“Balderdash!” he spat.
“How dare you! You… you are the vilest man I have ever met. You put Mr. Todd to shame.” She felt positively violent and began to pace the room, the hand not holding the lantern clenching and unclenching. Oh, if she could slap his arrogant, handsome face.
“Well, my lovely dove, I happen to know the Duke of Lucere from Oxford,” Mr. Stephens yelled through the window. Water ran off his nose and dripped into his mouth. He shook his head, trying to fling it off, but more fell. “He never mentioned a parcel of Primroses in godforsaken Lesser Puddlepiss. And you’ve no more corresponded with the duke or spoken with the duchess than I’ve created a bloody flying ship to the damn sun.”
“I told you not to utter vile language in my presence!”
“Well, then don’t bald-face lie in mine,” he retorted.
She approached the window. “You can just… just… slither back to hell with your scaly brethren.”
“Who’s uttering the vile language now, my sweet baggage?”
She slapped the glass as if it were his face. He only smiled. “Don’t become angry with me because I’ve guessed your pathetic game of passing yourself off as your betters. No doubt, you can fool the dull-witted inhabitants of Puddlepiss, but I’ve traveled the world and been in the presence of many great men, including your fine, upstanding Duke of Lucere. You may keep your Primrose motto that you’ve stolen. I know a conniving swindler when I see one. Albeit the most beautiful one I’ve ever laid eyes on. Truly, you waste your talent here. You belong in Drury Lane.”
She couldn’t even form words but released a deep cry born of rich fury. She hit the window with her palm.
He laughed. “You’re not hurting anyone but yourself, miss,” he had the nerve to say.
Nonetheless, she continued to smack the glass. “You heinous, vicious, hateful monster. You can—”
Someone tapped her shoulder. She whirled around to find Mr. Harris holding a candle, a solemn expression on his face. Her sisters waited behind him. Estella was immediately remorseful to be caught so undignified.
Mr. Stephens’s muffled voice penetrated the room. “Make her see reason, Harris.”
“I feel that Mr. Stephens may be correct on some small points,” Harris said in calm tones. “Miss Cecelia, perhaps you would care to elucidate the situation to your sister.” He stepped back, giving her sister audience.
Cecelia’s guilt-filled eyes darted about, looking everywhere but at Estella’s face. Dread weighted Estella’s belly. What had the twins done?
“I-I dared Amelia to kiss Mr. Stephens,” Cecelia confessed.
“No, you didn’t,” Estella replied without thinking. “You couldn’t. You would never do something so vulgar and ill-mannered. This cannot be the truth. Who made you say that?”
The twins looked at each other. “I-I pretended that Mr. Stephens was a ghost and fainted before him,” Amelia confessed. “And when he knelt down to assist me, I kissed him.”
Estella felt like she had received a hard blow to her lungs. She staggered to a chair and grabbed its armrest. Mr. Harris hurried to take her elbow.
“How... how are you my sisters?” she stammered. She could scarce breathe, let alone make words. “How do we share the same blood? Primrose ladies do not behave this way. I—Mama—we taught you better.”
“I’m sorry,” Amelia muttered in a voice barely heard above the rain.
There was only one thing to be done.
Estella straightened her shoulders and raised her head. Primroses never shrank from doing their duty, no matter how much it pained them. “I do not need the apology. You will wait right here.”
Estella strode to the door and opened it. “Mr. Stephens, would you please come in?” she called into the downpour.
“I don’t know,” he shouted back. “I’m rather afraid of you.”
* * *
Lucere stepped just inside the front door. Cold rain dripped from his clothes and hair. His shirt clung to his chest, as did his pantaloons to his love pipe. He watched the ladies’ eyes enlarge at the sight. Estella blushed violently. She kept her eyes trained on his face, not on his eyes exactly, but the region around his left ear.
It was her own fault if he wasn’t decent to be seen.
“Miss Cecelia and Miss Amelia,” she said. “I believe you have something to say to Mr. Stephens.”
