The Trouble With Dukes

by Grace Burrowes

  Keswick had daughters and sons in quantity. He knew all about bearing up and about checking on family.

  “We’re discussing Keswick’s dereliction of duty,” Rosecroft said. “He’s lost track of Murdoch, who was last seen disappearing into the hedges with Megan in tow. You will recall that we were dragooned into an impromptu tea dance without tea cakes, the object of which was to ensure that Murdoch, known among his fellow officers as—”

  Westhaven was studying his brother as if Rosecroft had burst forth into an aria in praise of spotted unicorns.

  “You sound like our papa,” Westhaven said. “Though the privilege of imitating Moreland ought properly and exclusively to belong to me, you sound exactly like His Grace lecturing on the subject of Whig politics. If you ask me, Megan is the one doing the towing.”

  He nodded discreetly—Westhaven was always discreet—toward the end of the ballroom closest to the supper buffet. Megan Windham led a brawny, kilted fellow toward the stairs to the minstrel’s gallery. Both Megan and her nominal escort held plates of food. Murdoch wore the bemused expression of a prizefighter who’d been rendered unconscious in the first round, but had no recollection of the blow that had felled him.

  “All present and accounted for,” Keswick said. “Nobody missing in action, but two people apparently wise enough to take advantage of Her Grace’s practice of opening the buffet before the supper waltz ends. Perhaps you should do likewise, Lord Rosebud. My countess claims hunger can make a man irritable.”

  Dark brows swooped down while Westhaven took a sip of his champagne—or pretended to.

  “If somebody doesn’t tune that violoncello, I will not answer for my behavior.” Lord Valentine, looking lacily resplendent, had emerged from a card room. “Who else is pleading a teething child, breeding wife, or aching head to leave immediately after supper?”

  “You will not leave until Her Grace says you can leave,” Westhaven said as Lord Valentine plucked the champagne from his brother’s hand. “All appears to be going well, but then, this is the Duchess of Moreland’s ball.”

  Benevolent providence, fate, and a sensible Deity knew better than to thwart Her Grace’s wishes on the matter of her seasonal ball. Mere grown sons and sons-in-law would dance until dawn if the duchess required it of them.

  “It’s early for you to start whining,” Rosecroft said, swiping the glass from his youngest brother.

  “Ellen sent me on my own tonight,” Lord Valentine replied, looking stoic in the face of such a miserable fate.

  A moment of fraternal sympathy ensued, with nobody looking anywhere in particular, for a Windham fellow attending a ball without his lady was a pathetic specimen indeed. Other exponents of good breeding might pretend they barely knew their spouses socially, not so the Windhams.

  “Megan and Murdoch not only took a deal of fresh evening air in the gardens together,” Rosecroft said, “they have dodged the supper waltz in favor of more conversation. Gentlemen, I believe we have a situation brewing. They were surpassingly devoted to their shared waltz at Westhaven’s tea-cake-less tea dance.”

  Keswick considered taking a turn stealing the champagne, but the glass was nearly empty.

  “My very point,” he said, “which is why I asked what we know of Hamish, Duke of Murdoch, before you went off into some pout about missing your sweets.”

  Rosecroft turned a glower on Keswick. “My countess ensures I’m kept well supplied with sweets, I’ll have you know, very good tea cakes among them. Iced tea cakes by the dozen, with filling, and—”

  “Somebody get the poor old thing to the buffet,” Lord Valentine muttered, before his expression arranged itself into a charming smile. “Megan, good evening. You look lovely, as usual. Murdoch.”

  The conversation fell into a lull as the music below came to an end, and even Westhaven seemed to need a moment to muster yet another polite, proper verbal sally. Murdoch peered over the balcony at the dancers now assembling into a very long line that stretched into the ballroom itself.

  “Miss Megan, you had the right of it. Sitting out the waltz in favor of a dash through the buffet line was a brilliant strategy.” He peered at the Moreland heir. “You’re accounted a canny fellow. If you intended to sit out the supper waltz, I wonder why you weren’t down there, choosing the tastiest morsels for your countess, Worsthaven.”

