Ne'er Duke Well E-Book

Alexandra Vasti

• Herausgeber: Corvus
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 449

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

***THE SWOONIEST, FUNNIEST REGENCY ROMANCE OF THE SEASON, PERFECT FOR FANS OF BRIDGERTON*** A USA TODAY BESTSELLER Featured in Entertainment Weekly, New York Times, Good Housekeeping, Red, Oprah Daily, and more... STRATAGEM FOR THE RESTORATION OF RESPECTABILITY TO THE DUKE OF STANHOPE: Step 1: Find perfect wife Step 2: Save reputation from ruin Step 3: Do not, at any cost, fall in love with Selina Ravenscroft Peter Kent, newly inherited Duke of Stanhope, has developed quite the scandalous reputation - which must be overturned if he is to win the guardianship of his young half siblings. For help he turns to Lady Selina Ravenscroft, society's most proper debutante (save one tiny secret...). She suggests courtship and marriage to a lady of unimpeachable character - which due to the aforementioned secret is definitely not Selina herself. But her matchmaking goes awry when the scorching chemistry between them proves impossible to resist. For the disreputable duke and his unpredictable matchmaker, falling in love might just be the ultimate scandal... 'Steamy and witty' Red 'A gem ... dazzling banter' New York Times 'Brimming with heart' Good Housekeeping READERS LOVE NE'ER DUKE WELL: 'Heartwarming and very sexy' ***** NetGalley review 'I devoured it!' ***** NetGalley review 'I NEED more of it, desperately' ***** NetGalley review 'Had me fully gripped and swooning' ***** NetGalley review

Leseprobe

First published in paperback in the United States in 2024 by

St Martin’s Publishing Group, an imprint of Pan Macmillan

First published in paperback in Great Britain in 2024 by Corvus, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.

Copyright © Alexandra Vasti, 2024

The moral right of Alexandra Vasti to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

No part of this book may be used in any manner in the learning, training or development of generative artificial intelligence technologies (including but not limited to machine learning models and large language models (LLMs)), whether by data scraping, data mining or use in any way to create or form a part of data sets or in any other way.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Paperback ISBN: 978 1 80546 136 4

E-book ISBN: 978 1 80546 137 1

Printed in Great Britain.

Corvus

An imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

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www.atlantic-books.co.uk

PRAISE FOR NE’ER DUKE WELL

“Ne’er Duke Well is a delightful quicksilver romp with unforgettable characters that readers will be rooting for from start to finish.”

—Deanna Raybourn, New York Times bestselling author of the Veronica Speedwell series

“Ne’er Duke Well by Alexandra Vasti is an irresistible delight from a remarkable new talent. Every page inspires a smile, laugh, or pause in reading while one hugs the book because it’s just so lovely, witty, and benevolently clever. Vasti does really interesting things with genre tropes, making the historical romance fresh and exciting. I felt so enlivened after reading, I wanted to run around waving it at people, saying, ‘Read this now!’ Vasti has quickly earned her place on my list of favorite writers.”

—India Holton, author of The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels

“A witty page-turner with two adorable leads whose funny banter and chemistry are off the charts! I didn’t want their antics to end.”

—Virginia Heath, author of All’s Fair in Love and War

“If it were socially acceptable for blurbs to be in all caps, I’d do it for Ne’er Duke Well and Alexandra Vasti. In fact, all caps doesn’t seem strong enough to convey how much I loved this book. Vasti has quickly made her way to my list of top historical romance authors with the kind of writing that makes me scream and kick my feet in public places. Outrageously hot, tender, and brimming with wit . . . Vasti has secured herself as an auto-buy author in my book, one that I will stay up way too late reading and be glad for the lack of sleep come morning. This opposites-attract historical romance brims with the delicious restraint required of our lead characters in a society they end up defying that explodes in exceptionally steamy moments. Vasti’s storytelling is this season’s Incomparable, a title she’ll hold for years to come with the care and craft she deftly applies to her incredible novels.”

—Mazey Eddings, author of Late Bloomer

“Utterly delicious and undeniably clever, Alexandra Vasti’s Ne’er Duke Well was unputdownable. I’m absolutely certain that Regency romance fans everywhere will love this warm, wonderfully witty, and oh-so-sexy novel just as much as I did. What a spectacular debut!”

—Amy Rose Bennett, author of Up All Night with a Good Duke

To librarians, to booksellers, and to every reader who’s ever handed someone else a book and said, “Try this—I think you’ll love it.” You change lives.

And to Matt, always.

Content note: This book contains discussion of childhood illness and death of a sibling as well as references to slavery and domestic violence. There is also one use of a slur for sex workers (uttered by a villain!). I hope I have handled the challenging topics in the novel gently and with respect.

Contents

Title

Copyright

Praise For Ne’er Duke Well

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Epilogue

Author’s Note

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Landmarks

Cover

Start

Chapter 1

. . . You may be interested to hear that Peter Kent has finally inherited. You remember what he is like, do you not? One pities the House of Lords.

—from Lady Selina Ravenscroft to her brother,

Lord William Ravenscroft, His Majesty’s

Army, Seventh Division, 1815

Peter suspected the project was doomed.

It had not been a good idea to begin with. Surely he could have found another way to satisfy his half sister’s desire for a rapier—one that did not involve dressing her in boy’s clothes and smuggling her into a fencing parlor on Bond Street.

He should have sent for a rapier, not gone out to fit her with it himself. He could have had someone bring a sword to his house.

He was supposed to be a duke, for Christ’s sake.

Peter Kent, the ninth Duke of Stanhope—for all that he’d never set foot in England until two years ago, when he’d become heir presumptive to the dukedom and the Earl of Clermont had dragged him unceremoniously away from his home in Louisiana.

He was the duke now. Had been for three-quarters of a month. People called him Your Grace. He had more money than God.

