by Sophia James
Obviously furious, she sat down next to her eldest son.
‘Cook is beside herself. She slaved for hours over the coddled eggs.’
Then she leaned across the Duke to address his brother.
‘And do not think for one second you will escape my censure, Julius! It has not gone unnoticed that you chose to skulk off just now rather than assist me with our confused guests!’
Instead of appearing chagrined, Lord Julius grinned and gestured to Eliza. ‘Have you met Miss Harkstead, Mother?’
The change in their mother was instantaneous and dramatic. ‘So you are Miss Harkstead...’ All trace of fury now gone, she stared curiously at her across the table. ‘I am delighted to make your acquaintance, Miss Harkstead.’ An odd look passed between the Duchess and her younger son. ‘I have been looking forward to meeting you, though I must confess you are not at all what I imagined...’
Before Eliza could respond to such an unexpected comment, the Duke stood decisively. ‘Shall we all eat?’ He seemed uncomfortable. Suddenly eager to be gone. ‘Cook will have my guts for garters if I allow her famous coddled eggs to go cold.’
‘I’ll wager they are already cold!’ The Duchess skewered him with a terrifying glare before she also rose. ‘And that is assuming you have some of your guts left intact after I have finished with them, my dear. And believe me—that is yet to be decided.’
Then she glided to the sideboard first.
Chapter Six
All Marcus had wanted was five minutes at breakfast to get to know Miss Harkstead better. When that had failed miserably, thanks to everyone else, he had hoped he might be able to grab some time for a quiet chat during the interminable shopping trip to the village, but he had been thwarted at every turn by every other young lady present, all of whom were now determined to do whatever it took to outshine her, or to scupper his attempts even to exchange a few mere pleasantries with her without a vast audience.
A similarly frustrating evening of the dreaded wassailing loomed before him, and already he was at his wits’ end. The herd of duke-snaring husband-hunters now circled him on the driveaway and there was still no sign of the object of his fascination.
But her aunt Penelope was there. Front and centre with her daughter in tow, practically glued to his side and doing her utmost to convince him that her child was the woman of his dreams.
‘Oh, you really must hear her sing, Your Grace. My Honoria has the voice of a nightingale. Many people have commented upon it. Perhaps tonight, if we place her next to you during the carolling, you will hear her. She has such a talent for—’
‘Sorry to interrupt. Urgent estate business...’
Julius grabbed his arm and pulled him away, striding from the suffocating crowd at speed towards the stables.
‘Thank you! I owe you. Again.’
‘You most certainly do.’
His relief at being saved was temporary. ‘That doesn’t mean I am not still peeved at you for this morning.’
‘I cannot think what for,’ Julius said.
How to put it without sounding pathetic and jealous? ‘For having so much fun at my expense over breakfast and for flirting outrageously with all the ladies throughout it. The latter was quite unnecessary, Julius, and frankly a bit unseemly so early in the day.’
‘As I recall, I only flirted with Miss Harkstead during breakfast.’ Clearly on a mission, Julius was striding across the lawn, but not so fast that Marcus didn’t see his smug grin. ‘You can hardly blame me—she is uncommonly pretty. And, for the record, I thoroughly intend to flirt with her some more tonight.’
The temptation to grab him and punch him on the nose was overwhelming.
‘I don’t think she would appreciate it.’
‘Surely you mean that you wouldn’t appreciate it, big brother?’
Marcus opened his mouth to speak and then promptly shut it until he could temper his words. Silently he fumed, only to watch his brother’s smug grin being replaced by a bark of laughter.
‘I knew it!’ He waved his finger too close to Marcus’s face. ‘Your blatant jealousy has revealed the truth. You are smitten with her! Admit it.’
‘I am not smitten.’
Yes, he was. And the fact that he was, so soon, was ridiculously rash, when he was never rash.
‘I hardly know her.’
But he desperately wanted to. Everything. Every last fascinating minute detail.
‘We have exchanged a few pleasantries over two meals. That is all. And during one of those I hardly got to say two words to her, thanks to you, our mother and that dreadful Lady Broadstairs.’
‘Only twice?’ His brother feigned unconvincing innocence. ‘Gibson must be mistaken, then, because he said the pair of you were chatting for ages yesterday. In the library...’ Those damn eyebrows rose again. ‘Completely unchaperoned.’
‘I really do not appreciate what you are insinuating!’
‘Did you kiss her?’ His brother’s eyebrows wiggled suggestively. ‘You know Mama’s views on kissing. It only takes one kiss to recognise the one.’
This needed to be nipped in the bud—and then he would hunt down Gibson like a dog and give him a piece of his mind too. Butlers were supposed to be discreet and loyal, not tittle-tattle turncoats who spread gossip to the rest of the family.
‘Absolutely nothing untoward occurred during that brief meeting. I will have you know I was a perfect gentleman!’
His brother rolled his eyes. ‘Of course you were. Sadly, I expected nothing less.’
‘Sadly?’
Julius stopped dead on the pathway to the stable yard, so abruptly Marcus almost crashed into him, and then had the gall to look annoyed.
‘Heaven forbid you should act on impulse once in a while! Everything always has to be so measured and pragmatic and blasted sensible for you!’
