A Duke Deceived

by Cheryl Bolen

  “Oh, Richard, I’m so dreadfully sorry. You’d have been better off had you never married me.”

  He did not respond.

  Dinner was a disaster. Bonny’s plans to display her husband in a happy domestic setting to his friends blew up in her face. No one could have looked more brooding than Radcliff did throughout dinner. He barely said two words. And every time one of the footmen passed his chair with a bottle of wine, he demanded another glass. By the time the men retired to Radcliff s billiard room, he was well on his way to a thorough foxing.

  At least the ladies’ assemblage in the salon lacked the awkwardness of her last dinner party with the unwanted Lady Lynda Heffington, Bonny thought, still holding back tears.

  Why had Richard been so dreadfully inhospitable? And the way he had looked at her! As if he could wring her neck. His wicked friends were sure to be more desirous than ever of removing him from so wretched a household.

  As the finely dressed women sat around on silken sofas discussing delicate topics, Lady Landis directed her gaze at Bonny. “I must say, marriage does not seem to agree with either you or your husband, Barbara.”

  Bonny, jolted from her reverie, shot a puzzled glance at her aunt.

  Lady Landis’s eyes danced. “Why, you’re getting as thin as a poker.”

  Her aunt was sharper than Bonny had given her credit for. Not even Marie had noticed how Bonny’s gown had begun to hang on her thinning frame. Ever since this estrangement from her husband, Bonny had lost interest in eating, to the degree that she sometimes felt physically ill at the sight of food. “It is probably just your imagination, Aunt.”

  “Bonny looks perfectly beautiful to me,” Emily said.

  To which Mrs. Miller and Cressida readily agreed.

  Bonny, sitting next to her cousin, placed her hand over Emily’s. “You never can see any fault with me.”

  “I suppose I am very loyal to those I care about,” Emily whispered. “Even if you haven’t been to see me of late.”

  “I’m sorry, Em. I have been feeling wretched lately.” Her face brightened. “I did come to see you twice, though, and both times you were riding in the park with Lord Dunsford .”

  “I...I had hoped he might be here tonight. Since you invited him the last time.”

  Bonny watched her cousin’s face carefully. And she knew. Emily had transferred her love for Harold to his brother.

  “I do wish William Clyde’s little wife could have been here tonight,” Mrs. Miller said.

  “Did I hear him telling you at dinner that she recently presented him with a second son?” Cressida asked.

  “Yes. She has been at her mother’s for her confinement.”

  “I think she should have been at her own house, with her husband,” Cressida said. “Instead of him carrying on in London as if he had no family and no responsibility. I told Mr. Twickingham my thoughts on the subject, and he quite agreed.”

  Poor Twigs, he would probably agree to anything Cressida said, Bonny thought. Cressida fairly well led him around by the nose. There was nary a thought in his head that was not put there by the lovely blonde he had taken off the shelf.

  Lady Landis strode across the room, smiling, and reclaimed her seat next to her daughter. “These bloods appear to have little interest in the married state.”

  At this point, the men entered the salon.

  “Radcliff,” Lady Landis snapped, “don’t you find your wife getting thinner?”

  He turned to Bonny. He was still so angry he could have shaken his beautiful wife senseless. She must have sold the Radcliff Jewels—jewels that had been in his family for two hundred years—to pay her lover’s gaming debts. Everyone in London knew of Dunsford’s heavy losses. Radcliff’s s eyes swept over Bonny’s body. “You are correct, my lady.” He turned back to his friends. “Whist anyone?”

  “Mr. Twickingham has promised to teach me the finer points of the game,” Cressida said, removing herself from the sofa and strolling to Twigs’s side.

  There was enough interest for two tables. The four young men who took their gaming rather seriously sat at the other table. That group included Bonny’s cousin, Alfred, and the duke’s three friends.

  Not being particularly close to the duke’s circle, Stanley Moncrief stayed with the women and attempted to charm them.

  “Have you ever seen Richard’s hunting lodge in Scotland, your grace?” Stanley asked Bonny.

  “I did not even know of its existence,” Bonny said.

  Stanley got to his feet and held out his hand to Bonny. “Come, I will show you a painting of it.”

