“Is that so?” he said in a very quiet, very gentle voice. Those who knew him understood that when he used such a tone it would be in their best interests to immediately flee in the opposite direction. Eleanor stepped closer.
“Yes,” she said, meeting his hard gaze without flinching. “It is.”
“In that case, I suppose you don’t mind that if word of this gets out your reputation will be completely ruined and no man will ever have you?”
“First, word of this is never going to get out. Second–”
Derek harsh laugh cut her off. “Word always finds a way to get out, my lady. Even now I’ve no doubt there are busy bodies standing outside this room with their ears pressed to the door. Make no mistake, people have noted our absence. And it will not take very long for them to draw whatever dark conclusion they wish.”
“Let them think what they want. Henny and I know the truth, and it doesn’t matter a whit to me if my reputation is ruined.”
“And your parents?” he challenged softly. “What of their reputation? For you can rest assured that they will be given the same cut direct as you. Your mother strikes me as a lovely, sociable woman. What a pity it will be when she’s no longer received by any of her friends.”
For the first time, Eleanor’s courage faltered. “I…Mama?” she said uncertainly, looking back at Lady Ward. “That’s not true, is it?”
“A scandal of this magnitude would indeed affect the entire family,” Lady Ward said gravely. Then her expression softened. “But if you truly do not wish to marry His Grace, your father and I will not force you.”
Eleanor’s face was so easy to read Derek could decipher every emotion that flitted across her freckled countenance, from doubt to anger to disbelief, and finally, at long last, grim acceptance.
“Fine,” she said shortly. “I’ll marry you. But I’m not going to like it.”
Derek smiled humorlessly. “That’s fine, Red. Neither am I.”
Chapter Five
Hawkridge Castle
(Almost) One Year Later
Eleanor Ward had been married to the Duke of Hawkridge for eleven months, three days, and nine hours. In all that time, they had spoken exactly four sentences to one another.
Wait, she thought, a tiny line appearing between her winged eyebrows as she reconsidered. Was it four or was it five?
Five, she decided, if she counted the day of their wedding when he had looked into her eyes and said – albeit with great reluctance – “I do”. Although did two words really count as an entire sentence?
Debatable.
"What do you think, Mr. Pumpernickel?" Coaxing the white Persian up into her lap with a tiny sliver of anchovy, she scratched carefully under his chin, knowing the cat could go from purring to hissing in less time than it took to pour a cup of tea.
Not unlike her husband.
"Yes, you and the duke have quite a lot of traits in common, don't you? For one thing, you are both arrogant, not to mention quite unapproachable." Leaning back in her chair, she stared thoughtfully at the fireplace and the flames that hissed and crackled within. It may have been the first week of April, but Eleanor would hardly describe the weather as spring like.
The pond still had a thin crust of ice around the edges and the lawn was covered in a silvery blanket of frost. It was so cold the farmers had yet to plant their crops for the upcoming season, and whenever she went outside she was forced to bundle up as though it were the middle of January.
"You also come from impeccable bloodlines," she continued matter-of-factly. "Although you really have nothing to do with that. It wasn't as if you chose who you parents were going to be. How could you? You're a cat."
Mr. Pumpernickel’s ears flattened.
"A brilliant cat," Eleanor assured him quickly. "Just brilliant."
Mr. Pumpernickel’s tail swished.
"Oh, for heaven's sake. You're a genius. Second only to Socrates. There." She stroked a hand down his back. "Do you feel better?"
The Persian glared up at her from one slitted blue eye – he’d lost the other in a fight when he was only a kitten – before he jumped off her lap and trotted out of the parlor without so much as a backwards glance.
"Go on," she muttered under her breath. "I didn't want to speak to you anyways."
"Talking to yourself again?" Lady Georgiana Hanover glided into the room as if she were walking on a cloud. Sweeping her skirts to the side with an elegant flick of her wrist, she sat across from Eleanor and helped herself to one of the scones sitting on the glass table between them. "I thought we discussed that, darling," she said between nibbles.
