The Scandalous Love of a Duke (15 page)

Perhaps she had not hidden her pain as well as she’d thought.
I am merely heartsore and silly, pining for a man who will never love nor want me.
“I did not eat much luncheon.”

John slid his hands into his trouser pockets and watched Katherine bid farewell to her vicar. At least it was Phillip who was driving her home and not that man. Her parents had already gone on ahead, while his stood behind him.

He’d had little opportunity to watch Katherine in the church, with the Pembroke pew packed to the brim with his fidgeting brothers and sisters.

Phillip approached Katherine and took her arm.

Jealousy and longing shot through John. He wished to be able to touch her. He wanted to hear her voice and feel her touch on him. But he was doing the right thing. He had to let her go. Yet it was not only his sacrifice, but hers. He had seen her eyes when he’d told her it was over.

What must she think of him?

Had he killed whatever it was in her she called love?

Sometimes he thought some sort of madness had overcome him as far as Katherine was concerned. How had he ever thought it had been the right thing to do, to steal her innocence when he had nothing to offer in return?
She is right
–
I am spoilt and selfish
.

He was going to change.

“Are you coming, John?” his mother called behind him.

John turned. What was he, a child to be called back to her?

“You are brooding about something,” she said, walking towards him.

He shook his head. He did not wish her encroaching into his thoughts. This party had been an awful idea. He was tired of his brothers and sisters in the house already, and his father and mother, and his grandmother, seemed to watch him constantly and question him all the time, without using words. Consequently he’d spent little time with them.

When he walked towards her without answering, she said, “We are all proud of you. You know that don’t you, John?” It was the sort of thing she would have said when he was ten.

He still did not answer, but as he reached her, she gripped his arm adding, “But you are not alone in this. If you need us, we are all here for you – Edward, your uncles, your grandmother, your aunts and I. You need not isolate yourself.”

“I am hardly doing that, you are here, Mama.” His pitch was irritable as they walked on towards the carriages.

His stepfather was watching, waiting for them.

John set his expression to avoid Edward reading it.

His parents had discussed this conversation. John knew how close they were. His mother would have told Edward she was concerned, before speaking.

“That is just it though, John. We are here, but you are not. You spend more time in the library and in your chambers than with us,” she took a breath. “Mary and Robbie would like to know you better. You built up Robbie’s expectations when you took him to Tattersalls and you have barely spoken to him since, and Mary has missed you for so many years…”

And?

“If there is anything I have done,” she said suddenly.

He looked down and met her gaze but continued walking.

“Your solitude concerns me, John? It concerns Edward too. I know you deliberately stayed abroad. If I, or we, have done something to upset you, you would tell us?”

Why were you not there before I was ten?
The question shot through his mind but he would not ask it. He would not appear such a fragile fool.

Her eyes shone brightly as they held his gaze.

“You need not fret over me, Mama.”

She gave him a tremulous smile. “A part of me knows that, and yet another part of me senses there is something wrong, John.”

“I will take Robbie driving this afternoon, if it pleases you.”

“John, this is not about simply spending more time with your brother, although he will be overjoyed if you do. It is about you. I wish you to be happy, and I do not think you are.”

Happiness? His life had always been about duty. He’d escaped it for a few years in Egypt, but he’d always known, even then, he was only buying time. “I have everything I need, Mama.”
Except the feelings Grandfather beat out of me.
Surely he should feel some compassion towards her, not this annoyance.

“But you are not happy.”

John looked up as they neared the carriages, at his stepfather, and took a deep breath.

“Life is not only about responsibility, John, happiness outweighs it,” she whispered finally before they could no longer talk.

~

Katherine tried to hurry, weaving between the people in the busy high street in Maidstone.

The weather had turned as miserable as her mood and a very light drizzle of rain had been falling for hours, making everything damp, and the sky dreary.

She was tired, exhausted by the thoughts running through her head in circles.

The pain had gone and now she only felt numb and hollow inside. But she still wished to look her best tonight. She did not want John to know how he’d affected her. Let him think her as unaffected as him.