  He led her to Radcliff’s library. Over the blazing hearth hung an oil painting of a rather Tudorish two-story house nestled among fir trees, a blue stream running beside it. “Lovely, isn’t it?” Stanley said.

  Her eyes on the painting, Bonny nodded.

  “Like you,” Stanley said, encircling her with his arms as he bent to kiss Bonny.

  She tried to wriggle from his grasp. “Stop this!”

  Angered by her protest, Stanley grasped her slender arms with his bruising hands and pulled her to him, his mouth crushing hers.

  Bonny twisted her head frandcally, her lips tight, but she could not break from his hold. “I am married!” she shrieked.

  Stanley answered with a frightening laugh, his hands still painfully digging into her. “Your husband does not act like a married man. Everyone knows he does not plan to keep you. He has admitted that he made a mistake by not marrying his true love.”

  Bonny’s heart thundered. “His true love?”

  “Lady Heffington.”

  Seized by an overwhelming rage, Bonny found the strength to break from Stanley’s hold and slap him across the face.

  Just then her husband walked into the room.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Take that away, please!” Bonny demanded as Marie angled her way into the bedroom, balancing her mistress’s breakfast tray in one hand and attempting to close the door with the other.

  Marie glanced at Bonny sitting up in her bed, her face white as a ghost. Shrugging, she pivoted and turned to exit the room.

  “No! Get me something. Quick! I’m going to be sick,” Bonny said, tightening her palm over her mouth.

  Marie hastily put down the tray, ran to the dresser, removed the pot and brought it to Bonny, who began retching immediately while motioning for Marie to leave the room.

  III as she was, Bonny desired to spill the meager contents of her stomach in privacy. If there was one good thing about the estrangement with her husband, it was that he wouldn’t see her heaving and retching and turning blue.

  After giving Bonny a long enough period to be thoroughly sick, Marie came back into the room—minus the hot breakfast—and gave Bonny an appraising glance. “There now, yer grace,” Marie said tenderly, taking the pot from Bonny’s trembling hands. “Ye’ll be good as new in no time. Mrs. ’enson says ye’ll be back to yer old self before long.”

  “Mrs. Henson knows of my illness?”

  Marie set the pot outside the door and came back to stand at Bonny’s side. “Mrs. ’enson knows everything that goes on in Radcliff House.” The kindly maid wiped a gentle hand over Bonny’s damp forehead and smoothed away her mistress’s wayward strands of hair.

  “And how, pray tell, does she know precisely when I shall get well?”

  Marie held up a day dress she had selected from Bonny’s wardrobe and spoke matter-of-factly. “She had two babes of her own.”

  Bonny’s mouth gaped open. “Pray, whatever are you talking about?”

  “About ye being with child.” Marie calmly walked over to Bonny’s bed. “Do ye feel up to getting out of the bed, yer grace?”

  Bonny leaned back on the mound of pillows, her mind spinning from Marie’s casual comment. “You think...you think I’m going to have a baby?”

  Marie smiled broadly and nodded. “It’s very happy we all are. All except fer poker-faced Mr. Evans.”

  “But... bu
t...” Bonny began to protest. Then she remembered the night Richard had acted so strange in the library. When he had said, “No man can serve two masters.” When she had prepared to serve him as he instructed, but his shell had suddenly melted, revealing the same tender, loving man to whom she had given her heart.

  The memory of that night grew even sweeter now that she realized a child, their child, might have been conceived then.

  Bonny flung off her covers and stepped from the bed, smiling and throwing her arms wide in a huge stretch. “Pray, Marie, open the windows. To be sure, it must be a lovely day.”

  “I say, Radcliff,” William Clyde said, “I believe Fanny Tuttle to be the most beautiful of all the opera dancers, and she clearly lusts after you.”

  “Not in my style,” Radcliff said distractedly, eyeing the young man who had just barged into Mrs. Ferndale’s gaming establishment. The fellow looked very much like his wife’s cousin, Alfred Wickham.

  “Pray, tell us what is your style?” said Stephen Langford. “You used not to be so particular before you were ensnared by the lovely Bonny Barbara Allan.”

