When the Duchess Said Yes (40 page)

She was thoroughly charmed.

“Who do you belong to?” she said softly, crouching down before the dog to ruffle his ears. “Where is your master, to let you run through the woods like this?”

The dog closed his eyes, and made such a grumbling groan of complete contentment that she laughed.

“What a delightful fellow you are,” she said. He was obviously someone’s much-loved pet; not only was he round and well-fed (perhaps a bit too well-fed), but he wore an elegant red leather collar with silver studs around his neck. There was a silver tag, too, and she
tried to turn it around to learn his name. “Come, let me properly make your acquaintance, sir.”

“His name’s Fantôme,” said a gentleman’s voice behind her. “It seems he has made a more glorious conquest than his usual squirrels.”

With a little gasp of surprise, Diana looked swiftly over her shoulder to the gentleman, and gasped again. He was young, not much older than herself, and he was every bit as handsome as his dog was not. He had broad shoulders and the strong, even features that would make any woman walking along the Mall take notice of him, but it was his smile that captivated Diana, a devil-may-care grin that reached his eyes that made her smile at once in return.

“Fantôme is French for ghost, isn’t it?” she asked.

“It is,” he said, crouching down to her level with the dog between them. He wore a blue coat and a red waistcoat, both cheerfully bright even here in the shadows, and his light-colored buckskin breeches were tucked into top boots. There were spurs on the boots, which made her suspect he’d been riding, and had somewhere shed both his mount and his hat to chase after his dog.

“Though I fear he’s far too corporeal to be a real specter,” he continued. “You’ve only to look at him to see the truth. Isn’t that so,
Monsieur le Gros
?”

“Master Fat!” Diana exclaimed, translating for herself. “You’d call this fine gentleman by so dreadful a name?”

“I would,” declared the gentleman soundly, patting the dog’s broad back with fondness. “He is a French dog, and he is fat. And I do call him Monsieur le Gros, because it’s true. All the best endearments are, you know.”

“If you call your dog Master Fat,” she said, “then I should not wish to hear what you would call your lady.”

“Ahh, but I haven’t a lady, you see.” He sighed deeply
and drew his brows together, trying to look sorrowful, but only succeeding in making Diana laugh again. “I’ve no use for endearments beyond Fantôme.”

“I don’t believe you, sir,” Diana scoffed. “Gentlemen like you always have ladies.”

“That’s true, too,” he agreed. “More truth: I do not have a lady at present, but I expect to have one again very soon.”

Her cheeks warmed. It wasn’t the same kind of miserable flush that she’d felt with Lord Crump, but the exciting glow that came from mutual interest and amusement. He was flirting outrageously with her, and if she were honest, she was doing the same with him. She shouldn’t be permitting any of this, of course. She should rise and immediately return to the path and to Lord Crump or her sister’s carriage, whichever returned first.

But she didn’t. “Then we are quite even,” she said. “I didn’t have a gentleman when I rose this morning, but I do now.”

“I congratulate you on your swift acquisition, ma’am,” he said, a flicker of regret crossing his face. “Dare I ask the fortunate gentleman’s name?”

She shook her head, the flirtation as suddenly done as it had begun. Yesterday, and any other yesterday before it, she would have been gratified to see the regret on this gentleman’s handsome face. Any other day, and she would have been pleased to see he was as charmed by her as she was by him.

But today, now, she was promised to Lord Crump. She could vow she wouldn’t marry him, that she’d rebel, but her conscience told her that she wouldn’t. She’d be as dutiful in obeying her mother’s choice as her sisters had been, and pray that her own marriage would be as happy as theirs, too. She would because, truly, a lady had no choice.

And she would never again sit beneath a tree to laugh and flirt with a handsome gentleman like this one.

She scrambled back to her feet. “I must go. I can’t stay any longer.”

He stood, too, making her realize how much taller and broader and more brilliantly male he was in his blue coat than she thought.

“You could stay if you wished it,” he said, as Fantôme, agitated, began to race around them. “Another moment or two. Please. You can.”

She shook her head, looking back through the trees to the path. She saw Lord Crump, his black mourning standing out among the others as he waited for her.

“Please don’t ask me,” she said, beginning to back away. “Because I can’t. I
can’t
.”

He caught her hand lightly to keep her from leaving.

“Only a moment, sweetheart,” he said. He considered her hat, then plucked one of the tiny silk flowers from the crown, as if plucking a real flower from a garden. He tucked the wire stem into the top buttonhole of his coat and gave it an extra pat.

“There,” he said softly, smiling. “For remembrance, yes?”

“No,” she said, striving to harden her voice and her heart, and failing at both. “Good day, sir.”

Then she turned and ran back to the path, to Lord Crump and to her fate as his wife.

BY ISABELLA BRADFORD

When You Wish Upon a Duke
When the Duchess Said Yes