The Accidental Duchess

by Jessica Benson

  “Truly?” I was aware that I was grinning like an idiot, which was odd, because I am not entirely certain that I even cared for his implication. Being likened to a boiled cabbage was really no cause for celebration, and who, really, wanted to be thought of as sustaining?

  “Yes,” he said, and then we fell again into silence. The quiet stretched on between us. Cambourne seemed to be regarding me with some secret amusement. “When you said you were tired of being a pawn in this?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m curious: What precisely did you mean? Were you actually implying that I possess the ability to move you at will?” he asked. “Or was it that I’m setting you up so as to defend myself? Or that I’m willing to sacrifice you to advance my position?”

  “I don’t know,” I whispered, now truly unable to take my gaze from his face. And, then, to this day, I do not know what came over me, but I stood up and moved to his chair. I stood over him and he looked up at me, his expression unreadable. “But isn’t that why you married me? Because you believed I would allow you to do any of those things?”

  He looked at me oddly. “I wouldn’t say that exactly, Gwen,” he said, quietly.

  I suddenly felt very bold. I reached out my hand and he took it and drew me onto his lap. I waited for his touch, feeling so tightly wound with expectancy that I almost felt as though I would snap if he did not put his hands on me.

  “And? Are you willing to sacrifice me to advance your position?” I asked, finally, when he did not.

  “You don’t think I already have?”

  I looked him straight in the eye. “Have you?”

  And for just an instant a flicker of doubt actually crossed his face. “I don’t know,” he said, and I wondered just how close to the mark I was. “Why do you ask so many questions, Gwen?”

  “And why do you answer so few?”

  He smiled. “Because talking is so very overrated.” And then he shifted, so that I was still on his lap, my legs across his, but my back was against the back of his chair. “Don’t you think?” he asked, as he bent to unfasten the wrapper at my neck.

  I opened my mouth, but he forestalled me. “No,” he said, taking both my wrists in one of his, “don’t answer that, it would just be more talking, after all, and I need all my powers of concentration to breach this fortress.”

  “I thought,” I said—despite his ban on talking—as my head fell against the back of the chair, “that this required a bottle’s worth of fortitude, at the least.”

  “Sometimes a man has to summon all his courage in order to quiet the enemy,” he replied, as his lips found the hollow of my throat.

  “I’m the enemy?” I whispered, as my eyes fell closed.

  “And here, I thought we were, for the moment, a team.”

  “Jesus,” he said. “How much do you have on under this tent?”

  My eyes snapped open. “You are worried you won’t know what to do?”

  “I know what to do,” he said, in a dark voice, turning toward me.

  And he did, as it turned out, with both his hands and his mouth. His hair brushed over my face, as he put his lips to my neck. “Time to conquer the enemy,” he said, with a laughing tone to his voice, as his lips slid down to my breast.

  Liquid. My entire body was liquid as his lips grazed the very tip of my breast. His hands held me firmly against his lap. I twisted my torso to be closer to him and he swayed over me, sliding his hands along my sides, pushing the wrapper open further. I groaned as his hand cupped my breast, his thumb was so tantalizingly close—

  I bolted upright in his lap. The letter! I had completely forgot about the letter and his fingertips had been a bare half-inch away. I scrambled off the chair. “This was very pleasant,” I said, practically tripping over my own foot.

  His eyebrow went up. “Pleasant!” he said.

  “Oh, indeed. But I really must … go.” I was half afraid (hoping) that he would try to restrain me, but he didn’t.

  “Apparently, you really must,” he said, as the dark, heavy look in his eyes was replaced with something perilously close to amusement.

  I didn’t stay to watch, but rather fled toward his dressing room to return the way I had come. “Well, good night, Cambourne,” I said.

  “Good night, Gwen,” he said, his voice heavy with amusement now. “Enjoy your letter.”

  I stopped and gaped at him.

