The Trouble With Dukes

by Grace Burrowes

  “We go no farther than the terrace,” Megan said, ignoring Sir Fletcher’s proffered arm.

  “My dear, you wound me. I offer my escort knowing the limitations of your sight, and having many memories of you stumbling over carpet fringes and thresholds. Why must you be so disdainful of my attempts to protect you?”

  They reached the terrace, though all the other traffic was headed inside. Devlin St. Just, Earl of Rosecroft, went through the second set of doors, deep in discussion with Joseph, Earl of Keswick. They either did not see Megan or they were colluding in Sir Fletcher’s courtship.

  No family wanted too many unmarried females underfoot. They were expensive, petulant, and got up to the stupidest intrigues. Witness Pammy and her impoverished captain.

  “What do you want?” Megan asked, stopping at the top of the terrace steps.

  “What I want is to enjoy a stroll with my intended on a pretty evening,” Sir Fletcher said. “In addition to that, I want a goodly sum of money so that my future is secure, and I would not mind the attentions of a devoted wife and a talented mistress, if you must know. Do you mind if I smoke?”

  “Yes.”

  “My, you are in a taking. When we’re married, in the manner of devoted husbands the world over, I will ensure that my wife’s nerves are settled.”

  “Sir Fletcher, either get to the point or prepare to enjoy the evening in solitude, for I’m promised to Murdoch for the supper waltz.”

  She’d gripped her fan as tightly as some men gripped their swords. How gratifying.

  Sir Fletcher took out a cheroot and ran it under his nose. Lovely scent, though too dear in his present circumstances. Marriage to Megan would change all of that, the sooner the better.

  “This will be your last waltz with the estimable Murdoch,” Sir Fletcher said. “You really are not safe with him, you know. He turned on his own men, led them straight into a nest of French soldiers. His subordinates would mention that day only in whispers—those who survived—probably because he threatened to kill any who spoke against him. Murdoch is a killer. You can see it in his eyes.”

  Megan snatched the cheroot away and pitched it into the bushes. “I could slap you for spreading such talk. If I were a man, I’d call you out.”

  “If I were not a gentleman,” Sir Fletcher said, “I’d have you on your back out in the mews. Here’s what you need to know, Megan. You think you have your letters, because you had one of your pet Scotsmen steal them from my home. I’m prepared to publicize that larceny—the duke would be tried in the Lords, but the younger brother remains a commoner, gallows bait just like the rest of us.

  “Regardless of which brother I accuse,” he went on, “everybody will believe my version. The sad truth is, to explain how upset I am that my dearest literary treasures have gone missing, I will leave a trail of delicate inferences about the contents of the letters.”

  He smiled, very much enjoying the transition in Megan’s eyes from distaste to fear. “I’m not very delicate when in my cups,” he mused. “I try, but often fall short of the goal.”

  The violins were tuning up, and Megan’s hand was fisted at her side. Marriage to her would not be boring.

  “I do have my letters,” she retorted. “Say what you please, and I’ll simply produce the letters without revealing their contents. Perhaps you’ve an entire catalog of letters from compromised young ladies. Why don’t you advertise that fact and see how much longer you’re welcome in polite society?”

  Sir Fletcher’s pleasure in the encounter dimmed. A bit of spirit was interesting, but when a man exerted his superior intellect and natural authority, the woman was to simper and fuss, then turn up biddable and contrite.

  “Megan, do not force my hand,” Sir Fletcher said, leaning closer. “I am a very good shot, and if your cousins, or your Scottish wolfhounds, want to call me out, I will at the very least wound them sorely and cause great scandal. I was in the army, my dear. When I wasn’t perfecting my aim, I was learning to make copies of every document that mattered. You have your letters, and I have precise copies of each one, right down to a beautiful facsimile of your elegant signature.”

  Ah, finally. Her bravado faltered. “You copied my letters?”

  “A man never wants such precious sentiments to leave his control,” Sir Fletcher said. “The orchestra will start on the introduction soon. Best run along, darling. From now on, though, your supper waltzes are all mine, as are your good-night waltzes. Let’s hope your parents don’t tarry in Wales for too long, hmm?”

