The Way to a Duke's Heart: The Truth About the Duke

by Caroline Linden

  “You have found me out,” said Tessa dryly. “I did plan to drive like a manic to Mells and risk death and dismemberment, but now I shall have to reconsider.”

  “That sort of driving is no fun at all unless you are racing someone else, in any event,” murmured Lord Gresham.

  “Perhaps we should each hire a carriage and see,” she replied before she could stop herself.

  But Gresham only laughed and turned back to Eugenie, who was looking uncertainly between them. “Are you also going to Mells, Mrs. Bates?”

  Eugenie hesitated. “I prefer not to,” she said carefully, glancing sideways at Tessa as she spoke. “I worry about Mrs. Neville going alone, and it is my duty to look after her, but I confess . . . I do not look forward to it.”

  No, Eugenie didn’t want to go, and had only agreed to go because Louise became hysterical at the thought of her sister driving around Somerset alone. Tessa gave a mental sigh and surrendered. Let this be part of her penance for being rude. “There is no need,” she told her companion. “Since Lord Gresham has so kindly offered to go with me, you needn’t come along. Perhaps you might enjoy that new novel you brought from Bath.”

  “Yes, indeed!” Eugenie smiled in gratitude. “You will drive safely, won’t you, my lord?”

  “As safely as Mrs. Neville desires,” he said with a grin. He turned back to her. “Would an hour from now suit you?”

  Tessa agreed, and soon after Lord Gresham left. Eugenie could barely speak, she was so pleased. “Do you see, dear, how very charming he can be?” she cried, fluttering her fan in front of her pink face.

  “Yes.”

  “And how kind! How very convenient it was that he planned to go to Mells today, just as you did, and then offer to escort you!”

  “He is not escorting me,” Tessa reminded her. “We are going on the same business, at the same time. I know what you’re thinking, Eugenie, and you must stop.”

  The other woman gaped at her, then assumed a pious expression. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, dear. I worried for your safety, that’s all.”

  Tessa shook her head. She knew how Eugenie’s mind worked, and could almost hear the hopeful thoughts racing through her head at the possible outcomes of her drive with the earl. Eugenie was very fond of novels and fairy tales, where the lonely maiden fell in love with a handsome hero. If there existed a more perfectly handsome hero than the Earl of Gresham, Tessa couldn’t imagine him, but she was no helpless maiden in search of a hero. “Then we are all satisfied. I shan’t be alone, and you shall have a peaceful day of reading.” What Lord Gresham would gain, she didn’t know, but he also seemed pleased by the arrangement.

  Eugenie’s smile was proof she held out very high hopes indeed, whatever Tessa said. “Yes, dear. I am quite satisfied.”

  Charlie thought his morning’s visit couldn’t have gone better. By careful effort he managed not to look at Mrs. Neville, and to pretend she was not a beautiful woman he wanted something from. It seemed to work, since she spoke to him without any of her previous frosty manner. Even better, she agreed to drive with him to Mells, which meant he could tackle two problems at once.

  First, he would have his introduction to Hiram Scott. Without the slightest idea what connected him to Durham or Dorothy, Charlie had decided a straight-on approach would be best. The man’s reaction to his sudden appearance would tell him a great deal, if not betray him altogether. It would also drive home to Scott that his secret was out, and perhaps lead him to negotiate a deal where he handed over any proof he had about Dorothy Cope, and in exchange Charlie would keep Gerard from killing him.

  But second, he would have Mrs. Neville to himself for the drive each way. Charlie couldn’t deny an unwarranted thrill of anticipation. He could try to tease more information about Scott from her. And even if those efforts failed, he would still have almost two hours to wheedle his way into her good graces, where he was increasingly interested in being. Tessa Neville was uncommonly attractive when she smiled.

  He called for her at the appointed time, pleased to find her ready and waiting. Her dark green pelisse highlighted her unusual eyes, and Charlie barely stopped himself from complimenting her. With a brief touch of hands, she stepped up into the gig he’d hired, and they were off, bowling down the road toward Mells.