These facts did not seem to matter to his half siblings.

“Lu,” he said to his sister, slightly horrified to hear pleading in his voice. “You sure you don’t want the kitten? We might buy it a little collar . . .”

He’d brought his siblings a soft, fluffy gray kitten in a basket that morning. Freddie, his ten-year-old half brother, had nearly come out of his skin at the sight of the thing, but Lu had quelled Freddie with a wordless scowl.

Freddie, at least, had wanted the kitten.

“No,” said Lu flatly. “No kittens. Its tail looked like a chimney brush.”

“Its tail looked soft,” mumbled Freddie disconsolately.

“It has claws,” offered Peter. “And teeth. Sharp little teeth.”

He’d felt a right jackass in the carriage on the way to their house that morning, trying to stuff the kitten into the basket. The idea had seemed so promising. What child could resist a kitten? He’d had one brought in from his country seat in Sussex—because, in-bloody-explicably, he had a country seat in Sussex. And people who brought things at his request.

And then the damned kitten kept popping out of the basket and climbing his coat sleeve with its little needle claws and sinking its tiny teeth into his ear and shrieking like the hounds of hell were after it.

Pop pop went its claws as he’d pried it from his coat. Then meeeewwwww as he shoved it into the basket. Then ouch Jesus blasted cockered ratsbane, let go of my goddamned thumb!

And then Lu didn’t even want the kitten. She’d turned up her nose as if she were the ninth Duke of Stanhope and not his illegitimate twelve-year-old sister, the natural daughter of a dead man who thankfully would never darken her door again.

Peter hadn’t even known about Freddie and Lu until he’d gotten to England. He hadn’t been able to protect them from their father’s neglect and cruelty. Just like he hadn’t been able to protect Morgan.

But he was damned if he wouldn’t protect them now.

It would help, though, if he could get the children to trust him. Or at least like him. Or even tolerate his presence without glaring suspiciously in his direction.

“I want a rapier,” Lu said. “So that I might stab people with it.”

You, her eyes said. So that I might stab you.

“I’m not sure that there’s actual stabbing in fencing.”

“How do you know?” Lu asked. “Do you fence? Is there fencing in America?”

“I fence.”

Good God, the child didn’t need a rapier to know exactly where to place the knife in his gut and twist. Yes, he was American. Yes, he was damned out of place here on this cold, foggy island, and in the fencing parlor, and in the House of Lords. And no, he hadn’t been to Eton and Oxford, and no, he didn’t know how to convince the Court of Chancery to give him guardianship of Freddie and Lu, and no, he didn’t know how to get Lu on his side.

And no, and no, and no.

But for the rapier, he could say yes.

“I mean to demand satisfaction,” Lu murmured, almost inaudible over the sounds of the street. “From the world.”

God, she was a terrifying creature.

“Good,” he said. “Let’s buy you a rapier. But listen, Lu, don’t talk, all right?”

Her brows drew together. “Whyever not?”

“Because you sound too much like a small, bad-tempered lady.”

She glowered. “I am no lady.”

“Well, you sound like one, so keep quiet.”

“How would you know? Are there ladies— ”

Peter frowned at her, and to his surprise, she closed her mouth mid-sentence. Frowning? Was that how he was supposed to act like a guardian? God, he hoped not, because the expression on his face made him feel like his father, and he resented it with every fiber of his being.

“In New Orleans?” he finished for her. “Yes, Lu, there are ladies in New Orleans. My mother was a lady.”

“Oh,” she said.

Beneath Lu’s chastening hand on his shoulder, Freddie said, “Was?”

“She died,” Peter said, “a long time ago.”

“Our mother died too,” Freddie said.

“He knows, Freddie,” Lu said irritably. “That is why he is trying—and failing—to pry us away from Great-great-aunt Rosamund.”

Ah, yes, their current guardian. The beloved Great-great-aunt Rosamund, who was not, as far as he could discern, actually related to the children, and who did not appear to recognize them whenever he returned them from one of their outings.

After their mother’s death, the children had been passed like unwanted puppies from household to household, settling most recently upon a very elderly thrice-removed aunt. Rosamund nodded off mid-conversation. She rarely rose from her chair. She occasionally referred to Lu as Lucinda, but sometimes she called her Lettice and sometimes Horatio Nelson.

But despite all that, Lu acted like she wanted to stay with the woman—even though Peter could buy her a whole room full of fencing masters and send Freddie to Eton and give them everything he’d always wanted and never had.

“Lu,” he said now, “I’m telling you, if you talk, it’s not going to work. So show me how much you want the sword by keeping your mouth shut, and we’ll walk out of here with one strapped to your hip.”

She scowled, but she did it. They strolled quite casually into the fencing parlor.

A quarter of an hour later, they strolled back out. Lu was red-faced at the extravagant lies Peter had invented to account for her refusal to speak. Freddie buried his laughter in his hand, and Peter held the sword nearly above his own head to ensure that Lu couldn’t stab anyone with it.

Which was how he found himself—bracketed by children and with a small sword held aloft out of a still-sputtering Lu’s reach—when they collided with Lady Selina Ravenscroft.

Chapter 2

. . . I do remember Peter Kent. He knocked you into a mud puddle at Broadmayne, didn’t he? And stole your horse. And wasn’t there something about a wedding at St. George’s, two sheep, and a duel?

—from Will Ravenscroft to his sister Selina, posted from Brussels

Selina settled her poke bonnet firmly onto her head, ducked out of the back alley behind her publisher’s office, and emerged into the sunshine of Bond Street.

It was extremely large, the bonnet, its brim jutting out past her face like a green silk prow. It clashed horribly with the pink pelisse she wore knotted over her yellow-striped, outrageously flounced walking gown, and if she kept her head tilted downward, her face was almost entirely obscured.

