Unmasking the Duke, page 9
“They do here at the Gardens,” he pointed out. “Why not elsewhere?” He held her gaze. “Kitty, I would like to give you time to think about this, to come to us when you are comfortable with the idea. But circumstances have pushed us all to some…urgency. Your uncle fears for your safety here. His enemies have already got to you once.”
“Through you,” she pointed out, flicking her fingers over the note in her lap. “They know already of some connection between you and me.”
“Which is a matter for further investigation,” he said pleasantly, although with a hint of grimness in his fine eyes. “For the moment, I am in a position to have a large number of loyal servants who can protect you constantly, whether you are outdoors or in. No one will get to you who should not. On the other hand, the Gardens are open to the public, which means all sorts of people are around all the time. To run the Gardens, your uncle and your brothers are constantly out and about where you are not. They cannot protect you as they would wish.”
There was truth in that, but still… “I don’t want to be protected!”
He smiled. “Yes, you do. It’s having to be protected that grates on you. And on me. But we have to work with the hand we have now until we can change it.”
“But we are agreed the fire was to hurt Uncle Bill,” she protested, frowning with fresh fear. “Who will protect him?”
“Your uncle assures me he has ways to protect himself. Now that war has been declared, I don’t fancy the chances of his enemies.”
She stared at him. “And you don’t mind that? That we live on the edges of the law? That my uncle made his first fortune, probably, on the wrong side of it? Probably with violence?”
The duke’s smile was crooked. “My dear girl, most of the aristocracy is descended from robber barons of one kind or another. I am not so hypocritical as to condemn someone’s family for doing what my own did a few years previously.”
As she frowned over that, he added, “Whatever he was in his past, I believe your uncle is a good man. And the transformation, if there was one, is due to you and your cousins.”
“He cheats at cards,” she said desperately.
“So does my Great—Aunt Augusta. In fact, I’d like to see you sharp her.”
In spite of everything, laughter caught in her throat and started a painful coughing fit that brought Uncle Bill back into the room. By then, the duke was holding the water to her lips and helping her drink, but over the cup, her gaze met her uncle’s, and she saw that he had made up his mind.
“Even your lowliest servants will be too superior for me,” she said desperately. “I will shrivel and fade to nothing amongst your aristocratic family,”
“Nonsense.” The duke smiled, snatching her breath all over again. “Whenever I have seen you among the aristocracy, you shine.”
And that deprived her of words long enough for him to stand and bow with no trace of irony and walk out of the room.
*
“You want what?” Meg asked, staring at Johnny across the drawing room table.
“I want you and Harry and your tribe to remove round to Grosvenor Square in order to chaperone a young lady I believe to be Cousin Margaret’s daughter.”
“I thought that’s what you said,” Meg said weakly. “Couldn’t she just go to Mama at Dearham Abbey?”
“Perhaps for Christmas. I don’t think she’s ready yet for Mama.”
Meg had never been slow. “Why, who is she?”
“She’s the adopted niece of one William Renwick, who owns Maida Pleasure Gardens.”
Meg caught her dropping jaw and swallowed. “Oh, dear.”
“She needs to be able to hold her own at least among the family. Learn to be a lady.”
“Johnny, I can’t teach her to be a lady,” Meg scoffed. “I spent most of my life being told off for hoydenish behavior.”
“Which is why you will be so good for Kitty. She is spirited and kind and likes to laugh. And she is better educated than many debutantes it has been my misfortune to stand up with. But you will see for yourself. She is coming to Dearham House tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow!”
“She has been the victim of an accident and has been injured. She may also still be in danger, so I will be instructing the household and Harry accordingly.”
“You’re very high-handed all of a sudden. Harry won’t just jump to your bidding, you know.”
“Of course I know,” Johnny said cheerfully. “Which is why I rely on you, sweetest sister, to persuade him.”
Meg uttered a word that was not remotely sweet or even ladylike and left the drawing room to see to her babies.
