'Who is included in this hunting party, Your Grace?' he asked wickedly, his blue eyes dancing mischievously.
Allegra easily saw that he was on to her, but certainly the prince wasn't. His Highness was as dense as pudding. 'It's a small party, just my husband and his three closest friends. They have hunted together for years at this time every autumn, Mr. Brummell. Lord Walworth, the Earl of Aston, and Viscount Pickford. It is very intimate, you understand, and now that these four gentlemen are wed, the party shall be even merrier,' Allegra said sweetly. Then she turned to the prince. 'I hope that Your Highness will not be bored. Now that you are here, I shall invite the widowed Lady Perry and her sister, Lady Johnstone. That way we shall be even at dinner.' She smiled brightly at them.
'Excellent! Excellent!' the prince agreed.
'Now, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I will go and have two of our guest chambers readied for you and Mr. Brummell, Your Highness,' Allegra said. She curtsied, and moved serenely from the dining room.
'By Jove, Quinton,' the prince pronounced, 'that's a fine girl you've married! Going to make you an excellent duchess, even if she ain't of the first order bloodwise. It don't hurt to improve the stock with something less than a thoroughbred young mare now and again.'
'Thank you, Your Highness,' the duke replied, bowing, and feeling just the faintest prick of irritation over the prince's remarks. I am so damned proud of Allegra, he thought. What instincts she had! She had greeted their unexpected royal guest, fed him, and turned his disappointment into pleasure. And he had not a doubt that this hunting party was going to come off without a hitch.
Crofts was awaiting his mistress outside of the dining room doors. 'I have had the Lake Suite prepared for His Highness and the Blue Bedroom for Mr. Brummell, your ladyship.'
'Excellent,' Allegra replied. 'In one hour, Crofts, I shall want a footman to take my letters to the stables. Send one groom, mounted, for each letter, and they are to await the reply. We are having a hunting party in two days. As far as the prince and his companion are concerned, this event has been planned for some time.'
'Very good, your ladyship,' Crofts said, hiding a smile. He had served two previous Duchesses of Sedgwick, and this third was more than their equal.
'I will be in my drawing room. Send Honor to me with my writing case,' she further instructed him.
'At once, your ladyship,' he replied, bowing, and hurried away.
As soon as she had her lap desk, Allegra hastily penned notes to Sirena, Eunice, and Caroline explaining that the prince had arrived without warning, and she had invited him to remain for a hunting party. They must come in two days' time. She then wrote a note to Lady Perry apologizing for her last minute invitation, and requesting that the lovely widow and her sister join them. Sealing her missives with red wax and impressing her seal ring in the wax, she rang for the footman.
'Has Crofts given you your instructions?' she asked the footman.
'One groom for each letter, and await the reply,' Perkins said. 'Is that correct, your ladyship?'
'Go along then,' Allegra said nodding.
The next two days were spent in preparations, but those arrangements were made with the utmost discretion so as not to arouse the suspicions of their guests. The prince and the duke spent the day out-of-doors riding and hunting waterfowl. Mr. Brummell, however, begged off. They ate great breakfasts and suppers. The evenings were spent playing Whist for no stakes as Prinny well understood the duke's aversion to gambling, although he was unable to refrain from one small complaint.
'Seems to me a man so plump in the pockets shouldn't be so stingy, Sedgwick,' he grumbled. 'Especially when he's winning.'
'But if we were playing for real stakes, Your Highness,' Allegra remarked, 'you should owe my husband both Devon and Cornwall by now. Quinton is but saving your kingdom for you.'
Brummell burst out laughing. 'A clever sally, your ladyship,' he said. 'I hope you will come to London this winter.'
'It is unlikely, Mr. Brummell. We are country folk, and happy to be so,' Allegra said to him.
'Nonsense!' Prinny answered her. 'I command you to come, Duchess. Can't ever have enough beautiful young women about me, I fear. You will be a triumph, I vow.'
'How flattering you are, Your Highness, but remember I have a duty to fill my husband's nursery even as your wife is now doing. I must attend to that before I come back to London,' Allegra told him.
'Prettily put, Duchess, but unless you are breeding, I will expect to see you dancing at Almack's,' Prinny replied. 'God bless me! I believe I have won this hand, gentlemen.'
Quinton had not come to Allegra's bed the second night of their marriage, but she had been far too busy with all her preparations to notice his absence. Now on the third night she lay quietly, unable to sleep, and wondering why he was not by her side, when the door to their rooms opened and the duke entered the bedchamber, climbing into the bed next to her.
'My lord, I had begun to believe you had forgotten you had a wife,' Allegra said frostily. But secretly she was delighted to see him. 'Our guests will be arriving tomorrow. We will have no time for each other, I fear.'
He pulled her into his arms, giving her a long, slow kiss that set her pulses racing and her toes tingling.
'I could hardly forget you, Allegra,' he told her when he had thoroughly kissed her, leaving her breathless and slightly dizzy. 'And this is not my idea of a perfect first week of marriage. Damn me, my dear, if we shouldn't have taken a wedding trip after all.'
'It would have been fine,' Allegra replied, 'if Prinny hadn't got it into his head to come to Hunter's Lair for our wedding, and then arrived after the fact. Why isn't he at home with his wife? She is expecting a baby after all.'
'He despises Princess Caroline. If the truth be known the princess is gauche, rough-spoken, and not given to bathing as frequently as she might. You know how fastidious Prinny is, my dear. I went to the wedding in April. The prince was drunk to the point of collapse. The king had to run after him when he wandered away from the altar during the ceremony.'
'How sad for his wife,' Allegra said softly.
'Why sad?' the duke probed. 'Their marriage, like ours, was a sensible and practical matter, Allegra.'
'They might not be in love, Quinton, even as we are not in love, but you are kind to me. I do not believe if I were carrying your child that you would leave me to wander about visiting your friends and acquaintances,' she responded. 'You would not desert me.'
'No, my dear, I would not,' he agreed softly. He lay her back against her pillows, smiling. 'Dare I hope that you missed me last night here in your bed? I know that I missed being with you.'
'Did you, sir? Then, pray, what kept you from me?' she demanded.
'Our guest and his passion for Whist, I fear,' was his answer. 'It was quite late when Prinny decided he would go to bed. Mr. Brummell is far more sensitive to our newly married state despite his youth and bachelor status. He attempted several times to coax Prinny from the card table, but to no avail.'
'You are here now,' she said in a tone he would have sworn was seductive.
'Madame, are you flirting with me?' he teased, and chuckled when she blushed. There was still so much innocence about her. He reached out, and pulled the ribbons of her night garment open. A single finger flicked each side apart. 'Are you suggesting, madame, that I make love to you?' He looked