She wasn’t disguised. She hadn’t needed to wear the rough serge servant’s dress she’d kept stuffed in the bottom of her wardrobe for well over a year, a fact that struck Selina as something of a relief.

If Lady Selina Ravenscroft, younger sister of the Duke of Rowland, were to be caught wandering about London in servant’s garb, the scandal sheets would be wild with it by morning.

But in this—a shockingly out-of-fashion outfit, her hair tucked away beneath the bonnet and her face shaded by its outlandish brim—she wasn’t precisely in disguise. She was simply barely recognizable, which was exactly how she preferred it.

And if she were to be recognized in this ridiculous ensemble, that wouldn’t be enough to engender a scandal. Well, perhaps a very mild one, given that she was walking about without a chaperone or maid. But she need only cross two streets to where the Rowland carriage waited—her delightfully bribable maid Emmie snugged inside—and then she’d be safe. No scandal today.

No scandal so far.

Of course, it was only a matter of time before someone found out the truth about Lady Selina Ravenscroft.

She angled a glance back at the office of Jean Laventille—the radical Trinidadian immigrant who was both her publisher and her only confidant. It was, decidedly, a mistake. Because with the poke bonnet’s brim blocking her vision and the flounces dancing around her body, she didn’t see the little boy who darted across her path until it was too late.

They collided with a whomp, and Selina felt the breath rush out of her. She tried to stop herself from kicking the boy in the calf and overbalanced instead.

“Hell’s bells!” said the child, voice sweet, dark-fringed eyes wide as saucers.

And Selina flung her hands out in front of her, her mind busily registering a series of facts:

One, the child was, perhaps, not a boy.

Two, Selina’s face was about to make a very abrupt acquaintance with a cobblestone.

And three, these gloves were certainly going to be ruined, and she really liked these gloves—

And then she was caught around the chest by one strong masculine arm and set, cautiously, back on her feet.

“Good God, Lu,” said the owner of the arm. “You’re lucky I didn’t accidentally stab this woman, because even peers of the realm aren’t exempt from the legal consequences of murder.”

And—

Oh.

Oh no.

Selina knew that lightly accented voice. She knew the owner of the arm. She knew that particular brand of easy words and nonsensical charm, and she knew without looking that the expression on the man’s face would be a slightly feral grin.

Peter bloody Kent.

She couldn’t look up. She couldn’t turn her gaze even one fraction, because then the brim would reveal her face, and he would recognize her. And she really, really didn’t want him to recognize her.

She was alone, not that Peter would care. But he might wonder what she was doing out here on Bond Street by herself. He might ask. He might have seen her come out of Laventille’s office, for heaven’s sake. She couldn’t be connected to the publisher, because then she might be connected to Belvoir’s, and then she would be so thoroughly entangled in the web of deception she’d crafted that she might never find her way out.

Also, he’d practically rescued her, which was mortifying.

And, God, she was wearing this patently absurd costume.

Not that she cared what he thought of her costume. Not that she thought about Peter Kent like that.

Or at all. Ever.

“Beg pardon,” she mumbled, sidling away, eyes downcast and fixed on his dusty boots. She couldn’t look up. She thought maybe there was another child somewhere to his other side, but she dared not turn her head to check.

But then, horror of horrors . . .

He recognized her anyway.

“Selina?”

Oh blast.

She tipped her head back to meet his gaze. And then back, and back farther. The bonnet, which had been quite superb at disguising her appearance, was remarkably poor at allowing for normal social congress.

Finally she found his face.

Yes, it was Peter Kent—Stanhope, she reminded herself, he was the Duke of Stanhope now—and yes, he was grinning bemusedly down at her.

She was tall, but he was taller. His bright brown eyes were lit with warmth and the comfortable, irrepressible familiarity that had him addressing her without her proper title. His dark curls were artfully mussed—she wondered if he had his valet form them with hot tongs. His fair skin was gold-burnished from the Louisiana sun, and his lips were almost insultingly lush for a man, and—

This. This was why, in the two years since she had met him and he’d tossed her into a mud puddle, she did not think about Peter Kent.

Selina dropped into a practiced curtsy, polite but not deferential. “Your Grace. What a pleasant surprise.”

Peter’s grin widened. “You wouldn’t say that if I’d stabbed you with Lu’s rapier.”

She had no idea what he was talking about, as usual. She didn’t even see a rapier.

Peter turned and gestured to the slightly smaller of the two children at his side. “Come on, Freddie, hand it over before Lu steals it and skewers someone.”

“I thought it was blunted,” said the boy, sounding scandalized. “You said it was for practice.”

“Lu could skewer someone with a spoon.”

The boy—Freddie, evidently—produced what appeared to be a toy fencing foil from behind his back and handed it to Peter.

Peter’s large palm practically enveloped the thing. It looked ridiculous.

He turned back to Selina. “Now that the weapons are safely stowed—”

She arched an eyebrow. Stowed, was it? He more or less held the small sword aloft.

He caught her look and ignored it utterly. “Lady Selina, allow me to present to you my siblings. Lady Selina Ravenscroft, this is Miss Lucinda Nash”—he used the foil to gesture to the taller of the two children—“and Master Frederick Nash.”

Master Frederick Nash gave her a polite bow.

Miss Lucinda Nash swept her flat cap from her head, setting free a tumble of shining chocolate curls, and bowed so low she was nearly prostrate on the ground. Then she stood, regarding Selina with bright, fierce green eyes, as if daring Selina to comment on her boy’s garb.

Well, Selina supposed that she had no room to criticize anyone for what they were wearing this afternoon.

“Miss Nash,” she said, inclining her head in greeting. “Master Nash. It’s my pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

“Lu,” said the girl furiously. “Not Lucinda. Lu.”

“Lu,” whispered Freddie, looking pained. “You’re not supposed to correct the duke in public—”

“Freddie, shut up, they can hear you—”

Selina bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. God, she would have hated to be laughed at when she was that age.

