A Duke in Disguise

by Cat Sebastian

  “Do you not believe that he’d be as good a husband as a duke as he would have as an engraver?”

  “That isn’t the point,” Verity protested.

  Lady Caroline removed a piece of paper and a pair of spectacles from her reticule. “Do you not believe you and he are fundamentally equal and—” she read from the paper “—it is long past time to do away with meaningless distinctions of rank?”

  Verity knew that phrase. That was from a piece she and Nate had written for the Register months ago. “We were referring to universal suffrage, not marriage.”

  “To be perfectly honest, Miss Plum, I don’t care who he marries or who he takes as a mistress. I know I ought to, but I’ve spent twenty years wondering what happened to the child I tried to save, and now that I see him safe and sound I only want him to be happy. My nephew will make a good duke,” Lady Caroline said, rising and shaking out her skirts. “And as long as this nation has dukes, it can only be for the best to have as many good men in that position as possible. He’s kind and he’s fair. He reminds me of his father, who was the best of brothers. And while I can’t expect this to mean anything to you, it makes me proud to know that one day soon there will be a worthy Duke of Arundel.”

  “Why did you come here today?”

  “You have a place in the world, something all your own. I envy you. Being anything at all to Ash—wife, mistress, even friend—will mean giving up some of that, and perhaps taking something from him in return. I wouldn’t blame you for not wanting to do it. I came to remind you that the man you know hasn’t changed. But he is rightfully the next Duke of Arundel, and if the court finds otherwise next week, it will be unjust. It is his place in the world and he’s starting to accept that.”

  Verity felt the implied rebuke that at the very least she ought to do the same.

  Ash had hoped that his uncle’s absence would allow the servants to stop slinking about in terror lift the sepulchral gloom that blanketed Arundel House. When that didn’t happen, he realized that the servants had as much at stake in the upcoming trial as he did: if Ash lost, his uncle would surely either dismiss the servants without references for their disloyalty or find some more dire way to retaliate.

  With this in mind, he visited his grandfather’s apartments for the second time.

  “Do you enjoy dragging this family into disrepute, boy?” the old man croaked from his bed. The Duke of Arundel did not seem interested in forging a friendly relationship with his long-lost grandson.

  Ash forbore from responding that any dragging into disrepute had occurred some decades since, and short of getting tried for treason and murder he could hardly outdo his uncle. “Exceedingly,” he said. The duke let out a wheezy laugh. “But I came to ask you about the servants. They must be in your employ, not my uncle’s. If I lose this suit, I want to know that you’ll ensure they have references. And I want your promise that in your will you’ve left enough for my aunt to be independent.”

  A malicious gleam lit up the old man’s eyes. “That’s what you’re worried about? Just goes to show you aren’t a proper Talbot, no matter what blood you have in your veins.”

  “Because I exert myself on behalf of other people?”

  “No, because references and incomes will be the least of their problems if you lose. If you win, too, come to that.”

  A shiver coursed down Ash’s spine. “What do you mean by that?”

  “Come now. You know what kind of man my son is. What do you think he’ll do to you and anyone who has helped you? Do you think he’s going to quietly disappear? He burnt down the conservatory at Weybourne Priory to punish Caro for allowing supper to be served cold.”

  Ash remembered the burnt pages of his aunt’s herbarium. “How could you stand idly by while this happens? She is your daughter.”

  “And he is my son.”

  This man—possessed of title, fortune, and connections—had more power than anyone Ash had ever met, and he couldn’t see his way to using it to protect his daughter. That amount of power was precious, rare, and the Duke of Arundel did nothing with it. He just let it molder and go to waste. Ash climbed the stairs to his own bedchamber and spent a sleepless night, thinking he heard footsteps in the darkened corridors or smelled smoke wafting from the attics.

  Chapter Seventeen

  In the windowless box room, Verity could see her breath and smell distinct signs of a mouse infestation.

  “It’s too cold to rummage through the attics,” Nan said, clutching her apron in her hands. “You’ll catch your death up there.”

