The Art of Duke Hunting

by Sophia Nash

  Head pounding, Alex forced his eyes and mouth to work. “ ‘In a continuation of the regular obscene excesses of the Prince Regent and his royal entourage, not one of the party made an appearance at St. George’s earlier this morning, with the exception of our Princess Caroline, darling Princess Charlotte, and Her Grace, the young Duchess of March. His Majesty’s absence and that of the groom and groomsmen caused all four hundred guests to assume the worst. And, indeed, this columnist has it on the very best authority, partially one’s own eyewitness account, that not only the august bridegroom, His Grace, the Duke of Candover, but also seven other dukes, one archbishop and the Prince Regent himself, were seen cavorting about all of London last eve on an outrageous regal rampage. Midnight duels, swimming amok with the swans in the Serpentine, a stream of scantily clad females in tow, lawn bowling in unmentionables, horse races in utter darkness, wild, uproarious boasting, and jesting, and wagering abounded. Indeed, this author took it upon himself to retrieve and return to White’s Club their infamous betting book, which one of the royal entourage had had the audacity to remove without even a by your leave. In this fashion we have learned that the Duke of Kress lost the entire fortune he so recently acquired with the title, although the winner’s name was illegible . . .’ ” Alex’s voice stumbled to a halt.

  “Happens to the best of us,” the Duke of Sussex murmured as consolation. That gentleman was as green about the gills as Alex felt.

  “And the worst of us,” mumbled the Duke of Middlesex, as he finally gave in to the laws of gravity and allowed his body to slide down the wall on which he was leaning. He sunk to the ground with a thud.

  “Don’t stop now, Kress. You’ve gotten to the only good part.” Candover leaned in wickedly.

  Alex had never tried to avoid just punishment. He just wished he could remember, blast it all, what his part had been in the debacle. He cleared his throat and continued, “ ‘Even the queen’s jewels were spotted on one duke as he paraded down Rotten Row. Yes, my fellow countrymen, it appears the English monarchy has learned nothing from our French neighbor’s lessons concerning aristocratic overindulgence. As the loyal scribe of the Fashionable Column for two decades, you have it on my honor that all this occurred and worse. I can no longer remain silent on these reoccurring grievous, licentious activities, and so shall be the first plain-speaking, brave soul to utter these treasonous words: I no longer support or condone a monarchy such as this.’ ” Alex stood very still as the last of the column’s words left his lips.

  At precisely the same moment the other dukes cleared their throats, and one valet tried to escape.

  “If any of you leave or say one word, I shall cut off your head with a . . .”

  “Guillotine, Majesty?” Isabelle chirped.

  In the silence, a storm brewed of epic proportions.

  Thank the Lord, the chamber’s gilded door opened to divert His Majesty’s attention. The Duke of Barry, a Lord Lieutenant of the 95th Rifle Regiment, stepped in, almost instantly altering his unsteady gait with expert precision. Only his white face and the sheen of perspiration on his forehead gave him away. Mutely, he stepped forward and laid a dueling pistol on the foot of the cashmere and silk royal bedclothing.

  “Dare I ask?” His Majesty’s voice took on an arctic edge.

  Barry opened his mouth but no sound came out. He tried again. “I believe I shot a man. He’s in your billiard room, Majesty.”

  The Duke of Abshire entered the royal chamber behind Barry with the hint of wickedness in his even, dark features marred by a massive black eye. Known as the cleverest of the bunch, good luck had clearly deserted him on this occasion.

  “I thought you were leaving, Abshire. Or do you need me to show you out?” Candover’s usually reserved expression turned thunderous.

  Alex leaned toward Sussex, and almost fell over before righting himself. “What did I miss?”

  “Trust me,” Sussex whispered. “You do not want to know. You’ve got enough on your dish, old man.”

  Alex raised his eyebrows at Sussex and missed Abshire’s dry retort directed at the premier duke, Candover. There was no love lost between those two. Then again, Candover’s remote, holier-than-thou manner grated on just about everyone.

  Middlesex, still on the floor, tugged on Alex’s breeches and Alex bent down to catch the former’s whisper. “I heard a lady shouting in chambers next to mine, then two doors slammed, and Candover came out rubbing his knuckles.”

  Alex shook his head. Could it get any worse?