*
By the following morning, Kitty felt much less shaky. Her headache had faded to manageable proportions, and the burns on her hands and shoulder had settled into mere aches. With Vera’s help, she went downstairs and had breakfast in the kitchen—scrambled eggs this time—and was touched when her uncle and cousins joined her, looking ridiculously pleased with her progress.
After breakfast, the boys filled the bathtub and departed, leaving Vera to help her bathe and wash her hair. After which, wrapped in the biggest towel, she went back upstairs to dry. Vera brushed out her hair, carefully avoiding her head wound and her burned shoulder, re-dressed her injuries, and helped her into the autumn-red dress.
“You would be better at this than I,” Kitty muttered.
“No, I wouldn’t. For a start, I’d say better than me, not I. You’re the one who listened at school.”
“They never taught us to speak like ladies, though, did they? How to eat like a lady, how to curtsey like one, how to make conversation like the nobs.”
Vera nudged her. “You’re half a nob already. You can pass everything you learn on to me, so I’ll be a credit to Luke when he’s building palaces for the prince.”
“I won’t fit in. His sister will hate me for the imposter I am.”
“The duke don’t think you’re an imposter. Chin up, Kitty, it only needs to be for a little while, and then you can come home if it’s awful. Or even if it isn’t. Come on, I can hear a carriage at the back gate.”
Since it was a Sunday, the Gardens were closed, but the duke had arrived in a massive traveling coach with no crest on the sides. He sprang out without help and let down the steps himself before strolling forward to meet her entire family gathered before the back gate.
“I will look after her to the best of my ability,” he promised Uncle Bill. “And keep you informed.”
Uncle Bill nodded curtly and offered his hand, which the duke shook cordially. “I’ll see Miss Harris is taken home, too.” He touched his hat to the others and offered his arm to Kitty. She took it rather blindly but found Rob waiting to hand her into the carriage.
With a gasp, she hugged him, then Dan and Uncle Bill, and let Rob help her inside. Vera followed, twitching at silken cushions to ensure Kitty’s comfort. Finally, the duke followed, filling the space, and then the horses started off, and Kitty stared blindly back at her waving family.
“Give over, Kit, you’re not going to another country,” Vera scolded. “You’re no further from them than you’ve been from me since you moved out to Maida.”
“I know,” Kitty said, trying to smile. “I just feel this is all happening to someone else. That when I leave, I’ll never get myself back again.”
She was grateful that the duke did not appear to see the need to make conversation with her. He and Vera had the odd humorous exchange while she watched out the window in silence until they reached Hyde Park and the huge, fashionable houses nearby. She had never been in this part of the city before, and it left her speechless and even more intimidated.
The carriage drove into a large, gracious square and pulled up in front of an impressive front gate. Liveried footmen ran down the front steps.
“Oh my,” Vera mumbled, and Kitty giggled. “Off you go, Highness.” Vera grinned and winked. “You know where I am.”
“Stay in the carriage,” the duke said to Vera. “It will take you home.”
“Don’t be daft,” Vera said as one footman opened the door and another let down the carriage steps. “Rig like this’d be in bits in no time round Seven Dials. It can drop me at a hackney stand if you insist.”
“I do,” the duke said, casually depositing some coins in her hand before he got out with perfect grace and waited to hand Kitty down.
Kitty drew in her breath, twitched her eyebrows in her friend’s direction, and laid her hand in the duke’s.
Chapter Ten
She walked up the steps on his arm and inside a wide entrance hallway. She tried not to gawp as the duke gave his hat to a bowing, very superior servant, and then turned to her.
“Collins will take your bonnet and cloak,” he said. “Let me help you.”
Her hands lifted of their own volition to perform the tasks herself, but her bandaged fingers were clumsy, and she let them fall again. His were deft, untying her bonnet ribbons and the frogs of her cloak, a curiously intimate service that made her flush all over. And yet she felt bare and exposed as he unwrapped her and handed her outer garments to the butler.
She tried a smile at the servant, who surprised her by smiling back.