  “Thank you for offering to accompany me,” she said. Her gloved hands were folded in her lap, and she stayed primly at her end of the seat.

  “No trouble at all,” he said, reminding himself again not to engage in empty pleasantries. “In fact, I hoped I might ask a favor of you in return.”

  “Oh?” He felt her glance, and hoped Mrs. Bates’s advice was worthwhile.

  “I’ve only recently begun inquiring into canals,” he said, raising his voice as the wheels rattled over loose stone on the road. It was a miracle any commerce at all was conducted around here, with the roads as they were. Mrs. Bates had been right to be concerned about the drive to Mells, but he kept the thought to himself. “I’ve come to see Mr. Scott, but have never met the man. Might I ask your impression of him?”

  She had a way of pursing her lips that was very appealing. Charlie could see it from the corner of his eye, and had to concentrate very hard on the horse’s ears to keep from turning to admire it more openly. “He is very clever at choosing the best way to present his plans,” she said after a moment. “I don’t wonder that he’s been so successful in recruiting investors.”

  “Is he an honest man?” He wondered if she would tell him the truth. He wondered if she knew it.

  “I’ve no reason to think otherwise,” she said in some surprise.

  “And yet you’ve come all the way into Somerset to see for yourself.” He dared a quick glance at her. “What doubts do you have?”

  “He wants a great deal of money,” she said tartly. “I don’t want my brother to be taken advantage of.”

  How interesting that she was here to protect her brother; normally it would be the other way around. Charlie began to see why Mrs. Bates had advised him to treat her like a man. “I see. But what precisely in Scott’s plans do you question?”

  “Everything.”

  “Everything,” he repeated in astonishment. “You must have quite a store of knowledge to question every last detail of the canal.”

  “Not every last detail,” she said with an exasperated glance at him. “A canal is a complex project. There are landowners who must be appeased by the track of the canal. Investors don’t always make their contributions. There are engineering difficulties to overcome, with tunnels and aqueducts. This canal traverses quite a drop, and will depend on reliable locks. Then there are problems with money, wages, workers . . . There are quite a lot of ways it could run into trouble.”

  Good Lord. Charlie had no desire to engage in a point by point analysis. He didn’t give a damn about the canal or its engineering, only about Hiram Scott. And, in a different way, about Tessa Neville. “Yet canals have been very rewarding in this shire.” It hadn’t been hard to learn that much. “Surely they’ve learned ways around the difficulties.”

  “That is precisely why I’m wary. It’s become almost accepted fact that canals are prosperous, therefore investing in a canal, any canal, is a wise decision.”

  “You don’t agree.” He didn’t need to ask.

  “I don’t accept everyone else’s opinion as fact, no.”

  “What is your inclination in this case?”

  “I wouldn’t have come this far if I were inclined against it,” she replied.

  “So you expect to make the investment,” he persisted.

  She hesitated. “Yes, I believe it will turn out to be prudent. Mr. Scott’s numbers are compelling and impressive. I just need to be sure.” There was no waver in her voice, just plain confidence.

  “Because you don’t quite trust him,” said Charlie, to provoke her.

&nb
sp; “I don’t completely trust anyone who wants money from me, my lord.”

  He glanced at her before he could stop himself. She sat facing forward, a composed, neatly contained woman. Her pale green eyes surveyed the road in front of them; she didn’t look at him. But with the sun on her face, gleaming on the dark curls that escaped her bonnet, Charlie wondered that any man could think of money when looking at her.

  “I think you don’t completely trust anyone,” he said on impulse.

  Her gaze flew to meet his, flashing fire. Her lovely mouth compressed, then eased. “Why should I?” she replied evenly. “Do you trust everyone, sir?”

  He laughed. “Not everyone, no. But I don’t immediately assume every man I meet is untrustworthy.”

  She turned away, facing forward once more. “Nor do I.”

  Charlie looked at her serene profile for a moment. “Yes, you do.”

  Instead of becoming indignant, she merely sighed and gave a slight shake of her head. “As you like.”

  “You are the wariest woman I’ve ever met,” he went on. “And I cannot decide if you merely dislike me, or if you fear I have nefarious designs upon Mrs. Bates.”

