Unmasking the Duke, page 6
Everyone at the table was gazing at him, agog. He bowed with faint amusement and met Kitty’s suddenly determined gaze. Determined to refuse him or to speak to him?
He never found out, for a tap on his shoulder caused him to turn and face Kitty’s erstwhile waltz partner.
“Your pardon, sir,” the man said, dropping his gaze. “Might I crave the favor of a private word?” The submissive gaze shot up to see what impression he was making, and Johnny knew he had been right.
He bowed again to the table in general, noting Kitty’s sudden frown, and turned to the young man.
“Would you mind walking?” the man asked. “Just to a more private spot.”
Johnny swept his arm in front of him. “Lead on.”
To his surprise, he was led right outside the pavilion, so he kept a wary out for likely confederates who might help rob him. But the man didn’t lead him off the paths, merely to stand beneath a lantern to the right of the main door.
“Am I right to suspect I address His Grace, the Duke of Dearham?”
“My dear fellow, it’s a masquerade,” Johnny said amiably. “You can be His Grace if you like.”
“I heard your friends address you,” the man said. “And I saw the way Kitty looked at you.”
“Am I to assume you have the advantage of me?” Johnny inquired.
“It was me you came to meet,” came the blunt response. “I told your lawyer, if you want more proof Kitty’s your relation, then I have it.”
“You intrigue me,” Johnny murmured, keeping his eyes on the man’s face. “And you are?”
“My name’s Harris. Toby Harris. I live in Taverner Street in Seven Dials. Next door to where Bill Renwick found Kitty.” He delved in his pocket but radiated no hint of violence, so Johnny stood perfectly still until Harris brought out a gold locket on a chain, a dainty piece of female jewelry. On the front of it was a miniature portrait of a woman. “Perhaps you recognize this?”
Johnny gave it only a cursory glance. “I can’t say I do.”
“Maggie, Kitty’s mother, gave it to my mother as a token of thanks because Ma looked after her when she was ill. Look.” Harris pressed a catch, and the locket opened to reveal a lock of fine, soft chestnut hair, almost the right shade to be Kitty’s.
Harris closed the locket again and held it up toward Johnny, who suddenly frowned and took it from him, turning so that the lantern light fell on the young, beautiful face in the painting. It was, unmistakably Her Grace, Johnny’s grandmother. He knew her at once because a larger version of the same portrait hung in the drawing room of Dearham Abbey.
Johnny’s fingers curled around it. “May I borrow this? To examine it at my leisure. As soon as I have, I promise to return it to its rightful owner.”
A twitch of Toby Harris’s eye told him the young man did not like this idea, and Johnny watched the struggle wage across his face before he said, “Of course. We know where to find each other.”
Johnny smiled faintly, inclined his head, and returned to the ballroom without another word.
Chapter Six
“Is that him?” Vera whispered in Kitty’s ear.
“Yes…” She gazed anxiously after the duke’s retreating back until both he and Toby vanished from view. She knew a confused urge to follow them, as much to do with annoyance as protection, only why would she try to protect him?
“Now I understand,” Vera murmured in awe. “He is…gorgeous.”
“Yes, but what does Toby want with him? What is he up to?”
“Warning him off?” Luke suggested with a quick grin.
“Or standing up for Kitty’s interests,” Vera retorted.
“It’s not his place to do either,” Kitty said flatly. “Excuse me. I’m going to find out what they’re up to.”
“Here, where’s Kitty going?” Sal’s voice demanded behind her as she slipped around the edges of the dance floor. Rob and Vera’s voices spoke soothingly back, and fortunately, no one followed.
Her uncle was in conversation with some people a few yards from the main entrance, so Kitty made a dash for the door, just as it opened, and she literally bumped into the Duke of Dearham coming back inside.
Before she could catch her breath, or her heart, his arm was around her, sweeping her onto the dance floor and into the waltz.
“It’s polite to ask,” she said coldly.
