by Jane Ashford
Also by Jane Ashford
Once Again a Bride
Man of Honour
The Three Graces
The Marriage Wager
The Bride Insists
The Bargain
The Marchington Scandal
The Headstrong Ward
Married to a Perfect Stranger
Charmed and Dangerous
A Radical Arrangement
First Season/Bride to Be – Two novels in one
Rivals of Fortune/The Impetuous Heiress – Two novels in one
Heir to the Duke
What the Duke Doesn’t Know
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Copyright © 2017 by Jane LeCompte
Cover and internal design © 2017 by Sourcebooks, Inc.
Cover art by Paul Stinson
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The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
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Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-one
A Sneak Peek of Nothing Like a Duke
One
Two
About the Author
Back Cover
One
Lord Sebastian Gresham pulled up at the top of a steep ridge and leaned back in the saddle, giving Whitefoot a rest from the long climb. The view from this Herefordshire height was extensive. Before him, the land fell away in folds to a swift river at the base of the ridge. Green fields and pastures rolled out north and east, and mountains loomed to the west, the edge of the Welsh Marches. Straight ahead he could see his destination—Stane Castle, still a distant gray pile.
Thoroughly at home on horseback, Sebastian felt only pleasantly tired, even after the long cross-country ride. With a smile, he remembered a story his father the duke liked to tell, of how Sebastian’s three-year-old self had clambered onto the largest hunter in the Langford stable and clung like a burr as he hurtled over a five-barred gate. It had taken two grooms to remove him, squirming and kicking and protesting that he would ride Thunderer, he would. Sebastian almost thought he remembered the incident. But perhaps it was just from hearing the tale.
He signaled Whitefoot with his knees, and they started slowly down the path toward the river. Sebastian took in a deep breath of the soft summer air, so different from the reek of London. The scents were unlike those around his childhood home of Langford as well. Crisper, somehow, with hints of cold stone and evergreen. Georgina had said that her family’s estate was at the “back of beyond.” Certainly the country hereabouts seemed sparsely populated.
Sebastian fell into a daydream of his lively, golden-haired fiancée. Surely there would be many more opportunities for them to be alone out here. During the London season just past, they’d barely managed a few kisses, even though they were officially betrothed. Now, he had an extended leave from his military duties in town. A castle would have gardens, surely, perhaps even a maze to get lost in. With their wedding coming up in a few weeks, they ought to be allowed some freedom. Sebastian relished the possibilities this thought roused.
Whitefoot’s hoof sent a shower of pebbles over the edge of a narrow slant of path, and Sebastian brought his attention back to the present. First of all, he had to meet Georgina’s parents. Indeed, it was odd that he’d never encountered them, but apparently the marquess and his wife never came to London, or even Bath, which was nearer their home. That was why her grandmother had brought her out, Georgina had explained. She’d seemed uneasy, if not positively evasive, when she mentioned her parents’ distaste for society. Still, Sebastian wasn’t worried. The family that had produced a charming woman like Georgina must be all right. And, without false modesty, he knew himself to be a convivial fellow. He was confident the meeting would go well. If they didn’t care for society, well, he’d be happy to let them be and spend more time alone with Georgina.
The zigzag path down the ridge came out at a ford. Sebastian guided Whitefoot across the river and found a lane that seemed to lead toward the castle, perched across the valley on a spur of hill. Another half hour, and he’d be there, he estimated. There was no sign of Sykes with the carriage and his luggage, but Sebastian wasn’t the least surprised. Even though he’d lingered after Nathaniel’s wedding and taken his time on the ride, it would probably be a day or two before his valet arrived. The roads in this part of the country were wretched. Sebastian would make do with the contents of the portmanteau lashed to the back of the saddle until then.
The road up to Stane Castle angled across the hill under a towering stone wall. As a military man, Sebastian appreciated the opportunities it provided to rain shots down on invaders. These days, tufts of wildflowers and weeds sprouted from between the great blocks. It had been years since Stane faced hordes of Welsh tribesmen boiling out of the hills to ravage the English countryside.
He rode through an open gate and into a tunnel of stone lined with arrow slits. On the other side of the wall was a cobbled courtyard, also enclosed. Sebastian dismounted as a competent-looking groom came out to take Whitefoot. “House that way?” Sebastian asked, nodding toward an arch in the inner wall as he relinquished the reins.
“Yes, sir. Through there and to your left,” the lad answered.
Sebastian strode under the arch and out into an open space. Within the encircling bastion, the castle sprawled, a jumble of a building, obviously added to by generations of Stanes. An ancient moss-covered round tower anchored one end. Closer by was a more modern wing with tall windows and graceful stonework. The hoped-for gardens spread out like green skirts around the place.
