The Lost Duke of Wyndham

“You were saying, Miss Eversleigh?” he murmured.

She almost told him. It was strange, because she barely knew him, and furthermore, he could not possibly be interested in the trivialities of the Belgrave household. Even if he did become the duke-and the thought of it still made her somewhat sick to her stomach-well, it wasn’t as if Thomas could have identified any of the housemaids. And if asked which ones his grandmother disliked, he’d surely have said, All of them.

Which, Grace thought with a wry smile, was probably true.

“You’re smiling, Miss Eversleigh,” Mr. Audley remarked, looking very much as if he were the one with a secret. “Do tell why.”

“Oh, it’s nothing,” she said. “Certainly nothing that would be of interest to you.” She motioned toward the staircase at the rear of the hall. “Here, the bedchambers are this way.”

“You were smiling,” he said again, falling in step beside her.

For some reason that made her smile anew. “I did not say that I wasn’t.”

“A lady who doesn’t dissemble,” he said approvingly. “I find myself liking you more with every passing minute.”

Grace pursed her lips, eyeing him over her shoulder. “That does not indicate a very high opinion of women.”

“My apologies. I should have said a person who does not dissemble.” He flashed her a smile that shook her to her toes. “I would never claim that men and women are interchangeable, and thank heavens for that, but in matters of truthiness, neither sex earns high marks.”

She looked at him in surprise. “I don’t think truthiness is a word. In fact, I’m quite certain it is not.”

“No?” His eyes darted to the side. Just for a second-not even a second, but it was long enough for her to wonder if she’d embarrassed him. Which couldn’t be possible. He was so amazingly glib and comfortable in his own skin. One did not need more than a day’s acquaintance to realize that. And indeed, his smile grew jaunty and lopsided, and his eyes positively twinkled as he said, “Well, it should be.”

“Do you often make up words?”

He shrugged modestly. “I try to restrain myself.”

She looked at him with considerable disbelief.

“I do,” he protested. He clasped one hand over his heart, as if wounded, but his eyes were laughing. “Why is it no one ever believes me when I tell them I am a moral and upstanding gentleman, on this earth with the every intention of following every rule.”

“Perhaps it is because most people make your acquaintance when you order them out of a carriage with a gun?”

“True,” he acknowledged. “It does color the relationship, doesn’t it?”

She looked at him, at the humor lurking in his emerald eyes, and she felt her lips tickle. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to laugh the way she’d laughed when her parents were alive, when she’d had the freedom to seek out life’s absurdities and the time to make merry over them.

It almost felt as if something were waking up within her. It felt lovely. It felt good. She wanted to thank him, but she’d sound the veriest fool. And so she did the next best thing.

She apologized.

“I’m sorry,” she said, pausing at the base of the stairs.

That seemed to surprise him. “You’re sorry?”

“I am. For…today.”

“For kidnapping me.” He sounded amused, vaguely so. Perhaps even condescending.

“I didn’t mean to,” she protested.

“You were in the carriage,” he pointed out. “I do believe that any court of law would brand you an accomplice.”

Oh, that was more than she could take. “This would, I assume, be the same court of law that sent you to the gallows earlier that same morning for pointing a loaded gun at a duchess.”

“Tsk tsk. I told you it wasn’t a hanging offense.”

“No?” she murmured, echoing his earlier tone precisely. “It ought to be.”

“Oh, you think?”

“If truthiness gets to be a word, then accosting a duchess with a gun ought to be enough to get one hanged.”

“You’re quick,” he said admiringly.

“Thank you,” she said, then admitted, “I’m out of practice.”

“Yes.” He glanced down the hall toward the drawing room, where the dowager was presumably still enthroned upon her sofa. “She does keep you rather silent, doesn’t she?”

“Loquaciousness is not considered becoming in a servant.”

“Is that how you see yourself?” His eyes met hers, searching her so deeply she almost stepped away. “A servant?”

And then she did step away. Because whatever it was he was going to find in her, she wasn’t so sure she wanted to see it. “We should not loiter,” she said, motioning for him to follow her up the stairs. “The blue silk bedroom is lovely. Very comfortable, and with excellent morning light. The artwork in particular is superb. I think you will like it.”

She was babbling, but he was kind enough not to remark upon it, instead saying, “I’m sure it will be an improvement over my current lodgings.”

She glanced over at him with surprise. “Oh. I had assumed-” She broke off, too embarrassed to remark that she’d thought him a homeless nomad.

“A life of posting inns and grassy fields,” he said with an affected sigh. “Such is the fate of a highwayman.”

“Do you enjoy it?” She surprised herself, both by asking it and also by how very curious she was in the answer.

He grinned. “Robbing coaches?”

She nodded.

“It depends on who is in the coach,” he said softly. “I very much enjoyed not robbing you.”

“Not robbing me?” She turned then, and the ice, which had been cracked, was officially broken.

“I didn’t take a thing, did I?” he returned, all innocence.

“You stole a kiss.”

“That,” he said, leaning forward with great cheek, “was freely given.”

“Mr. Audley…”

“I do wish you’d call me Jack,” he sighed.

“Mr. Audley,” she said again. “I did not-” She looked quickly about, then lowered her voice to an urgent whisper. “I did not…do…what you said I did.”

He smiled lazily. “When did ‘kiss’ become such a dangerous word?”

She clamped her lips together because truly there was no way she would gain the upper hand in this conversation.

“Very well,” he said. “I shan’t torment you.”

It would have been a kind and generous statement if he hadn’t followed it with: “Today.”

But even then, she smiled. It was difficult not to, in his presence.

They were in the upper hall now, and Grace turned toward the family apartments where he would be staying. They moved along in silence, giving her ample time to consider the gentleman beside her. She did not care what he’d said about not completing university. He was extremely intelligent, unique vocabulary notwithstanding. And there was no arguing against his charm. There was no reason he should not be gainfully employed. She could not ask him why he was robbing coaches, however. It was far too forward on so short an acquaintance.

It was ironic, that. Who would have thought she’d be worried about manners and propriety with a thief?

“This way,” she said, motioning for him to follow her to the left.

“Who sleeps down there?” Mr. Audley asked, peering in the opposite direction.