The twins appeared bereft of speech. They just ogled him.
“Amelia!” Estella cried.
“I’m sorry I pretended you were a ghost and kissed you, but Cecelia dared me,” Amelia said, as though her twin had taken control of her body.
Estella stiffened. He realized for the first time in all the great commotion that she wore a faded, wet apron. “And I apologize for calling you vile, a heinous monster, and related to snakes,” she said through tight lips.
“I apologize for calling you a ‘sweet baggage,’” he conceded.
She waited with one eyebrow arched for a further apology. Unfortunately, he refused to give her satisfaction.
“Please excuse us, Mr. Harris,” Estella said at some length. “Cecelia, Amelia, please go to your chambers. Or do I need to dare you to? Perhaps I should dare you to have proper manners as well?”
Lucere couldn’t stop his bark of laughter. He received a vicious glower from Estella.
He had to admit, she was glorious when she was angry. His mind ventured somewhere very lurid, where she straddled his naked body and turned all that anger into desire-fueled vigor.
“Mr. Stephens, I would like to speak with you,” she said. “Alone.”
Estella lifted a brow. She mustn’t have missed Lucere’s start of surprise.
“Why don’t you dry yourself?” she said in saccharine, almost seductive tones, and then added, “And I’ll retrieve our family Bible.”
Chapter Six
* * *
In Lucere’s chamber, Harris dressed his master as Lucere checked on the state of his signet ring and diamond jewelry for his German princess. As he inspected the diamonds, he thought how lovely they would appear on Estella. Her pale coloring and glittery eyes—especially when she was angry—would complement them nicely. But then, Estella could make a necklace strung of pebbles and rubbish appear beautiful.
“Wasn’t she stunning?” he told Harris. “And the fire in her eyes? I felt it all the way down to my, well, love apparatus.”
“She is very formidable when crossed,” the man conceded, straightening the shoulders on Lucere’s coat. “Might I suggest a little humility when dealing with her now? Perhaps make no mention of your love apparatus.”
“Good God, Harris, you must think me a simpleton indeed. I wouldn’t dream of mentioning the old merrymaker at this juncture.” But he couldn’t leave Harris with peace of mind. “Unless, of course, she were to touch upon the subject.”
* * *
Lucere found Estella sitting on the sofa in the parlor, hugging a Bible to her chest. A pile of letters rested in her lap. The burning candles on the side table cast her face in golden light. She had brushed her hair into a tight bun and removed her apron. Tension, imbued with hurt and sadness, charged the air. It made him swallow any comic, sardonic comments he would have normally made on such an occasion.
He sat carefully beside her, leaving a full three-inch gap between their bodies, which she increased to eight or so by scooting down. She brushed an errant strand of hair behind her ear, opened her Bible, and placed it in the space between them.
Nothing akin to having a Bible for a chaperone, Lucere quipped to himself.
On the page was penned a family tree. She moved her fingers along the branches. “This was my great-uncle, the eighth Duke of Lucere.” Her finger ran across the page, past five of the duke’s siblings. “This is my grandfather Lord Maxim.”
Good God! She was The Despicable Uncle’s granddaughter!
Although a great-uncle to Lucere, Lord Maxim was known to every family member as The Despicable Uncle—a libertine o
f such low character that he would appall the very devil. One did not bring up The Despicable Uncle to his mother or grandmother unless in close proximity to smelling salts. And one certainly did not mention Lord Maxim in polite society. The exploits of today’s most-hardened London rakes (Lucere, Starlingham, and Mowne) paled to Lord Maxim’s reprehensible achievements. Lucere’s great-grandfather had exiled him from the family. His portrait removed from the gallery. All ties severed from the notorious rogue.
Naturally, Lucere was compared to The Despicable Uncle.
Estella, however, clearly didn’t remember the man the way society did. She wore a misty smile as she spoke of him. “My father died shortly after the twins were born. We moved into this home with my grandparents. Grandpapa was the most kind, loving man. I do not know a better gentleman.