  “I always think,” he said, “that the better part of chess is being willing to wait for your opponent to make a mistake. For what it’s worth, I’m a patient man. I always win.”

  Which left me wondering as I made my way back, who, in this case, he was playing against: me or Milburn.

  21

  In which I am summoned to attend my mama

  My Dear Fellow,

  While it pains me no end to put pen to paper in this fashion, I find myself at point non plus. As you know, I held reservations from the first on the notion that Milburn was suited to the undertaking of our Task. And it seems that the worst of these have been realized. I am informed that subsequent to his safe arrival in Toulouse, he has disappeared. I am assured by our numerous contacts in the area that there is no question of harm having befallen him. As you know, a good deal of the King’s money is at stake. Should my men be successful in locating your brother, as I am certain they will be, I will find myself with no other choice than to try him for treason. At which time, regrettably, it is more than likely that the Other Matter will become public. I am yours, most regretfully.

  I folded the letter, having read it for about the tenth time since the previous night, and stared unseeing at the wall. What I really wanted, of course, was to bring it round to Cecy’s. But then Therèse would no doubt want to accompany me, and since she believed Cambourne and I were lovers, I would be unable to speak freely. There was only one thing for it, I decided: I had to tell her that we were not.

  I was only just managing to convince myself that telling her would not be as awful a prospect as it seemed, when Giddings, the butler, entered and handed me a missive. I recognized the handwriting instantly and opened it with a gloomy sense of foreboding. I had, it seemed, been peremptorily summoned to attend my mother’s drawing room later this morning. Surely things could not get worse?

  I made my confession to Therèse on the way to Cecy’s. “It is a very large shame—” she said as I lifted the knocker at Cecy’s front door. Then we both fell silent as the butler relieved us of our outer garments and ushered us into the morning room, where Myrtia was already ensconced. The moment the butler had left Therèse picked up the thread of her conversation precisely where she had left it “—that you are not sharing your Cambourne’s bed, if it is him you want.”

  Cecy held up her hand, then. “Just a minute,” she said. “This is completely unacceptable. You send urgent notes round to Myrtia and myself about having found evidence, and here we are, waiting, verily holding our breaths with anticipation, and now you two enter talking about something else altogether—something highly interesting to be sure, but something different! Oh, no, you will back up a few steps, please.”

  “Good morning to you also, Cecy,” I said, kissing her on the cheek before sitting down and handing her the letter. “Behold the evidence.”

  “Just right there. In the drawer of his bedside table?” said Myrtia, her disbelief clear in her tone, when they had finished reading. “Not hidden? Not locked away?”

  I shook my head.

  “But what does it mean?” Cecy frowned, still holding it.

  “Other than that he was obviously being blackmailed.”

  “The letter?” Myrtia asked her. “Or the fact that he left it for Gwen to find just now?”

  “He couldn’t have known that she was going to sneak into his bedchamber and look in the drawer,” Cecy objected.

  “I suspect he had a good guess that it was a likelihood,” I replied. “He certainly knew I’d been ransacking the house at every opportunity. He’s probably wonder
ing what took me so long.”

  And Cecy said, “The meaning of the letter is obvious enough in the basics, but what on earth do you suppose that Other Matter could be?”

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “But whatever it was, it was enough for Cambourne to have sent Milburn into danger.”

  We were all silent again, staring into the fire for a few moments.

  “Yes,” Cecy said after a moment. “I don’t think he’d do that lightly.”

  Myrtia looked at me intently. “Now that you know Cambourne, Gwen, what do you believe would be worth that risk to him?”

  I thought about this. “I don’t know,” I replied. “Honor, I suppose.”

  Therèse spoke up for the first time since we had seated ourselves. “But perhaps more importantly, we must ask ourselves why it is if Cambourne wants Gwen to know what happened, that he tell her sideways.”

  I shouldn’t have understood her, but I did. “Letting me find it instead of just telling me, you mean?”

  She nodded.

  “I agree,” said Myrtia.