  He bowed punctiliously over her hand, and sauntered off in the direction of the card room. Let Megan have her waltz with the charmless Murdoch. Even condemned prisoners were allowed a last meal and a final prayer.

  Megan was too angry to be afraid, but she knew the anger would burn itself out, leaving only the timid, compliant nincompoop Sir Fletcher had charmed and duped several years ago.

  “Miss Meggie, I’ve been searching for you,” Hamish said as Megan crossed the corridor separating the terrace from the ballroom.

  The duke made a stunning impression in his Highland finery, and every time Megan’s path crossed his amid the music and fashion of polite society, he looked more at ease, more a man at home among his peers, if not his friends. At this distance, Megan recognized her beloved by the swing of his kilt, his height, and his posture more than his features.

  And she knew Hamish’s voice. Knew the caress lurking within the burr, and the affection and loyalty lurking deeper still.

  Damn Fletcher Pilkington.

  “Your Grace.” Megan curtsied. “Our waltz should be coming up. I’ve been looking forward to it all evening.”

  Hamish peered at her, and Megan could not muster a smile for all the kilts in Perthshire. “Meggie, what’s amiss? Do your feet ache?”

  Her heart ached. “I’m a trifle fatigued. Perhaps you’d rather sit with me?”

  Though what was she to say? Sir Fletcher had copied her letters and was eager to create a scandal should Megan refuse his suit.

  “Aye,” Hamish said, wrapping Megan’s hand over his arm. “I think a few minutes’ peace and quiet with my darling would be lovely.”

  “Don’t call me your darling,” Megan snapped, dropping Hamish’s arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean … We need to talk, Hamish.” They needed to end their engagement before it had been announced.

  “We most assuredly do need to talk. Something’s wrong, and you are my darling.”

  He led her to a bench on the terrace beneath a torch that had been purposely left unlit, run out of oil, or been snuffed by an opportunistic couple.

  Megan settled beside Hamish, not as close as she craved to be. “I’ve been a fool again.”

  Hamish’s posture changed, like a cat hearing a rustling in the undergrowth. “I’ll not let you cry off on me, Meggie Windham. Whatever talk you’ve heard, whatever rumors are circulating now, none of it matters half so much as my regard for you. Tell me who has upset my duchess, and I’ll have a word with them they won’t soon forget.”

  He rose as if to charge away in search of an enemy, and Megan had to move quickly to get her hand around the belt holding his sporran.

  “Don’t you dare run off on me, Hamish MacHugh. Sir Fletcher will be lying in ambush for you, and that’s the last battle I want on my conscience.”

  “Sir Fletcher? Has Pilkington bothered you, Megan?” Such gratifying menace in that question.

  “He has more than bothered me, Hamish. He has copied my letters, and will cheerfully call out anybody who thwarts his plan to marry me. He has deduced that you or possibly Colin stole my letters back, and he’ll cause all manner of talk should I balk at marrying him.”

  Hamish sank slowly to the bench. “He copied your letters?”

  “Sir Fletcher claims that army life taught him to have all important documents copied, and that not only does he have a record of the contents of the letters, he’s taken care to replicate my signature exactly. He even mentioned that Colin co
uld be tried for theft as a commoner, while you would be tried in the Lords.”

  Hamish was silent for a long moment, while the introduction to the waltz began in the ballroom. The waltz was one of Cousin Valentine’s more dramatic pieces, and the dratted dance was in a haunting minor key.

  “Say something, Hamish, please.”

  More silence, while Sir Fletcher was probably bowing and smiling at some blushing debutante or running up gambling debts Megan’s settlements were supposed to pay. The anger Megan had expected to fade was only growing.

  “Forgery is a felony,” Hamish said. “And you’re right. This is an ambush. I’ve been ambushed before. I don’t care for it. Colin is safe enough from a conviction—he was dancing and flirting while I was retrieving your letters—but the threat of criminal charges brought against my brother is bad enough, and exactly what I should have expected from Sir Fletcher.”

  “I’m sorry, Hamish. I’ve dragged you into my battles, and Sir Fletcher has no honor. He doesn’t fight fair. I knew that, and I still involved you.”

  Hamish said nothing, merely sat staring at the flagstones. He might have been a statue, Highlander Seated, while Megan wanted to screech and kick something—Sir Fletcher’s breeding organs, for example.