"I wasn't talking to myself," Eleanor said defensively. "I was talking to Mr. Pumpernickel."
Georgiana lifted a sleek ebony brow. Like her brother, she had hair as dark as midnight and hazel eyes that stood out in startling contrast against her ivory countenance. Similar to the outside of a pearl, her skin had its own luminescent shine, something which Eleanor, with her scattering of freckles across sun kissed cheeks, was noticeably lacking.
"I do not think having a conversation with a cat is considered an improvement,” she said haughtily. “We converse with people, Nora. Not empty rooms or persnickety felines."
"Mr. Pumpernickel is not persnickety. A touch arrogant, perhaps, but-"
"I did not come here to discuss the personality traits of your cat."
Eleanor's mouth set in a mulish frown. "Then why are you here?"
Try as she might - and she had tried - she'd yet to warm up to her husband’s sister. It wasn't that Georgiana was mean, per say. It was just that they had absolutely nothing in common. Georgiana was fashionable and graceful and ladylike, while Eleanor was...well, none of those things. Put side by side, the two women couldn’t have looked – or acted – more differently.
Georgiana, with her flawless style and stunning good looks, made Eleanor look like a country bumpkin with her disheveled hair and frumpy dresses that were more often than not smeared with dirt and grass stains after an afternoon spent frolicking outside with her animals. Neither one of them understood the other, and that misunderstanding had caused more than a few tensions since Georgiana’s husband unexpectedly passed and she came to spend her mourning period at Hawkridge Castle.
Nestled amidst fifty thousand acres of rolling fields to the east and thick, unharvested forest to the west, one would think Hawkridge Castle and its surrounding grounds would be large enough for two women to cohabitate in relative peace and harmony.
One would be wrong.
Constructed by her husband’s great-great-great grandfather when Britain was still under the reign of the Tudors, the castle was massively sized…but apparently it wasn’t quite big enough for Georgiana to mind her own business.
No matter which wing of the castle Eleanor tried to hide in (and there were plenty to choose from), her sister-in-law always managed to find her. She liked to pretend it was by accident. “Oh, dear me!” she would laugh, fluttering a hand over her chest. “I didn’t know you were in here.” But Eleanor had long ago begun to suspect she sought her out on purpose, like a dog hunting down a bone. And like a dog with a bone, she would use Eleanor to entertain herself for a time before reburying her and flitting away to do…well, whatever it was well bred, well behaved women did.
“I have some very exciting news to share.” Draping her arm across the back of the chaise longue, Georgiana leaned back and delivered a smile that could only be described as glib. “Would you care to guess it?”
“No.” Eleanor shook her head. “I really don’t want to–”
“Oh, come on,” Georgiana coaxed. “Don’t be an old stick in the mud. I’ll give you three guesses.”
“I’m not being a stick in the mud, I just–”
“Nora.” Beneath the sugary sweetness, her sister-in-law’s voice was unmistakably sharp. “Be a dear and guess.”
Since it would be easier – and quicker – to play along than to argue, Eleanor gritted her teeth and said
, “You’ve decided to return to London.”
Please, please, please let that be it.
“Return to town when I am still in mourning and the Season is nearly finished? Honestly, Nora, the way your mind works is quite amusing. Guess again!”
“You’ve bought a new hat?” she ventured.
“No.” Georgiana’s nose wrinkled. “It’s as if you’re not even trying.”
“Fine. I give up.” Grabbing a scone off the plate – her third of the morning – Eleanor stuffed the entire thing in her mouth so she wouldn’t have to play Georgiana’s ridiculous game to its conclusion.
“Oh Nora, you’re so amusing,” Georgiana said with an airy laugh. “And I must confess, I am so jealous of the way you can eat and eat and never gain a single stone. More than one of those scones and I need to let out my stays. They’re just riddled with sugar and butter, you know.”
They could have been filled with lard for all Eleanor cared. Scones were delicious, and she’d be damned if she stopped eating them for something as frivolous as the size of her waistline. Although to be fair, her weight was never something she’d had to worry about. Not with all the energy she exerted caring for her menagerie of rescued animals.