Near the center of the edifice, Sebastian spotted a wide, studded oak door, up three steps from a stretch of lawn. Taking this for the front entry, he mounted the steps. There was no bell, only an iron knocker in the shape of a striking hawk. He raised it and let it fall. The thud was surprisingly loud, as if he’d struck a great drum.
The door opened at once. Primed to face a footman or maid, Sebastian blinked at the figure who confronted him instead. The slender, dark-skinned man wore a sort of long coat or tunic of figur
ed brocade over narrow trousers. Straight black hair framed his aquiline features and brushed the raised collar of the garment. Intelligent dark eyes examined Sebastian. The man pressed his palms together and bowed. “You must be the young lord who is to marry my host’s daughter,” he said. “Namaste.”
His voice had a lilt that Sebastian recognized. He’d heard it from travelers native to India. “Er, yes,” he replied, thrown a bit off his social stride.
The man moved back to let him enter. Sebastian stepped in, and paused to let his eyes adjust to the sudden gloom as the door shut behind him. He could make out a high-ceilinged, paneled hall in the light from small windows near the ceiling. Much of the far end of the chamber was taken up by a huge stone fireplace. A carved stair twisted upward at the back.
“I am Anat—” began the man, and stopped as a chorus of yapping arose in the distance. “Alas,” he went on. “They come. They always answer the knock.”
“They?” said Sebastian. The man’s tone suggested calamity.
His companion merely gestured toward the stair. The yapping rose in volume, and then a positive sea of small dogs flowed down the steps and along the stone floor. They pooled around the Indian gentleman’s slipper-clad feet, barking and sniffing and panting. The man crossed his arms over his chest with a pained look. “Can you command them?” he asked. “They will not hear me.”
They were pugs, Sebastian saw. Fifteen or twenty of the tiny brown-and-white lapdogs favored by many older ladies in London. He’d never seen so many together. They milled about the other man, pawing at his legs, staring upward with bulging brown eyes, drooling on his feet, and all the while yapping like… Well, like pugs.
“Please,” said the other man. He looked quite distressed.
Sebastian stepped further into the hall. “Here,” he said, speaking as he would have to the well-trained dogs at Langford. “Come away from there.”
Floppy ears pricked. Little heads came up. The dogs’ prominent brown eyes shifted to him. After a moment’s scrutiny, the pugs flowed over like a school of fish to surround him and began to scratch and slaver at his riding boots. One clamped its teeth on the end of his spur and tried to chew it off. The largest reared up, threw its front paws around his calf, and began moving against the leather in a highly inappropriate manner. “Stop that at once,” Sebastian said.
“My thanks are yours,” said the Indian man and slipped away through a doorway beside the steps.
“Wait,” said Sebastian. “Where do these dogs belong?” But the fellow was gone. Another of the pugs flung himself on Sebastian’s free leg. The two dogs pumped away in unison, huffing like little steam engines.
“Hello, Sebastian.”
He looked up to find Georgina poised on the stair. A beam of sunlight from above gilded her hair and illuminated her oval face. She wore a pale-blue gown, and her hand rested on the wooden baluster, delicate as a flower. She looked like a masterwork in the portrait gallery at Langford.
The dogs panted and writhed on his legs.
Sebastian was not a man to blush, but he’d never found himself in a situation quite like this. Used to obedient dogs, he was torn between reaching down and pulling the two miscreants off him, which would draw more attention to their unsavory activities, and ignoring them, which was increasingly difficult. He lifted one foot off the floor and shook it a little, trying to dislodge the wretched animal unobtrusively.
“Don’t kick them,” Georgina said.
“Of course not.” He was appalled at the idea of kicking a dog.
“People are tempted,” she responded.
He couldn’t tell if she was joking. Her voice sounded odd. She didn’t smile either. Indeed, she looked somehow muted, constrained, quite unlike the elegantly composed young lady he knew from London.
“I can’t call them off, I’m afraid. They only listen to my mother.”
This was not the sort of reunion Sebastian had pictured. He wanted to step forward and greet her properly, perhaps even kiss her, but that was out of the question in his current plight.
“I’ll get Mama,” Georgina added, and hurried up the stairs and out of sight.
As soon as she was gone, Sebastian bent and grasped the offending dogs by the scruffs of their necks. He lifted them away from his legs and held them up so that he could stare at them sternly, one by one. “No,” he said.
Two small tongues lolled below bright eyes, almost as if they were laughing at him. Small paws waved in the air.
He set them firmly aside. “Down. Sit.”