  William helped himself to a glass of brandy off the tray of a waiter passing by. “Now you find fault with all the ladies. If she’s not too tall, she’s too small. Or her breasts are too flat or her arms too fat. I beg you to tell me what is wrong with the lovely Miss Tuttle.”

  “Miss Tuttle?” Radcliff asked. “Oh, yes, the opera girl.” His eyes followed the man. It was Alfred Wickham.

  “Will you fellows leave poor Radcliff alone,” Twigs said. “Can’t you accept he’s a happily married man?”

  “It’s not a happily married bridegroom who leaves his bride alone night after night,” Huntley said.

  “I beg you will excuse me, gentlemen,” Radcliff said, pushing back his chair and standing up. “I see my wife’s cousin.”

  The duke turned to meet Alfred’s gaze.

  “Radcliff! Here you are. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

  Remembering the night Alfred had crashed into the Abernathys’ ball with bad news for Bonny, Radcliff felt his heart nearly stop. He froze, watching Alfred’s forlorn face. Something must have happened to Bonny! “Is my wife...?”

  “Bonny?” Alfred glanced pensively at Radcliff. “Oh, there’s nothing wrong with her.”

  Radcliff went limp with relief.

  “But I do need to speak to you in private.”

  Radcliff put his arm around Alfred’s shoulder. “Come, we’ll have cigars on Mrs. Ferndale’s balcony.”

  Outside, with the glass doors shut behind them, Radcliff offered Alfred a cigar. Radcliff liked Alfred. He wondered how two such nice offspring as Alfred and Emily could have come from that contemptible Lucille Wickham. Then he thought of the woman’s mild husband and swelled with pride. It was Lord Landis’s blood—Benny’s blood—that determined the sweet nature of the Wickham children.

  Taking the cigar, Alfred tapped it and began speaking. “I felt I needed to tell you what horrid lies are being spread about your wife, your grace.” He showed Radcliff his raw knuckles. “I became so enraged when Stanley told me those damned lies I fairly well lit into him.”

  “I am sure my cousin deserved it,” Radcliff assured him. “Now, tell me what he told you.”

  Alfred took a puff of the cigar. “Well, he—Stanley—began by touching me for five quid. Said as how we were all family now. Then he acted sad and said something like how disappointing it was that your marriage to my cousin was going so badly.” Alfred stopped, eyeing the duke ruefully. “I regret to say I told Stanley that I was sorry to hear...to hear of you running wild still with the same old bloods you ran with when you were single. That’s when he said you and Bonny had an understanding. She had her affair with Dunsford, and you could cavort with any woman you chose. That’s when I hit him. I’ll not have anyone talk like that of my cousin. Bonny’s as true as a saint, I’ll vow.”

  Damn Stanley, Radcliff thought. He would do more than hit him this time. The vile creature persisted to menace what Radcliff valued most. Radcliff had crashed his fist into Stanley’s face when he found him trying to manhandle his wife. He’d told his wretched cousin he would never again be welcome at Radcliff House. He winced as he decided his next recourse.

  Radcliff clasped a strong hand on Alfred’s shoulder. “It’s my fault,” he said in a low voice. “My deplorable behavior has given rise to these wild rumors.” He took a long puff on the cigar and slowly blew the smoke out into the cool night air. “I thank you for coming to me with this information. My cousin will not slander my wife anymore—thanks to you.”

  Once her stomach settled, Bonny left the house and rode to the square near Kepple Street. The day before, Dunsford’s page had slipped her a note requesting her to meet him at eleven-thirty.

  When she arrived, Bonny saw that Harriet already had her uncle making a cake of himself over her. He met Bonny with smiling eyes as she sat on the carpet next to Dunsford and planted a kiss on top Harriet’s fair head. “This must be the last time you beckon me here,” Bonny said. “I find deceiving the duke most distasteful.”

  “I may not have to come here again myself,” Lord Dunsford said, throwing the giggling baby in the air and catching her.

  Bonny shrieked. “I beg you will not do that again. I am quite terrified you will drop her.”