While Georgiana spent her afternoons reading a book or working on her sewing, Eleanor was outside chasing after all manner of creatures, from the three goslings she’d found abandoned by their mother when she first arrived at Hawkridge to the litter of pygmy shrews she’d saved from the gardener’s shovel.
After Mrs. Gibbons, the no nonsense housekeeper with a stern brow and even sterner tongue, made it clear that ‘wild beasts’ were not welcome inside, Eleanor had managed to coax the groundskeeper into allowing her use of the empty carriage barn. With the help of some footmen, she’d constructed half a dozen pens for her larger pets and four wooden box enclosures for those who still needed to be confined to a nest. For the most part the animals behaved themselves, but the goslings – now tripled in both size and temperament – had been proving particularly difficult as of late.
As soon as the ice was completely melted off the pond she was going to release them, but until then it was going to be a struggle to keep the young geese contained. The silly things insisted on following her wherever she went, and four days ago they’d nearly ended up on the dinner menu when they’d wandered into the kitchens and caused such a ruckus that Mrs. Gibbons had gone after them with a carving knife.
Poor Ronald had barely managed to escape with all of his feathers intact, and Donald had been one step away from being thrown straight into a pot of strew when Eleanor plucked him up and dashed outside. Mrs. Gibbons had been so furious that her entire face had turned a rather alarming shade of purple, and she still wasn’t speaking to her. Eleanor may have been the duchess, but the housekeeper had made no attempts to disguise where her loyalties lay. She treasured Hawkridge Castle first and foremost, the duke second, Georgiana third, and Eleanor came in at a (very) distant fourth.
She didn’t mind. She may have been married to the duke, but Georgiana was more of a duchess than she’d ever be. All of the servants deferred to her. When there was a decision to be made relating to the running of the household Georgiana made it, and Eleanor was only too happy to let her. It kept things at an even keel, and allowed her to do what she really wanted which was to care for her animals.
If not for the stone walls and thousands of acres of rolling fields and thick woods, she might as well have still been at home. She was married, but not married. A duchess, but not a duchess. It was a very peculiar position to be in, but one she’d adjusted to quite well over the past eleven months, three days, and – her gaze flicked to the mahogany table clock in the corner of the room – nine hours and twenty minutes. She did miss her parents on occasion, but they visited when they could and she and her mother exchanged monthly letters. One thing she did not miss?
Her husband.
It had been an enormous relief when the duke had informed her, in no uncertain terms, that they would lead completely separate lives once their vows were read.
“I am going to remain in London,” he’d said, those brandy colored eyes of his daring her to challenge him. “And you will reside at Hawkridge Castle in Surrey.”
“Do you mean we’re going to live apart?” she’d asked.
“Yes. That is precisely what I mean.”
“Oh.” As relief had swept through her like a wave crashing up against the shore, Eleanor had hugged her arms to her chest and fought the urge to grin ear to ear. “That sounds splendid.”
And live apart they had, for eleven months, three days, and…twenty-one minutes.
“You’re really not going to try and guess?” Georgiana said with a sigh. “Fine. I’ll tell you, but only because I cannot keep it to myself for a second longer.” She smoothed an invisible wrinkle on her black skirt, hazel eyes demurely lowering to her lap before they suddenly lifted and pierced Eleanor with a smirking stare that filled her with immediate dread. “I’ve just received word from London…”
What remained of Eleanor’s scone slid greasily down her throat as her entire spine stiffened. Don’t say it, she thought silently. Don’t you dare say–
“Derek is coming home!”
Chapter Six
“Don’t leave.” Her plump lips pursed in a persuasive pout, Vanessa stroked her hand down Derek’s gleaming back – they’d just finished a very rigorous bout of lovemaking that had left them both perspiring and slightly breathless – before rolling onto her back, pink nipples pointing proudly up at the ceiling.
She could have easily reached for the sheet that was twisted around her hips and covered herself, but Vanessa was not a woman predisposed to modesty. It was one of the things Derek liked best about her. And one of the things he was going to miss the most when he traveled to Hawkridge Castle to tame his feral bride.