“And to accept. So, if you will forgive me my oversight, I shall forgive you yours.”
Refusing to laugh, she scowled. “What do you want?”
“To dance with you again, of course. And to invite you to an assignation whenever you are tired of the dancing.”
That took her breath away. “No,” she managed.
“No, it’s the wrong answer? Or no, you won’t come?”
“Both!”
The beguiling, teasing twinkle faded from his eyes. “Very well, no joking. But I do need to speak to you without your family or mine hanging around.”
She blinked, her eyes straying to the tableful of fashionable gentlefolk he had brought with him. “That is your family?”
“Well, the serious-looking fellow is my brother. The rest may be related somewhere. They often are.”
Her quick glance gave her only a dazzling impression of elegance and beauty before the duke turned her, and she could no longer see them. She glanced up to speak seriously to him, but his gaze was as steady, his masked face so…not merely handsome but appealing, that the words fled. The mere pleasure of dancing with him had sneaked into her body at some point, smoothing away the awkwardness she should have felt. Why should it be so different dancing with him? Just because he danced better than Toby or anyone else who had held her like this.
“What about your friends?” he asked. “You have not slipped out in disguise tonight, have you?”
“No. My uncle gave permission to me and my cousin Rob. Partly, I suspect, to punish Dan for his idiocy the last time you were here. You didn’t tell anyone about that, did you?”
“What makes you think so?”
“We’ve had no untoward visitors.” She took a deep breath. “I should thank you.”
“But it would choke you because of what you see as my dishonesty.”
It wasn’t a question, more of a wry statement, but she answered anyway, lifting her chin. “I am not so petty. I do thank you. What we did to you was unforgivable, and you have every right to bring the law down on us. We are all profoundly grateful that you did not, even if some of us don’t quite know it.”
For several moments, he actually seemed speechless. “That’s a very handsome apology,” he said at last, “especially considering you let me go. Did that cause you any trouble?”
“It earned me a mouthful from Dan until I pointed out his own utter stupidity and what my uncle would say if he knew the whole of it.”
“Forgive my stupidity, but why didn’t you simply say that at the time rather than tying me up?”
She dragged her gaze free and stared at the rather tasteful sapphire pin in his cravat. “Because the smugglers were there. If they didn’t think we were taking care of the problem, they might have done so themselves.”
“So, you waited until they were gone. You are quite alarmingly level-headed, aren’t you?”
“I don’t scream and faint when I encounter a problem, if that is what you mean.” She raised her eyes to his once more. For once, though his eyes were warm and a little puzzled, he did not appear to be laughing. “I am not, after all, a lady.”
Now the glimmer of a smile crept into his eyes. “Oh, nicely done, Miss Kitty. An insult and a denial at once, though I must introduce you to my sisters. But you do bring me back to the point. Walk with me? If I promise to be a gentleman.”
“From what I have seen of gentlemen, that is no comfort. In fact, I shall need my cousin as—”
“My dear, you are relentless. Very well, I promise not to touch you, not to kiss you, or otherwise show you any sign of what anyone might construe as disrespect. Although, in my defense,” he added as she flushed furiously, “I must tell you that I never kiss anyone I don’t respect. Shall we?”
His arm dropped from her back, and he released her hand, offering her his arm instead. By giving her a choice, damn him, he took the wind out of her sails. And he had promised to be a gentleman. So why her heart pounded, she had no idea. For an instant, they stood thus, surrounded by dancers who didn’t quite bump into them.
Then, almost impatiently, she seized his arm and strode through the waltzers. She had meant to tow him along, both venting her anger and proving her disregard for whatever danger he presented. But somehow, he walked by her side. The waltzers parted for them, as did the people milling between the dancefloor and the exit.
There was no sign of Uncle Bill or Dan. The staff she did see never looked at her. She suspected they would see only the duke in any case.