  “It shouldn’t take me more than a few hours,” Verity assured her. “And if the trial is to begin next week, there’s no time to spare.” She had thought there would be months before the judge agreed to hear Ash’s suit, and could only imagine that the duke had pressed the powers that be to expedite matters.

  She stared at the pile of detritus in the box room. Nobody had ever cleared it out in the five and twenty years she had lived here; more and more things got added, shoved into spaces between trunks and cracked bedsteads and piles of what could only be rubbish. Before Roger left for Bath, he asked Verity to stow some of his belongings up here. Verity hoped to find a journal or perhaps whatever correspondence had existed between himself and the headmaster of Ash’s school. She didn’t like to think that Roger might have known the truth of Ash’s origins and failed to tell Ash, but she had known Roger. The man had been fiercely protective of the boy who had come to him as a friendless invalid. If Roger had thought Ash was better off not knowing, if he had suspected—correctly—that Ash would be in danger should his identity become known, then he might have deliberately withheld that information.

  It took hours to even find Roger’s belongings, the contents of the room having gotten quite jumbled when Nate and Charlie rummaged through while packing for their journey. Eventually her eyes landed on a crate labeled in Roger’s neat hand. She shoved it out onto the landing to examine it in better light. There was also a battered old trunk, too ratty to withstand an ocean voyage, and she dragged that to the landing as well.

  Verity had hoped to find journals, but if Roger had ever kept a journal, he had not sent them to be stored in this attic. What she found instead were a pair of galoshes, an opera hat, several engravings that she would remember to send on to Ash, and a bible. This last object was perplexing, because Roger was as vehement an atheist as Nate was. It was a costly volume, bound in red calfskin with gilt on the edges. A red ribbon that had been intended for use as a bookmark was tied to another ribbon, and then wrapped around the entire book. Verity untied the ribbons, partly because she was loath to see a volume that had been produced with such care treated so badly, and partly because she had to know why Roger—fussy, fastidious Roger—had done such a thing. She worked the knot loose and gingerly opened the cover, careful not to damage the binding. In between the front cover and the first page was a stack of letters, still folded. She delicately unfolded the top one and read the date. November 1799. And it was addressed to Roger from a man who signed himself Adrian.

  It took only a single glance to determine why Roger had kept this letter. This was a love letter. There was nothing actionable, and if she hadn’t known Roger well enough to be familiar with his inclinations she might not have noticed the sentiment, but it was a love letter nonetheless. She might have put the letter back into the bible, bound the book once again, and returned it to the shadowiest corner of the attic, if she hadn’t seen the word pupil towards the end. Might Roger’s Adrian have been one of Ash’s schoolmasters?

  She opened the next letter so quickly she nearly tore it. The date was two weeks after the first letter, and after a lengthy disquisition on the subject of chilblains, Adrian mentioned that his school had a new student who had arrived in the chaperonage of a rector from Ashby, in Norfolk. The clergyman had privately told the schoolmaster that the local rumor, passed on from a woman who fostered the child some years ago, was that the boy was the scion of a noble family who wa
s put into hiding after his uncle made an attempt on his life. Adrian had asked whether the child knew of his origins, and the rector said that he did not. Adrian then asked what family the child belonged to, and the vicar said he did not know, but that it was one of the oldest in the land.

  Verity realized she held in her hand the key to Ash’s case, the piece of evidence that connected Ash with the child who had been brought to that village in Norfolk. She could throw it into the fire and hope that the Court of Common Pleas found Ash’s claim to be without merit. But she knew she wouldn’t. Ash had made his choice; he had found what Lady Caroline called his place in the world. Verity would support him in that, even if she didn’t like it, even if it meant that any future they had together would bring about an irretrievable change for Verity.

  She shook the dust out of her hair and sent a note to Arundel House.

  Some hours later there came a knock on the shop door. She ignored it at first, but when the rapping persisted she ran downstairs, dressing gown wrapped tightly around her, ready to give a piece of her mind to whoever couldn’t understand what dark shop windows meant. “We’re closed,” she called. “Been closed for hours. Bugger off.”