“Truly?” Lucere said, unable to hide his incredulity.
Estella waxed on. “He always hid treats for me in his pockets. For my seventh birthday, he had a miniature cart made for me, so small it could be driven by goats. I drove all around Lesser Puddlebury.” She chuckled. “And how he flirted with Grandmama. He adored her.”
As he gazed at her lovely profile, this revelation had a different effect than he would have anticipated. Instead of feeling shock or even disgust, a primitive possessiveness filled him: She was his forever. They shared the same blood. He could never lose her now.
Why did he feel this way? For God’s sake, she ran a lodging house and traced her line back to the family villain. For an entire day, he had assumed with good reason that she was a light-skirts. He couldn’t introduce her to his mother or bring her around to the respectable drawing rooms of London.
Estella continued on, unaware of the epic, earth-shifting emotions he was suffering. “Grandpapa loved a fine joke, but about the Primrose family name he was always very serious. If ever I got in trouble as a child, which was a great deal, mind you, I was rather a spirited child.”
“I can well believe it,” he said, remembering the fire in her face.
She turned her head to look at him. Her dreamy smile bathed him like the summer sun.
“He would say, ‘You are a Primrose, young lady. Primrose Princesses—he called me a princess—do not hide pigs in their bedchamber.’”
“You hid a pig in your bedchamber?”
“To save her from slaughter. I even gave Lucie—yes, I named her after the Duke of Lucere, shhh, don’t tell your acquaintance—a robe to sleep in. But she was a chubby, happy thing and didn’t fit in it. So, I took one of Mama’s ball gowns. It suited her quite nicely.”
“Very thoughtful of you.”
“So considerate.” She laughed. He fought the urge to touch her small ear and let his finger travel down the line of her jaw.
“What happened to Lucie?” he asked.
“I cried and cried and then cried some more to Grandpapa. He relented and told me Lucie would be mine, but I had to take care of her else we would have Lucie for Easter dinner. I daresay he didn’t think I was up to the task.”
“Were you?”
She raised her chin. “Yes. Faithfully, every day. Wading in the mud to feed her. I’m happy to say that Lucie died of old age.”
“You are truly awe-inspiring.”
Her face fell. She must have thought he was making jest of her.
“I’m not trifling with you, Miss Primrose. You have a lovely heart.”
She continued to gaze at him with suspicion and then edged farther away. She picked up one of the franked letters in her lap and held it near the candle so that he could read his name inscribed in his secretary’s neat hand.
“I have recently begun to correspond with the duke.” Her shoulders sloped. “Pray, in truth, I enjoy a correspondence with his secretary.”
Lucere had nothing to say. He had inherited his father’s secretary, Richard Fellows, and, like his father, trusted Fellows, imprudently it seemed, to alert him only to important matters.
“What—what do you write to his secretary?”
Her face darkened. “The duke is very busy. But he is a generous man, I-I’m given to understand. But you know the Duke of Lucere from Oxford. You must know of his benevolent and kind nature. You must.”
She appeared to be imploring him for reassurance of the duke’s character, desiring Lucere to affirm all the good qualities that she had endowed her cousin.
What had she written him about? Damn Fellows. He and his secretary would enjoy a tête-à-tête upon Lucere’s return to London. From now on, every little word Estella penned would go directly to him. In fact, every incoming correspondence would pass his desk, in case other relatives were being as poorly treated as she’d been.
“My impression of the duke”—Lucere carefully chose his words—“is that he is a man of many faults—many stupid, careless, horrible faults. But, upon my last meeting with him, the duke was making strides to be worthy of his title. I feel he wants to be a… a better man. A much better man.”
His words did little to reassure his newfound cousin. In fact, she made a forlorn-sounding squeak.
“And... and you should know that I have spoken to the duchess,” she said. “It was years ago. Very well, if you must know, I was six. I was visiting London with my grandparents—remember, my London travel I told you about.”