  “I think, because that is his way of telling me in a neutral way, of getting me to come to him with what I want. That is the thing of it with him. He never tells me what to do, but always seems to be waiting to see what I will do,” I said, getting up and beginning to pace as a sudden excitement came over me, as I realized that I, and I alone in the room, understood him. “And because there is something more that he doesn’t want to tell me. He said the oddest thing the other day about what he had told me being a veritable love poem compared with what he had not.”

  Therèse tilted her head, looking at me thoughtfully. “How interesting. You have not in all this time been to Cambourne’s bed? You tell me the truth when you tell me that on the way here?”

  I shook my head. “No,” I said. “I have not. I did tell the truth, but what has this to do with the letter?”

  Therèse lifted her cup and sipped. “It seems to me that Cambourne, he has so far played along with what Bert-ee has asked, has he not? And I say to myself, and now to you, I do not understand it—”

  “Well, it seems obvious that Milburn knows what the Other Matter is,” I said, “and is using it to blackmail Cambourne. So whatever it is, it’s serious enough for Cam-bourne to cede to his demand. It was clear that Milburn was threatening him.”

  Therèse shook her head. “I do not know Cambourne so well, but even I can see how important this title, it is to him,” she said. “And I think he play a leetle game with Ber-tee, but he does not have the intention of really giving up the titles. I make doubt that he would allow this to continue if he thought there was a question of endangering the … succession, I think you call it?” At my nod, she continued. “You English, you are very keen on the succession. That is why, after all, that Cambourne, he did not allow me to go with Ber-tee.”

  I stared at her. “It is?”

  “Of course,” she said. “He was thinking that if I became with a child, it would give him less of the control of the situation. Now, he knows he can take time. So all you have to do is become pregnant.”

  Become pregnant! I stared at her. “I don’t know,” I said.

  “You need to learn to take what you want, Gwen,” said Therèse gently. “I was beginning to think you are tired of being the good girl. And Cambourne, I think, he think it too, and that’s why he leave you the letter now.”

  I sighed. “Old habits are hard to break,” I added, glumly. “And anyway, to do that I’d have to seduce him, which I can’t seem to manage. Believe me, I’ve tried the thing.”

  Therèse shook her head in apparent disbelief. “All this time you are together, living alone in the house, the two of you. And you have not managed a simple seduction! But now,” she said, briskly, “we shall apply some practicality to the situation, n’est-ce pas? That is why we French are so good at love! We understand that one must take a practical approach to the matters of the heart.”

  “Rather like preparing for battle?” I asked her, trying for a teasing tone.

  But she was serious when she replied, “We French, we prefer to be to the point, without this insistence had by you English to never do or say what one means.”

  “And it complicates the situation nicely,” Myrtia said. “Since consummation makes this marriage to you much harder to dissolve. Perhaps,” she said, looking up, “this is exactly what he wants you to do.”

  “He certainly hasn’t behaved like it was all the times he tossed me out of his bedchamber,” I said.

  “It was the robe.” Therèse shuddered visibly.

  “The robe?” Cecy asked with interest. “You must tell us all about it, Therèse. But now, Gwen, is it not time for you to go pay that visit to your mama, as promised?”

  I looked at the clock. “Unfortunately,” I said. “I’ve been trying to forget.”

  Cecy waved gaily. “Don’t blame you a bit,” she said. “I’m trying to forget about mine, too. Now, go and do what you have to, and do not fret about a thing: the three of us will come up with a plan to get you pregnant.”

  Now why, I wondered all the way to my parents’ town house, did that thought not bring me comfort?

  When I arrived, my mother, my father, and Violetta were already assembled.

  “This is simply unacceptable,” my mother had said, right off, without so much as a greeting. “Tell her, Axton, that this is simply unacceptable.”

  “This is simply unacceptable,” my father said, as directed.

  “Do you mind if I sit before you roast me alive?” I asked.

