All I Want for Christmas Is a Duke

by Vivienne Lorret

  “You might have gone with them.” Part of her wished he had. Then she might have avoided this feeling of an old wound being torn open, and she might have avoided the sheer breathlessness he conjured from her even after all these years.

  He shrugged, his broad shoulders settling deeper into the squabs. “I might have. We were just deciding what to do when your coachman offered me a ride. It was clear, though, that you couldn’t accommodate all of us.”

  No, not in the small conveyance she’d been allotted for this trip. The current earl had taken his larger coach to Hampshire.

  “I do thank you for your kindness in allowing me to ride with you,” Kingsbury added. Such perfect courtesy, just as she remembered from him.

  “You do know we’re making for Worthington Manor.” Obligation forced her to point out their direction, which would lengthen his journey in the end, if indeed he’d been headed toward Gloucester.

  His smile chased the shadows from the cab. “A dashed sight better than freezing in my own coach. Or even sheltering in some dingy village public house.”

  “I wonder if you’ll agree when we arrive.”

  “Why?” The lines about those blue eyes crinkled as his grin broadened. “Have the servants all fled?”

  Patience suppressed an urge to place her hand over her heart. His low, friendly tone, as if they’d been sharing some private joke, only made her pulse trip over itself. “Something like that. The earl is not in residence, but I can put you up in the dower house.”

  The steady clicking of Linnet’s knitting needles broke off for a moment, and she sniffed, turning a stiff-­lipped glare on Patience. Patience raised her chin and met the stare head-­on. She was no longer some green girl a handsome young man of high station could dazzle.

  If Kingsbury noticed Linnet’s reaction, he made no comment. “I shall be grateful for whatever hospitality you can offer. Despite my title, I am not utterly dependent on an army of servants at my beck and call every moment of the day. In fact—­” He captured Patience’s gaze and held it. Her heart, blast it all, fluttered just as it had when she was nineteen and easily dazzled. “I shall look upon this as an adventure.”

  THE LAST THING Nathaniel Westlake, the seventh Duke of Kingsbury, had expected for Christmas was a punch to the gut. Not only that, but one delivered by a lady.

  But that was exactly what it felt like to see Miss—­ No.

  She was Lady Worthington now. He must remember that, even if the rest of her matched the image she’d graven in his mind. Black hair, hidden beneath a staid bonnet, and flawless pale skin set off a pair of striking green eyes and lush lips. The years had been kind to her. If anything, she was more beautiful now than when he’d first met her. When she was a young baron’s daughter from the country who had just made her bow.

  She sat across from him, her spine straight, one might even say rigid, her hands folded, holding some manner of silent conversation with her maid. No doubt the maid disapproved, if the jerky movement of the woman’s knitting needles indicated anything.

  No doubt, as well, Lady Worthington would win this particular argument. The set of her jaw told him as much.

  And thank God for that. Nathaniel had no eagerness whatever to knock about an empty manor house waiting for the weather to clear, when he might spend a few hours renewing an old acquaintance—­and if he was completely honest with himself, an old, unrequited desire. One he’d thought long buried, but it roared to life now, a spark set to dry tinder.

  “Where were you headed in such a storm?” That Lady Worthington broke the silence came as a shock. He’d sensed a hesitancy in her demeanor, one increased with the heavy burden of what might have been.

  “I was called to Town on a personal matter, but I’d hoped to make it back to my estate to surprise my boys on Christmas morning.”

  At the mention of his twin sons, her smile became fixed, deuce take it. “So they weren’t expecting you?”

  “No, thankfully.” One small blessing in this mess. He’d hate to disappoint a pair of small children on so important an occasion as Christmas morning. Instead, he had to face a decade-­old disappointment, one of his own making. “You said before that the earl is not in residence. I must confess my surprise that he didn’t include you in his Christmas plans.”

  “Oh, he offered.” She waved that thought away with a gloved hand. “I turned him down in favor of spending the holidays with my brother. I’d presents prepared for my nephews, but I suppose they’ll have to wait to open them. My old governess would approve. She firmly believed that denying oneself built character.”