“Ah yes.” Why did this little admission break his heart? Had she been trapped in Puddlepiss her entire life?
“My grandpapa and I were strolling in Hyde Park when he said, ‘Ho now, there is the Duchess of Lucere!’ He hurried me over and presented me. I was so nervous when I performed the curtsy. I wanted to be perfect, for the duchess was the most regal, most majestic lady I had ever seen. And the duke—the current Duke of Lucere—was there. He was a boy, of course.” Her face tensed as she peered into her memories. “I remember he looked rather sad, which I thought was odd. Why should a future duke be sad? He held a kite, and I asked if he wanted to fly it, hoping to cheer him up. It was a beautiful kite.” She said no more, leaving the story hanging like an unfinished song, the chord sequence unresolved.
But he knew how it had ended that day in the park. Catherine had died a year before. As he’d strolled along the paths behind his mother and new nurse, he had felt lost, despondent, and, most of all, guilty. He remembered the young girl in blue frocks so clearly. How readily she had smiled, contrasting with his gloominess. He had wanted to give her his kite and run with her. But then his mother tugged his arm. “Come, my lord, we shall be late for callers,” she said, refusing to acknowledge the shameless interlopers who dared to claim their acquaintance.
So that had been Estella and The Despicable Uncle all those years ago.
Estella collected her letters and her Bible. “I’m not a so-called bald-faced liar, but I did bend the facts. That is unworthy of a Primrose, and I’m very sorry. I hope you will accept my apologies.” She rose.
“Wait!”
He knew he should reveal his true identity, but he hesitated. She might slap his face, for years and years of abandonment. For letters he didn’t return. For the kite they never flew together. He couldn’t tell her the truth in the same day he had mistakenly thought her a low prostitute and treated her as such.
He fell to his knees and seized her elbow. “I’m sorry that I questioned your morals. I’m sorry that I called you a swindler. I’m sorry that I acted like an ars—a horse’s backside. I’m humbly sorry. Please forgive me.”
She gazed at him, her brows lifted, lips parted. He must have appeared crazed in his desperation for mercy, because she broke into laughter.
“I admit, you were very entertaining,” she said.
“I must be good for something.” Then he blurted, “Why aren’t you married? You’re beautiful. You are the most ravishing lady I have ever seen.” Humiliation and self-loathing had loosened the old tongue. If she thought him impertinent before, now she would consider him a lovesick bedlamite.
“You think I’m ravishing?” She spoke in the same voice she might h
ave used to ask, You think fairies exist and live in your hat?
“Exquisite. Stunning. You should have been shackled long before now and to a very protective and jealous husband.”
The laughter in her eyes vanished. She withdrew her hand from his. “It’s a difficult situation.”
“A secret love?” He came to his feet. “Hidden engagement?” He was being impolite, but he was curious. She was a mystery he was determined to solve.
After all, she was his second cousin. He had familial duty toward her.
“I wish it were the case.” She appeared tired, her face aging years in a space of a few seconds. “Let me make you some honey and mint tea.”
“That won’t be necessary. Why don’t you rest?”
She shook her head. “I’ve kept you in the rain, and I don’t want you to catch a chill. It will take only a few minutes.”
“Thank you, but truly I really wish to sleep now.”
“Well then, please bundle yourself up tonight. There are extra blankets in the wardrobe. Do you require anything else for your health and comfort?”
Lucere stifled the reply he wanted to make, which was, Yes, I require holding you close to me. Instead, he said, “No, thank you.”
“Good night, then.”
She performed a bob-like curtsy and strolled toward the door, stifling a yawn. He didn’t want to part from her. Something else needed to be said. The song hadn’t reached its coda.
“Miss Primrose.”
She turned.
“You truly are the most beautiful lady I have ever met. And not just your face. A gentle, warm light shines around you. Rest assured that I don’t say this in any way to trifle with your affections or make you feel beholden to me. I’m very sincere when I say you are aptly named, a radiant star.”
Dukes In Disguise Page 17