Standing, he splashed lukewarm water on his face before pulling on a pair of dove gray trousers and a white linen shirt. Buttoning his shirt he turned to face his mistress, his gaze leisurely traveling down her voluptuous figure before returning, with great reluctance, to her narrowed eyes. He knew she was displeased with him. Just like he knew there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Did she think he wanted to go chasing after Eleanor? Bloody hell, he’d rather gouge his eyes out with a dull spoon than tangle with that shrew again.
But his cousin had left him no choice.
Somehow, Lord Norton Bertram, the Earl of Glengarry, next in line to inherit the dukedom, and general pain in Derek’s arse, had discovered the terms of their late grandfather’s will. Mostly importantly the clause where Derek would be forced to forfeit the dukedom if he was not legally married before his twenty-ninth birthday.
In England, an unconsummated marriage could be grounds for annulment. It was no longer as common a practice as it once had been, but neither was it completely unheard of. Which meant Norton’s daring threat to take him to court and seize the title for his own wasn’t completely without merit.
The sniveling little wanker had actually had the audacity to stand in the middle of his study and demand proof that Derek had bedded his wife. As if it were the dark ages and the blood-stained sheet was being kept in a closet somewhere.
It had taken considerable self-restraint not to forcibly remove the smug look from Norton’s face with his fist, but somehow he’d managed to show his cousin out without resorting to physical violence. Then he had immediately gone to his solicitor’s office, who had told him, after a bit of hemming and hawing, that Norton might have a legitimate claim to the dukedom if their grandfather’s will was brought into question in the court of appeals. After all, it was common knowledge that Derek and his duchess had been living completely apart for the better part of a year.
“There’s no guarantee either way, of course,” Mr. Banks had said anxiously. “But it would tie up the estate for months if not years, something which I believe you were hoping to avoid by marrying Lady Eleanor.”
His
solicitor was right. The predicament he now found himself in was precisely what he’d been trying to avoid when he’d married Eleanor. There was a part of him that knew he couldn’t ignore her forever, of course. At some point he would need to produce a legitimate heir, if only to keep Norton’s grasping hands off of his bloody title should he expire unexpectedly.
It wasn’t so much the title itself that he cared about, or even the wealth. It was the knowledge that Norton and his wastrel ways would destroy everything their ancestors had so painstakingly built and preserved. The man was a charlatan and a gambler who had burned through his considerable inheritance in less than two years and was desperately looking for another way to refill his coffers. Well, Derek would be damned before he gave him the means to do so. Even if it meant returning to Hawkridge and wooing the last woman in all of England he wanted to look at, least of all bed.
His wife.
“I won’t be gone for very long. Two fortnights at the most,” he told Vanessa, reaching for a silky blonde curl. She batted his hand away.
“You’re going to her,” she spat, and Derek was surprised to see a stirring of jealousy in the depths of her frigid blue eyes. Vanessa may have been a passionate creature in bed, but out of it he’d never met another woman more detached or unfeeling which was what made her such an excellent mistress. He never had to worry about her doing something ridiculous, like falling in love with him. And while he knew she hadn’t been pleased when he’d married Eleanor, she’d never said anything.
“Not because I want to.” The overstuffed mattress creaked as he sat down beside her and traced his finger down one creamy thigh. This time she allowed him to touch her, but if she were a cat her tail would have been swishing back and forth in silent warning. “You knew I would have to do this at some point or another. It does not change anything between us.”
“Doesn’t it?” she asked, tilting her head.
“No. When I return we can pick up right…where…we…left…off.” He punctuated each word with a kiss, working his way up her thigh to her breasts. Drawing a nipple between his lips he expertly swirled his tongue around the hard little bud, but when he felt her stiff and unyielding beneath him he sat back with a sigh. “You’re making more of this than there has to be. It’s not as if I am bringing the chit back to town with me.”
The Spring Duchess (A Duchess for All Seasons Book 2) Page 4
