Scandalous Duke

by Scott, Scarlett

  Johanna’s belongings had arrived from the hotel. All of them, that was, save one trunk.

  She stared at the valises and trunk now, sitting end to end in the chamber where she would be spending the next few nights. A few and no more, she reminded herself firmly. She must not get accustomed to this. Even if the chamber was large and sumptuous, the room decorated in stunning style.

  “Would you have me unpack them for you, ma’am?” asked the maid who was tentatively hovering alongside the trunks in question. “It would be my pleasure to see you settled.”

  The domestic—Owens, as she had introduced herself—was kind and eager to be of assistance. But Johanna felt odd accepting the assistance. Indeed, as she stood in the center of this beautiful chamber, a chamber which had likely once belonged to Felix’s former mistress, she could not help but to feel that she did not belong.

  She had never before had a servant attend her.

  Nor had she ever had a room as elegant and finely appointed as this one.

  But along with her awe at the luxurious surroundings was the heavy weight of dread. For she was running from Drummond, and she had never in all her years been able to run so far or so fast he had not been able to eventually catch her. The last time, it had taken several years. This time, there was no telling.

  She suppressed a shiver at the thought, tamped down her fear.

  “I will see to the unpacking myself, Owens,” she forced herself to say.

  “It is no trouble, Miss McKenna. His Grace has tasked me with seeing to you,” the maid said. “Direct me as you like, and I will see everything tucked away nice and neat, just where you want it.”

  Miss McKenna.

  How odd it was to be addressed by her true name after so many years. But Felix had informed the staff, and even his daughter had taken to referring to her as Miss McKenna now. She could not deny it left her feeling as if she were in a strange state of vulnerability. But most vulnerable of all, given everything that had happened, was her heart.

  An unwanted thought occurred to her then.

  “Owens, you were not employed by the last…resident of this home, were you?” she asked, hoping Felix had not also given her his former mistress’s maid.

  “Oh no, Miss McKenna.” Owens smiled tentatively. “I am new to this position. Being a lady’s maid has always been a dream of mine.”

  The domestic’s admission sent a spear of guilt through her.

  “Forgive me for being churlish, Owens,” she hastened to say. “Of course you must do what you like. I merely did not want to cause you extra work or trouble.”

  “Nonsense.” Owens opened the first trunk. “Do you have a preference as to where your undergarments shall go, ma’am?”

  Johanna wanted to tell the maid not to unpack all the luggage entirely, for she had no intention of remaining here long. But she did not want to see any further shadows of disappointment darken the maid’s expression. And a voice inside, she refused to acknowledge, suggested perhaps she would stay here longer than she supposed.

  That she would want to.

  Felix’s face rose in her mind, handsome and concerned. Tugging at her tender heart in ways she could not afford to allow.

  She cast a glance about the room once more, taking in the sleekly polished wardrobe, the large bed with its intricately carved headboard and posts. Oh, how she wished the chamber had not once housed a former lover of his. She had no right to feel envious or jealous of a paramour from his past, and she knew it. She had no hold on him. No right to him, and she never would.

  And yet…

  Some part of her felt, quite foolishly, as though she did.

  “Ma’am,” prompted Owens. “Shall I sort everything for you and then inform you of their location when I am finished?”

  Bless the woman for seeing how overwhelmed she felt by everything that had happened in the last few days.

  “Yes,” she agreed, summoning up a smile. “That would be wonderful, Owens, thank you. I believe I will go in search of Lady Verity while you work. Excuse me.”

  She left the chamber behind and did not have far to roam. She descended one floor and was instantly treated to the sound of delighted girlish giggles, followed by hastily approaching footsteps.

  Two sets, unless she missed her guess. One large, one small.

  She rounded a bend in time to find Verity being chased down the hall by the Duke of Winchelsea, her curls fluttering about her angelic face. Father and daughter were both smiling.

  “You will never catch me!” vowed his daughter.

  “I shall catch you if it is the last action I take,” he called in a mock stern voice.

  Johanna froze, mesmerized by the sight of father and daughter at play. Of the so oft serious and elegant Duke of Winchelsea racing down the hall after his daughter. Of the matching smiles they wore. The laughter.

  Their lightheartedness and the moment itself melted the ice in her heart.

  Emotion slammed into her with such force she almost lost her balance and toppled over. As it was, she scarcely had time to prepare herself when Verity made her way to Johanna and launched her little body unexpectedly into her arms.

  “Save me from the evil Papa dragon,” cried the little girl, giggling.

  Johanna clutched Verity to her tightly, relishing the embrace. How much she had missed when she had lost Pearl. The thought left her feeling the same old ache, along with something else. Something new.

  “I will save you, fair maiden,” she promised, playing along with the game past the lump in her throat as Felix reached them.

  He stopped, near enough to touch. So near the scent of sandalwood wafted over her. His countenance changed as their gazes met and held.

  “Miss McKenna,” he greeted her formally.

  For his daughter’s benefit, she guessed, clinging to that same indifference. Trying to forget the way he had kissed her and touched her. The way he had brought her such pleasure.

  But, dear Lord, how could she ever forget that? It was a sheer impossibility.