She’d hoped to spend the afternoon bathing and finding a prettier way to style her hair but her mother was being her usual obnoxious self and ensuring Katherine had no time to do so. It was already past two and here she was in Maidstone with a groom running the fourth errand of the day and this time it was to find a paler ribbon for Jenny’s hair to show off the colour of her eyes better.

Phillip was due back soon at least.

Her gaze reached ahead to the milliner’s shop. She was almost there.

She wished she did not have to go to John’s party but she was no coward. She would face him and hold her head high no matter that she felt as small as the church mouse he kept calling her.

What a dreadful idiot she had been. He must think her no different than any woman of the gutter to have asked her to do those things –
and I agreed
. That had only taught her how little she thought of herself.

Yet this dinner party made no sense. If he wished nothing more to do with her, he need have nothing more to do with her. There was no reason at all for him to hold a party and say he had done it for her.

“Miss Spencer?” a gentleman uttered as she virtually collided with him.

“Mr Wareham.”

A fellow victim of John’s cold heart.

She bobbed a brief curtsy.

He bowed slightly, clutching the brim of his tall hat.

“I would say good day, but this weather makes it less so, does it not? Where are you off to in such a hurry?” His tone was friendly, if a little hollow, like John’s.

She blushed and met his pale, measuring gaze.

She had spoken to him at church a few times. He’d never ignored her, but he’d not made any particular effort to associate with her either.

She chose to smile and give him a little time. After all, she of all people could understand how he must be feeling as John’s cast-off.

“I am in search of ribbons.” She forced a light tone into her voice, as he had. “I heard you have left the Duke’s service, Mr Wareham. I was sorry to hear it.”

His expression darkened and his tone turned sour. “Yes, well, life is not fair is it, Miss Spencer, one does not always have what one ought.” Then he smiled suddenly, although there was hardness behind his eyes. “Would you care to join me for tea at the inn? We could perhaps mourn the hand of fate together? I know you suffer from gossip.”

Oh. She had not expected that, but he probably lacked company. Sympathy struck her. She knew he had no family locally and no friends. He rarely socialised in the community, even though they all held him a little in awe. But she could not stop, she had to get home.

“I am in a hurry, Mr Wareham, perhaps another time.”

“Yes, indeed then, another time,” he stated, his eyes on her face. “Good day, Miss Spencer.” He bowed slightly again and lifted his hat.

“Good day,” she bobbed another brief curtsy and then they parted, but she could feel his gaze follow her as she carried on along the street.

~

“Is this all we have?” John stated with frustration, leaning back.

Harvey just smiled lightly.

Did he think this was amusing? John was not amused.

Harvey had gathered numerous pieces of information but the key to finding the lost money was missing. He knew where Wareham had been born, to some actress, in London, as an illegitimate child with no named father. John knew where Wareham had been raised and schooled too. He’d been to Eton and then Oxford. So they also knew there was some wealthy benefactor in Wareham’s life. Probably the unnamed father. And John now knew Wareham had been in his grandfather’s service ever since leaving Oxford. But what good were those facts?

John wondered if Wareham had been ripping the old man off since the beginning. If so, there might be thousands stored away. Certainly, money had been dripping out of the estate’s income in every ledger John had reviewed.

He had brought them all up to town now so Harvey’s staff could start calculating the loss.

Wareham was probably currently living a merry life on it too. He’d made no attempt to disappear. He was still in Ashford and John was still having him watched.

Hell and the devil
.

Phillip was having more luck working on the loan however. He’d discovered it was an investment rather than a loan.

Wareham had been stung by a man of his own ilk. He’d invested in a canal-building scam. The rogue who’d promoted it had apparently disappeared with Wareham’s funds. Wareham had tried to use the Duke’s name to get it back.

“My solicitors are still searching for an account in Wareham’s name, Your Grace. We know the investment was not made in cash, so the account must exist.”

