“People tend to behave differently than they ordinarily would when they know who I am. All they can see is the title, not the man who bears it.”
Megan detected a large dose of bitterness in those words that made her feel distinctly uncomfortable. She was guilty of just that, seeing only the title—no, that wasn’t quite true. The title had been her first consideration, yes, but everything else hinged on the man. If he didn’t suit, then it wouldn’t matter what title he bore, for she wouldn’t have him.
“I’m sorry,” she said, and meant it. “That can’t be an easy thing to live with.”
He shrugged. “One of the little drawbacks of being a duke.”
“I hope there are some benefits to compensate.”
The comment had him grinning again. “Oh, a few.”
Now why did that “few” sound so very wicked? No, it was the grin. That grin was definitely not wholesome.
“One of those things wouldn’t be getting away with being a trifle high-handed, would it?”
She meant it teasingly. He answered seriously.
“A trifle? I dragged you out here, dear girl. That was most assuredly high-handed of me.”
“Yes, it was, and now that you mention it, I realize you haven’t apologized for it.”
“Another benefit. I rarely apologize. Who, after all, would dare bring me to account for my actions?”
She didn’t like the sound of that. Were Tiffany there, she’d be pointing out that they hadn’t come across many good qualities yet, and Megan would have to agree. What the devil had happened to the charming man who had only moments ago confessed to an overwhelming urge to kiss her?
“I believe I would have no difficulty in doing so, Your Grace.”
He half sat, half leaned on the railing, crossed his arms, and gave every indication of being amused. “Would you indeed? Your own character is so exemplary, then, that you can cast stones?”
Neither the subdued lighting on the terrace nor the half mask she wore could hide her blush completely. “Absolutely…not. I don’t claim to be anywhere near perfect, but then I don’t represent such an exalted title.”
“And if you did, would that make you any less spoiled or willful?”
Megan stiffened. “What, I would like to know, has led you to assume either of those things about me?”
“A good guess?”
Disappointment was welling up again, much worse than what she’d felt when she thought she might not meet the duke tonight. It was nearly choking her, and that made her furious. She didn’t know what had gone wrong, but if she didn’t leave now, she’d say something to end the possibility of any future encounter—if she decided to give him a chance to redeem his appalling behavior.
“I believe I’ve had too much air. Good evening, Your Grace.”
“Not so fast, my dear.”
Not only his words detained her. His arm had snaked out as she’d turned to leave, and she now found herself drawn nearly between his legs.
“I’ve made you angry again?” he ventured with galling good cheer.
Megan decided that he had to be an idiot to ask that question. “Absolutely, and it’s increasing by the second. Let me—”
“That wasn’t my intention.”
She felt a spark of hope. Maybe he just wasn’t himself tonight. Maybe he thought her more sophisticated than she was and she’d merely misunderstood his insults. “What was your intention?”
“I want to see a lot more of you.”
Exactly what she had hoped to hear—before this abrupt change in him. Now she wasn’t at all sure if she ever wanted to see him again.
“Why?” she asked boldly.
“I’m becoming bored with my current mistress. I think you might do to replace her.”
“Your mistress?”
He went on blithely as if she hadn’t almost screeched. “Yes, I think you might do nicely. Can’t say for certain, though, until I try you out. Shall we find a secluded spot in the garden to—”
The crack of her palm against his cheek cut off his shocking suggestion. Megan pushed away from him. He didn’t try to stop her this time. But she didn’t leave. She wanted to do more than just slap him. She wanted to rail at him for being exactly what Devlin had said he was, a bounder, a rogue, a seducer of innocents, but she was too angry to get the words out.
She thought about ripping off his domino. After all, she didn’t want to mistake this rake if she did ever see him again, which she sincerely hoped would never happen. To think she’d actually been disappointed earlier that she might not get to meet him tonight, and even more so only moments ago.
“Ah, there you are, Miss Penworthy. I believe this dance is mine.”
She turned with a start, feeling almost guilty for being caught alone with such a wicked man as she now knew Ambrose St. James to be. But it was the duke’s friend, Lord Frederick, to whom she had promised the next dance. Two of a kind? Possibly. More than likely, actually, so both were to be avoided henceforth.
“You, sir, keep detestable friends,” she told the marquis in her most chilling tone. “That one in particular.” And she pointed a stiff finger behind her.
“That one?” Lord Frederick asked.
His bewilderment made her frown, then turn to see why he hadn’t understood her perfectly. But the reason was quite clear. The previously occupied perch on the terrace railing was now empty.
The odious Duke of Wrothston was gone, vanished, with not even a bush stirring on the other side of the railing to mark his passage. Too bad he hadn’t done so sooner, before she’d met him. No, it was better to know, and now she knew. As far as she was concerned, Ambrose St. James and his title could rot.
Chapter 17
“Why haven’t you told me, ‘I told you so’?”
They were on the last leg of the journey home, the Robertses’ coach jostling along at a steady put-you-to-sleep pace. Tiffany’s mother was in fact dozing on the opposite seat, so the girls had had no conversation for a while.