  Lord Valentine fell prey to a spate of coughing, while Rosecroft passed Worsthaven the empty glass, and began thumping his baby brother soundly on the back. Very soundly.

  Miss Megan murmured something about finding a seat before they were all taken, and led her kilted duke off among the potted palms.

  Lord Valentine recovered from his coughing fit and bowed to his older brothers. “Rosebud, Worsthaven, I bid you good night. I’m off to find a piano with which to entertain Her Grace’s guests during supper. I can’t wait to hear what verbal artillery that Scot will aim in my direction, or yours, Keswick. I confess, I begin to like the fellow.”

  He bowed to Keswick and strolled away, smirking handsomely.

  “Valentine has always carried something of a burden regarding his name,” Westhaven remarked, finishing the champagne. “Perhaps we ought not to have teased him quite as much.”

  “We’re his older brothers,” Rosecroft said. “We had a duty to tease him or our sisters would have tormented him even worse than we did. He turned out well enough, after all.”

  Rosecroft was a fine strategist, and after Keswick had consulted with Louisa regarding the evening’s developments, he’d probably consult Rosecroft as well. One thing was clear, based on what Keswick had overheard while lurking among the honeysuckle. Megan Windham could not marry Sir Fletcher.

  Murdoch’s plan for salvaging Megan’s situation was—like many good plans—expedient, discreet, and did not require displays of violence. That it was illegal and dangerous was Murdoch’s challenge to meet.

  Megan had not come to the ball expecting to recruit an ally in the person of Hamish, Duke of Murdoch, and yet, his worthy qualities were as obvious as the plaid on his kilt.

  He did listen. He did not judge. He was practical, kind, honorable, had a subtle sense of humor—and a sense of the absurd—and, of all things, his nature was, indeed, affectionate.

  “Shall we find a table in the portrait gallery, on the terrace, or up here, Your Grace?”

  Megan had purposely brought Murdoch to greet her titled cousins, for the more polite society saw the duke accepted by his peers, the less anybody would dare speak ill of him.

  “I like to be near greenery,” His Grace said. “Camouflage, to use the French term.”

  “Or the pleasure of natural surroundings,” Megan replied, leading the way to a table situated among enormous ferns.

  The minstrel’s gallery ought to have been the warmest location on the premises, but Her Grace ordered the highest windowpanes opened before a ball even began. The result was warm air with a hint of movement in the most private of possible locations. Card rooms opened off the gallery as well, so foot traffic typically came and went in the direction of the stairs. The crowd in line for the buffet meant for the present, Megan could enjoy relative seclusion with her escort.

  “Do you like all this folderol?” His Grace asked. “I’d honestly rather be home in my library reading Wordsworth or Burns.”

  “At this hour, my head usually aches too much to read anything,” Megan said. “My spectacles help me see, though wearing them all day takes a toll.”

  Megan arranged herself side by side with Murdoch at a small table, both of them facing out across the gallery. The effect was like being behind a hedge, with a view of the fields and gardens beyond.

  “Can you see the portraits across the ballroom?” Murdoch asked.

  What ensued was a quiz of sorts, the result of which was to reveal that Megan could see clearly without her glasses at only a specific, middle distance, something she hadn’t realized before.

  “For the most part, I make guesses,” she said, offeri
ng the duke a bite of pineapple.

  Aunt Esther was permitted one truly extravagant entertainment at the height of each season, complete with ice sculptures, pineapple, and hothouse flowers. In a few weeks’ time, her second, less formal gathering would mark the beginning of the season’s end, after which the summer exodus from the capital would ensue.

  How many letters would the budget for this ball have ransomed if Murdoch couldn’t steal them back in the next few days?

  “You guess at faces?” Murdoch asked, taking the pineapple from her fingers.

  “I guess at everything. Faces, expressions, moods, innuendo. If I know a person, then seeing his face clearly isn’t as important. For strangers, I’m quite at sea unless I peer at them closely, or they speak with particular emphasis.”