“My brother Nicholas is a duke as well,” she offered instead. “I assure you, I correct him in public frequently.”

Lu’s eyes sparked with interest.

“No, please,” said Peter. “Please do not encourage her.”

“And is your brother the duke this stodgy?” asked Lu, as if Peter hadn’t spoken.

Stodgy? Goodness, stodgy wasn’t exactly the word that came to mind when she considered Peter. Alarming, maybe. Confounding. Unsettling.

Not that she thought about him, of course.

“Yes, my brother the duke is stodgy indeed.” She sent an apologetic thought in the direction of Rowland House. Nicholas wasn’t precisely stodgy, but when she’d been a child, he certainly had seemed rather staid. Perhaps a bit overly aristocratic.

Stodgy, in a word.

“And is your brother the duke also so old?”

Oh mercy, how could she not laugh?

“Why yes,” Selina said. “Similarly, er, decrepit.”

Peter made a choked sound.

“And is your—”

“Thank you, Lu,” said Peter, slinging an arm companionably about the girl’s small shoulders. “That’s probably enough character assassination for one day.”

“Fine,” said Lu. “Pardon me for making conversation with the first interesting person we’ve met in London.”

Somehow, this rather backhanded compliment had Selina feeling quite pleased with herself. Ridiculously gowned and halfway to scandal she might be, but at least this funny little child found her interesting.

“Surely not,” Peter protested.

Selina felt herself deflate.

“I just took you to meet Angelo, didn’t I?” Peter continued. “That was certainly interesting.”

“You would not permit me to speak, so it’s not as though I could make conversation—”

Selina couldn’t stop herself. “You took your sister to a fencing parlor?” At least that explained the masculine attire.

Peter, Freddie, and Lu turned identical guilty gazes toward her, and Selina was powerfully struck by the resemblance among the three of them. The same brown curls, lit by hints of auburn in the sun. The bird-like bones of the children were echoed in Peter’s lean, muscular frame, and in Lu’s gamine face she could see Peter’s same mischievous charm.

“I am going,” Lu said with some dignity, “to learn how to fence.”

“Though probably not at Angelo’s,” Peter put in.

“Certainly not,” Selina said. “I was taught to fence in my own home, which is the only acceptable location for a lady of quality to learn the sport.”

“You were?” exclaimed Lu, losing all track of her composure.

Peter’s lips curled up. “Are you suggesting that Lu learn how to fence in . . . your home?”

Selina scowled. “Not at all. I meant—oh, you imbecile, you knew what I meant.”

Lu grinned what Selina was starting to think of as the Kent family grin. “Oh, I like her.”

“Of course you do,” Peter said. “She wants you to learn how to stab people.”

“Might I suggest,” Selina said drily, “that you hire a fencing master to attend both of your siblings at the Stanhope residence?”

Peter frowned, and Selina felt her brows go up. She wasn’t sure she’d ever seen him frown. “The children do not reside with me.”

“They don’t?” She couldn’t help the rather appalled tone of her voice, though even as she said it, she supposed she was being absurd. Of course they didn’t. What handsome single young aristocrat would house two small children in his London residence during the Season if he had any other option?

What aristocrat other than her older brother Nicholas, of course.

She and her twin, Will, had been six when their parents had died. Six years old, and half out of their wits with terror at the fear of what would become of them. They’d huddled together under the bed linens for the first time in years, wondering whether they’d be sent away to live with some ancient relative they did not know.

But instead, Nicholas had abandoned Oxford and, all of twenty years old, had come home to raise them himself.

“They don’t live with me, no,” Peter said, and his voice sounded uncharacteristically grim. “But not for want of trying.”

For want of . . . trying?

“You don’t have guardianship of your siblings, then?” she asked. And how puzzling that was. She knew Peter’s parents were both deceased, like her own. Surely it would be a matter of course for the guardianship to pass to him, as hers and Will’s had passed to Nicholas.

“We are half siblings,” said Lu icily, and then understanding clicked into place.

These were natural children. Peter’s father must have had these children with his mistress—or perhaps not even that, simply a woman with whom he’d had intercourse. Perhaps not even the same woman, she supposed.

Her own father had had a long-term mistress before he’d married their mother. It wasn’t uncommon for aristocrats.

Male aristocrats, that is. It wasn’t uncommon for male peers to have children with women who were not their wives.

But it was uncommon for the legitimate heir to recognize them—to introduce them as his siblings to an acquaintance on the street.

Goodness, Peter Kent did have a way of surprising her.

“I see,” she said. “And where do you reside now, Miss Lu?”

Lu jerked up her chin. “With Great-great-aunt Rosamund. We love Great-great-aunt Rosamund.”

Freddie emitted a little squeak—Selina thought maybe Lu had kicked him—and then he was nodding along agreeably. “Oh yes, we love her. We love her, um . . . her, um . . . her . . .” He gazed at Selina and then inspiration seemed to strike. “Her bonnets!”

Peter gave a strangled cough.

Lu rolled her eyes. “Thank you, Freddie.”

“She sounds like a paragon,” Selina said.

“Oh yes,” said Peter, “certainly. What did she say this morning when I arrived to collect you? I don’t think I quite understood her.”

Freddie produced an imitation of a quiet snore.

“We love Great-great-aunt Rosamund,” repeated Lu. “And her home is where we shall stay.”

“Unless I can pry you out by means of legal action,” said Peter, and there was that frown again. Selina found she didn’t like to see him frown. Which was probably the most bizarre thought she’d had all day, and that included all the eye-popping combinations of colors she’d imagined plucking out of her wardrobe.

“Don’t you know,” Peter was saying to his sister, “I could fill the drawing room of the Stanhope residence with fencing masters, if you so desired it, Lu.”

“I do not.” Her small chin was still lifted, her dark brows arched in challenge.