  “Forward, impudent chit!” snapped Violetta.

  My mother looked to be considering whether or not to grant my request, but I sat down anyway, before she could tell me not to. “I know I didn’t raise you to be so disrespectful!” she said, eyeing me in such a way that would have reduced me to a puddle just a few short weeks ago.

  “What the deuce is going on over there?” my father wanted to know.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Rumors are rife,” my mother said.

  “Loose Frenchwomen,” Violetta said, darkly. “Running about Milburn House half-clothed.”

  My father brightened. “P’raps I should come assess the situation,” he suggested.

  “Oh, do be quiet, Axton,” my mother suggested back.

  “Just the one loose Frenchwoman,” I said. “Fully clothed.” And my father looked disappointed. “A cousin to the Duchess of Winfell,” I added, and his face fell further.

  “That silly ass Milburn’s returned!” Violetta said, as though she were delivering news of the utmost import.

  “Actually, I was aware of that,” I replied. “As I happen to be living there and I’m not quite so stupid that I don’t know who’s under my own roof.”

  “Oh, but don’t you see? This ruins everything,” my mother almost wailed. “I was certain he was dead. Why, why, could he not have been dead?”

  “Excuse me?” My voice was positively dripping with frost.

  “Milburn is back. Cambourne has taken up his rightful place, and now you’re living with that ridiculous man milliner, and his French trollop, while legally married to his brother,” she said.

  “And I’d lay a pile of blunt on it that you were far too namby-pamby to have let Cambourne bed you while you were still living together!” Violetta crowed.

  I stared at them. Now, it is true that my intellect was not precisely in top form at the moment. It had, after all, been a trying few days, but I was alert enough to distill the fact that they apparently believed Cambourne had gone back to being himself. I’m not certain why this surprised me, but it did. I decided, just for the moment, that nothing in particular was to be gained by enlightening any of them as to the actual composition of the two households.

  “I—” I began, but my mother spoke, her voice almost rising to a shriek. “Cambourne never consummated that marriage?” she wailed.

  “No,” I said, very precisely. And then I smiled
sweetly at her, enjoying the way she went pale.

  “Only disaster can come of having someone with French blood under your roof,” Violetta said. “If I’ve said that once, I’ve said it a hundred times.”

  I believed her. “A hundred at the very least, I should think,” I said.

  “None of this would have mattered had you taken my advice and treated him with a firmer hand,” Violetta said pointedly. “How do you think I brought Worth to heel?” she demanded, and then went on. “A fine piece of man like Worth doesn’t just fall into step, y’know!”

  “Had to be beaten into it, as I recall,” my father said.

  “Oh, do be quiet, Axton,” my mother said again. “The entire point was consummation. For Gwen and Cambourne to consummate the marriage so he couldn’t cast her off when Milburn returned. Now there’s nothing to stop his annulling and she’ll be married to Milburn! Of all people.”

  “I thought that was the original idea,” I said, looking from one to the other, “me being married to Milburn.”

  “Not my idea in the first place,” my father said, holding up his hands.

  “That would imply, by association, that you’ve had one, Axton!” my mother said.

  “Demme, no!” my father replied. “Not much in the idea line,” he explained, cheerfully.

  “This should have been taken care of from the first,” my mother said, giving my father a most unpleasant look. “And it would have been had you only done as I said and”—she glanced at me—“never mind.”

  I stared at her and yet barely saw her. Honor, I was thinking. Cambourne valued honor above all, and surely he must have known that he was risking his by marrying me.

  “And at the very least you should have forced him to consummate it!” She was almost yelling, but I was uncertain whether it was directed at me or my father.

  “Hey ho,” my father said to my mother, rather rudely. “I defy even you, Almeria, to tell a man when to f—consummate his own marriage.”

  She glared at him. “I told you, Axton! And a good thing it was, too, as I doubt you’d have got around to figuring it out on your own. But never mind that. Now, we have to think about how to help Gwen.”