Page 15 of Secrets of a Duke's Heart
“No.”
“You might want to be more forthcoming with the truth if you want her to say yes. I am certain she would make an excellent duchess, but she should know before going into a union what she’s signing up for.”
“I don’t want her to marry me for the damned title!” he roared. “The reason I like her so much on such a short acquaintance is that she enjoys my company without having the slightest idea that I am a duke. I have courted with ladies and never once had the impression that they liked spending time with me for any other reason than the size of my fortune and my connections to the other Wayward Dukes.”
By now his hair must be thoroughly disheveled, he had spiked his fingers through it so often it must be standing on end like a porcupine’s quills. That was what he felt like: prickly and aggrieved, ready to stab anyone who came near. A good, hard ride might not accomplish much of anything but it would release some of the pent-up anxiety and anger boiling inside him, a witch’s cauldron of bad feelings and outrage.
How dare Clarissa refuse him? She, a commoner, and he a duke?
Which reminded him of the reason he had come here in the first place. This was a terrible time to give Prescott the news, but he might as well get it over with before he was beset by yet another calamity.
“Speaking of the Wayward Dukes, Cranbrook has asked me to convey this message to you personally.” He extracted a rather battered envelope from his inner pocket. The red wax seal remained intact, showing an entwined WW with the letter C, similar to his own signet ring, only his bore an M. Each signet ring was distinct and passed down to each new “duke” from the previous successor, and they were often used as a code when seeking assistance via written correspondence—as Cranbrook had requested of him do in return for the favor of keeping Pamela’s secret.
“What does this concern?”
“You have been appointed the guardian of an orphaned ward. A little girl named Estelle.”
“Why me?”
“He did not divulge his reasons to me. I presume he explains his rationale for naming you her guardian in that letter. I will not speculate why, though I can tell you he chose me to personally deliver the letter because he had been trusted with the secret of my niece’s birth.”
There had to be a sordid story behind little Estelle’s origins, otherwise there was no reason to involve the Wayward Dukes. Jude knew it was none of his business, and he was up to his neck in secrets already. He couldn’t summon a shred of curiosity about anyone else’s personal drama.
“I must be going. My horse is waiting, and Harriet won’t be found by me sitting cozily by the fire.”
“Wait.”
Jude stood stiffly, waiting for Prescott’s reproach. He was under-slept and confused and aching for his niece’s safety, but none of this excused the fact that he was being an ass, and he knew it. The habits of secrecy and self-protection were too ingrained.
“I’ll have a word with Clarissa, if you want me to try and change her mind.”
He bobbed his chin once, without hesitation. Relief cut through the knot of emotion binding his chest. He inhaled fully for the first time in what felt like days.
“Please do. I will have no other woman for my bride.”
One advantage of being a duke was that he nearly always got what he wanted.
But Jude had not counted upon Clarissa Penfirth’s stubborn force of will.
CHAPTERSEVEN
Rain rolled over the Cornish countryside again that afternoon, this time without the grand theatrics of a thunderstorm. By afternoon, Jude was wet, miserable, and far from shelter.
“Keep up, Monty,” called out Leacham. Jude gritted his teeth and dug his heels into his tired mount’s flanks. He despised that nickname. The Riders were rough company, the Cornish terrain as harsh and unforgiving as its inhabitants, and his thoughts continually bounced between Harriet’s whereabouts and Clarissa Penfirth’s outright rejection of him. It still smarted.
Water dripped down his collar.
“Where is this place?” He sounded like a child whining,Are we almost there?Composing himself, he straightened his spine and patted his horse’s neck. “This one needs to rest.”
He said nothing about the harsh way his companions drove their own horses.
“Down that hill.” Leacham pointed down the slope. They had split off from the other two Riders to cover more ground. Without a reliable communication system, he wasn’t sure what the men expected to accomplish, but he supposed the more eyes they had searching for Harriet, the better. All that mattered now was that they find her.
It was too much to hope that she would return home untouched. Tonight, when he returned to Prescott’s, he would have to write to Lord Lucarran to inform him of the disaster that had befallen his bride. Putting it off any longer risked rumors getting back to London before he could do damage control.
Jude sighed. Why couldn’t anything ever be easy?
“That’s the place,” Leacham said with a sinister satisfaction that Jude didn’t like one bit, pointing down the hill at a tidy cottage with bright flowers spilling from the window boxes. The only pop of color in the landscape. Everything else here was gray. Gray rocks stained dark with wet gray rain, the gray rolling ocean waves. Even the grass had acquired an ashen hue to his eye.