  The torchlights flickered as the Earl of Keswick stalked across the terrace. He’d been injured on the Peninsula, and when he was tired his gait became uneven.

  “Her Grace has asked after you, Megan,” Keswick said. “Murdoch, good evening. When one partners a lady for her supper waltz, one is typically found dancing with the lady when that waltz is played.”

  Hamish rose in an eruption of muscle and male dignity. “The lady did not care for the gloomy quality of the music, and I was unwilling to forgo her company.”

  Forgo it, he must. Permanently. Megan might eventually learn to bear that heartbreak, but not if she was also expected to bear Sir Fletcher’s children.

  “Joseph, you may report to Her Grace that I’m merely taking the air in Murdoch’s company.”

  “Yes, Cowlick,” Hamish said. “Report to headquarters that the pickets are all on sentry duty, as assigned. I suspect your countess is wondering where you’ve got off to, so you might as well report to her too.”

  Keswick’s gaze snapped from Hamish to Megan. “Perhaps you’ll join me for a hand of cards after supper, Murdoch.”

  The earl’s invitation bore the quality of a glove hitting the flagstones.

  “Perhaps I will,” Hamish said.

  The ensuing silence was considering on Keswick’s part, unreadable on Hamish’s.

  “I’ll find a footman to relight that lamp,” Keswick said. “Megan, good evening. Murdoch, I’ll await you in the card room after supper.”

  Keswick disappeared through the open doors to the gallery, leaving Megan with little more to say to her beloved except good-bye.

  “I don’t expect you to share the buffet with me,” she said. “In fact, it’s probably best if you didn’t. Sir Fletcher will remark it, and I wouldn’t want—”

  Abruptly, she could not force any more words past the lump in her throat.

  “What don’t you want, Meggie?”

  For the past few weeks, Megan had been building a vision of her future in her imagination. Beautiful Scottish scenery, laughing red-haired children, music, and cozy evenings by the fire had figured prominently. Cozier nights under the blankets had figured more prominently still, but so had decades of affection, trust, shared dreams, and shared life. She’d felt her world opening up into a beautiful vista of new experiences and new sights.

  That vision had crumbled in the space of five minutes, and was replaced by years of sorrow and misery as Sir Fletcher’s wife. He wanted a wife and a mistress, make no mistake about that, and he already regarded Megan’s dowry as his to waste on as many mistresses as he pleased.

  “I don’t want to trouble you further,” Megan said softly. “I’ve already asked too much of you.”

  Hamish stood very tall in the shadows. “I could fight him, Meggie. For you, I could meet him.”

  That admission had cost him, clearly. “You are not a killer, Hamish MacHugh, and you are far too precious to me to be risked at Sir Fletcher’s hands.”

  “So you’ll sacrifice yourself instead?” The question was quiet, bewildered, and pained.

  “If I must,” Megan said. “Sir Fletcher isn’t the worst husband I could have. He’ll likely grow bored with me after a few years, and we’ll live separately as most fashionable couples do. A few sons, and he’ll lose all interest in his wife.”

  She prayed that was so. Prayed she didn’t find herself married to a man who’d break her glasses and her spirit for his own entertainment.

  “Megan, are you asking me to leave you to Sir Fletcher?”

  She owed Hamish a resolute yes to that question. She couldn’t even nod her head. “Don’t make me cry, Hamish. Please, not now, not tonight. I can’t have any talk, and I wouldn’t want …”

  “I’m precious to you, but you don’t want me,” he said. The words should have been bitter, but Hamish enfolded Megan in a gentle embrace. “You are daft, Meggie Windham, and brave and foolish—also a bad liar. Before you blow a full retreat, grant me a boon.”

  Megan sensed a trap, but she was too busy savoring what might be her last moments in Hamish’s arms.

  “You’re trying to charm me,” she said, her cheek against the wool of his jacket. “I have no defenses right now, Hamish. I can barely think, and any moment, one of my cousins will come strutting through that door, and I’ll want to smack him with my fan.”

  “I’ll encourage you in any displays of affection you care to aim at your family, but all I’m asking you for is a truce, Megan.”