  “Your Grace,” she returned, making her best attempt at a curtsy while she held his still-giggling daughter in her arms. “I had not realized you had returned.”

  The moment she said the words, she wished she could take them back, for she was making a revelation she had no wish to make: that she had noted his absence. That she had been wondering where he had gone and when he would return.

  Which of course, she had.

  In spite of her every instinct to keep her distance from him and not to allow herself to become emotionally attached to him in any way, she could not deny the feelings he incited deep within her. Hated feelings. Unwanted feelings.

  Lingering beneath the surface of every moment.

  “I was seeing to some matters of mutual concern,” he told her then, his tone somber. All the levity had leached from his handsome face.

  And she knew the reason for it. Knew, too, what he spoke of. Her heart clenched painfully. He had spoken with Scotland Yard on her behalf, it would seem. She had no notion of whether the news was good or grim from his expression.

  “I appreciate your attentiveness to such concerns,” she said quietly before lowering Lady Verity to the floor.

  Verity clung to her, seemingly unwilling to let her go, and Johanna did not blame her, for she was hit with a similar sensation. Seeing Felix’s daughter smiling, her green eyes dancing with merriment, lightened Johanna’s heart. After the trauma of the evening before, it was a relief as well. The little girl was so full of life, so precious. Johanna could not help but to feel a maternal pang whenever she looked upon her, a reminder of what she had lost.

  “Miss McKenna, I beg of you, do not lower me or the Papa dragon will catch me!” cried Verity, still lost in the vivid world of her imagination.

  Johanna wondered if this was a game Felix played often with his daughter. It certainly held an air of familiarity. Here was another side of him she had not seen. Yet another side she liked. He was a good father to
Verity, a loving father. She felt, as she stood there, a dreadful interloper in their family.

  She was acutely aware of the fact that she did not belong here. And indeed, that by the mere virtue of her presence, she could be putting the both of them in very real danger. She could not bear for anything else to befall either of them. She must go as soon as she was able to find other lodgings.

  “Do stop attempting to climb Miss McKenna as if she is a tree, poppet,” Felix told his daughter then, though there was no bite to his words.

  The fond smile on his lips made Johanna’s insides turn to liquid.

  Verity dutifully released her, but the moment the girl’s feet touched the carpeted hall, she cried out, throwing an arm over her forehead in a dramatic gesture. “Oh, woe is me. I have fallen into the moat.”

  She pretended to swoon then, collapsing into a heap of frilled skirts.

  Johanna could not help but to laugh at the girl’s antics. Felix was no better able to contain his mirth. His deep, husky laughter rang through the hall again, and she could not stay the wave of warmth it sent crashing over her this time.

  He had a beautiful laugh.

  But of course he did. Everything about the Duke of Winchelsea was gorgeous and elegant and far too perfect. He was not of her world.

  “It would seem you are not the only one beneath this roof with a flair for drama, Miss McKenna,” he observed, his gaze locked with hers once more.

  His words reminded her, quite belatedly, that she had missed her rehearsals for today. And not only that, but depending upon the time, she would likely miss the entire evening’s play altogether. Dread struck her.

  “I must get to the Crown and Thorn immediately,” she said. “In all the commotion, I have completely forgotten to attend rehearsals. Mr. Saville will be very displeased with me, and I cannot blame him. Do you have the time, Your Grace?”

  “Do not worry about the time,” Felix said, his laughter gone now.

  She mourned the loss. He looked like a man who needed more lightheartedness in his life. She did not have the time to worry over it, however, because she was going to be late for The Tempest.

  “But I must,” she argued. “I need to hire a hack to take me to the Crown and Thorn at once.”

  “I sent a note ’round to Mr. Saville on your behalf earlier today,” he told her, surprising her. “I informed him you would not be attending the theater at all today.”

  “But I cannot miss a performance,” she argued. “I have never, in all my years as an actress, missed a show.”

  “You are going to miss this one,” he said, his tone grim. “You cannot believe after what you have told me that I will send you off to the theater on your own this evening.”

  And there he was, taking care of her again. Fretting over her once more.

  She must not allow it.

  She frowned. “The choice is not yours to make, Your Grace. I have a contract with Mr. Saville, and I am obligated to perform, regardless of the circumstances.”

  “Help me,” Verity called from the floor then, interrupting the sudden tenseness of the moment. “Someone rescue me from the moat, oh please!”

  Jolted from the heaviness of her thoughts, Johanna bent without thinking and scooped the girl into her arms once more. It was not until she stood to find Felix’s gaze pinned to her that she realized she was taking liberties that were not hers to take.

  “Forgive me, fair maiden,” she said, reverting to what she did best—playing a role. “I fear I must flee, for another quest awaits me. I have to surrender you to the Papa dragon after all.”

  With that, she shifted Verity in her arms so that Felix could take his daughter from her. He did, though the girl attempted to cling to Johanna’s neck.

  “Do not go, Miss McKenna,” she begged, pouting from her father’s arms. “I was having such fun. Papa has never played princess and dragon with me before.”

