The Straight-Laced Duke Selbourne Read online

  She wore her amazingly abundant golden brown hair simply, in a center part, and it hung to her shoulders in a soft fall of row after row, layer after layer of silky corkscrew waves only Mother Nature could have created. Lush. Barely tamed. Innocent and yet decadent. Eminently touchable.

  To touch that hair! To touch it, feel its warmth between one’s fingers, bury one’s face in it, to beg for any small favor, and be damned!

  Bramwell swallowed down hard on what had to be his mounting madness, then watched as she raised a hand to her face, to push a long, errant ringlet away from her eye. Her cuff fell back to reveal a delightfully molded forearm below an artistically small-boned hand and long, slim fingers topped by strong, white-tipped nails.

  No flaw. No flaw. The woman was perfect. But how? Nobody was perfect. And surely not this woman of all women.

  A footman stepped forward sprightly, grinning from ear to ear, and relieved her of her cloak, revealing the rest of her.

  Bramwell gave a small cough, sure something had lodged in his throat.

  He’d been right, if mad, to believe his own eyes, his instincts. There was no flaw. Everything about her was perfect, if somewhat in miniature. Rounded, but not running to fat. Lush, while never coming within a thousand miles of overblown. From the top of her naturally curling hair to the slim span of her waist, to the soft flare of her hips and all the way to the tips of her small shoes, she stood not much higher than five feet. Five feet and approximately two inches of glorious perfection.

  All this Bramwell could see.

  One could only imagine the perfection of her bosom, then weep.

  Or take refuge in icy disdain, a smidgen of arrogance, and perhaps even a dollop of stiff-backed pride.

  The ninth duke of Selbourne, at last locating whatever tattered shreds remained of his senses, opted for the latter, and remained poker-straight and silent. Although one also could, if one were of a delicious bent of humor and of a mind to contradict the man, say Bramwell Seaton had been rendered dumbstruck.

  If there was a God, and Bramwell sincerely prayed there was, the apparition standing in front of him, clad in a dark blue traveling gown—and carrying some large something covered with a paisley shawl—would open her mouth to speak, and croak like a frog. Or screech like an owl. Or drop her H’s. Or do something, anything, to make him stop thinking that he’d just had his first glimpse of Heaven when he knew full well he’d more likely just been dropped headfirst into Hell.

  “Well, hello there,” the apparition said, just as he was about to say something hopefully crushing. Her voice came to him with the sweetness of honey, the lilt of a songbird, and the faint, confusing, and quite annoyingly adorable trace of a French accent. “You must be the duke, mustn’t you? Yes, of course you are. You look very much like Uncle Cesse, or will, when you grow older and less sober. I suppose I should curtsy to you now, yes? Will you please hold Ignatius for me? I’m not quite so polished in my curtsies as dear Mrs. Farraday would like, and would hate to make a cake of myself so early in our acquaintance. I’m Sophie, by the way. Although I suppose you already know that.”

  All right. So he hadn’t gotten the first words in; she had beaten him to it. But surely there were a lot of things the worldly, urbane ninth duke of Selbourne could say now in answer to this breathless, entirely enchanting little speech.

  He couldn’t dredge up a single one.

  Maybe later, when he could get his tongue unstuck from the roof of his mouth.

  He settled now for a single, strangled, “Ignatius?”

  Sophie Winstead smiled again. Her nose, Bramwell noticed, crinkled up rather adorably when she smiled. Did it have to do that? “Yes, Ignatius. My parrot, of course. Oh, dear. You don’t mind, do you? Mrs. Farraday said I should leave him behind in Wimbledon, but I just couldn’t. We’re very close, you understand. Ignatius and I, I mean—although I’m also quite devoted to dear Mrs. Farraday, who is still snoring most soundly in our coach. She’s rather deaf, you understand, poor dear, and it will take Desiree—she’s my maid—a few more shouts and nudges to rouse her.”

  She smiled again, tipping her head to one side. “You don’t say much, do you? As I remember it, Uncle Cesse could talk the limb off a tree. Perhaps you’re not feeling well, yes? Shall we dispense with curtsies and the like and just go upstairs to the drawing room? I’ll pour you a drink, find you a nice footstool, and you can rest. Yes, that’s what we’ll do. Mrs. Farraday can just follow after as best she can. Now, come along. Sophie will fix everything. You’ll see.”

