Bewitching the Duke

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Authors: Christie Kelley

BOOK: Bewitching the Duke
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Books by Christie Kelley
Every Night I’m Yours
 
Every Time We Kiss
 
Something Scandalous
 
Scandal of the Season
 
One Night Scandal
 
Bewitching the Duke
 
 
Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation
BEWITCHING THE DUKE
CHRISTIE KELLEY
eKENSINGTON BOOKS
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
To my sisters,
Karen, Pat, and Louise.
 
Thanks for all the support!
Staffordshire, England, 1814
 
Selina White paused before the Duke of Northrop’s bedchamber. What was it about this room that made her tremble? She had put off this bedroom for last, even though it needed her attention the most. Slowly, she opened the door to the duke’s bedchamber and slipped inside the room.
She closed her eyes for a moment to adjust to the darkness before blinking them open again. Why hadn’t the servants opened the curtains in here? The duke should be arriving within the next few hours. She felt around until she found a small table. She placed her cleansing bowl on the table determined to lighten the room so she could finish her job.
Slowly she walked toward the windows and the bright sunlight that would assist her. Pulling back the heavy velvet curtains, she sighed as the vast beauty of Northrop Park opened before her. As she took in the view, a loud groan forced her gaze to the large bed.
“Bloody hell, I told Roberts no one was to disturb me until noon!”
Selina gasped and turned away from the window to stare at the man in the duke’s bed. His large hands rubbed at his eyes. His tousled black hair needed a good brushing. But as his hands moved away from his face, she felt pierced by his icy blue eyes. She’d only met him one other time, but she would never forget those eyes.
“Who are you? One of the new servants?”
She almost laughed at the idea of any new servants being hired for this crumbling estate. The average age of the servants was sixty. “No, Your Grace.”
He groaned and sat up against the pillows at the headboard.
He looked like the drunken degenerate she’d heard stories of for the past few years. Mrs. Roberts always disavowed those claims of the duke being nothing but a worthless reprobate, maintaining that as much as he’d loved his late wife, he could never act in such a manner. Selina doubted Mrs. Roberts’s assertions. Even now, he didn’t attempt to hide his naked chest. And she couldn’t seem to look away, even though she knew she should. Broad shoulders melded into a strong chest lightly covered with black hair. Her fingers twitched as if they wanted to feel the sensation of his warm skin.
She must be mad!
“Have you completely lost your tongue, girl?”
“I’m not a servant, Your Grace.”
He closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the headboard. “Did Thomas send you?”
Thomas? “I have no idea to whom you are referring.”
“My brother. Did he pay you to join me in my bedchamber?”
She clutched the small chair near her to keep her knees from giving out. “You think someone paid me to be your whore!”
The duke shook his head. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”
“Perhaps not for you, but it would be for me.”
“Indeed?” he said with a coarse laugh. “You enter my room with your hair unbound and your dress cut down to your breasts and I’m supposed to believe you are an innocent angel?”
“I would never do such a thing!” She stole a quick glance down at the bodice of her dress. The man was mad, the gown completely covered her breasts.
“I’ve never met a woman who wouldn’t do anything for the right price.”
“Well, now you have. And I don’t care what you believe about me or any other woman.” She strode toward the table where she’d set her cleansing bowl.
“Do not leave this room until you tell me who you are and why you are in my bedchamber,” he demanded.
The cold tone of his voice stopped her feet. Her mother had warned her to stay away from the house when the master was at home. Selina knew he’d hated her mother, but she never assumed his disgust would carry down to all women.
He shouldn’t even be here yet. She’d been certain she could finish the herbal cleansing of the house before he arrived later today. Obviously, he arrived late last night.
“Who are you?” He started to move the coverlet off his body as if he meant to stand.
“Please don’t get up,” she said quickly. The last thing she wanted to see was his naked body. Although, it might prove quite interesting.
No!
She couldn’t think of him that way. Absolutely not the duke. “Miss White, Your Grace.”
“Miss White?” He paused and a dark scowl formed.
She only nodded.
“The wise woman’s daughter? Why are you here and not your mother?”
“My mother passed on a few years ago.”
“Bloody hell. Based on the smell of sage I can only assume you have taken up her practices?”
“Of course. Who else will tend to the sick on your estate?”
“There is no one sick here. I also happen to know there is a completely qualified physician in town.”
“Qualified?” Selina snorted. “Qualified as a rotten sod. The man is incompetent to practice medicine.”
“The man is highly educated and trained. Now get out of my room and my house,” he said in a low voice as he pointed toward the door.
“With pleasure, Your Grace.”
Selina grabbed her bowl of burning sage and raced for the door. Once in the hall, she leaned against the wall and released a long breath as her heart pounded in her chest. The man was more dreadful than she’d expected. First assuming she was a whore and then almost standing up before her with nothing to cover himself. What an awful man.
“Miss White, you cannot go into the duke’s bedchamber.”
She looked up to see the duke’s ancient butler ambling toward her. “I know that now, Mr. Roberts.”
“You were in there?”
“No one told me he was here. Yesterday I was told he would arrive this afternoon. I assumed I would have this morning to finish.”
“That stupid fool boy,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Randall let you in this morning, didn’t he?”
“Yes.” Randall was the youngest footman in service to the duke, and everyone questioned his mental capacity. Selina’s mother had told her that he’d taken a terrible fall when only three. He’d never been the same since.
“He knew the duke arrived last night. He should have told you.” The older man leaned in closer. “Was the duke angry?”
Remembering the way the duke had looked at her when he thought she was a prostitute brought heat to her cheeks. “Of course. He tossed me out of his bedchamber.”
“Oh, dear.” Mr. Roberts twisted his hands together. “He’s been in a foul mood since he arrived. He must have seen the condition of the house last night and it upset him.”
Selina frowned. “But the estate was, and still is, his responsibility to maintain. He hasn’t sent money for the needed repairs. He should be ashamed of his actions.” Lack of action was more the term.
“Shh,” he reprimanded as he glanced back at the duke’s door. “We all know the duke has failed his responsibilities to the estate and its tenants. But you don’t want to be the one to remind him of that.”
“Someone should.”
“Perhaps. But no one with a bit of sense would dare speak of it to him.”
Selina shrugged. The duke needed someone to set him to rights. Most of the tenants were frustrated with the lack of attention their cottages received. The only thing that kept them on the estate was the generous income the duke let them retain. The fertile land provided a welcomed source of income for both the duke and the tenants.
“I fear His Grace may have taken one look at this old place and decided that having a wedding here was a dreadful idea. And if that’s true there will be no hope of getting this beautiful house restored to its former glory.”
One of the tenants had told her there was to be a wedding. She couldn’t imagine the type of woman who would marry a man like him. Then again, she’d heard the stories of women so eager for a title they would do just about anything. The woman was most likely as shallow as he. But what would possess the man to have a wedding at his most decrepit estate? The one place he hadn’t visited in eight years. “Why are they having the wedding here, Mr. Roberts? He despises this place.”
“She insisted, miss. Thought it would bring happy memories to the estate instead of the ones that haunt him.”
Selina had to agree with the bride. Perhaps now that he was getting married he would put away his rakish ways, refurbish the house, and have his children here. While that would be excellent news for the tenants, she had no desire to deliver the child of the duke.
“Did you finish the cleansing?”
“No. I still need to finish the duke’s wing up here, and then his library and study.” Her mother had always insisted the rooms used most intimately by the family should be cleansed last so they were fresh when the family arrived. Now Selina worried she might not get the chance to finish. The cleansing was one of the few rituals a wise woman still performed. Not that there were many of the women left. Generations of ridicule and threats of being labeled a witch had forced many to give up the ancient ways. Selina only knew of three other women who kept up the practices.
“What will you do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Walk with me down the stairs,” Mr. Roberts said as he glanced over at the duke’s bedchamber door again. Once downstairs, he stopped. “The duke was always a man of habit. While he hasn’t been here in years, I would still wager that he takes a morning ride at nine. If you get here by then, you should have an hour to do your cleansing.”
“But it might take me two days at that rate.”
He sent her a paternalistic smile. “Better than not finishing at all.”
“True.” But after her first encounter with the duke, she wasn’t certain she even wanted to complete the cleansing. She’d never met such an aggravating man in her life. But she knew her duty. Hopefully, she could avoid him and finish her work.
“I’ll send a stableboy to your cottage tomorrow if the duke takes his ride.”
“Thank you, Mr. Roberts.”
“No, thank you, Miss White. Where would we be without you? You take care of all us servants and the tenants too.”
She kissed his weathered cheek and headed for her cottage. Where would they be, indeed, she thought. She tended to their ills and delivered their babies. If only the duke understood how important her work was to the estate.
But she couldn’t explain it to him. After what happened eight years ago, she needed to do her best to avoid him completely. God only knew what would happen to her if he ever learned the truth.
 