To add insult to injury he grabbed Marcus by the shoulders and shook him.
‘Sometimes you need to forget you are a blasted duke!’
Marcus prodded his brother firmly in the chest. ‘I am a blasted duke! A job with such crushing responsibilities I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. Unfortunately, it is not something I can ever forget!’
‘I know, but...’ Julius sighed as he let go. ‘What if Mama is right? What if there is one special person for each of us? Where the connection is instant and undeniable and draws you like a magnet? Meant to be? Fate...’
‘Have you been at the wassail early?’ Marcus pointed to the shadowy crowd of ladies still watching them from the driveway. ‘Rabid husband-hunters, the lot of them! All dragged here by their mamas to entice and then trap us both!’
‘I appreciate that one of Mother’s dreaded house parties isn’t the ideal place to meet the woman of your dreams, big brother—largely because Mama will become unbearable on the back of it and make my life intolerable as a result—but...’ He huffed out a breath. ‘I’ve seen the way you look at Miss Harkstead and she at you...’
Miss Harkstead had been looking at him? His heart instantly swelled in his chest at the thought.
‘Wouldn’t it be awful if you were so sensible, so measured, so pragmatic and averse to the idea, purely on principle, that you missed the chance fate has thrown at you?’
‘Surely you, of all people, do not believe all Mother’s fairy tale nonsense about fate and history repeating itself? Love at first sight is a myth, Julius. I hardly know her.’
Although, bizarrely, he felt he did. Know all that truly mattered at least.
‘Or at least I know nothing beyond the fact she seems refreshingly different.’
And lovely and clever and gloriously unimpressed with his title...
‘Nor will you, unless you take a chance. You have a few hours, Marcus. Tonight, tomorrow, one ball, and then she leaves first thing the next morning with everyone else. Don’t waste them. Se
ize the day! Take some time to really get to know her and at least explore the possibility before you dismiss it completely.’
And there was the rub.
‘In case it has escaped your notice, this house is teeming with eager ladies all doing their level best to monopolise my every spare second. Amongst all that, do you seriously think I will have the time or the privacy to get to know any one of them better.’
‘Do you think I haven’t considered that?’ Julius’s answering grin was smug. ‘I have a contingency plan all worked out. In fact, if my exceptionally cunning plan works, you will owe me such a huge debt of gratitude I fully intend to take the whole of Mother’s next dratted house party off.’
‘I don’t follow...’ But suddenly he desperately wanted to.
‘Lady Trumble, deaf Lady Audley and a couple of the other old dears aren’t going to go wassailing, because the walk is too far for their legs. They are going to stay behind at the house. Which means either Miss Harkstead remains with them, as Lady Trumble’s companion, or she joins the circus over there and you will never have a moment’s peace together.’
‘So?’
‘So I have come up with a brilliant idea to include the old dears in the wassailing festivities whilst also giving you some time alone with the bewitching Miss Harkstead.’
‘She’s not my Miss Harkstead—’ He found himself talking to his brother’s gloved hand.
‘I am well aware of that fact, cretin. Just as I am well aware of the fact you would very much like her to be. Therefore, you either grab the bull by the horns, and commit yourself to riding upon it for the next few hours, or regret it for the rest of your sensible, measured, pragmatic and miserable life.’
A depressing scenario indeed.
‘What’s the plan?’
‘I have arranged for the old dears to be driven to and from the village by carriage. Lady Trumble has agreed with me that she cannot possibly ride in that carriage without her indispensable companion by her side. But, as there are only four seats in the carriage, Miss Harkstead will have to ride alongside the coachman.’
‘I still don’t follow.’
‘That is because I have yet to apprise you of the shocking calamity which has necessitated my dragging you so unceremoniously away from all those hideous husband-hunters.’
Julius slapped him firmly on the back, obviously very pleased with his own ingenuity.
‘In a cruel coincidence, the entire staff of the stables have been laid low, after eating something which didn’t agree with them, and there is nobody fit enough to drive the elderly ladies tonight. But I know that you, being selfless, pragmatic and egalitarian, will want to offer to step in and save the day and drive them yourself.’
Which would give him a blissfully solitary fifteen minutes with Miss Harkstead beside him on the way there, and another fifteen on the way back.
‘I suppose it is only right that I drive them—as the head of this household, the stables and our guests are ultimately my responsibility after all.’
‘That’s the spirt!’ Julius grinned as he gazed towards the stables. ‘I shan’t accompany you. The ladies are waiting in the carriage for the hero of the hour to save the day, and they would probably unanimously much prefer me to do it if I present them with the option, so you’d best get cracking while I give all the other ladies the bad news. We will meet you in the village.’
‘Don’t hurry.’
‘I won’t—and I would advise you to take the long way around to give Cupid a greater chance. Oh, and before I forget, I have brought you a little something which might come in handy if you do miraculously discover she is the one.’
His brother rifled in the pockets of his greatcoat before slapping something into Marcus’s gloved hand.
‘Mistletoe?’
Julius shrugged before he sauntered away. ‘Well, it is Christmas, big brother. It would be a crying shame not to make use of it. Carpe diem and all that.’