The cold air hit her, and she gulped it in with relief. Though what there was to relieve her in this situation remained a mystery. She was alone with a powerful nobleman, who had already taken advantage of her and who, for some reason, she didn’t yet understand, wanted something she wasn’t prepared to give.
And yet, walking beside him, among the other couples dallying beneath the trees, reality seemed to fade. As she held his arm and moved along the path leading beyond the pavilion toward the lily pond, he no longer seemed like a duke. He was the handsome young gentleman who had smiled at her more than a year ago and taken a heavy tray from her. He was the man who had danced with her earlier in the week, stolen kisses, and stood up to threatening smugglers, giving a pretty good account of himself, too.
He wasn’t related to her, whatever he thought. But for the first time, it entered her head that she wouldn’t mind. Why was that?
Unwilling to look further in that direction, she said abruptly, “What was it you wanted to discuss?”
This part of the gardens was quieter. No giggling came from the undergrowth, although it might just have been muffled by the gentle splashing of the waterfall.
“The man you danced with first,” Johnny said unexpectedly. “Who is he?”
“Toby? An old family friend.” She glanced at him, gathering her skirts to climb the steps to the pond. “What did he say to you?”
“I’ll tell you in a moment. What’s his name?”
“Toby Harris. He is my best friend’s brother, the son of the builder, James Harris, who is one of my uncle’s oldest friends. What did he want with you?” She sat on the first boulder, gazing up at him expectantly.
He took something from his pocket and sat next to her, almost touching. “Do you know what this is?”
A gold locket lay in his palm. In the dim light, it looked valuable, with the portrait of a lady painted on the front. “It looks like the kind of necklace Aunt Mary kept locks of our hair in. Does it open?”
He didn’t look at it as he caused it to open. She knew he was watching her, though she didn’t know why. Within was indeed a lock of dark hair. She closed the locket and bent over it, even taking hold of his wrist to bring the portrait closer to her.
“She’s pretty. Is she a real person? Who is she?” She looked up and met his steady gaze. At some point, he’d removed his mask, and his lean, masculine beauty swiped at her breath.
“An ancestress of mine. My grandmother, in fact. Have you never seen this before?”
“No, but then—”
“Why would Harris have it?”
She blinked. “Toby had it? How on earth… He isn’t a thief, I’m sure of it.”
For some reason, she thought he relaxed, although he remained perfectly still. “He told me your mother gave it to his for her kindness in looking after Maggie.”
A frown tugged at her brow. “That makes no sense.”
“Unless Maggie was a Winter.”
Her fingers curled in response, and she realized she was still grasping his wrist, which was strong and supple in her hold. She dropped it as though it burned her, muttering an apology, and tried to think.
“Why would Toby try to convince you I am this long-lost cousin of yours? Because I’m not, you know.”
“Perhaps he’s trying to do you a favor.”
“How? It makes no difference to him whether or not…” She broke off as another unpleasant idea hit her. She dragged her gaze free of his, trying to think. “If I was your cousin,” she said abruptly, “what would you do?”
He shrugged. “That would depend on what you wanted.”
A home with his family, perhaps, or means to establish her independence… And Toby, both lazy and ambitious, kept trying to court her.
“You shouldn’t believe anything Toby tells you,” she said abruptly.
“He is a liar?”
She jumped to her feet too quickly, torn between truth and old friendships. Johnny stood up, too, steadying her with a hand on her waist.
“Toby plays his own games,” she managed. “They aren’t necessarily in your interest. Or mine. I have to go.”
“Stop,” he said mildly. Both hands were on her waist now, but lightly, unthreatening, although somehow, they seemed to burn through the fabric of her gown. “You’ll fall down the steps. I didn’t mean to agitate you.”
“But you meant to find out if I was part of Toby’s scheme, whatever it might be?”
“Yes, though it made no sense to me.”