  The maid’s snort temporarily drowned out the steady click of her wooden needles.

  Nathaniel cleared his throat. “How have you been keeping?”

  She inclined her head. “Just as you see me.”

  “I mean it. I’d really like to know.”

  Those grass-­green eyes widened. Clearly she’d interpreted his question as a social sort of device whose reply did not matter so long as it was given. But it did matter. Greatly.

  “I’ve a quiet enough life, as you shall see. I am content.”

  Content. There was a telling word. Not happy, merely content. But then, he couldn’t state any better for himself. “I am imagining you playing the doting auntie to your nephews.”

  “My governess would despair,” she said. “This Christmas aside, I’ve quite spoiled them. I suppose it’s for the best that I never had any children of my own.” A shadow seemed to pass across her face, there, then gone in an instant. “They’d be regular little scamps.”

  She looked hard at him, giving him the impression she was trying to communicate with him wordlessly, as she had with her maid. If nothing came of our association, if we both married elsewhere, it was for the best, her green gaze said. I left Worthington with no heir, and his title passed to his brother. I failed in my primary duty.

  If Nathaniel had secured his succession, he’d failed at marriage in his own way. God only knew he’d made an honest attempt with his wife, Olivia, despite her being his family’s choice. Miss Patience Wentworth had become Lady Worthington by then, to Nathaniel’s everlasting regret.

  And just as it had with Miss Wentworth, he’d run out of time when it had come to Olivia. They’d been wed less than a year when she’d succumbed to childbed fever within a week of presenting him with an heir and a spare. Fewer than twelve months was hardly sufficient to learn all there was to another person.

  Yet he’d spent even less time with the woman sitting across from him now. Less time and in less intimate circumstances, with chaperones—­indeed, with the rest of society—­scrutinizing his every move. How was it, then, that he felt he knew this woman far better than the one who’d shared the marriage bed with him? How did such a thing occur?

  For if he’d failed with Olivia, it was possibly because he’d never been able to push past the fact that she was not Miss Patience Wentworth.

  Now he found himself seated in a carriage, trundling through a snowstorm with a woman he’d thought lost to him forever, as if God, or fate, or whatever higher power oversaw his life had given him another chance.

  A chance to get it right.

  The only thing he needed was to determine if the lady still returned his interest.

  Chapter Two

  THE FIRST TIME the future Duke of Kingsbury had placed his hand on Miss Patience Wentworth’s, the contract had electrified her. Even through the barrier of gloves, the touch had shot through her like a spark popping up a chimney. Surely that couldn’t have been right. Surely it couldn’t have been proper. But the next time the dance had brought them together, it had happened again. And then again.

  Surely such an event shouldn’t repeat itself ten years later before her front door. But the moment the duke handed her out of the carriage, she once again experienced that old, familiar jolt. For a moment, she was back in that
ballroom, twirling beneath the chandeliers in a white satin gown, her skirt belling about her ankles. Anticipating the next touch. Hoping he’d ask her for another dance once an appropriate interval had elapsed.

  Now, watching his reaction from beneath the brim of her bonnet, she pulled her hand away. Had he felt it, too? Indeed, had he ever felt more than a passing attraction for her? That shatterproof façade of correctness made it all the more difficult to read him.

  Oh, he’d danced with her, often enough to raise eyebrows and set tongues wagging. Enough that after several social events during which he’d sought her company, his sister had pulled her aside and warned her off in no uncertain terms.

  “A future duke and the daughter of a country baron?” Lady Diana Westlake had waved a very expensive fan before her nose, as if to wave off an unpleasant scent. Patience had to think the gesture had been a comment on the cleanliness of her hems and the soles of her dancing slippers. “It simply isn’t done. Put the thought from your mind this very moment.”

  But Patience hadn’t been able to. By the end of that very first reel, she’d been certain of one thing—­she was completely and utterly smitten with the marquess.

  For all the good it had done her.