“I have to admit,” Selina said, “it is a particular pleasure to have a fencing master attend you at your leisure.”

Lu turned a scowl in Selina’s direction.

“Listen to Lady Selina, won’t you?” Peter said, his face softening. “You like her. She’s interesting. She’s easily the cleverest woman of my acquaintance.”

A little frisson of delight curled up like a cat inside Selina’s chest, and she tried to get hold of herself. Good God, there was something about these offhand Kent compliments that could charm the hat off one’s head. Even this monumental green silk bonnet.

“In fact,” he said, and he turned to Selina as if about to speak. He paused for a moment, and then said, “Yes—I think that—” His warm brown eyes rested on her face consideringly.

“You think that . . . ?” she prompted after a moment. Her cheeks were starting to feel a bit warm, and she really did not want to blush, for goodness’ sake. Selina did not blush. She refused to blush.

“I’d like to speak to you and your brother about this exact situation. Can I call on you at Rowland House?”

She wasn’t entirely sure what situation he was talking about—curse the man, he always made her feel as though she’d lost the plot—but . . .

She knew herself. She knew her fatal flaw.

She was curious. She always wanted to know more.

“Yes,” Selina said. “I am living at Rowland House with the duke and duchess.”

“Excellent,” Peter said. “I’ll call on you there.”

And then he clapped a hand to the back of Lu’s head and said, “Try a curtsy this time, Lu.”

Lu’s mouth pinched, and she held out imaginary skirts and swept Selina a rather magnificent curtsy that almost reached the depths of her previous bow.

“You know,” said Selina, “I quite like you as well.”

Chapter 3

. . . Have you any new interest in politics after spending the last eighteen months with His Majesty’s Army, Will? You might be interested to know that the new Duke of Stanhope (Peter Kent, I’m sure you remember him) delivered as his maiden speech perhaps the most devastating opprobrium against slavery ever heard in the House of Lords. I am well pleased by his ascension to the peerage.

—from His Grace Nicholas Ravenscroft, Duke of Rowland, to his brother, Lord William Ravenscroft, His Majesty’s Army, Seventh Division

“Tell me again,” said Mohan Tagore, “why we are walking to Rowland House.”

Peter made himself slow down to keep pace with his barrister’s shorter strides. Then he realized he’d been whistling a Carnival song he hadn’t thought of in years and he made himself stop that too.

“It’s a fine day,” he said. “Use your legs, Tagore. I have it on good authority that an unused muscle atrophies. I worry for you.”

“Are you saying that if I were to gag you for a month or so, your tongue would atrophy? Because if so—”

“God forbid,” Peter said. “I assure you, while you might not regret the loss of that particular organ, there are a number of ladies of my acquaintance who might disagree.”

Tagore choked briefly on air. “I am going to pretend I did not hear that and ask you again why we are walking to Rowland House.”

Peter took a moment to meditate on the question. He’d considered taking the Stanhope carriage to Tagore’s office, picking up Tagore, and then having them conveyed together to Rowland’s door. But it seemed too absurd—to ride barely a dozen streets to Tagore’s office, then back again as far to Rowland House—when they could walk. The sky was painfully blue, a color that made him think of Louisiana with the mixture of love and nostalgia and loss that he’d felt ever since he’d arrived in England with the Earl of Clermont two years prior.

He wanted to look at the sky. He wanted to talk to Tagore before they got into Rowland House and everything became all caution and pleading-without-seeming-to-plead.

“Or perhaps,” Tagore said, apparently tired of waiting for Peter to answer, “you might tell me why we are meeting at Rowland House at all.”

“I want to talk to Rowland about the next six weeks. I want to see if he has any ideas as to how we might make the lord chancellor more amenable to our petition.”

In six weeks, Peter’s petition for guardianship of Freddie and Lu would come before Lord Eldon, the chancellor of the High Court. And unless something changed quite drastically in that span of time, Peter was going to lose.

“Eldon is a problem,” Tagore agreed. “But I meant, rather—why Rowland House? You are a member of Rowland’s club, are you not?”

Peter was. He was fairly certain Rowland had exerted no small amount of pressure to encourage the manager of Brooks’s to extend a sponsorship to him, because he’d been offered membership nearly a year before his ducal elevation. Rowland was brilliant at those sorts of things—easing the way, making the track smooth. Peter had never had the talent for it. Nor the inclination, even, until he’d moved to England.

“I wanted you to talk to Rowland as well,” he said easily. “You’ll be at the Court of Chancery with me, and Rowland will not. I’m hopeful he’ll have some suggestions.”

Tagore drummed his fingers against his thigh. “It’s a challenge. Lord Eldon moves in entirely different political circles than Rowland, for all that Rowland is a duke. Rowland’s a Whig, a reformer, and Eldon is the most entrenched of the Tories.”

“I know it. I’m hopeful that we might be able to think of another approach. Not direct political pressure, but . . . something.”

“Rowland isn’t in the habit of bribery. Nor Eldon, for that matter.”

“No bribes,” Peter said. Not that he would be opposed to bribery, if it would get him Freddie and Lu, but he’d already talked the matter over with Tagore and decided it wasn’t practicable. But he was damned if he was going to let his brother and sister go without a fight.

He had lost a sibling, back in New Orleans, when they had both been children.

He would not let it happen again, not for all the dukedom or for all the world. There had to be something they could do. There had to be another way.

And he wanted to talk to Selina Ravenscroft.

That, as much as he couldn’t say it aloud to his barrister, was the reason they were going to Rowland House. At Brooks’s, Selina wouldn’t be there. At a ball, he couldn’t lay his cards on the table in front of her and watch her clever, busy mind puzzle away at the problem.

In the two years since he’d met her, he’d seen her at work a number of times. She distracted maidenly aunts to help facilitate unchaperoned marriage proposals. She rearranged conversational groups, murmuring in response to his curious glance, “Lady Stratton can’t abide the Earl of Puddington. I’d hate to see fisticuffs ruin my aunt’s party.”

