How To Seduce A Duke

that.

She would not allow herself to look.

He would just smile back at her in a condescending way, thinking to himself how he’d fooled her so completely. That she actually had believed that he had been doing Quinn a grand favor by watching over her-when in fact she was almost certain that he had devised their separation to begin with.

The beast.

To occupy herself, Mary watched the minute hand on the tall case clock in the corner start its full-circle journey around the dial.

Hardly amusing. And after just one minute her eyes were inching toward Rogan. Couldn’t allow that.

So Mary played a little game whereby she would close her eyes and count to sixty, then open them again just as the minute hand moved on.

She grew bored with that activity after just two minutes.

How would she last the evening with the duke sitting right beside her and Quinn just a few rows behind with the lovely widow? She would go mad if she had to endure it much longer.

As the moments passed, she began to wonder if Quinn was enjoying his evening with Lady Tidwell.

A quick look at the couple would not be so very improper, would it? Not if it was a small glance, and nothing more.

Mary set her fan atop her knee, and over the next seconds, removed her hand. The lace fan tumbled to the floor between her seat and Rogan’s.

She bent to retrieve it, but immediately the duke’s hand shot down between the seats and wrapped his fingers around the fan.

Luck was not with her. Of course the wretched man chose that very moment to act in a gentlemanly manner.

Brilliant, just brilliant.

Still, Mary bent at her waist and plunged her hand between the chairs as well. She fished her hand around the feet of chairs, pretending she was not aware Rogan had already picked up the fan. As her hand scrabbled around the floor, she turned her head as much as she dared and wedged her eyes as far to the left as she could manage, hoping to catch a glimpse of Quinn.

And catch it, she did. Only the appalling sight she glimpsed made her turn around completely in her chair to be sure of what she had seen.

Quinn was holding Lady Tidwell’s hand between both of his own. Oh God. He held her hand the very same way he had held hers in the parlor, not so many evenings ago.

The backs of Mary’s eyes pricked as she caught Quinn staring, most adoringly, into the widow’s eyes. He squeezed her hand in his.

A tear breached Mary’s lower lashes and splashed onto her cheek.

“Turn around, gel. People are taking notice.” Lady Upperton grasped Mary’s arm and turned her around in her chair.

“Your fan, Miss Royle.” Rogan glanced down at her, no doubt seeing her tears, as he closed her fan and placed it into her gloved hand, along with his handkerchief.

Deuce it. Mary tried hard to blink back the tears welling in her eyes without needing Rogan’s linen.

She took a deep breath, then raised her chin, trying to keep the tears poised in her eyes.

It was then that she noticed she was peering up at a very large painting positioned behind the musicians.

Focus on the painting. Not on what Quinn might be doing.

It was a full-length oil portrait of a beautiful woman. Clearly, she was highborn. She had an aristocratic look about her.

Her expression was demure, yet in her eyes Mary could almost believe she saw sparks. The painted sky behind the woman was dark and dramatic, which made her white gown vivid and fresh. Her hair was piled high upon her head, with coils of ringlets spilling down the sides of her throat. Around her shoulders, in stark contrast with her almost virginal appearance, was a crimson-and-gold Kashmir shawl.

Mary looked at the shawl, so bold and vivid, and then once more she focused on the woman’s eyes. They seemed to flicker with a sly vitality.

With feminine power.

A knowing smile lifted Mary’s lips.

She felt almost as though she knew this woman. Could see her soul through her eyes.

“Mary?” Lady Upperton nudged her shoulder.

She turned to look across at the old woman, but the moment she did, the tears she’d fought slipped down her cheeks. She scrubbed them away with Rogan’s handkerchief, then folded the linen in a square and squeezed it in her palm.

“Mary?”

Belatedly, Mary realized that the musicians had finally stopped playing at last, and that Lady Upperton was peering pointedly at her. “Oh, dear, I do apologize, Lady Upperton. I found myself quite taken by the woman in that painting.”

“You would not be the first.” Then it almost sounded as if Lady Upperton huffed. “Sir Joseph possesses many paintings by the artist George Romney, but this one is his prize.”

“Why is that?”

“Because ’tis rumored that the Prince Regent himself commissioned the painting…when the lady was his mistress.” Lady Upperton caught Mary’s arm and pulled her near. “But when she lost his favor to another, he never paid the commission or claimed the painting. So there it sat in Romney’s studio until his death, when the house and its contents were sold by his heir.”

Mary leaned back in her chair and gazed up at the painting.

From the corner of her eye, she could see that Rogan was looking up at it as well.

“She was a classic beauty,” he admitted, punctuating his words with a greatly affected sigh.

Mary did not look at him. Instead she directed her next question to Lady Upperton. “Who was she?”

“Are you serious? You really do not know?” Rogan rudely broke into the conversation. “My, you are a country miss, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I am.” Mary glowered at him. “But I was not addressing you, Your Grace.”

Rogan chuckled. “My, my, Miss Royle. Either you have taken a sudden dislike to me…or you are working very hard to play unattainable. Which is it?” He lifted one eyebrow, which only served to infuriate her further.

“I think you know, Your Grace.” Mary glared at him, holding her angry gaze as long as she could manage.

Those ladies and gentleman of society who sat nearby suddenly quieted and watched them, as if eagerly awaiting a sparring match between the country miss and the highborn duke.

Lady Upperton noticed the other guests’ focused attention and was quick about stopping the heated exchange.

She snorted an overdone laugh. “Goodness now, the war is over, let us not begin another.” She tapped Mary’s arm with her fan, forcing her to break her daggered gaze, then tamped down her tone. “The woman is Frances, Countess of Jersey.”

A cold finger seemed to run down Mary’s spine. “You do not mean the Lady Jersey.”

The woman who wrapped up the cold, blue babies in her shawl and handed them off to Papa?

She shook the idea from her head.

Impossible. Impossible!

“Yes, I do.” Lady Upperton sighed. “As you can see, she was quite beautiful in her day. And she took full advantage of that beauty.”

“So, she is no longer living.”

“No, Miss Royle, she is alive. I saw her only last year,” Rogan mentioned nonchalantly. “She…was an acquaintance of my father’s.”