  A faint pink suffused her cheeks, but her expression didn’t change. “You heard what I said at the hotel in Bath, when you arrived, for which I am very sorry. I can only plead a short temper, made worse by the discomforts of travel, and offer a humble apology.”

  “You should,” he told her. “Normally it takes people at least a half hour’s conversation to decide how indolent I am.”

  “Yes.” She slanted him a look. “So I see.”

  He grinned. “Precisely! Now at least I haven’t been convicted on prejudice, but on my own failings.”

  Her lips pursed up again, and finally a reluctant smile broke through. “Hardly, my lord.”

  “Perhaps, with diligent effort and enough time, I can improve my standing in your eyes,” he went on, enjoying himself now. “Next week I might appear merely shiftless, and the week after that lackadaisical. Why, dare I hope to rise so far as . . . benign?”

  This time she laughed, just a little. “You’re a silver-tongued serpent, aren’t you?”

  “Nonsense. I’m as harmless as a lamb,” he said solemnly.

  Those bright green eyes narrowed on him. “I doubt that very much.”

  Charlie affected great shock. “Indeed! On what evidence, madam?”

  He thought he had her there. He’d been the soul of propriety and good manners—exquisite manners, even—toward her and her companion. She looked at him, hesitating, and he grinned in triumph.

  “You’re too charming,” she said at last.

  “Flattery, madam!” he exclaimed in glee. “First indolence, now charm! You mustn’t accuse me of such things, I may expire of the shock and drive us off the road.”

  “I am ready to take the reins at any sign of infirmity.” She smiled as she said it, and Charlie almost did drive off the road. Tessa Neville’s eyes glowed with sly mirth and her lips curved in a wholly bewitching way when she was in the right humor. And by God, he liked it.

  “Which, I gather, you consider an excess of charm.”

  “In some cases, yes.”

  “And is that my chief failing, Mrs. Neville?” He kept his eyes trained forward, on the twitching left ear of the horse, but he could see his companion still. “You may tell me honestly—in fact, I hope you will.”

  The mirth faded from her face. She studied him for a moment, her gaze direct and clear. Mrs. Bates had one thing right: he certainly shouldn’t treat Mrs. Neville as he would any other woman. No one else looked at him so frankly. Charlie was used to a variety of female expressions—coyness, calculation, adoration, seduction—but he’d never felt as though he was being assessed as he was now. Not for the value of his title or the size of his income, not for his physical appearance or even for his reputation among the ton, but for something more. He had the sense Mrs. Neville was trying to decide if she could trust him, at least enough to answer his question honestly.

  “You puzzle me, my lord,” she said after a minute. Charlie kept his face bland but curious even as his heart sped up. “I cannot think of any connection between our families, but you’ve taken so strongly to Mrs. Bates.”

  “She reminds me of my aunt, whom I love very dearly.”

  “Do you not see your aunt often?”

  “Every other week, during the Season.”

  One corner of her mouth puckered in bemusement. “Then you’re not expiring from the lack of company. What can you possibly mean by lavishing attention on Mrs. Bates?”

  “May I not enjoy her company? She seems to welcome it,” he parried, beginning to wish she would turn that incisive gaze away. He could feel it cutting into him even without facing it head-on.

  “She could not possibly be more delighted by it,” said Mrs. Neville, a bit dryly. “I don’t wish to be rude, but it festers in my mind. Why us? What about her, or about me, attracted your attention and keeps it fixed on us?”

  “Do you think yourself not worth my attention?” he asked.

  “No,” she said frankly. “Not at all. My family doesn’t know yours. We’ve never met. I have nothing you could want, no advantage I could offer you, and Eugenie has even less—unless you are perishing for want of someone to debate the latest style in bonnets or the newest Minerva Press novel. And yet you wait on us as if you desperately need something from us.”