He’d seen her identify a fragile dowager missing a glove from across a crowded room and produce a new glove as if from nowhere.

Once, at the Breightmets’, he’d seen her thrust her friend Lydia Hope-Wallace into a potted palm. He’d watched with interest as Lydia had cast up her accounts, hidden from all passersby, and then stood by in frank amazement as Selina somehow managed to remove Lydia from the ball without a single other person seeming to notice their departure.

Just last December, she’d organized the elopement of Clermont—who had become one of Peter’s closest companions—and her own dear friend Faiza Khan. Clermont and Faiza had given every impression of despising each other. Peter had been quite certain no one but he knew that Clermont carried Faiza’s earring in his pocket like a blasted talisman.

But Selina must have known. She had certainly known something, because one day Clermont and Faiza had been shouting at one another over dinner and the next they were well on their way to Scotland, in a post-chaise personally hired by Selina.

She was so damned efficient. She seemed like she could be in two places at once. She could light up the room like the most popular woman of the beau monde, but he’d also seen her fade into the background when she chose to. Though how she managed that, he had no idea, what with her acres of honey-blond hair and that wide, expressive mouth.

And her eyes, light amber, like a cat’s eyes, or a wolf’s. He’d thought about those eyes from time to time these last two years.

Not as often, though, as he’d thought about how infernally clever she was, and how much he liked that about her. She fixed things, like her brother—but not in his same way. Rowland was a politician, all careful talk and social grace and terrifying ethical code. Selina wasn’t afraid to sneak about, to hide in a potted plant or steal a glove if she had to.

And when he’d seen the way Lu had warmed to her, and the way Selina had known instinctively how to win Lu’s confidence, it had occurred to him suddenly that if anyone might have a fresh thought about how he could gain custody of his siblings, it would be Selina Ravenscroft.

He was still thinking about her when they arrived at Rowland House.

The butler ushered them inside and set out to determine if His Grace was receiving callers.

“And Lady Selina,” Peter added. “I’d like to see His Grace and Lady Selina.”

He felt rather than saw Tagore’s sharp dark-eyed gaze.

Like a penknife, that look.

“Social call, is it?” said Tagore blandly.

“No,” Peter said. “No. Have you met Lady Selina?”

“I have not had the pleasure. Rowland’s sister?”

“That’s right. When you meet her, you’ll see why I want her here as well.”

Tagore snorted. “I’m sure I will.”

Peter ignored him, and the butler returned to deliver them into a drawing room decorated in blues and creams. Nicholas Ravenscroft, the Duke of Rowland, stood to greet them as they entered. He was tall and dark-haired, perhaps half a dozen years older than Peter’s own nine-and-twenty. His wife, Daphne, was there as well, a welcoming smile on her face and her riotous mahogany curls springing in all directions.

And in the corner of the room, rising to her feet from a leather armchair, was Selina.

Today she wore demure white, and there was no trace of the immense green thing she’d had on her head when he’d met her on Bond Street. He couldn’t quite say whether he missed it—he’d rather admired the way she had worn it, all defiance, as if it were a crown and not a hat the size of a barque. Her gloves were neatly buttoned at her wrists, and she gave him the politest of curtsies as he greeted her. Her eyes were downcast, and for just a moment he doubted this whole damned thing.

Then she looked up, and that fierce tawny gaze caught his, and he knew down to his bones that he’d been right to think of her.

And he had the strangest thought then: that he’d been right every time he’d thought of her. That every time she had crossed his mind—her keen wit and her capable manner and even, if he were being honest with himself, the plump curve of her mouth and the tender spot at the nape of her neck—every time, it had been right. That she belonged exactly there, inside his head.

Which was ridiculous, even for him.

He shook off the peculiar notion and seated himself as the duchess poured tea for all of them. He noticed when Daphne stripped off her gloves that there were ink stains on her fingers, and he recalled that she was intimately involved in the stewardship of several of their country estates. He wondered if asking all of the Ravenscrofts for advice about how to manage his affairs would be a bit beyond the pale.

They made polite small talk for a few minutes, and then Selina helpfully directed the conversation where Peter wanted it to go.

“And did you see your brother and sister safely home to Aunt Rosamund then?” she asked, her fingers nudging her teacup to the exact center of its saucer.

“I did, yes,” Peter said, and then turned to the rest of the group to explain. “Lady Selina had the rather adulterated pleasure of meeting my brother and sister last week in town while I took them shopping.”

One corner of Selina’s mouth quirked up, but she didn’t say anything about the fencing, which was probably good, since he wanted Rowland to think of him as a responsible guardian and not an impulsive degenerate who would permit his sister to behave like a hoyden.

Which he was. And she did.

“How did they enjoy London?” asked Daphne. “Remind me again how old they are. I think they’re quite a bit older than our boys, are they not?”

“My sister Lucinda is twelve,” Peter said. “My brother Frederick is ten.” He took this opening to outline in circumspect detail their background—attempting to be mindful of faux pas such as “talking about your father’s sexual escapades in the company of ladies” and “insulting benevolent elderly women.”

“We’ve been laying the groundwork these last two years, preparing legal arguments and encouraging a relationship between Stanhope and the children,” Tagore said. “But we didn’t want to put forth the application for guardianship until His Grace inherited. Once that happened, I petitioned the lord chancellor immediately. Our case is set to go before him six weeks hence.”

Rowland toyed with his cravat. “Eldon is the sticking point. If you’d gotten the new vice chancellor, Plumer, I wouldn’t be so concerned. But Eldon . . .” He trailed off.

Selina’s brows were drawn together. “Nicholas, I don’t understand. Why wouldn’t Stanhope automatically be granted the guardianship, as you were?”