  The black-haired duke, Abshire, clapped a hand on the shoulder of the most respected and most quiet duke of the circle, Barry. “Is he dead?”

  “Yes,” Barry replied.

  “Are you certain?” Sussex asked, eyes wide.

  “I think I know when a man is breathing or not.”

  “But there are some whose breath cannot be detected,” Middlesex croaked.

  “Rigor. Mortis,” Barry replied.

  An inelegant sound came from the duchess’s throat.

  “Please forgive me, Isabelle,” Barry said quietly. “Your Grace, I do not know the man.”

  “Just tell me you locked the chamber when you left it,” the prince said dryly. When Barry nodded, the prince continued darkly. “I had thought better of you, Barry. What is this world coming to if I cannot count on one of England’s best and brightest?” The prince, still in full shadow, sighed heavily. “Well, we shall see to the poor, unfortunate fellow, as soon as I am done with all of you.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” Barry replied, attempting to maintain his ramrod posture.

  “Now then,” His Majesty said with more acidity than a broiled lemon. “Does not one of you remember what precisely happened last night?”

  “I remember the Frenchified spirits Kress’s man”—the Duke of Sussex looked toward Jack Farquhar with pity—“brought into His Majesty’s chamber.”

  “I must be allowed to defend . . .” Farquhar began and then changed course. “Yes, well, since three of you locked me in a strong room when I voiced my concern, I cannot add any further observations.”

  “Is that the queen’s coronation broach, Sussex?” the imperial voice demanded suddenly.

  The Duke of Sussex, now pale as the underbelly of a swan, looked down and started. Hastily, he removed the offending article and laid the huge emerald-and-diamond broach on the end of the gold-leaf bed frame, beside the pistol.

  Alex just made out Middlesex’s whispered words below. “Very fetching. Matches his eyes to perfection.”

  Alex felt a grin trying to escape as he helped Middlesex to his feet.

  “Just like the wet muck on your shoulder compliments your peepers, Middlesex,” retorted Sussex.

  Ah, friendship. Who knew English dukes could be so amusing when they dropped their lofty facades? Last night had probably almost been worth it. It was too bad none of them could remember it.

  “Well, at least the columnist did not know about the unfortunate soul in the billiard room,” Isabelle breathed. “Did you all really swim in the Serpentine? I declare, the lot of you are wetter than setters after a duck. I would not have ever done anything so—”

  “You were not invited,” the Duke of Candover gritted out.

  “And whose fault was that?”

  “Enough,” the Prince Regent roared. The royal head emerged from the gloom and Alex’s gasp blended with the rest of the occupants’ shocked sounds in the room.

  His Majesty’s head was half shaved—the left side as smooth as a babe’s bottom, the long brown and gray locks on the right undisturbed. None dared to utter a word.

  Prinny raised his heavy jowls and lowered his eyelids in a sovereign show of condescension. “None of this is to the point. I hereby order each of you to make amends to me, and to your country. Indeed, I need not say all that is at stake.” His Majesty chuckled darkly at them. “And we have not a moment to spare. Archbishop?”

  A small fat man trundled forward, his head in his hands, his gait
impaired.

  The future king continued. “You shall immediately begin a formal answer to this absurd column—to be delivered to all the newspapers. And as for the rest of you—except you, my dear Isabelle—I order you all to cast aside your mistresses and your self-indulgent, outrageous ways to set a good example.”

  “Said the pot to the kettle,” inserted Sussex under his breath.

  “You shall each,” His Majesty demanded, “be given your particular marching orders in one hour’s time. While I should let all of you stew about your ultimate fate, I find . . . I cannot. I warn that exile from London, marriage, continuation of ducal lines, a newfound fellowship with sobriety, and a long list of additional duties await each of you.”

  “Temperance, marriage, and rutting. Well, at least one of the three is tolerable,” the Duke of Abshire on Alex’s other side opined darkly and discreetly.

  Alex could not let this farce continue. “Majesty, I appreciate the invitation to join this noble circle of renegades but—”

  “It’s not an invitation, Kress,” the Prince Regent interrupted. “And by the by, have you forgotten your return to straightened circumstances if this column is correct? You shall be the first to receive your task.”