  There was the answer to her question, then. Just as she had supposed, Felix did not have much room for levity or lightheartedness in his life. What, she wondered, had changed? What had made this fearsome, staid duke come undone enough to laugh with his daughter? To pretend to be a dragon?

  She did not dare suppose it had been her influence. That her silly song had shaken him enough to make him realize his daughter needed laughter the way plants needed sun.

  “I am afraid I must go,” she told the girl.

  “You must stay,” Felix insisted. “Theo already knows you will not be in attendance this evening and has made other provisions.”

  How tempting the notion was. To remain here, with Felix and Verity, to bask in their presence while she could. But that was not just foolish, it was reckless. If she was to continue supporting herself abroad with her work as an actress, she could not simply fail to appear.

  “I told you, Your Grace,” she said, “I do not miss my shows.”

  “Please, Miss McKenna,” Verity chimed in. “Papa is excellent at playing dragon and princess, but I doubt he can sing the way you can.”

  She felt her resistance sliding. Just this once. What would be the harm?

  “You see?” Felix flashed her a quick, tender smile that did strange things to her heart. “We are, the both of us, depending upon you.”

  The fight left her. What could she say to Felix and Verity, this father and daughter who had somehow fallen into her life and filled her with emotions she had no longer thought she possessed?

  There was only one answer that felt right.

  “Very well,” she allowed. “I will stay.”

  Chapter Ten

  Johanna McKenna had worked some change over him, and Felix could not deny it any longer as he sat with her in the salon following dinner. Verity had been tucked into bed some time ago, yawning and smiling. When she had thrown her arms around his neck and pressed a kiss to his cheek, his heart had seemed to swell to thrice its original size.

  And it was all the doing of the alluring woman seated alongside him.

  He had not realized just how potent an elixir his daughter’s happiness could be until he had heard her laughing with Johanna McKenna. Nor had he realized how much Verity longed for his attention and affection.

  When he had returned from his meeting with the Duke and Duchess of Arden, he had felt as if he carried the weight of a dozen worlds upon his shoulders. But then, he had seen Verity’s sweetly cherubic face, and he had known such a rush of gratitude for her. Thankfulness that she was alive, that she had not been injured or worse in the fire at Halford House. Humbled that she was his.

  She had asked him, very seriously, if he wanted to play dragon and princess with her. And so he had. And he had chased her down the hall, laughing with her as if he were no more than a lad himself.

  It had been nothing short of miraculous. Nothing short of wonderful.

  “Thank you,” he told her.

  She slanted a startled look in his direction. “What are you thanking me for, Your Grace?”

  Now that they were alone, out of the listening ears of his daughter, he did not want the formality between them.

  “When we are alone, I would prefer if you continue to call me Felix,” he said.

  A charming tint of pink colored her cheeks. “As you wish, Felix, but you have nothing to thank me for. I have brought nothing but danger to your door, which is the last thing I would wish for you.”

  The danger would have found him inevitably anyway. The Fenians were growing bolder in their plotting and their targets by the day. But she did not know the depths of his involvement with such matters. He had kept his work at the Home Office a secret from her out of necessity.

  “I do not want to think about the danger now. We are safe here, and you have my word on that. As I see it, however, I have much to thank you for. You have brought happiness back into my daughter’s life.” He paused, struggling to find the proper words for what he wanted to convey. “I have not heard her laughter as many times in the last five years of her life as I have today.”
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  “Lady Verity is a lovely girl,” Johanna said softly, her wistful smile once more in place.

  The one that told him she was thinking of her own daughter. She must have been an excellent mother. Watching her with Verity filled his chest with an odd tightness he could not explain. With a longing.

  He supposed it made him wonder how Hattie would have been with his daughter, how their little family would have grown together, had they had the chance. Much as Johanna must look upon Verity and wonder how her life would have differed had her daughter lived.

  “She is my saving grace,” he said honestly of Verity. “In the early days, after losing her mother, I do not think I could have survived without Verity.”

  “You loved your wife very much,” Johanna observed.

  “Yes,” he answered honestly. “I did. When she died, a part of me died along with her.”

  At least, that was what he had thought, how he had felt. But now, he could not help but to wonder if that was not entirely true. If instead, he had believed a part of himself dead which had not truly died at all. If that part of him had merely been lying dormant, waiting for the right moment to come back to life.

  Or waiting for the right person.

  Waiting for Johanna McKenna. The last woman for whom his heart should long. And yet, the only one for whom it did.

  “She was a fortunate woman, to have been so loved by you,” Johanna said.

  There was no jealousy in her voice, only raw candor.

  “I was the fortunate one.” His voice was rough with emotion now as he recalled Hattie, his charmed marriage with her. From the moment they had begun courting, she had stolen his heart. He had never had a hope of defense against her. “I wish Verity could have known her. But Hattie died when she was so young. She has no memories. All she knows of Hattie is what I tell her.”

  That still broke his heart every time he thought about it.

  He knew that much would never change, regardless of how much time passed and how much healing he was able to do.

  “I am sorry, Felix,” Johanna said, touching his hand. “That must be so incredibly difficult for you. My heart aches for both you and Verity.”