There was a moment of awkward silence, and Selina’s lips pursed. “I mean—that is to say—I know what natural children are. I understand why the guardianship wouldn’t be assumed.” Peter noted with fascination the flush that slowly worked its way up the fair skin of her neck. In the last two years, he’d rarely seen her blush. Even the first time they’d met—when he’d stumbled upon her in the woods, still damp from bathing in a stream at her country estate—she had not blushed, merely delivered a scorching glare.

He had to admit, he liked that sweet strawberry flush on her skin. Rather alarmingly.

He had seen her grind her teeth on numerous occasions, and she was doing that now too. “I simply meant that I don’t understand why this is a problem. Stanhope is a duke. He wants his siblings. What could possibly be the difficulty?”

“The problems,” Peter said, “are twofold. First, my father never formally acknowledged the children. In fact, I don’t believe he recognized them at all. We know from the Stanhope account books that their mother went to my grandfather for financial support, not to my father. Between Tagore and my Sussex steward, we’ve produced any number of records that show that the previous duke supported them for years, but they aren’t mentioned in his will or my father’s. For all legal purposes, I might as well be a stranger who’s come to snatch them from the clutches of the court’s noble servant, Great-great-aunt Rosamund.”

Selina took that in with a stubborn set to her jaw. “Nonetheless. We are all here well acquainted with the power of a dukedom. Whyever would Eldon stand in your way?”

“Eldon was born the son of a coal-fitter,” Nicholas said. “He’s rather less impressed by the peerage than you might expect, for all that he’s now Baron Eldon and the voice of the king in the High Court.”

“But what objection could he possibly have to Stanhope’s taking the children?”

“Me,” Peter said, wincing at the bluntness even as he said it. “His objection is me.”

“I see,” said Selina, though her expression said plainly that she did not.

“I have not endeared myself to Eldon this year,” Peter continued. “Or any year, in point of fact. He has a particular sense of English pride that resents the sudden elevation of an American upstart to the highest levels of the government.”

“But your father was English,” protested Selina.

“Yes,” Peter said, “and my mother was French. To many, the latter is more consequential.”

“And, as I may have mentioned,” Nicholas added, “Eldon is a Tory. The worst of them. He hates reformers with a passion. Thinks England was at its best in 1688.”

“It would have been better,” Peter said, “if I had not made that speech in the Lords just after I took my seat.”

Tagore muffled a snort, and Daphne coughed a laugh into her teacup.

“What speech?” Selina asked. “What happened?”

“It was,” Nicholas said delicately, “certainly rousing.”

Peter spun his teacup in its saucer and then watched in some horror as tea arced up the sides of the cup and sloshed onto the porcelain beneath. “I argued for total abolition of slavery across all British colonies. In a few, er, choice words.”

“ ‘The greatest practical evil ever inflicted upon members of the human race,’ I believe it was,” said Nicholas. “ ‘The severest and most extensive calamity in the history of the world and an irremediable stain on our national character.’ ”

“Er,” Peter said. “Yes.”

And though he’d always known that Rowland was perhaps his strongest ally in the Lords on the question of abolition, the fact that Rowland seemed to have memorized the words he’d used to condemn slavery was . . .

Well, Peter felt speechless for perhaps the first time in his life.

“I begin to see the problem,” Selina said. “You are requesting a favor from a man who is not disposed to like you, whom you have sparred with politically, and who has no legal requirement to give you what you want.”

“All that,” Tagore said, “and then there was the cognac.”

“Oh for God’s sake,” Peter said. “I couldn’t possibly have known about the cognac.”

Nicholas arched one dark eyebrow. “I am unaware of this particular concern.”

Tagore’s eyes were gleaming like he’d just been handed a brand-new inkpot, or whatever the hell barristers liked. “Before His Grace inherited the title, it came to his attention that his grandfather was a particular connoisseur of cognac, and so before the former Stanhope passed on, the current Stanhope—”

“Kent,” Peter interrupted. “I beg you. Call me Kent. This story makes no sense when everyone involved has the same title.”

Tagore waved his fingers in dismissal. “Fine. Kent here decided he wanted his grandfather to have the very best in cognac before his death.”

“Before his death,” Peter clarified. “I am not dead in this story.”

He was pretty sure Daphne laughed again. Selina shot him a chastening glare.

“Not yet,” mumbled Tagore. “In any case, Kent talked to Stanhope’s steward and found out where the man used to purchase the highest-quality bottles—smuggled, of course, because they are produced in France. Begging your pardon, Lady Selina, Your Grace.”

“I am aware of smuggling,” said Selina.

“Indeed. Er. Of course. In any event, that particular cognac was no longer for sale. So Kent hired a band of highwaymen—”

“Blatant defamation,” said Peter. “They were perfectly respectable members of their own particular kind of trade—”

“A band of highwaymen,” Tagore said, rolling right over his objection, “to steal the cognac from the smugglers. And they did. All eighteen barrels of it.”

Nicholas appeared on the point of speaking, then stuffed an iced biscuit into his mouth instead.

“I really don’t know what they were thinking,” Peter said. “Eighteen barrels! I meant for them to take a bottle.”

“But the real problem,” continued Tagore, “is that the smugglers had been hired personally by Lord Eldon. He is, as it turns out, obsessed with cognac himself. And those eighteen barrels were the last production of an ancient distillery that was destroyed by Napoleon’s armies.”

“They were very expensive,” said Peter morosely. “Thousands of pounds.”

“And Kent stole them all. And then, because he did not want to store eighteen barrels of illegally obtained cognac in his house, he had them decanted and passed the extra bottles out to every public house and tavern in the county of Sussex.”

“So now,” Peter said, taking up the story, “Eldon is buying up every single bottle, one public house at a time. But the word has gotten out about the cognac, and the tavernkeepers are all charging him twenty times what they’re worth.” Twenty thousand pounds. Surely Eldon could not want to spend twenty thousand pounds on French brandy.

