Page 1 of Secrets of a Duke's Heart
CHAPTERONE
Miss Clarissa Penfirth was laying on the settee near the fire with her feet tucked up beneath her—a thoroughly undignified, if comfortable posture—reading a treatise on land management when the door to her cousin’s study flew open and hit the wall with a bang. In burst a wild-eyed stranger with tousled sable hair.
“Sir!” she exclaimed, dropping her book face-down into her lap and pressing her hand to her breast. Her heart galloped like a startled horse. The stranger’s gaze slid right past her to where her cousin, Viscount Nathaniel Prescott, was already striding over to them.
“Monty,” he said warmly. “May I introduce Miss Clarissa Penfirth?”
“There is no time for pleasantries,” the intruder declared, casting her a dark look. “Send the lady away. I must have a word with you in private at once.”
Clarissa glared back at him. Dismissive prick. She knew she didn’t possess much in the way of feminine charms, but it was rare that she was ignored outright. Her hair was a shade of deep brown that didn’t exactly inspire poetic odes, her height several inches above average, and her figure on the plump side. Worse, she was wearing her worst dress, the unflattering one perfect for lounging about reading books about improving soil drainage and how to prevent one’s flock of sheep from overgrazing fields.
Still, it wasn’t often she wassent away.Unless one included her extended visit to Viscount Nathaniel Prescott, her cousin and childhood friend. He and her parents had conspired to get her out of the house and out of public view while her much prettier and younger sisters took their turns making their debuts. No one wanted her hanging about like a spectral spinster of unwedded misfortune.
She wasn’t even sure why she cared what this Monty thought of her. He was clearly an arrogant man who was used to issuing orders and getting his way. No one spoke to a viscount that way.
No one ordinary, anyway.
She tilted her head, pondering.
“My niece has been stolen by a pirate!” Monty shouted.
“Don’t be silly,” Prescott said. “There are no pirates in Cornwall.”
The glare Mr. Monty leveled at her cousin was so toxic it could have stripped paint off a wall. He fisted his dark hair and tugged, leaving it even wilder than before.
“We do have our fair share of smugglers,” Prescott conceded.
“Smuggler. Pirate. Same difference,” grumbled Mr. Monty. Clarissa refrained from correcting him that there was a technical difference, just as there was a difference between privateers and pirates. Her cousin would chide her for pedantry if she did.
Her lively intelligence was the main reason she had never attracted a proper suitor. Men liked pretty women who listened attentively, laughed at men’s jokes no matter how stupid or offensive, and didn’t speak. Clarissa had learned the hard way that men did not want a clever woman for a wife.
“When did the kidnapping happen?” she asked briskly.
“Just now. Not half an hour ago. He took her from the Cock and Bull tavern in town. Kidnapped her! Right out from under the noses of the blasted Waterguard!”
“Monty, you’re overwrought.”
“Of course I am overwrought! My niece is missing!” He cast a beseeching look at both of them. “I have taken care of Harriet ever since she was a baby. I named her. I was taking her to be married in Ireland.”
“Cornwall is rather out of the way for a trip to Ireland,” Clarissa observed. Nothing this man was saying added up. Despite his wild and abrupt manner, he intrigued her. Or, perhaps, because of it.
There was no use in denying the fact: she was bored. Although her cousin was a generous host, Nathaniel was busy with managing his estate, leaving Clarissa mostly to her own devices. Now, Mr. Monty had blown in like a summer storm and rained down more secrets in the span of five minutes than she had encountered all spring, and she was suddenly determined to uncover them all.
“Time is of the essence,” she said briskly. “Tell me what the Waterguard’s Riders are doing.”
“One of them rode to Polperro with a message. Two others commandeered a fishing boat to give chase. What happened after that, I don’t know.”
“Then there is nothing more you can do,” Nathaniel said easily. He tipped open the top half of a globe to reveal a bottle of liquor hidden inside. He poured two fingers and held it out to Monty. Clarissa’s conscience twinged when he accepted it with a shaking hand. He really was upset about his missing niece.
“There might be something,” she said slowly. Nathaniel froze with his drink halfway to his lips. He shook his head ever so slightly. She ignored his unspoken warning. “There is a couple who live a few miles from here, in a cottage that used to be part of the Prescott estate. I have heard rumors that the husband, Mr. Thomas Davies, was involved in smuggling before he set up shop in Cavalier Cove.”
“You shouldn’t pay attention to idle gossip.” Her cousin frowned. “Where did you hear this?”
“From Mrs. Gosling,” she said. “Your housekeeper.”
A muscle in Nathaniel’s jaw ticked.
“If there is any hope of finding information, we must go at once.”