  Pour him a drink? Fetch him a footstool? What on earth was she talking about? The duke’s stomach dropped to his toes. Good God! There was no other explanation—the chit obviously had been raised to be a gentleman’s mistress! Before Bramwell could unstick that startling thought from his brain and form an answer, Sophie had lifted the hem of her traveling gown a bare inch and, still clutching the shawl-covered birdcage, gone lightly tripping up the curving staircase.

  Bramwell glared at the footman, who quickly slid his gaze from Sophie’s derriere and lost his admiring leer. The duke then found himself following along after his father’s mistress’s daughter, muttering under his breath: “Uncle Ces-ee? Oh, Father, how could you!”

  Secret thoughts and open countenance.

  — Scipione Alberti

  Chapter Two

  Sophie gritted her teeth, smiled prettily, and turned from the drinks table, a glass of Madeira in her hand. “There you are, Your Grace. See? I’ve found the wine, just as I was sure I would. Now, you just sit down right over there, rest your feet on that footstool, and I’ll see to Ignatius for a moment, if you don’t mind. He’s a most sociable creature, and isn’t accustomed to being shuttered during the day.”

  The duke took the glass she offered—had she left him any choice?—but remained standing. Obviously he was doing his best to pretend that she was a lady, and not the daughter of the notorious Constance Winstead. Sophie shrugged and didn’t insist. If he wanted to stand until she had seated herself, it was his prerogative. However, if he wanted to stand until Hell froze over and the Devil went ice-skating, well, then she’d just have to make him see the error of his ways. As long as he ended by sitting down, and believing that taking his seat had been his own idea.

  She would do whatever made the man happy, or made him think he was happy. That’s what her mama had always said. And her mother had always made it a point to keep her men happy. All of her men. So many, many men. For years, Sophie had thought herself to be the luckiest of children—having so many doting uncles.

  Until she realized that, although her uncles numbered in the dozens, she strangely had never met any aunts or cousins.

  That’s when Desiree had taken her aside and explained the ways of the world to her—something her mama never would have done, preferring her daughter to be innocent of such things. But Desiree had “lived the life,” as she called it, before fleeing Paris in 1804 with her latest protector, who had made the mistake of backing the hapless duc d’Enghien in his plot against Napoleon. When that man had tossed her over a few years later for no other than Constance Winstead, Desiree had come to Wimbledon bent on a hair-pulling match, and ended by becoming Constance’s sometimes lady’s maid and boon companion, an arrangement that had suited them both.

  The gentleman in question, however happy at first, had not found this arrangement quite so pleasing when he learned Desiree was now officially out of the life (Lord only knew what naughty ideas that man had harbored in his head!). He soon dejectedly departed for friendlier climes with both an English and Gallic flea in his ear, leaving behind him two giggling ladies much in charity with each other.

  Desiree had immediately thrown off her stays, indulged her love of French pastry, and taken the then still-quite-young Sophie under her motherly wing.

  Firstly, lastly, and probably eternally—it was Desiree who had tried and failed, and tried and failed again, to break Sophie of her one seemingly insurmountable fault: her rather v
olatile temper. If the maid had not succeeded in banishing that temper over the years, she had at least brought Sophie to the point of recognizing her failing, and for the most part successfully curbing it, twisting it, turning it, using it to her advantage.

  Which was not the same as saying that the grown Sophie now had the disposition of a cute, cuddly kitten. Unless one was speaking of cute, cuddly young tigers, that could just as easily lick your hand or nip off your nose, depending on their mood. As Desiree had been heard to mutter more than once as she tried to console herself, if the little tiger had not changed her stripes, at least she had over the years learned how better to hide them from view.

  It also had been Desiree who had carefully explained a man’s needs when Constance had done with her lessons on a man’s wants. It had been Desiree who had helped school the young Sophie in her lessons, which explained the young woman’s hint of a French accent. It had been Desiree who had hidden Sophie from the worst of her mother’s life, and allowed her a peek or two at the best of it.