  The door to the dower house flew open, pulling her from her memories.

  “Oh, my lady. Thank the heavens.” Heedless of the blowing snow, Jane bolted over the threshold. She bunched her apron in her fists and gave the innocent fabric a hard twist. “When the wind started t’ howling, I was that certain ye’d overturned into a ditch.”

  Patience placed her hands on the maid’s shoulders and gently pushed her back into the entrance hall. “Why are you not up at the manor enjoying the servants’ ball?”

  “Oh, I couldn’t’ve. Not with this storm and my worriting over yer fate ’n all.”

  Patience encouraged her maid to advance to make room for Linnet and the duke. “As you can see, we’re perfectly fine. The carriage didn’t turn over once.”

  Jane craned her neck to peer past Patience. “ ’Tis a good thing I’m here though, when ye’ve brought company back with ye.”

  A very good thing. The soft glow of a fire beckoned from the sitting room. In a few hours, the feeling might even return to Patience’s toes. “Yes, Jane. We’ll need to make up the guest room. The Duke of Kingsbury will be staying with us until the weather breaks.”

  Jane let out a screech and backed up, nearly tripping over her feet in her haste to drop into a curtsy. “Yer Grace. My stars, ye’ll forgive me, but I’m sure as we haven’t anything fit for a duke’s table. And at Christmas.”

  Smiling, Kingsbury stepped forward. “Anything you were planning on having yourself will be splendid. I shall be indebted to your mistress for her hospitality.”

  “If you’d put the kettle on for some tea, I’d be grateful,” Patience said, though her mind was already preoccupied with the contents of the pantry. “We can sup on one of the meat pies I was taking to my brother’s.” Accompanied with some cheese and pickles, the fare would be simple but filling. “Linnet, if you’ll see about the guest bedchamber, we might vacate the hall and let the coachman bring in our trunks.”

  “If it please you, my lady, I should like to consult you on that very matter.”

  If it please? Patience blinked. After so many years, Linnet almost never behaved this formally, and unlike Jane, she wasn’t about to allow a title to turn her head. Linnet stared back, a telling glint in her eye.

  With a nod to Kingsbury, Patience waved her hand toward the sitting room. “You’ll pardon me for a few moments. Please, make yourself comfortable. Jane will bring you tea. Or perhaps we ought to send up to the manor for the good brandy?”

  “Do not trouble yourself,” Kingsbury replied. His rich baritone settled into her chest, more warming than any fire. “I wouldn’t dream of complaining about the accommodations, and that’s before I consider the alternative.”

  Patience found herself returning his smile. How easy it would be to slip back into the skin of that bedazzled young girl from the country. She pulled herself away and mounted the stairs, catching up with Linnet in front of the linen cupboard.

  “Since when do you need to consult with me on a matter of clean sheets?” Patience kept her voice low for fear it would carry down to the ground floor.

  Clearly in no need of advice, Linnet turned, a pile of bedding in her arms. “Just what do you think you’re about?”

  Patience gaped. All that was missing was the young lady on the end. “What gives you the idea I’m planning anything? The man was in a pickle, and we extended him some kindness. It was the least we could do.”

  Linnet looked away for a moment. “Your pardon, my lady. I forget myself. It’s only that I’ve been with you so long.”

  “And since you know me to be of good character and reputation, you ought to think nothing scandalous will come of his staying with us.”

  “Under normal circumstances I would agree with you,” Linnet insisted. “But I haven’t forgotten what that man meant to you, and I haven’t forgotten the way he broke your heart.”

  “Do you think I have? I am no longer that naïve little chit.”

  “I am not entirely certain.” Linnet hugged the pile of sheets to her chest. “I couldn’t help but note the way you looked at each other in the carriage. If that man’s intentions are honorable, I’m the Prince Regent.”

  A wash of heat rushed up Patience’s cheeks. She ought to reply. Ought to set Linnet down, but the words refused to come. At any rate, she could hardly come up with a convincing counterargument. She’d been unable to tear her gaze away from Kingsbury, and he certainly hadn’t passed the journey home staring out the window either.