Sebastian was used to command. Troops of cavalrymen jumped to obey his orders. Animals usually responded at once to the assurance in his voice. But this crew of canines stared at him as if he was speaking words they’d never heard before. The two primary offenders dashed forward, obviously ready to resume their assault on his riding boots. “No,” said Sebastian again.
He took several steps back, nearly tripping as they flowed around his moving feet. It was a challenge not to tread on any of them. As he fended them off with gentle insistence—and an utter lack of success—he actually considered climbing onto a chair, out of their reach. Which was ridiculous. And to be found in such a position by his fiancée and her mother was unthinkable.
Georgina walked quickly along an upper hall and down another stair toward the room where her mother was most likely to be at this hour. She wanted to find her mother and get her dogs off Sebastian right away, and she also wanted to retreat to her bedchamber and hide from the scene that must result. Why had she imagined an auspicious beginning to Sebastian’s visit? It had been a pretty picture—her family lined up in a smiling row, cordial greetings exchanged, offers of refreshment and easy conversation. But when had her parents had the time or interest for any of that?
She loved Mama and Papa—of course she did—but at this moment she couldn’t help wishing that they were not quite so…individual. Back home after months in London among people who revered convention and cultivated elegant manners, she noticed it more than ever before. Sometimes it seemed that her parents positively dared strangers to misunderstand and mock them. If Sebastian didn’t get on with her family, if he despised them… Georgina feared such a reaction, and resented the possibility for myriad reasons on both sides of the question. One thing was clear, however. She simply couldn’t marry him if he did. The thought left her fiercely desolate.
Seeing him again had set her pulse pounding. All the sons of the Duke of Langford were tall, handsome, broad-shouldered men with auburn hair and penetrating blue eyes. When you added to that the muscular frame, dashing side-whiskers, and unconscious swagger of a cavalry major, the combination was potent indeed. From their first meeting, Georgina had been roused by Sebastian’s bold, masculine presence.
She’d resisted, of course. Even her limited social experience had predicted that such a man would be insufferably arrogant. But Sebastian wasn’t. He’d approached her with all sorts of inquiries about her thoughts and feelings. And then he’d listened to her answers. It was unprecedented.
Still, she’d been suspicious. There’d been something stilted about his conversation at first. But as the season went on, it became clear that his interest wasn’t feigned. Their conversations grew deeper. He’d actually asked her help in understanding a cryptic conversation at a ball, and when she’d explained, he hadn’t punished her afterward by drawing away or belittling her. As some men did. Many men, really. Why did they find it so insupportable, seemingly, to be schooled by a female? But not Sebastian. She’d heard him tell a mutual acquaintance later that she had “more brains in her little finger than I do in my whole head.” Georgina smiled. She’d made up her mind to marry him in that moment.
And why hadn’t she already done so? She could have married in London from her grandmother’s house, Georgina thought as she entered her mother’s workroom. This visit might have been postponed until after the knot w
as tied. He’d have had to take her family as he found them then. But no. She shook her head. That wasn’t enough. She wouldn’t avoid, still less disown, her family. It was out of the question. If only they could, sometimes, be just a bit more commonplace for an hour or two.
On the far side of the large room, her mother sat at a cluttered desk, pen in hand. Georgina watched her scribble on the page before her. It couldn’t be denied that, as people often observed, Mama looked rather like her dogs, particularly when she was vexed, as she apparently was now, her lips turned down in her round face. A small, plump woman, with glossy brown hair and prominent eyes—though her eyes were blue, not brown—she had the same bustling curiosity. Sometimes, the similarity made Georgina smile. Today, it raised her protective instincts.
Mama’s desk was the only conventional piece of furniture in the spacious chamber. Everything else catered to her dogs. There were rafts of colorful pillows where they could lounge, piles of sticks for them to chew, and scattered heaps of other toys. Hearths at each end kept the room warm in winter, and small, hinged flaps in two of the long windows gave the animals access to their own walled garden. There was a tiled area where they were fed and a large tub in the corner where they were bathed. The pugs were kept scrupulously clean, though their sheer numbers meant that the place still smelled just a bit of dog. “Sebastian has arrived, Mama,” said Georgina. “You must come and say hello.”
“In a moment,” her mother replied without turning in her chair. “I’m just writing Lady Fairford about the puppy I promised her. She has somehow gotten the notion that I will send Treva in a basket on the mail coach. Yet I made it perfectly clear when we settled on the arrangement that she needed to send a carriage and servant to fetch her.”
Whatever the outer resemblance, Mama’s voice was nothing like the pugs’ yapping. It was deep and confident, surprising from such a small frame. Georgina often admired her parent’s sublime self-assurance. She never worried about being thought odd. And why should she? a part of Georgina objected. “The dogs are bothering him,” she added.