  The pineapple met its fate, though His Grace had delicate manners. “Sir Fletcher likely slipped past your guard, in part because you weren’t wearing your specs and didn’t know him well. Took me a while to realize English ways are different from Scottish ways, not only English speech, but English mannerisms. Got me in some trouble when I first bought my colors.”

  Nothing about this conversation was particularly remarkable—Megan’s eyesight had never been good, Sir Fletcher had slipped past her guard—and yet, Megan could only have had these exchanges with a friend.

  A true friend, who saw her clearly, who was willing to be seen by her just as clearly.

  “What was different about the English officers?” she asked.

  “Not only the officers, the whole bloo—blessed lot of them. Their humor is different, meaner, more sly, not as plainly funny to a Scotsman, while I suppose they think our jests childish. Englishmen consider it more dignified to ignore minor insults, though to a Scotsman, no insult is minor. If I know I’ve been insulted, then my brothers expect me to do something about it, not merely utter a few equally nasty words in response, and go prancing on my way.”

  “Is this why the Scottish typically fought in their own regiments, the English in theirs?”

  Murdoch sat back. “And the Irish in theirs? I suppose it is. Best to go into battle alongside fellows you understand, but it’s also true you fight hardest for your own.” Then more softly, “You’ll fight to the death for your own. The generals know that.”

  Megan squeezed his hand, and because they were dining, her gesture was bare fingers to bare fingers. Murdoch’s grasp was warm and firm, in contrast to some others she could name.

  “Sir Fletcher would fight hardest to preserve himself,” Megan said, considering a forced strawberry. “Though I suspect he found a way to avoid the worst of any battle. How will we steal back my letters?”

  She asked in part because Murdoch’s gaze had gone so bleak at the mention of fighting for his own, suggesting he’d lost men in battle—every officer did—or something even worse.

  “I retrieve the letters by gaining access to Sir Fletcher’s library in the dark of night and reaving them from his desk drawer. You assist by providing the intelligence for this undertaking and drawing me a map of his house, right down to the positioning of the furniture in his library and the location of each window.”

  “I can’t draw you anything at the moment,” Megan said. “I haven’t my glasses.”

  Murdoch helped himself to a strawberry from her plate. “Then talk to me, Meggie. Tell me what you recall of Sir Fletcher’s home, and draw me a map tomorrow when you have broad daylight, a fresh mind, and your spectacles. I’ll take you driving if the weather’s fair, and you can pass along your sketch, then. A week from now, you can burn those letters one by one, and sleep secure in victory over a wily foe.”

  Which delightful notion, Megan could not have contemplated a single minuet ago.

  She described not only the floor plan of Sir Fletcher’s family home, but also the placement of the furniture as best she recalled it.

  “What will you do if the desk is locked?” she asked.

  “Pick the lock,” Murdoch replied, putting a few candied violets on Megan’s plate. “Don’t tell me you’re scandalized. You have a platoon of sisters, and you grew up with older boy cousins, and they have another platoon of sisters. You’re probably a better lock picker than I am.”

  Megan was quite proficient with a hairpin. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because you don’t see as well as I do. You likely listen more closely, and your sense of touch would be more acute. Many of the best harpers in the Highlands have been blind. We have blind fiddlers, blind pipers. Seems only fair, if the Almighty withholds the boon of sight, that other gifts are given fuller expression.”

  A queer pang assailed Megan at that bit of philosophy. She popped a sweet, crunchy violet into her mouth.

  “I like to sing Mama’s songs from Wales or the occasional drawing room piece with my sisters, but I’m not the musical prodigy Lord Valentine is.”

  Another pat, to her shoulder this time. Murdoch really was an affectionate man. Megan could still feel the pleasure of his embrace, warm, sheltering, fragrant, and … masculine. So very masculine.

  “The harper’s gift isn’t only the music, Meggie. I love music, my sisters have beautiful voices, Colin plays a wicked fiddle. My blind uncle Leith excelled us all in skill because he was determined. His strength wasn’t only the music, but also the sheer, unrelenting stubbornness to learn despite a lack of sight.”