Chapter Seven
Eliza did not believe in sulking. She had always thought it a childish and fruitless endeavour when actual communication was better in solving a dispute. However, being banished to ride in the carriage with the older ladies rather than walking with all the others galled and, despite her using all the communication skills God had given her, even resorting to a full-on arm-waving tantrum, Great-Aunt Violet had refused to be moved.
But now that she was stuck in the carriage with the old ladies, forced to sit on the driver’s box in the cold, while they enjoyed hot bricks inside, she was sorely tempted to sulk regardless. And all because she suddenly had foolish and fanciful ideas about a certain handsome and charming gentleman who happened to be a duke.
Miserably, she arranged the thick blanket she had been issued as consolation tightly around her legs and gave herself a stiff talking-to before the off. Yes, he was a duke—which, of course, rendered her silly, pulse-flittering fascination pointless.
He enjoyed her conversation and her company, but to read anything more into his interest would be folly. To add to that, he had the pick of all the young ladies present and swathes of eligible and aristocratic beauties who weren’t, so why on earth would he be interested in her?
She had no fortune. No connections. No real clue how to behave properly in his world. And—and this also galled—none of the ethereal prettiness most of those young ladies possessed. She was too dark, too tall, and altogether too sensible even to try and compete.
So why did she want to?
In the midst of tonight’s inevitable melee, she really did not stand a chance of a minute alone with him to engage in any conversation. Today she had been lost in a sea of eager and significantly better dressed young ladies, only standing out perhaps because she’d positively refused to be eager. She might well be too dark, too tall and too common for a duke to woo, but she had her pride and she knew she was still a rare prize in her own right, exactly as her parents had always told her.
She was a long way from ugly. In fact she was intelligent, quick-witted, outspoken and fun. She had always secretly wanted a man to fall head over heels in love with her for all those qualities and flatly refused to settle for anything less. So if he wasn’t interested that was entirely his loss. She would be sensible about it rather than bereft.
There would be another man whose eyes twinkled. Whose mere presence made her pulse quicken. Who were as handsome and as charming and as attractive as him. Who called to her soul as he did.
The Duke of Manningtree wasn’t unique.
Surely?
‘Good evening, Miss Harkstead.’
As if she had somehow conjured him up, he strode through the entrance to the stables looking sinful in a dark greatcoat. Largely because he had the shoulders for it. He was hatless, and his dark golden hair was windswept. It suited him, making him seem more approachable and more human than he sometimes did when he was obviously being the Duke.
‘Good evening, Your Grace.’ Then, because she couldn’t think of a single other thing to say, she stated the obvious, pointing to the empty seat next to her. ‘We are awaiting our driver. Apparently the usual coachman has been taken ill.’
‘I am told the whole stable staff have been taken ill. Some mysterious ailment has forced them all to their beds, I’m afraid.’
‘Oh...’
That probably meant she would be staying here, now that Great-Aunt Violent had suddenly and selfishly decided she couldn’t be without her. She couldn’t help thinking that Aunt Penelope had got to her and insisted Eliza remain below stairs, where she belonged, on the off-chance a miracle occurred and the Duke suddenly became interested.
‘So I am the cavalry.’
One big hand grabbed the footplate before he hoisted himself up and to her great surprise seated himself next to her.
‘I hope you don’t mind being stuck with me for the duration—but somebody h
as to ensure the safe delivery of the wassailing pot to the village.’
A kaleidoscope of butterflies instantly flapped in her tummy.
‘Not at all, Your Grace.’
In the confined space, those big shoulders touched hers. She could feel the warmth of his body all the way down her right side. Smell the seductive spicy scent of the fresh cologne on his skin. As he snapped the reins and the carriage lunged forward over the cobbles, she bounced against him repeatedly because she couldn’t keep her balance. How could she when the only thing to hold on to was him?
They rode in silence as he effortlessly manoeuvred the large conveyance out of the stable yard, taking a different route down the driveway from the one she was familiar with, which went past the house. Instead he turned to cut across the parkland until they were shrouded in trees.
The only sounds she could hear were the crunch of frosty gravel beneath the wheels and the rapid thump of her excited heart. There were no stars, just the hazy shadow of the full moon behind a dense blanket of low clouds which threatened snow. As Eliza tried to calm her slightly erratic breathing, she watched her breath and his mingle in frozen mist in the frigid air, wondering what it was about him that called to her so.
‘Can I let you into a secret?’
His voice whispered past her ear and down her neck, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake.
‘I loathe wassailing. It’s all so...cringingly embarrassing.’
Pride forced her to make conversation, even though she had the overwhelming urge simply to sigh at him. ‘My father used to feel that way too—until he discovered the liberating benefits of wassail. He claims the only way to do it is three sheets to the wind. He has a point. It’s actually rather enjoyable after the first few cups.’
He laughed. It was a soft, deep, seductive sound which came from somewhere deep in his chest. ‘Perhaps drunk, I might enjoy it.’
‘And I think I might enjoy the sight of you drunk, Your Grace. It’s not every day a girl gets to witness an illustrious duke stumbling around and singing carols with abandon.’