  Hamish was up to something, and the waltz would soon end. “What sort of truce?”

  “We neither advance nor retreat. We hold our ground, displaying neither a flag of surrender nor overt aggression. A ceasefire while we tend to our wounded and consider our options.”

  Megan was wounded, and being in Hamish’s arms was the only relief for her pain. “I ought to find Sir Fletcher right now and tell him I’ll marry him. You’re contemplating something dangerous.”

  “You won’t allow me to call him out, for which I’m honestly grateful, and I can’t stomach the notion of you marrying him. I’d say a ceasefire makes sense right now.”

  Megan tried to think, to weigh benefits and burdens, but no great insights or stunning conclusions materialized.

  “How long does this ceasefire last, Hamish? I don’t trust Sir Fletcher one bit.”

  “We are agreed on that much. Give me a fortnight, and don’t be sacrificing yourself to Sir Fletcher’s schemes just yet. Give me a chance to ambush the man who’s again trying to ambush you.”

  “A fortnight, then,” Megan said. Little enough for Hamish to ask. “Two weeks at most. Sir Fletcher is not a patient man.”

  Fourteen days of liberty and longing for what could not be, and then she’d give Sir Fletcher her hand in holy matrimony.

  Hamish spotted Colin in the corner of the card room, looking rakish and happy in a foursome of former officers playing whist. Very likely, they were more invested in their reminiscences and their hostess’s brandy than in the card play.

  “I cannot for the life of me fathom what Megan Windham sees in a man who’s incapable of smiling,” the Earl of Keswick said, standing at Hamish’s elbow.

  “Ask your lady wife what a man incapable of smiling might have to offer that’s worth a woman’s notice,” Hamish replied. “She’s bound to have a few ideas.”

  “My countess is a font of creativity, while you have no wife at all.”

  “Who’s the man partnering Sir Fletcher?” Hamish asked, rather than admit the sad truth of Keswick’s observation.

  “Captain Garner Puget. One of Plyne’s spares and not quite a fortune hunter, according to—”

  “Your wife,” Hamish finished. Keswick was besotted, and Hamish could only en
vy him. “Why does Puget look familiar?”

  Hamish had seen the two together previously—at the musicale?—but why did the sight of Puget rankle, was the more pressing question. Of course, everything rankled, given the broadsides Megan had fired. She had looked so damned brave and pretty and lost when she’d announced Sir Fletcher’s latest perfidy.

  “Puget,” Keswick said, “was one of those younger sons who made a good soldier during the Peninsular campaign. Once the Corsican was vanquished, his choices were limited to India, Canada, or mustering out. I believe he served under Sir Fletcher for at least part of his tour.”

  And Puget still associated with an officer who’d been neither liked nor respected by his subordinates.

  “I’d bet my coach and team Sir Fletcher has blackmailed the poor sod somehow,” Hamish said. “Is there somewhere we can talk?”

  Keswick took a leisurely sip of his drink, which appeared to be lemonade. “We’re talking now.”

  “Fine, then I won’t tell you that the glowering lot of lords Megan calls cousins must stay by her side every moment for the next two weeks. Sir Fletcher has made a pest of himself, and I wouldn’t put it past him to propose to my Meggie in public.”

  Keswick wrinkled a splendid beak. “Three doors down the corridor, there’s a parlor without a fire. We’ll not be disturbed there.”

  Hamish let Keswick lead the way. Though as for not being disturbed, Hamish was well beyond disturbed. Copying Megan’s letters showed determination, cunning, malice aforethought, and all manner of alarmingly shrewd tendencies in a man Hamish wanted to dismiss as a lazy bully.

  Keswick locked the parlor door, and while the fire hadn’t been lit, one wall sconce flickered dimly. The room was more shadows than light, and after the chatter and hum of the ballroom, quiet as a tomb.

  “Why must Megan Windham be protected from an eligible suitor?” Keswick asked.

  “Because Sir Fletcher Pilkington is a damned scoundrel.”

  “He’d say the same about you, and has been doing exactly that in half the clubs on St. James’s Street. He claims your violence knows no bounds, you betrayed your men, and you’re half-mad on your best day. What I’d like to know is why Sir Fletcher is indulging a penchant for old gossip now?”