Tiffany had been about to fall asleep herself, but that softly uttered question brought her wide awake. “I thought you weren’t brooding about that anymore.”
Megan had done nothing else but brood about her colossal foolishness. She’d just kept it to herself after their earlier discussion, when she’d related the entire humiliating encounter with Ambrose St. James.
“Why haven’t you?” Megan repeated. “I certainly deserve it.”
“No, you don’t,” Tiffany said loyally. “And I wouldn’t do that to you. Besides, it might not have seemed like it, but I was really hoping everything would work out just the way you wanted it to with St. James. So I guess I’m just as disappointed as you are that it didn’t.”
“I’m not disappointed,” Megan assured her. “At least not anymore. What I am is furious with myself for pinning all my hopes on a man we knew absolutely nothing about—which you tried to point out numerous times. I still can’t believe how stupid that was. But I’m also furious with him. I can’t seem to help it. You’d think a duke would have more integrity than to be a bounder, wouldn’t you?”
“Absolutely. The title probably corrupted in his case. It’s been known to happen.”
“There ought to be a law against it,” Megan grumbled.
Tiffany said nothing. She waited. After a moment the expected laughter came.
“I don’t believe I said that,” Megan said, still softly chuckling.
“I don’t either, though I happen to agree.”
Megan burst into another round of laughter. “Stop, or I’ll wake your mother.”
Tiffany got serious again. “It’s true, though. Great power and wealth do corrupt, and St. James has both in abundance. A pity. Maybe if he’d been an impoverished duke, he would have been a bit more honorable.”
“And desperate for an heiress, which I’m not.”
Tiffany sighed. “Well, it’s water under the bridge now, so are you ready to do things in their proper order?”
“You mean
meet the man first?”
“That, too, but more importantly, fall in love first. That really is the way it’s being done these days, you know.”
“I know,” Megan replied. “That just doesn’t guarantee me the title.”
Tiffany wasn’t that surprised to hear this. Megan could be exceedingly stubborn and single-minded at times—most times, actually.
“So you do still want the title?”
Megan shrugged, her expression dispirited. “I don’t know—no, that’s not true. I’d still like to set Lady O on her ear, and I can’t very well do that without a titled husband, so I guess I would still prefer it. I’m just not going to count on it.”
Tiffany clicked her tongue. “Sounds like you’re giving up before the game begins.”
“Just being realistic from now on.”
“Realistic? You want to talk realistic? Are you forgetting that you actually did what you set out to do—well, at least half of it?”
Megan frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“The first part of your goal was to gain the amorous interest of the Duke of Wrothston. That you did, and then some. It’s not your fault that he turned out to be a lecherous rake with immoral propositions on his mind, rather than decent ones. You still caught his interest, Meg.”
“I did, didn’t I?”
“So I wouldn’t worry about that title. There will be dozens more for you to choose from when you get to London. But this time you meet them first, then you decide which one you’re going to fall in love with and let it happen—unless you fall in love first and that decides it for you. There is always that possibility, you know, and frankly, I highly recommend it.”
“You would, but then there aren’t very many men as wonderful as your Tyler.”
“True, but you’re forgetting I fell in love with Tyler before I knew he was wonderful, the very day I met him, as it happens. I was just so fortunate that he is wonderful, but I don’t think it would have mattered very much if he’d had a few bad qualities. We have to take the good with the bad when the heart makes the choice.”
“That does not sound too encouraging, Tiff. In fact, it only supports my previous contention that I’d do well to choose the man first, then let love take its course.”
“Suit yourself, as long as you meet him first to determine that you won’t be wasting your time on another bounder—and as long as you’re in love before you agree to marry him. You will agree to that at least, won’t you?”
“Absolutely—only how long do you think it takes to fall in love my way?”
Tiffany rolled her eyes. “You’re asking me, who did it instantly? How should I know?”
Chapter 18
Megan was surprised by how anxious she was to get home. And once she was home, she was frankly amazed that her urge was to go straight to the stable, rather than into the house to greet her father. She supposed she just missed her horse. She had missed her morning rides. But that shouldn’t account for such a compelling impulse, especially when she’d been away only four days.
And she had been away from home before. There had been that trip to Kent for her twelfth-birthday present—why couldn’t she have found out back then what an odious man the duke was?—and a few shopping expeditions to towns that offered more than Teadale. Her father had accompanied her those times—maybe that was the difference, but her conscience told her otherwise.
Why don’t you be honest? You want to see that horse breeder.
Absolutely not. If anything, he’s the last person I want to see.
Sure he is.
You’re forgetting his knowledge of St. James. He probably knew exactly what would happen at the ball, or guessed it would happen, while I was arrogantly informing him that I would be marrying the man. How can I face him after that?
With your usual charm…and arrogance.
Very funny. But what if he asks what happened? Not what if; he will ask.
You can lie.