 
Colin Barrett, the seventh Duke of Northrop, stared at the closed door with a scowl. How dare that woman enter his house . . . his bedchamber . . . without his permission? He tossed the coverlet off his body and reached for the trousers he’d left on the floor last night. His valet and trunks wouldn’t arrive until later in the day. Having not spent a day in this house for years, Colin was certain there was nothing in the linen press worth wearing.
After dressing, he headed for the door determined to confirm that Miss White had departed. The last thing he wanted or needed in his house was some woman who believed she held a type of mystical power or could cure all ills. No woman had such power. It was 1814; medicine belonged in the hands of educated men.
He’d returned to this house to take back control of his life. And he would start with that blasted wise woman.
“Roberts!” he shouted. Without waiting for an answer, he trudged downstairs. “Roberts!”
“I am here, Your Grace,” he said from the salon.
“Did you allow that woman entrance to my home?”
Red tinged the older man’s cheeks. “What woman do you mean, Your Grace?”
“That bloody wise woman!”
Roberts furrowed his brow as if in thought. “I did, Your Grace. Should I not have?”
Colin clenched his fists. “No, you shouldn’t have let her inside my home without my permission.”
“I do apologize, Your Grace. I assure you I shall endeavor never to let a woman like her in your home again.”
Colin paused for a moment at the butler’s odd choice of words. He shook his head. “Very well, then. Where is she now?”
“Now?”
“Yes, now. Did she leave?”
“Of course, Your Grace. I believe she was on her way to her home.”
Colin sighed. “And which direction would that be, Roberts?”
“East, Your Grace.”
“Thank you.” Colin rushed out the door, intent on catching her. He walked quickly down the worn path toward the tenants’ homes. A figure up ahead caught his eyes. She maintained a slow, easy gait as if she hadn’t a care. She glanced around and then paused for a moment to breathe in the fragrance of a flower. Once she resumed her walk, her long, curly, blond hair blew in the breeze. He couldn’t help but notice the way her hips swayed under her blue muslin skirts. God, he shouldn’t be noticing that. Especially not with her.
“Miss White!” he yelled out.
She turned her head and then quickly walked inside one of the cottages.

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