She became aware of a growing pain in her mind. She rubbed half-heartedly at her forehead, then, understanding, dropped her hand with a sad little laugh. “Do you know what’s really funny? What I first liked about you was your openness.”
He blinked. “We were both masked.”
“Not then,” she said impatiently. “Before.”
A smile tugged at his lips. “Really? You remember me from Wenning’s bizarre revenge party?”
“I have a good memory for faces,” she said with dignity. “Let me go. I won’t fall down the steps I’ve been running and jumping on since I was ten years old.”
At once, his hands fell away, although he walked in front of her to help her down, still treating her as a lady, which for some reason annoyed her even more.
“I suppose you were always this…convoluted,” she said shrewishly. “I was just too foolish to see it.”
His lips quirked. “Thank you for looking. I like to think I am open with friends. But one cannot grow up as heir to a dukedom without a hint of cynicism.”
For the first time, she considered that—the toadying and the flim-flam and the concentration on his rank rather than his person. Something pulled at her that she couldn’t quite grasp.
“Even you,” he said softly, “cannot be kind and sunny all the time.”
She swallowed, secretly loving his strong grip on her fingers, and wished she didn’t. “Most of the time,” she managed and looked up to meet his gaze. “I am lucky in my life.”
An arrested look entered his eyes before his eyelids drooped like hoods. And she recognized at last what had been pulling at her.
His loneliness.
And in some almost hidden part of her, her own.
*
Johnny felt as if someone had hit him with a sledgehammer.
Stupidly, not once in his pursuit of righting the wrong done to his kinswoman, had it entered his head that her daughter would not want to be reclaimed by the Winters. That her life now was actually preferable to the one he was offering her. Of course, if she had chosen to mix with the Winter family, she would have found things new and unfamiliar, difficult at first, in terms of manners and surroundings. But he had never doubted Kitty’s ability to adjust. Or that anyone would want to.
That he was, in fact, upsetting her contentment, annoying a life much more pleasant than his own, in terms of everything but money, was something even an imbecile should have seen. But he, God help him, was blinded by her, by whatever feelings it was she churned up in him. Protectiveness and attraction, definitely, but beyond that, something else that was quite unfamiliar.
“I’m sorry,” he said abruptly as they walked in silence toward the pavilion once more. “Please believe I meant it for the best.”
She cast him a quick glance, but he was putting his mask back on—without her help—and he could not bear to see her expression. Instead, re-masked, he drew her hand jauntily back through his arm to enter the pavilion and parted from her the only way he knew how.
He bowed and lifted her hands to his lips, one after the other, and left her with his most dashing smile. He never once glanced back as he strolled back to his table and sat beside his brother. Most of his party seemed to be dancing.
“Who is the girl?” Peter asked him disapprovingly. “Your latest conquest?”
“No, just a girl. What of your own?”
Peter scowled. “If you mean Lady Langtry, I am not in the market for a mistress, and I refuse to commit adultery. Besides, I would never touch your cast-offs.”
Johnny buffeted him on the shoulder. “You are a miserable old grump, Peter. I may have once considered pursuing her ladyship—you can’t deny she’s beautiful and charming—but she was always more taken with you.” He smiled into his brother’s disbelieving eyes. “And you should be aware, she is a widow, not a wife.”
Chapter Seven
The distance the duke achieved while still flirting with his smile and his hand-kisses chilled Kitty to the bone.
Thinking about it as she flopped back down beside Vera, and as she danced with Luke, and with a stranger from the next table, and with Toby again, she realized something she had said had changed his mind. Either he no longer believed she could be the cousin he sought, or he had decided he did not want her to be.
Which should have felt like a relief, not a rejection. No friendship was possible between Bill Renwick’s niece and the Duke of Dearham. And nothing warmer was acceptable to her, so it was as well as he had decided to abandon her.
So why did she watch him dancing with those beautiful women of his own party and once with a dashing lady in yellow? Why did her heart cringe and her stomach tighten with something alarmingly like jealousy?
