. It is never time. But this cannot be escaped. It was always going to happen.”
George shook his head wildly. Wishing he could take his father into his arms. “But if—”
“George, you are my son and I know the strength in your heart.” His father lifted a shaking hand and gently touched his face. “That is enough.”
George swallowed. “I will try, Papa.”
His father smiled then, a gentle smile, as he cupped his son’s face as though they would always share the intimacy of father and child. “You will succeed. And I will always be with you.”
Tears stung George’s eyes and he swallowed them back lest he weep. And without thinking, despite his size, despite his years, he climbed onto the bed and took his father up into his arms.
The painful reversal struck him. His father had cradled him once. Now, it was George’s turn.
His father did not resist, but rested his head against George’s shoulder as if it were the most natural thing in the world, to be held by his son.
With a labored breath, his father began to recite Shakespeare with great passion, the words he had instilled in his son time and time again.
“This royal throne of kings, this scepter’d isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men. . .”
As his father’s breath began to fade, George took up the passage, filling it with his l
ove for his sire, for all that he had been taught and given, he finished,
“. . .this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands,
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.”
The last words were ragged and torn as he held his father and watched the man’s eyes once again turn glassy.
A gentle look of contentment eased his face and then. . . the great Duke of Harley was no more.
As he clasped his father to him, desperately searching for any sign but knowing now he would find none, he made a vow.
George pressed his cheek to his father’s head and whispered. “I love you, Papa. I love you.”
And then to himself he promised, I will be the great duke my father knew I would be. In every way, I will ensure that nothing befalls the Harley line.
No. It would be perfect. Just as his father had been.
Chapter 2
Lady Eglantine Trewstowe loved drama. She adored it, thrived in it, and happily swooned over it. In fact, she absolutely reveled in the delicious happenings in the pages of the novels she devoured on a daily basis. She could lose herself for hours in the words of her beloved poets. And one needn’t even question how she worshiped the Bard and his universal understanding of the human soul.
From classical to present, there were few printed words she could not love.
Byron, though a bit of a ponce in life, was a dream to read.
While she’d had the misfortune to meet the author in real life, she did think his work sublime. And much to her delight, she’d secured his latest work via the post and her London bookseller. She’d spent weeks anticipating the brown paper-covered package. And when it had arrived, she had crowed with triumph.
Now, it was hers. Every salacious, scandalous, rapturous word. And she was going to savor every one.
She picked up a buttered slice of toast and attempted, for the third time, to begin the much anticipated work. She opened the blue, leather-bound book, embossed with gold filigree, ready to grab the page cutter.