  Thankfully, thuds on the staircase announced the imminent arrival of the coachman. He heaved the duke’s trunk to the landing. Patience stared at the Kingsbury crest emblazoned on the top. That his private belongings were in her house, about to disappear into the spare bedchamber . . .

  Well, the intimacy of the situation was not lost on Patience. In fact, the import of all she was considering struck her straight in the midsection. Kingsbury would occupy that bed tonight, mere feet away from her. Almost as if they’d married.

  Linnet’s expression softened. Once the coachman thumped back down the steps, she said, “I’ll allow as to how you never had a chance to learn the true pleasures of marriage.”

  The last thing Patience wanted to recall was her husband’s fumbling. Her marriage bed had known discomfort at best without even the joy of motherhood to compensate. Deep in her heart, she knew her notions of conjugal bliss would be more than vague ideas if Kingsbury had offered for her hand.

  Something devilish in her prodded her to respond. “Perhaps now that I’m a widow, I should reap the benefits.”

  Linnet sighed. “But can you do that and yet guard your heart? I’d hate for you to go through that sadness a second time.”

  “So would I,” Patience admitted.

  By the end of her one London Season, she had hoped to receive an offer. But after a month of routs, balls, social calls, and flowers, the future duke’s family had voiced their disapproval of the match through Diana. Their relationship might have surmounted that obstacle, but it had not survived her father’s death.

  With a heavy heart, she’d overseen the packing of her ball gowns and returned to the country. With each passing day, she’d hoped for a letter or, indeed, any sign that Kingsbury had developed the sort of affection that led to a proposal.

  The day of the burial had come and gone with no sign. A month later, Diana had sought her out one final time to voice words that had echoed through Patience’s mind like the thump of a coffin’s lid closing.

  He never cared for you. The words, spoken in a false, friendly tone, as if Diana had been feeding her tidbits of the latest gossip, had burned through Patience’s brain, cold as a
cid. You were nothing but an amusement to him. A trifle. He’s gone, you know. Gone to amuse himself in Italy with our brother.

  After that encounter, she’d faced reality and laid aside, along with her dolls and the other trappings of childhood, her dream of being styled the Duchess of Kingsbury.

  She could only live up to her name for so long, after all. It had been time to grow up. Time to do her duty. And that had meant forgetting silly notions like infatuations, no matter how much it had hurt.

  LADY WORTHINGTON WAS too young to be a widow. The thought first took hold of Nathaniel at supper, and it continued to peck at him throughout the meal. He focused on the smoothness of her hand as she lifted her wineglass and noted the soft fullness of her lips as she swallowed a bite of her meat pie.

  He knew of her situation the way one knows a fact one learned in school. Paris is the capital of France. Half one hundred gives fifty. Twelve pence make a shilling.

  A woman should not be widowed at twenty-­nine—­not any more than he’d expected to lose his own wife so soon after their wedding.

  On a cold, intellectual level he knew.

  But her youth didn’t strike him in the gut until he followed her from the dining room to take a seat on the most stiff-­backed settee he’d ever encountered. He glanced about her sitting room: murky green wallpaper flecked with chinoiserie and peeling about the edges, faded brocade upholstery, heavy velvet draperies over the windows. It was a place for an old lady to pass her remaining years in peace.

  He raised his glass of brandy to his lips, and the liquor coursed into his belly on a wave of warmth. Lady Worthington sank into a shield-­backed chair—­Hepplewhite, if Nathaniel wasn’t mistaken, and every bit as uncomfortable as this damnable settee. She gazed into the fire, the flicker from the hearth gilding her flawless complexion.

  Too young, but that was what happened when a chit not many years beyond the schoolroom married someone thirty years her senior.

  She should have married you.

  He drowned that particular annoying voice in more brandy, because he might have lost her, as well, after too brief a time. Olivia’s passing had been heart-­wrenching enough. He could not have borne losing a wife he’d chosen himself.