  “An order is more like it,” the Duke of Barry warned quietly. The solemn man wore a distinctive green military uniform that reminded Alex of his own dark past. A past that would infuriate the Prince Regent if he but knew of it.

  Prinny glanced about the chamber in an old rogue’s fit of pique. “Kress, you shall immediately retire to your principal seat—St. Michael’s Mount in Cornwall. Since a large portion of the blame for last evening rests squarely on your shoulders, I hereby require you to undertake the restoration of that precious pile of rubble, for the public considers it a long neglected important outpost for England’s security. Many have decried its unseemly state.”

  A departure from London was the very last thing he would do. He hated any hint of countrified living. The cool lick of an idea slid into his mind and he smiled. “But, according to that column, I’ve no fortune to do so, Your Majesty.”

  Prinny’s face grew red with annoyance. “You are to use funds from my coffers for the time being. But you shall repay my indulgence when you take a bride from a list of impeccable young ladies of fine lineage and fine fortunes”—Prinny nodded to a page who delivered a document into Alex’s hands—“within a month’s time.”

  Candover made the mistake of showing a hint of teeth.

  Alex Barclay, formerly Viscount Gaston, with pockets to let in simpler times, felt his contrarian nature rise like a dragon from its lair, but knew enough to say not a word. The ice of his English father’s blood had never been very effective in cooling the boiling crimson inherited from his French mother.

  “And you, my dear Candover,” the prince continued, “shall have the pleasure of following him, along with Sussex and Barry, for a house party composed of all the eligibles. While you are exempt at the moment from choosing a new bride, as homage must be paid to your jilted fiancée, I shall count on you to keep the rest of these scallywags on course.”

  Candover’s smile disappeared. “Have you nothing to say to His Majesty, Kress?” The richest of all the dukes coolly stepped forward to face Alex and tapped his fingers against a polished rosewood table in the opulent room seemingly dipped in gold, marble, and every precious material in between. The rarefied air positively reeked of royal architects gone amok.

  When Alex’s silence continued, all rustling around him eventually stopped. “Thank you,” Alex murmured, “but . . . no thank you.”

  Candover’s infernal tapping ceased. “No? Whatever do you mean?” A storm of disapproval, mixed with jaded humor erupted all around him.

  Oh, Alex knew it was only a matter of time before he would capitulate to the demands, but he just hadn’t been able to resist watching the charade play out to its full potential.

  The Prince Regent’s face darkened from pale green to dark purple. It was a sight to behold. “And let me add, Kress, one last incentive. Don’t think I have not heard the whispers questioning your allegiance to England. If I learn there is one shred of truth to the notion that you may have worn a frog uniform, I won’t shed a single tear if you are brought before the House of Lords and worse. Care to reconsider your answer?”

  It had been amusing to think that life would improve with his elevation. But then, he habitually failed to remember that whenever he had trotted on happiness in the past, there had always, always been de la merde—or rather, manure—on his heels in the end.

  The only question now was how soon he could extricate himself from a ramshackle island prison to return to the only world where he had ever found peace . . . London.

  About the Author

  SOPHIA NASH was born in Switzerland and raised in France and the United States, but says her heart resides in Regency England. Her ancestor, an infamous French admiral who traded epic cannon fire with the British Royal Navy, is surely turning in his grave.

  Before pursuing her long-held dream of writing, Sophia was an award-winning television producer for a CBS affiliate, a congressional speechwriter, and a nonprofit CEO. She lives in the Washington, D.C., suburbs with her husband and two children.

  Sophia’s novels have won twelve national awards, including the prestigious RITA® Award, and two spots on Booklist ’s “Top Ten Romances of the Year.” Readers may contact her via her website: www.sophianash.com.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  By Sophia Nash

  The Art of Duke Hunting

  Between the Duke and the Deep Blue Sea

  Secrets of a Scandalous Bride

  Love with the Perfect Scoundrel

  The Kiss

  A Dangerous Beauty

  Copyright

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Excerpt from Between the Duke and the Deep Blue Sea copyright © 2012 by Sophia Nash

  THE ART OF DUKE HUNTING. Copyright © 2012 by Sophia Nash. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  EPub Edition APRIL 2012 ISBN: 9780062096487

  Print Edition ISBN: 9780062022332

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  Sophia Nash, The Art of Duke Hunting