  And it had been Desiree who had held a sobbing Sophie when the heartbreaking news came that her beloved, scatterbrained mother and her dear, sweet Uncle Cesse had unexpectedly perished in a tragic carriage accident.

  It had been the resourceful Desiree who had so cleverly written the letter concerning Sophie’s come-out, forged the various signatures that made it all look so wonderfully important and legal. A highly enjoyable round of slap and tickle with the local solicitor—coming out of retirement for the sake of her beloved Sophie, and just to see if she could still do it—had secured all the proper stamps and seals that cemented the legitimacy of the letter then forwarded to the ninth duke.

  It had been the endlessly enterprising Desiree who had hired the nearly stone-deaf and perfectly oblivious Mrs. Edith Farraday. She had proclaimed the woman to be Sophie’s legal guardian, and cast herself in the role of Sophie’s maid.

  And then, with all of this so neatly accomplished, she had proceeded just today to set them on the path that led to the front door of Uncle Cesse’s son.

  Sophie sneaked another peek at the ninth duke, the insufferably priggish man just now standing in front of the mantel, an untouched glass of Madeira in his hand. Did he think she had slipped a love potion into it, one meant to have him at her feet in an instant, her willing slave?

  Men were so silly. And so transparent. But lovable enough just the same. Rather like puppies, her mother had told Sophie; friendly, and eager to please, willing to play fetch and carry, even to roll over and do tricks to amuse you. Except that pug dogs, according to Desiree, didn’t lie to you to get what they wanted, use you, and then toss you over without a blink.

  And so this was how Sophie Winstead had grown to young womanhood, filled to the brim with her mother’s romantic notions, well schooled in what it took to woo and win a man, but also firmly grounded in her practical French friend’s caveats.

  And with a temper that kept her interesting.

  With her anger on simmer and her smile still firmly fixed, Sophie crossed to the table where she had set the birdcage—knowing the duke’s gaze was riveted to her every graceful, gliding step. She whipped the paisley shawl from the cage with a flourish, awakening the sleeping Ignatius.

  “Good afternoon, Ignatius,” she cooed, bending forward slightly, putting her face close to the cage. “I trust you’ve had a pleasant nap. Did you enjoy your trip in the coach, or was the ride too bumpy for you?”

  The bird lifted its yellow head from beneath one bright green wing and blinked. It then fanned out its blue, green, and scarlet tail feathers, swiveled its head about to quickly inspect its new surroundings, and protested in deep, guttural tones, “Demned coachie! Squawk! Quick! My flask! Secrets to tell! Squawk! Squawk! Demned coachie! Secrets to sell! Quick, my flask! Squawk!”

  Sophie bit her tongue to keep from laughing, knowing the word coach was always followed by this particular answer from Ignatius. “Oh, naughty bird! Sophie’s very angry with you,” she exclaimed, wagging a finger at Ignatius so that his head bobbed and weaved, following her every movement.

  “Sophie loves you! Sophie loves you!” Ignatius shrilled in a higher voice, much like Sophie’s own, pushing his head against the bars until she reached in two fingers and stroked his feathery head. “Sophie loves you! Squawk!”

  “No, no, no, Ignatius,” she corrected. “It’s Sophie loves me. Sweet, silly, literal bird!” She turned her back on the parrot and smiled sunnily at the duke. “You’ll have to excuse Ignatius, Your Grace. He is quite the mimic, and repeats nearly everything. Why, just now he sounded just like Uncle Tye, didn’t he—and then just like me. Isn’t that precious? He’s such a clever bird.”

  “Uncle Tye?” the ninth duke repeated, looking past her, at the birdcage.

  “Yes, indeed,” Sophie said, pleased but not surprised that he’d taken the bait she had so carefully offered. “Sir Tyler Shipley. Do you know him?”

  “Sir Tyler is your uncle? Sir Tyler Shipley, of His Majesty’s government?”

  Sophie knew her smile wrinkled up her nose. Desiree had told her so. She’d also told her that such small, endearing quirks could cause many a man to tumble into malleable insensibility, if not into believing himself to be in love. “One and the same, although I haven’t seen him in ever so long. I doubt he’ll remember me now as the rather pudgy child I was then. But I shall remind him.”