Thus encouraged, she took the duke’s proffered arm again to climb the elegant staircase. “Is Lady Meg in the drawing room?” he asked the retreating butler over his shoulder.
“I believe so, Your Grace.”
Kitty did not look forward to meeting his sister. Lady Meg would be justly suspicious of her so-called relationship to the family and probably of her intentions toward the duke. She would be everything Kitty was not and never would be, and the woman had no reason whatsoever to be more than coldly civil to her in front of His Grace. She would be appalled by Kitty’s appearance, speech…
“Meg doesn’t bite, you know,” the duke said mildly. “Though she is curious by nature.”
And then they were walking through open double doors into a magnificent drawing room that was bigger than the whole cottage at Maida Gardens. A polished parquet floor with two fine, matching carpets, elegant cabinets, and tables scattered throughout, with beautiful porcelain and silver ornaments. Tasteful silk wall coverings. Two crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling that must have contained enough candles to light up the whole Gardens on a winter night.
And in the midst of this splendor stood a cradle. An expensively dressed lady paced beside it, the baby in her arms making small, annoyed noises that weren’t quite crying while it wriggled and threw its arms around.
The lady paused in her perambulations and glanced toward them, a frown of worry tugging at her brow.
“Meg?” the duke said, as though calling her to attention. “Allow me to present Miss Kitty Renwick, Cousin Margaret’s daughter.”
“Possibly,” Kitty muttered.
“Kitty,” the duke continued as though he hadn’t heard, “my sister, Lady Henry de Vere. Though we all call her Meg.”
Lady Henry de Vere came toward her. “Of course, how do you do, Miss Renwick?” she said hurriedly, holding out one hand while she grasped the tiny, wriggling baby in the other. “Do you know anything about babies?”
“Only that I was one.”
Meg gave a snort of laughter. “Trust me, it doesn’t help. Nor does the fact that she is my fourth child and yet does not behave like any who have come before. Her sister lies peacefully asleep, while she won’t settle at all. Perhaps she wants Harry.”
“Where is Harry?” the duke inquired.
“Horseguards or somewhere. He shouldn’t be long. Would you mind, Miss Renwick?”
As her ladyship held the child out, it was instinct to take her, holding her upright against her good shoulder.
“Oh, your poor hands,” her ladyship exclaimed. “Johnny told me you’d been in an accident but…if it hurts, give her back to me.”
“She weighs nothing,” Kitty said in amazement, walking with the tiny creature to the window, where she turned her back to let the baby see out.
“She’s stopped wriggling,” Meg noted in triumph. “Do you know, I think she was bored?”
“I’m sure you were exactly the same,” the duke said wryly.
“Then I need to speak to Mama, don’t I?” she retorted. “She’s usually happy to deliver advice. Ring for tea, Johnny, I’m parched. And with any luck, Rosie will fall asleep, and we can put her in the cradle beside her sister.”
“Or you could give them both to the nursery maid,” the duke said wryly, walking over to pull a silken cord.
“I could,” Lady Henry agreed with the ghost of a smile. “But where’s the fun in that? Sit down, Miss Renwick, if it’s more comfortable.”
“Would you mind calling me Kitty?” she blurted, emboldened by the small aristocrat on her shoulder. “No one calls me Miss Renwick.”
“In fact, no one should while you’re here,” the duke said. “We shall call you Cousin Kitty, and you’ll be Miss Kitty to the servants. But you will need a surname for introductions.”
Kitty frowned. “Introductions to whom?”
“Anyone who calls on us. Fortunately, there shouldn’t be many, for there’s little fashionable company in London at this time of year.” He glanced at his suddenly curious sister. “We think Kitty’s…accident was part of an attack on her uncle. So she needs another name if we are to hide her.”
“Then something like Smith is too obvious,” Lady Meg declared, “How about Rennie? It’s enough like Renwick to be familiar for Kitty but a completely different name in its own right. Cousin, is that child asleep?”