  “Nonsense.” He nuzzled Harriet’s plump neck and pretended to blow bubbles against her flesh, causing the baby to giggle anew. “Is she not the most beautiful baby girl ever created? Of course, I expect her mother was just as lovely as a child.”

  “Then you know who her mother is?”

  “Since the night I met Emily, I have known.”

  “I think you should tell her.”

  “When the time is right, I will.” He tossed Harriet in the air again. Catching her and holding her close, he turned to Bonny. “I called you here to ask your opinion. I’m mad about this baby, and I want her to live with me.” He put Harriet down on the carpet and allowed her to crawl. Meeting Bonny’s gaze, he said, “I shall admit she is my brother’s baby, but that her mother was a Spanish woman who died during her lying-in. That way Harriet would have all the advantages she is due as my brother’s child.”

  “It would be most wonderful for Harriet,” Bonny said in a soft voice.

  “But?”

  “I shall have to break the news to Emily. She will miss her visits with Harriet most dreadfully.”

  His face clouded. “I hate to hurt Emily. I had not thought of that.”

  “But I am sure Em would agree that what you propose is in Harriet’s best interest.” Bonny chewed on her lip. “I shall first have to tell her that I have broken her confidence and told you of the baby.” Bonny rose and walked to the window, pulling back the lace curtains and gazing out on the gray day. “She will not be happy to learn you know the truth. She believes herself tainted.”

  “Tainted indeed! She’s everything a man could hope for. Why, she’s more beautiful than....” He picked up Harriet again. “Like you are, my pet,” he said to the baby.

  If only Lord Dunsford knew he was in love with Emily, Bonny thought.

  That afternoon Lady Landis welcomed her niece to Wickham House. As much as she wanted to believe the worst of that upstart niece of hers, Lady Landis no longer wanted to repeat Stanley Moncrief’s wicked tale about Barbara and that nice Lord Dunsford. And she had told Stanley Moncrief a few nights ago at the Radcliff dinner that his wicked tales about dear Lord Dunsford and her niece were nothing but a pack of lies. Why, anyone with two eyes could tell the earl was besotted with her own lovely Emily. That is, anyone except Emily. Thank the Almighty, her daughter had at least been civil to the peer.

  Already, Lady Landis’s imagination had run wild. My daughter, the Countess of Dunsford She liked the sound of it.

  Now she walked her daughter and her niece to the Radcliff barouche. “I daresay you two never will sit down and have tea with me. Always you must go off together. One
would think you were plotting to rob the crown jewels.”

  “Nonsense, Mama,” Emily said, giving her hand to the footman, who assisted her into the coach. “We just like to be together.”

  Bonny instructed the coachman to take them to Hyde Park. After they were away from Cavendish Square, Bonny asked, “When you were increasing with Harriet, were you allowed to walk, Em?”

  Emily’s head spun around. “Are you with child?”

  Bonny’s eyes sparkled. “I think perhaps I am. I’m dreadfully sick every morning. Were you?”

  “No. I had a very healthy appetite. I had absolutely no idea I was increasing until I realized I had not had a monthly flow in far too many weeks. So, of course, I walked and did everything as I had before. Then, when Aunt Camille found out, she would not allow me to do anything.” Emily took Bonny’s hand. “I’m so happy for you. I know how much you love Harriet and how much you have wanted a baby of your own. What does Richard think?”

  “I haven’t told him yet. I just realized this morning.” A contented smile settled on Bonny’s face.

  “I’m sure he will be delighted.”

  “Perhaps we had better not walk today. I suppose I need to save the little energy I have. I haven’t been able to have a really good visit with you, since I’ve been sick every day.”

  “Poor Bonny. I should have come to visit you.”

  “Nonsense. I understand you’ve been spending a good amount of time with Lord Dunsford.”

  “I had not meant to. It’s just that I so enjoy being with him. At first it was because he looked so very much like dear Harold. But now I realize they are quite different. Lord Dunsford is much more reserved than Harold.” She averted her gaze and spoke softly. “I like him very much.”

  Bonny’s heart began to hammer at what she was going to say. “Em, I have a confession to make.”

  Emily gave a little laugh. “A confession? Now you sound like Mama. Have you stolen the crown jewels?”