And when I don’t happen to marry St. James within the year, then what? Devlin will be good at gloating, you know he will. He probably wrote the book on it. I could have taken it from Tiffany, but an I-told-you-so from him—I’d probably shoot the man.
You have to face him eventually, so admit it, you can’t wait.
I can’t wait to be humiliated? When did I become a glutton for punishment?
When you noticed how handsome that man is.
Very funny.
Somehow, Megan managed to go to bed that first night home without giving in to the urge to see—her horse. But she was up at the first tinges of dawn the next morning, and on her way to the stable before the sun actually made it over the horizon. She was bubbling with anticipation that she refused to acknowledge, so she was incredibly dumbfounded to find the stable doors not just closed for the night, but also locked. Locked? Since when and why?
Megan stood there for several minutes, prodded with impatience, disappointment, and a number of other unwelcome emotions. She wondered how much noise pounding on the doors would make. Too much, especially since only the horses slept in the front of the stable.
She was about to go back to the house to wait for her normal hour for riding when one of her emotions got the better of her, and she marched around to the back of the stable instead. Of the several windows at the back, only one was covered with curtains. She tapped lightly on it, then a bit harder when she got no immediate response. But then the curtains—she felt a moment’s amusement upon noting that they were pink—were yanked apart, and the window was opened more than the crack it had been.
She had to be grateful—or not, her conscience put in—that it still wasn’t light enough for her to see very clearly into his darkened room, because she could just barely discern that Devlin Jefferys was standing in front of his window quite naked. It was lighter where she stood, so he had less difficulty seeing who had disturbed his sleep.
“What the devil are you about, brat, at this ungodly hour?” he demanded with a great deal of sleepy irritation before she could get her mouth open.
Megan bristled at the uncomplimentary name he persisted in calling her, but didn’t bring him to task for it. Her eyes were adjusting and getting a clearer image of him by the second, and, cognizant of his previous threats about staring, she felt it was more prudent to find something else to look at. So she turned slightly, facing the bare frame of the extension that was being added to the back of the stable—and suddenly realized there might have been another way in without having had to wake him.
That realization caused a certain amount of embarrassment, prompting her to apologize. “I’m sorry. I found the doors locked, but I’ve just noticed a back entrance. Go back to sleep, Mr.—”
“What back entrance?”
“Why, where the stable is being enlarged. Surely a door has been cut—”
“Why don’t you go have a closer look before you make assumptions, Megan? You’ll find that the extension is going up and will be nearly complete before an opening is cut to connect it. What’s the point of barring the doors out front if a bloody hole is left in the back?”
She detected the amusement that had slipped into his tone with that explanation, and that got her back to bristling. “Then the stable is completely locked?”
“Isn’t that what I just said?”
“How dare you lock me out of my own stable? By what right—did my father tell you to lock it?”
“I don’t need your father’s permission to protect the horses,” he said with a degree of condescension. “That happens to be my responsibility.”
“Protect them from what?” she scoffed. “Open the doors, Jefferys.”
“Go back to bed, Megan. The doors will be opened at a decent hour.”
“I don’t choose to wait until a decent hour, I choose to go riding now. Open the bloody doors.”
“You insist?”
“Isn’t that what I just said?” She tossed his own words back at him.
“Very well, you
asked for it.”
She glanced cautiously up at the window to find him gone. She bit her lip, frowning. He wouldn’t do what that “you asked for it” sounded like, would he?
He wouldn’t dare—but just to be sure, she called in through the window, “Don’t you dare open those doors with no clothes on, Devlin Jefferys. If you do, I’ll bloody well scream; then you can make your excuses to the servants who come running, and my father.”
With that warning, she marched to the front of the stable, confident that she had put a stop to what he had intended. And she must have, because he kept her waiting a good five minutes before the doors finally swung open. But he hadn’t taken her warning completely to heart. The wait had been to light a lantern, since the inside of the stable was still pitch-dark. For clothes, Devlin had put on only his trousers and boots.
Pink-cheeked that he had obeyed her only in part, Megan swept past him and went straight to Sir Ambrose’s stall. It was too much to hope that Devlin would simply go back to bed now and leave her in peace. He didn’t.
“Someone ought to teach you a little common decency, courtesy, and sense.”
Reprimanded by a horse breeder. His gall was utterly astounding.
“What does common sense have to do with it?” she asked without turning to look at him, allowing that she might be a little out of line on the decency and courtesy parts. “I wanted to ride. You had no right to keep me from doing so.”
“I still might keep you from doing so,” he growled at her back. “You don’t wake a man from a sound sleep and berate him for doing his job. Common sense would have told you that you won’t get away with it unscathed.”
She stilled in the process of reaching for Sir Ambrose’s saddle blanket. Her heart, on the other hand, was off to the races.
“You’d better keep your distance from me, Devlin.” They both realized, at the same moment, that she’d just used his first name for the first time. “I meant, Mr. Jefferys,” she corrected herself quite properly.
“Formality is a bit misplaced by now, don’t you think?” he asked, amusement present in his tone again.