“I think so. She’s quite slumped.”
Lady Meg detached little Rosie and laid her in the cradle beside her identical sister. Tea was brought in by two footmen, accompanied by a splendid array of cakes and scones and tiny sandwiches. Kitty’s stomach rumbled. She wondered if her throat was up to real food. If her manners were up to eating it in this company.
She accepted a cup of tea from her ladyship with a murmur of thanks, though her bandaged fingers made it awkward to lift the cup.
“Just use both hands,” the duke said. “There’s no one here but family.”
Lady Meg glanced at Kitty at the last word, and Kitty hastily hefted the cup to her lips.
During tea, the duke and his sister exchanged mostly chatter about family and friends, which they explained to Kitty as they went. She felt both impatient and ashamed of the silly charade, though the others seemed quite happy with it.
Seemed.
After tea, her ladyship took Kitty up to her bedchamber—another big, gracious room, with a huge bed and two bedside tables, a dressing table with a looking glass, a desk, a massive wardrobe, and another looking glass taller than she was. Her small carpetbag had been set on a chair by the dressing table.
“You didn’t bring much,” Lady Meg said.
“I don’t have much,” Kitty replied lightly.
“We should go shopping. What a pity Martha isn’t here. She’s much better at clothes than I am.”
“Lady Martha is your twin sister,” Kitty recalled.
“She is.” Lady Meg sank against the foot of the bed and regarded her. “Are you really Margaret’s daughter?”
Kitty met her gaze. “My mother was called Maggie. I’ve no idea if she was your Margaret or not. She died when I was a baby, and Uncle Bill took me in. His Grace thinks I’m his cousin. But it seems unlikely to me.”
“I can’t help wondering what he means by you,” Meg said abruptly. “You’re not his usual type at all, and in any case, he would never bring that kind of woman here to me. Are you just his latest cause?”
“Does he have causes?”
Meg’s smile was cynical. “Pursuit of pleasure, as a rule, dragging scandal in his wake.”
Kitty dropped her gaze to the bag.
“You don’t like that idea,” Meg observed. “Which is interesting.”
“Why?”
“Most women are either intimidated or attracted by his rakish reputation,” Meg said frankly. “You don’t appear to be either.”
She lifted her chin. “I’m not.” His reputation was not the man. “What other causes does he have?”
“Oh, various charities among the poor. And injustice among his friends.”
Kitty frowned. “I suppose I must be an injustice, then, although I am hardly a friend.”
“You appear, my dear, to be family.”
“Maybe,” Kitty said restlessly. “But frankly, I don’t see how you can introduce me as such to your friends.”
Meg shrugged, her gaze appraising. “Oh, I don’t know. A few rough edges to your accent, perhaps, but you speak well, and your basic manners are sound. But, forgive me, you seem less than wholehearted about the enterprise.”
“I don’t like being a fraud.”
Meg searched her face. “Johnny doesn’t think you are one. Neither does Ludovic Dunne, whose opinion one should never disregard because it is based solely on evidence.”
“But it doesn’t matter whether I’m actually your family by blood or not,” Kitty blurted. “In any way that matters, I’m Bill Renwick’s niece, who waits at Maida Garden tables and plays card tricks on Uncle Bill’s friends.”
“Is that all you want to be?” Meg asked. “Is it…enough?”
Kitty stared at her. “I don’t know. I’m not even sure what you mean.”
Meg moved restlessly from the bed to the window seat. “We are all born into a family or a circumstance that comes with certain…expectations. For example, I was born the daughter of a wealthy, powerful duke, and my one purpose was to marry well in order to bring my family even more wealth and power. But I wanted more. I wanted fun and adventure. I wanted to see the whole world and write books. I was such a trial to my family that they sent me to be a lady-in-waiting to the Princess of Wales, who was always talking of going abroad.”
“Did you go with her?”
“Lord, no, she took others instead, but that’s a different story. The point is, I did not settle.”
“But you are married now,” Kitty pointed out.