  The queer feeling spread, a chill followed by warmth. Megan suspected she’d just been complimented, not as an Englishman would render a compliment—to the pale blue shade of her dress, to the sprigs of violets woven into her coiffure, to something easily seen—but as a Scotsman gifts a lady with a compliment.

  “Sir Fletcher is stubborn,” she said. “Also mean.” He was no sort of kisser either, all rough, fumbling hands, thrusting tongue, and haste.

  “Does the food not agree with you?”

  She pushed aside the memory and took a sip of punch. “The food and the company are very agreeable. I can’t say when I’ve enjoyed a supper break more. Tell me about your home, Your Grace.”

  “You must visit someday. The landscape is wilder, the light sharper, the air more invigorating. You’d like it.”

  Megan would love it, for Murdoch clearly did. The longer he spoke of Scotland, and Perthshire in particular, the more heavily accented his English became, until Megan slipped into Gaelic, and he did too, and the orchestra resumed its graceful, measured dances without Megan even noticing.

  Their plates were empty and their glasses as well by the time Murdoch assisted her to her feet.

  “You have ruined me for socializing, Meggie Windham. My expectations for a society ball have been raised to include excellent conversation, a dash of intrigue, and the company of a lady whose well-reasoned opinions aren’t in the common way. My thanks for taking pity on a homesick Scotsman.”

  He’d taken her hand and enfolded it in both of his, though neither he nor Megan had put their gloves back on, for they yet lingered amid the ferns.

  She did not want to let Murdoch go. Didn’t want to let her hand slip from his, did not want to lose him among the throng below, did not want to fill her ears with violin melodies and gossip when she could instead be arguing economics and poetry with him.

  Alas, Megan was without spectacles, and thus when she went to kiss Murdoch, she had to cup his cheek against her palm, the better to perfect her aim. An hour ago, she might have contented herself with his cheek—a friendly kiss.

  But somewhere between a pat on the arm, and a compliment to her stubbornness, friendly had become inadequate. Murdoch was championing her cause, routing a scoundrel, and putting himself at risk on her behalf simply because he was a gentleman.

  Megan put her mouth to his, lingering for a moment, so he’d know she’d hit the target she couldn’t quite see clearly but could enjoy wonderfully even with her eyes closed. He was warmth and wonder, a hint of lemons, a whiff of heather.

  And she was in love.

  Longing sharper and more desperate
than homesickness shot through Hamish as he cradled Megan’s hand against his cheek.

  “You must not, Meggie.”

  Such was her determination that a man might easily mistake it for a lack of comprehension. Megan Windham’s gestures, her speech, her responses were all characterized by hesitation, a moment in which she appeared to be choosing words, deciding how to reply, or casting about for answers.

  Hamish knew better. As a Scotsman among English officers, as the head of his family, as a former soldier outcast among his fellow veterans, he knew what her lowered lashes truly signaled.

  She was marshaling her self-restraint, being prudent. Being relentlessly self-controlled and at a cost only another passionate soul behind enemy lines might suspect.

  A frisson of the battle lust pierced the warmth Megan’s kiss brought, an irrational conviction that Hamish alone could free her from that moment of hesitation she brought to even a stolen kiss. She’d cupped Hamish’s cheek first, a tender gesture that cut him to the marrow of his lonely soul.

  And then she fixed bayonets and charged his lines.

  Megan pressed her mouth to Hamish’s more firmly, and he swung her about, so his sheer bulk would block from view the identity of the woman who had dared kiss the Terror of Toulouse.

  Megan Windham was a terror in her own right, sending Hamish’s common sense teetering on the brink of oblivion. She went at him with everything—wrapped her arms about him, leaned into the kiss, and into a man contemplating the complete surrender of his wits.

  “Meggie, no. You needn’t kiss—”

  Her breasts pressed against Hamish’s chest. Her hand slid around his waist to anchor him more closely. A damp, sweet warmth swiped against the next protest Hamish would have made. Strawberries and tart lemons, daring and desire.

  Arousal leapt into the affray, and that—that delightful, damnable, male reaction—fortified Hamish’s honor. He lifted his head, but cradled Megan’s jaw, so her cheek was pressed against the lace and linen of his cravat.