  “Plum,” said a voice she would have recognized anywhere. “That’s not how you run a business.”

  She flung the door open. Ash’s hat was low on his forehead, the collar of his coat turned up high against his face, presumably so he’d avoid notice. “Come in before we have newsmen at the door,” she said, and let him up to her office. “I didn’t expect you to come in person,” she said.

  He stepped into the shop and she closed the door behind him. “You said you found papers in Roger’s belongings that shore up the evidence for my suit, and you thought I wouldn’t come in person?”

  “I meant to send them to your solicitor.”

  “I came in person to see if you had taken leave of your senses,” he clarified. “You’re going to aid and abet me becoming a duke?”

  “I’m going to aid and abet you, full stop,” Verity retorted.

  He regarded her for a long moment. “Thank you, Plum.”

  Upstairs in the study, she took the letters out of her desk and waited for him to read them.

  When Ash finally looked up, he frowned. “Why wouldn’t Roger have told me?”

  “Ash, he thought you were in danger. You were in danger, and you still are. Or maybe he thought you were better off not knowing. For heaven’s sake, you were better off not knowing, and so was I.” She set her jaw. “But things are different now. You’re the only thing stopping your uncle from doing a great deal of harm. So all that’s left is to ensure that you win next week.”

  She hoped he recognized this for what it was: an overture, a concession, a tiny sign that she was willing to accept Ash’s new role.

  He stepped towards her. “Is that all that’s left, Plum?”

  She shook her head.

  He peeled off his greatcoat to reveal a tailored coat that suited his broad shoulders and a pair of pantaloons that gave her thoughts an obscene turn. His linens were whiter than she had ever seen them, his hair smoother, his boots polished to a mirror shine. On his hand was a ring that gleamed red in the firelight.

  “You look terrible,” she said.

  He raised an eyebrow. “I’ve missed you, too, Plum.” It had been only a day since they had seen one another at Arundel House, but she knew what he meant.

  “I hate your coat and your stupid ruby ring.”

  He tossed his hat onto the sofa. “I think you’re glad to see me.”

  “Whoever did that to your hair ought to be shot out of a cannon.” She was saying all the wrong things, but it seemed that as long as she kept saying them, he kept moving closer, stalking towards her. She must have been moving towards him, too, because now they stood toe to toe and she could smell the new costly soap he used. “You smell bad too,” she whispered.

  He took her chin in his hand and looked down at her. She didn’t move away, but held his gaze steadily. When he bent his face towards hers, he paused when their mouths were an inch apart. When he finally brushed his lips across hers, the contact sent a shiver coursing up her spine, a breath stuttering out of her lungs that made a sound mortifyingly close to a whimper. She stepped away, dragging her body from his.

  “If you want me to leave, I’ll go,” he said. “But I don’t think you do. I think you want me here, like this, as much as I do.”

  “What happened to making a clean break of it?”

  “I was a fool. I tried to tell you yesterday but it came out all wrong.”

  “I hate all of this.” She poked a finger at his ring. “And this.” She indicated the gold watch chain that dangled from the pocked of his well-cut silk waistcoat. “And this.” She smoothed a hand down the soft wool of his coat. “I hate all of it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because—” Her voice nearly broke, and she took a steadying breath. “Because it took you away from me.”

  He put his hand to her cheek, as if there was something he could do or say to make things right. “It doesn’t have to be that way.”

  She grabbed his wrist. “Don’t lie to me. Don’t you dare.” She looked into his dark, dark eyes, and for a moment she thought she might be able to tell the truth. But not yet. “Take it off,” she commanded.

  “Pardon? Take what off?”

  “All these things I hate.” She pointed at his clothes.

  He blinked. “Sometimes I hate them too.”

  “Get rid of them.”

  “Well, Plum.” That moment of raw honesty between them was gone and they were once again Ash and Plum, him cool and detached, her hard and angry. But he was already unwinding his cravat. “Far be it from me to deny a lady’s—”

  In a moment of inspiration she took hold of his cravat and pulled him close, a quick jerk, a meaningless show of force against a man whose very power was the force that kept them apart. She heard him suck in a breath of air, watched his eyes darken impossibly further. Then she tugged his head down to hers and took his mouth in a kiss.