  “One most sincerely hopes not,” the duke muttered, finally falling into the chair Sophie had pointed out to him five minutes earlier. “Dear God, I hadn’t thought about this. Mayfair must be shin-deep in your mother’s discarded lovers.” He absently lifted his booted legs onto the footstool Sophie hastened to place closer in front of him. “This isn’t going to work. I don’t care what my solicitor said. There must be some other way. This isn’t going to work at all.”

  Sophie sat down on the small bit of footstool left to her and patted His Grace’s knee, wishing she could “pat” it with an anvil. “There, there. It’s not to worry. Only think about it, Your Grace. So many important men, and all of them so collectively eager to see me happily wed and out of London, yes? Out of London and stuck in Hampshire, or Sussex, raising babies and watching my husband go off to the city to bed his mistress. Just as they wed their wives and went off, in their turn, to bed my mother. Why, I imagine they will all prove most eager to assist you in settling me as quickly as possible—once they realize how very discreet I can be, of course.”

  The duke looked at her fully, his blue eyes so like dearest Uncle Cesse’s. Intelligent, all-seeing—yet without a trace of humor in them. How had any son of Uncle Cesse’s come to be such a prig? “I see. You’ve figured this all out madam, haven’t you? And you rather delight in the notion of strong men quavering in their boots as you walk into any gathering, fearing that their liaisons with the notorious Widow Winstead are about to be served up at the supper table.”

  The notorious Widow Winstead, indeed! Sophie longed to slap his face for such an insult. It was enough that her mother had been who she had been; it was too much to hear His Grace say the words, hear the tone of his voice when he said them. But she tamped down her temper yet again, and doggedly, determinedly, assumed a hurt expression, her full bottom lip pushing forward in a pout. “Oh, no, Your Grace! It’s nothing of the kind. I just thought you should know that, grateful as I am for your kindness in sponsoring me for the Season, I am not without resources of my own. I shouldn’t wish to be a burden on you, you see. And I’m quite confident my uncles will be of great assistance to both of us.”

  “If one of them doesn’t decide to strangle you in order to protect himself from scandal,” His Grace muttered, then drained his glass and looked up as Edith Farraday tippy-toed into the room and took up a chair in the furthermost corner. “Who’s that?”

  Sophie, grateful for the interruption, turned and waved to her make-believe guardian, waggling two fingers at her, and then explained the woman’s presence. “I would introduce you, but
I’m quite convinced Mrs. Farraday will be snoring again within the minute. Travel is anathema to her—a delicate stomach, you understand—so that Desiree prudently dosed her with laudanum before we set out. Frankly, I’m surprised she has been able to toddle up the stairs without assistance.”

  The duke looked at the tall, rail-thin woman for another moment, until Edith Farraday’s chin once more made contact with her bony breast. Then he turned to Sophie. “Shouldn’t she be in her bed?” he asked, then quickly swept his legs off the footstool and glared at her as if only belatedly realizing that his left boot had been resting most intimately against her hip, her hand on his knee. “Miss Winstead, please get up. This is highly unsuitable.”

  Don’t rush your fences, Sophie, she warned herself as she obediently rose, holding her breath so that her cheeks blushed a becoming peach. “I’m prodigiously sorry, Your Grace,” she apologized, smoothing down her skirts. “Uncle Cesse so liked it when I sat at his feet. He called me his little girl, and told me the most marvelous stories. He was always making me laugh, and teasing me back into a good humor whenever I complained to him about my studies. I particularly disliked sums.” She frowned, looking down at him in real sympathy. “You must miss him very much.”

  The duke abruptly stood up, turning away from her, but not before she caught the fleeting flash of anger—of pain?—in his blue eyes. “You must have your uncles confused, Miss Winstead. I never knew the man you’ve just described. And now, as my aunt has taken to her bed—that is, as my aunt is resting this afternoon, I suggest you rouse Mrs. Farraday, and I’ll have someone show you both to your rooms. We’ll meet again at dinner.”

  “You don’t like me, do you?” Sophie called after him as he made to quit the room. “I didn’t think you would, but I had hoped we could cry friends. After all, our parents were quite fond of each other.”