Margaret Moore - The Dark Duke

This did not bode well for Damaris, or Reverend McKenna, either, Hester thought, as she saw the young man glance at the beauty again. It didn’t take a lot of perception to see that he was completely smitten with her, and extremely worried about the presence of the duke.

Poor man! Hester feared his romance was doomed to failure, for even supposing Damaris’s father did not succeed in his plans concerning the Duke of Barroughby, Hester was sure Sir Douglas would set about searching for an equally advantageous marriage for her.

Hester repressed a sigh of her own. Her parents had no such ambitions for her. After Helena had made a match with a rich manufacturer’s son, and Henrietta with a clergyman who had a wealthy lord for a patron, they seemed to feel they had reached the end of their responsibilities. After all, Hester was no prize—or so their attitude seemed to suggest.

The reflection stung her as it always did, for she knew it did not have to be so. She had a lively and intelligent mind; if she could but have been taught more, she would at least have been able to find solace in learning. Instead, she was reduced to being little more than an elite companion for a difficult old woman, who complained about everything except her dear son, Elliot.

Could it be possible for one son to be such a paragon of virtue and the other apparently the very devil in human form?

If Adrian Fitzwalter was a devil, Hester thought him a perceptive one. No one else seemed to feel as she did about Canon Smeech, whom she had disliked from the moment she had met him, when he had looked at her with such condescending pity. She had listened to him condemn the duke with nearly as much venom as the duchess, only to see him smile at the duke as much as he dared while the duchess was present. Still, the duke shouldn’t have been so rude to the man’s face. The canon did represent the Church of England, after all.

Perhaps the duke’s animosity to a clergyman wasn’t so surprising, if one considered that the duke seemed to sin with such regularity and relish.

“Isn’t the scent delightful?” Damaris said, holding up a rose for Hester’s inspection and catching her quite off guard. “Don’t you think so, Reverend McKenna?”

“Beautiful,” the young man murmured, blushing, as Damaris bent her head toward another bloom. She colored very slightly, and Hester couldn’t be sure if it was because of her action, or because she, too, realized the remark was not strictly intended to refer to the flower.

Hester hoped Damaris would fall in love with Hamish McKenna. Damaris could do much worse for a husband, and she wanted the young woman safe from her father’s machinations.

And those of the Dark Duke, if she was being absolutely truthful.

Adrian spent the next few days closeted in his bedroom, where he did not have to put up with his stepmother, or make pleasant conversation with Sir Douglas and his daughter, who visited every day, or listen to the canon attempt to lecture him on the errors of his ways while trying not to offend him.

He saw nothing of Lady Hester, but he could guess that she was spending her time attending to his stepmother, whose various and sundry ailments would all have been made worse by the arrival of her prodigal stepson.

If Adrian regretted anything about his self-imposed confinement, it was missing the opportunity to study that interesting miss a little more. She certainly did not seem to begrudge Damaris Sackville-Cooper her beauty. Perhaps that could be explained by Lady Hester’s lovely sisters. She was probably used to being the plain woman in any gathering. However, he had been rather more surprised by her apparent lack of jealousy where the attentive young reverend was concerned. Adrian was quite sure of his ability to gauge reactions, and he was certain that Reverend McKenna was smitten with Miss Sackville-Cooper. Did Lady Hester see this, too, or did she simply not care?

That Sir Douglas was making grandiose plans for his daughter was also painfully obvious, and completely useless, for Adrian did not intend to marry for a very long time. He had enough responsibilities without adding those of a wife and subsequent children.

Nevertheless, by this time Adrian was heartily sick of his own company. To make matters worse, it began to rain, making his bedroom unremittingly gloomy. If the weather brought any comfort, it was that no unwelcome visitors would come to Barroughby Hall on such a day. Therefore, Adrian reasoned, he could venture to the library, a room his stepmother never entered. Jenkins could be counted on to have a fire there, for he lived in perpetual fear of the late duke’s library falling prey to mildew. It would be warm and cozy and he could find himself something new to read.

As he had hoped, a fire burned merrily in the library’s grate, making the dark-paneled room seem like a book-lined cavern. Adrian felt like Robinson Crusoe, marooned with only books for company. This did not particularly trouble him, for he had spent many such hours in this comfortable room, which had been his father’s favorite. His mother’s, too.

The peace of the room enfolded him. How much better it was to be here, instead of clubs and theaters with the men people liked to call the Dark Duke’s Dandies. Not a one of his London cronies was what a man could call a good friend. They simply amused him, and helped him pass the time.

He chose a book at random, something silly by Mrs. Radcliffe, and settled into a wing chair. He propped the foot of his sore leg on the grate as he prepared to read about the terrible dangers faced by the virtuous heroine in The Mysteries of Udolpho.

Soon Adrian was lulled into sleep by the warmth of the fire and the dull pit-pat of the rain on the window.

He drifted down into a dream, a memory. Of finding Elizabeth in that hot, filthy, dingy room. The efforts of her labor. The way she wailed and sobbed. The long, terrifying wait for the doctor and the dismissive look on the man’s face when he entered the room. Then the doctor’s fear when Adrian grabbed him by the throat and identified himself.

Too late. He was too late. The doctor was too late.

But there was someone else in the room. A woman. Quietly and competently swaddling the dying baby, cooing softly. Then, with infinite tenderness and patience, she turned to Elizabeth and wiped her feverish brow before looking up at him, with calm forgiveness and understanding.

It was Lady Hester, her smile like a balm on his tortured soul.

“Your Grace!”

Adrian awoke at once, to find Lady Hester shaking him gently, her face close to his, looking at him with worry and concern. Without thinking, he took her face between his two hands and pulled her toward him, kissing her deeply as if he could drink her in, like a dying man who finds water in the desert. For the briefest of moments she yielded, her lips soft and pliable against his.

How much he wanted her, he realized, the strength of his desire shocking him.

But only for a moment. She pulled back, staring at him with what could have been surprise or horror, her hand wiping her lips of his unclean touch—so different from his dream.

He cursed himself for a fool. Why, she wasn’t even pretty! It had to be because of the lingering effects of his dream that he had kissed her. “What do you want?” he demanded, wearily leaning back in his chair and waiting for her to slap him, or denounce him, to start crying, or run from the room.

She did none of those things. Instead, she took a step back, watching him, the expression in her large and shining blue eyes changing from shocked surprise to puzzlement. “Why did you do that?” she asked softly.

“Why not?”

“Because it was not a gentlemanly thing to do.”

“Given my reputation, this surprises you?”