  Ash’s heart slammed against the walls of his chest as Verity led him to her bedroom, then pulled him close for another kiss. The linen of his cravat was harsh and taut against his neck, and he wanted it tighter. He wanted a bite of pain to take away from everything else he was feeling.

  “I said take it off,” she whispered into his skin.

  Willing his hands not to tremble with anticipation, he pulled off his cravat, but she kept hold of one end, passing the length through her hands again and again, contemplatively, as if coming to a plan. He shivered.

  Coat, waistcoat, shirt, trousers: he flung them all into a pile and stood naked before her. He wanted to go to her, to pull the dressing gown off her shoulders and get rid of whatever shabby shift she had on beneath it. But plainly she wanted to be in charge tonight, and he wanted that, too, so he waited, watching as she pulled that strip of linen through her hands.

  “Get on the bed,” she said, and so he did. He lay back against the bolster and cushions, never taking his eyes from her. “Hands over your head,” she said, approaching him, wielding that cravat as if it were a weapon.

  He hesitated only a fraction of a second, not from fear or indecision but from the blunt force of the realization that this thing he had scarcely let himself imagine, this fantasy that had dwelt only in the most secret corners of his mind, was about to come true. Then he raised his arms. She rewarded him by kneeling on the bed beside him, her weight causing the mattress to dip slightly, angling his body towards hers. He felt the fabric wrap around his wrists: a threat and a promise. As she leaned over him, binding his wrists to the bedframe, her breasts, uncorseted beneath her shift and dressing gown, brushed across his lips.

  “Plum,” he whispered, his voice strangled.

  “Shh.” She tested her knot and ran her fingers down the length of his bound arms. The touch was equal parts soothing and agonizing. He was naked and tied up and completely
at her disposal, and surely that thought should not be half as appealing as it was. But she was looking at him with an expression of frank appreciation, almost wolfish desire, and whatever perversions they were about, at least they were about them together.

  “Look at you,” she said, caressing his shoulders and then rubbing a thumb along his stubbly jaw. “All for me.”

  “All for you,” he said, as if it were his part in the litany. He had known for ten years, for the entirety of his adult life, that he and Verity fit together, belonged together, and there was no dukedom, no title, no inheritance that could change that. And like this, at her mercy and under her gaze, he hoped she could see that. Her fingers trailed lower, over the muscles of his chest and the sensitive skin of his nipples. He suppressed a groan.

  “Don’t,” she said. “I want to hear it.” She pulled off her dressing gown and then she was only in her threadbare shift, as insubstantial as cobwebs, as translucent as a cloud. He wanted to touch everything the shift hinted at: the heavy curve of breast, the swell of her hips, the nip of her waist. He wanted to put his hands all over her, but she wasn’t letting him, and that, for whatever backward reason, made it even better, made the sight of her sharper, more acute. He pulled at his bindings, trying to get his mouth closer to hers.

  She responded by pulling the shift over her head and bending forward, letting her breasts skim his lips. He took a nipple into his mouth, heard her sigh of relief as he swirled his tongue around the pebbled flesh. His cock, painfully hard, got only harder when he realized there was nothing he could do about it. He couldn’t touch himself, and Verity was kneeling over him in such a way that even when he bucked his hips, he couldn’t do anything to achieve even the slightest friction. He groaned, and she gave him an approving smile.

  “Poor Ash,” she said, crawling down his body. “Poor, poor Ash. Here you are, about to get a fancy title and an entire estate, and there’s nothing you can do about your own cock.” She crawled lower, then shoved his legs apart. He could feel her breath on his skin, could see her nipples brushing the fabric of the quilt. Following his gaze, she brought a hand to her breasts, toying with them, as if weighing them in her hands. He pulled at his bindings, mainly to reassure himself that he really couldn’t get free. He couldn’t; he was tied fast and sure, going nowhere, at her disposal. Hers.