  Charlie thought a moment, then took the risk. Either this woman was the most accomplished actress since Sarah Siddons or she knew nothing about any blackmail. “Perhaps I do, Mrs. Neville.” He glanced at her sideways as he spoke, and caught the spark of satisfaction in her eyes at his words, followed closely by suspicion. “No great thing. It’s mere happenstance you’re the one I must ask it of.” They had reached Mells, and Charlie slowed the horse, turning toward the ironworks. Scott’s factory was obvious, the tall chimneys rising above the thatched roofs of the little village.

  “Well, what is it?” asked the woman beside him as they circled through the wrought-iron gates into the yard of the factory. It was a gracious but solid stone edifice, obviously prosperous, with a wide arched door and lines of clean windows. A carved wooden sign swung on an arm, bearing the title SCOTT & SWYNNE, IRON MANUFACTORS. It didn’t look at all like a blackmailer’s lair.

  He pulled up the horse in front of the entrance and set the brake. Distant clangs of metal on metal echoed from within, although they seemed out of place with the offices in front of them. He turned to look at her. Mrs. Bates had been right; flummery would get him nowhere with this woman. She was still watching him with the same direct, almost probing gaze as before. She’d never forgive him if he tried to manipulate her or lied to her, and inexplicably, undeniably, Charlie wanted her to like him. And as for what he wanted from her . . . “All I ask is an introduction to Hiram Scott.”

  Chapter 7

  Tessa’s mouth dropped open. “An introduction?” she repeated stupidly. Of all the things she might have expected him to say, that wasn’t one of them. It was ridiculous. He was a wealthy earl. He didn’t need her to introduce him to anyone, let alone a factory owner.

  “Yes.” Lord Gresham jumped down from the gig and gave her a faint smile. “Too demanding?”

  It made her suspicious all over again, which was too bad. She’d almost begun to like the man. Tessa smoothed her face and let him help her down. “Not at all,” she said. “I would be happy to introduce you to him.” It would add more to her stock with Mr. Scott than it would to Lord Gresham’s, but if he thought this was a favor she did him, so be it.

  Mr. Scott was waiting. Tessa smiled as he came across the clerk’s office to take her hand. “Mrs. Neville,” he said. “I trust your drive out was pleasant?”

  “Yes,” she said. Until Lord Gresham’s last, puzzling, request, she’d enjoyed the d
rive more than expected. “In fact, I was fortunate enough to meet a gentleman who also wishes to see your plans, and he kindly drove with me. May I introduce you to him?”

  Mr. Scott’s eyebrows went up, but he was pleased. “Capital! By all means. Is this the gentleman?”

  Tessa turned, thinking the earl was still outside, and started when she realized he’d been right behind her, silent as a shadow. How odd. She would have expected him to step forward at once, not wait for her to speak. “Yes,” she said. “My lord, may I present Mr. Scott. Mr. Scott, this is the Earl of Gresham.”

  As Tessa had known it would, Scott’s attention swung from her to Lord Gresham and didn’t swing back. “An honor to make your acquaintance, my lord,” he said cordially, making a crisp bow.

  Gresham, she couldn’t help noticing, barely bowed his head in reply. “And I, yours,” he said, in a different voice than she had ever heard from him. He sounded harder, colder, and not charming at all. There wasn’t a trace of his wicked grin, and he was looking at Mr. Scott as if he wished to bore a hole in the man.

  What had happened? A few minutes ago he’d been smiling and teasing her, and now he looked every inch the merciless aristocrat. Tessa frowned a little. Which was the true man? Perhaps they were all part of him. She stole another peek at him, and wondered why he chose to show her his charming, persistently friendly side.

  “Why, I daresay I don’t deserve the honor!” Scott was so pleased, he seemed not to notice how grim Lord Gresham’s face had become. “Have you heard of our canal works, or do you have a need for iron?”

  Lord Gresham didn’t speak for a moment, just stared hard at Scott. “The canal,” he finally said in the same wintry tone. “But I won’t interrupt your appointment with Mrs. Neville.”

  From the expression that flickered over his face, Mr. Scott would gladly have ignored Tessa for the rest of the day in favor of an earl, but he recovered well. “Of course not.” He swept out one hand. “Mrs. Neville has come for a tour, to ensure I don’t swindle her.” He chuckled. “You are very welcome to accompany us, my lord.”