“Good heavens,” said Daphne. “I’m not sure you could have made a more calculated project of indisposing Eldon if you’d tried.”

“Believe me,” said Peter. “I did not try.”

“Did your grandfather like the cognac?” Selina asked.

Peter felt his chest twist. God, what a question. Had he ever met a woman so clever and also so damned sweet?

“Yes,” he said. “He liked it very much.”

Nicholas looked like he couldn’t decide whether to laugh or tear off his cravat in disgust. “Stanhope, you have not exactly made this easy on yourself.”

“I know,” Peter said. “I know.” He couldn’t stop himself from rising, though he knew it wasn’t quite the thing. But he had to move. He had to do something. Damn him, he would not accept that his own recklessness had lost him the chance of getting custody of his brother and sister. He couldn’t accept it. He meant to care for them, to protect them, and he would manage it, no matter what it took. Even if it meant becoming an altogether different kind of man.

He walked to the window and pressed a finger to the glass, then rubbed the smudge clear with the sleeve of his coat.

Back in New Orleans, he hadn’t been able to protect his brother, Morgan, and Morgan had died. But Peter was grown now. He was a goddamned peer of the realm. He would not let his father hurt these children—not through neglect or cruelty. Not even from the grave.

“Your Grace,” said Tagore, “have you any influence in Eldon’s circle?”

“Not as much as I’d like,” Nicholas said. “I will certainly exert what pressure I can. But Eldon isn’t in the Lords now—though I have it on good authority that he would be open to such a thing when he leaves the Court of Chancery. I hate to say this, Stanhope, but I’m not sure how much I can help.”

When she spoke, Selina’s voice sounded almost abstracted. “What else do you know about Eldon?”

Peter turned away from the window to look at her. Her eyes were half narrowed, and her lips compressed as she looked into the middle distance.

Nicholas fiddled absently with his cuffs. “He’s a Tory. He supported Pitt for prime minister. He has been painfully resistant to any calls to reform the courts, despite the backlog of cases and the shocking bureaucratic inefficiency of the system.”

“Not about politics,” said Selina. “What do you know of him? Eldon. What’s his name?”

“Lord Eldon? John, I think,” Nicholas said. “John Scott.”

“He’s from Newcastle,” put in Tagore. “You can hear his northern accent when he speaks.”

“What does he care about?” Selina asked.

“England,” said Nicholas. “And our sterling national character.”

Peter winced.

“Cognac, apparently,” said Daphne.

“Perhaps Stanhope could deliver him cognac?” suggested Selina. “Or—perhaps not. Mayhap we should avoid reminders of your past misdeeds.”

“They say he was a rotter at school,” Nicholas said consideringly. “A devil for pranks and truancy.”

“Is that right?” said Tagore, looking suddenly intrigued.

“And of course,” said Nicholas, “there was the matter of his wife.”

Four gazes fixed on Rowland with interest.

“Eldon kidnapped her. Quite famously.”

Selina’s brows climbed nearly to her hairline. “He kidnapped her?”

“Well,” Nicholas temporized, “perhaps kidnapped is not the word. He was a law student at Oxford, at home on school break, when he fell violently in love with the daughter of a neighbor. Both sides objected to the match—his parents wanted him to focus on his studies, and her family thought the son of a coal-fitter beneath them. They wouldn’t back down, and so Eldon removed her from her family home by way of a window in the dead of night, carried her off to Scotland, and married her on the morrow.”

“Now, that,” Selina said, “is something.”

“Do you think to appeal to Lady Eldon?” asked Daphne. “Does she live in London with the chancellor, Nicholas?”

“I believe so. I understand them to be quite a devoted couple.”

Daphne tapped an ink-stained finger on her chin. “Shall we have them over for dinner?” she asked. “Is that too transparent?”

“Not at all,” said Nicholas. “I’m happy to arrange it, Stanhope, if you like.”

“Yes,” said Peter. “Anything you think might help.”

“I like this idea,” said Selina. “I’d like very much to speak to Lady Eldon. But I wonder . . .” She trailed off, her fingers absently nudging the cup on her saucer again. “I wonder . . .” Her eyes came up again and fixed on Peter’s. He felt her gaze almost like a tug, pulling at him from across the room, and he took a half step toward her before he could stop himself.

“Call here again,” she said. “Tomorrow. I want to talk to Lydia Hope-Wallace first. And then I want to talk to you.”

She had something in mind. Peter was certain of it—not just from what she’d said, but by her eyes, distant with concentration, and the decided set of her jaw. She had an idea, and he knew her well enough to think it would be a good one.

He felt a sudden rush of warmth that he recognized as relief, because . . . Because for the first time since he’d learned that Lu and Freddie’s mother had died, Peter thought that the children might just be all right.

Although now that he thought about it, there was something about the stubborn angle of her head that reminded him a bit alarmingly of Lu.

“You don’t think I should kidnap the children, do you?” he asked. “I mean, I would do it. But I’m not sure I’d survive the experience, now that Lu has a sword.”

“Um,” said Selina. “No. I do not think you should kidnap the children. I would . . . No. Certainly not.”

This was something of a relief, though in truth he’d already started spinning out ideas for how he might lure them out a window in the middle of the night. Tiny kittens armed with tinier spears, perhaps. Éclairs in the shape of épées.

Tagore seemed to be shaking his head. “I am going to pretend that I did not hear that, Stanhope.”

“Nothing to hear,” Peter said, and he strolled back toward his teacup from where he’d been standing at the window. “Cookie?”

“Perhaps one for the road,” Tagore said, and shortly thereafter they took their leave of the Ravenscrofts. Peter caught himself whistling again and tried to tamp down the sudden emotion that had blossomed inside him at Rowland House: relief and cautious hope and bright amber eyes.