John’s fingers covered his mouth. He wished this over with and sorted. His eyes shut for a moment.

“Is Your Grace worried he will make some other move?” Harvey asked.

John’s eyes flew open. He had let himself relax too much and Harvey had seen through his guard. John had not previously thought to hide his thoughts and emotions from Harvey, but since this thing with Wareham, John’s trust had grown even less, he could not even rely upon the people his grandfather had relied on.

The word trust spun John’s thoughts to Katherine, and whenever she came to mind, it was her eyes he saw – bright blue eyes burning into him as they accused him of lacking trust, being spoilt and shutting himself away.

She had called him two people, the two people he knew he was, but he was fast becoming just the one. The one he had never wanted to be. His grandfather’s monster, who did indeed shut everything and everyone out.

He had shut her out.

His thoughts and feelings for her were shoved aside with vicious denial. He had a duty to fulfil and a public life to lead.

“Your Grace,” Harvey prompted.

“I don’t know what to expect from him,” John answered. “He knows all of my grandfather’s business. Is that not risk enough?”

Harvey nodded, looking serious now, and steepled his fingers. “I have warned all the stewards to be cautious, Your Grace. We can also move your accounts if you wish?”

“Yes,” John agreed. “Please move them.” He was sure Wareham would be capable of faking signatures and getting access, it would be best to be safe. God, he did not need these added burdens in his life.

He’d done the right thing ending his affair Katherine, for her sake and for his. Nothing could have come of it and it would just have been another thing battering at his conscience. And yet, when he’d been with her in the tower room it was the only time he had been able to feel like himself since leaving Egypt. A deep longing opened like a wide empty hole in his chest.

He pushed the feeling aside and faced Harvey again. “Agree some code with the other stewards too, so they will know when communications come from you. When does the new man start?”

~

“You are coming, Katherine,” Eleanor urged. “We are not taking no for an answer, are we Margaret?”

Katherine looked from one to the other, feeling blown on a storm. They had been waiting for her when she returned from Maidstone, sitting in the parlour suffering her mother’s company until Katherine came home. They had come to steal her away to Pembroke Place so she might ready herself there.

“Aunt Ellen and Grandmamma have agreed. You are to stay the night. You are coming,” Eleanor pressed.

Katherine was certain John could not have agreed to this. He would surely not want her there.

“Pack up her things,” Margaret said, looking at Hetty.

Hetty looked uncertain about responding to orders from a visitor but then Katherine’s mother apparently accepted they would not leave without Katherine.

“Go, Hetty, do as the Countess asks.”

Jenny, who Katherine was fast realising had started growing up at last, smiled across the room as if to say you must go.

“Katherine,” Eleanor urged again. “You are not refusing. You will not come and visit me in town, so I wish your company here. I shall sit here until you accept and Harry will not be happy with you if I do, he’s grown terribly protective now I’m with child.”

Katherine’s heart thumped. “It is John’s home, and you’ve made no mention of an invite from him, I should not come unless he has agreed.”

“Poppycock! He has not even been there all week, his mama is organising it all, I doubt he even cares who is coming, all he appears to think about is business. Now, get ready.”

“Yes do, Kate,” Margaret added, “I really do not think John will mind, Pembroke Place is so big he’ll probably never even realise you are there.”

“It will be like old times,” Eleanor pressed.

Katherine looked from Eleanor to Margaret and back again. She was never going to persuade them to go away without her. “Very well.”

“Wonderful,” Eleanor said, rushing to hug her. “I am so glad. We shall have so much fun.”

Less exuberantly, Margaret kissed Katherine’s cheek and whispered, “It is good to see you once more.”

This must be Eleanor’s idea. She must have dragged Margaret along, just as Eleanor always used to when they’d been children. They were not children anymore. Life had changed completely, and Katherine knew her place now, and if she had been a little confused about it recently, John had made it plain again the other day.

Half an hour later, Katherine arrived at Pembroke Place in Eleanor’s carriage, with her small holdall which contained the evening dress John had bought her and other effects.