Least Likely to Marry a Duke Read online

  Only he doesn’t, she told herself. Will doesn’t look down on anyone, he merely holds himself to a higher standard as though an extra weight had been laid on his shoulders at birth and he is braced to bear it, convinced that if he relaxes for a moment it will all come crashing down and he will fail everyone whose welfare he holds himself responsible for.

  ‘Lord and Lady Fairlie, Miss Wingate, Your Majesty.’

  Verity swept into a low Court curtsy, her back straight to balance the plumes, knees braced to support the weight of her skirts. She took a steadying breath to rise without a stumble and there, on the lowest step of the dais, was Will.

  She had no idea how she managed to stand or how she kept her eyes fixed on the Queen, who spoke to her aunt as an old friend, smiled graciously at her uncle and then condescended to speak to Verity.

  ‘I understand that you are to leave us, Miss Wingate.’

  ‘Yes, Your Majesty. My father will be missing me.’

  ‘Do give the Bishop my good wishes for his health. One found his sermons very enlightening.’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am. He will be most gratified.’

  ‘I trust, ma’am, that Bishop Wingate will also be gratified by the news of his daughter’s betrothal, if I have your permission to put the question here and now.’ Will spoke as though interrupting the Queen in the middle of a Drawing Room was a mere trifle. Around them there was the sound of sharp indrawn breaths, the flutter of fans. Out of the corner of her eye Verity saw the Chamberlain’s head swivel to stare at Will.

  ‘“Put the question,” Your Grace?’ The Queen’s tone could have frozen the ratafia in the refreshment room.

  ‘I crave your indulgence, ma’am. But Miss Wingate believes that I am so wedded to correct behaviour that I will never allow my true sentiments to show. I hope to convince her that my desire to marry her is so heartfelt, so real and founded on my deep love and affection for her that I would risk dismissal from Court in order to express it.’

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  She was asleep and dreaming, of course, Verity reasoned. No one interrupted the Queen. No one even initiated a change of subject in her presence. This was one of those ghastly dreams where one was dancing naked at Almack’s or driving a curricle pulled by geese along Rotten Row at the fashionable promenade hour. Or perhaps she was ill, feverish. That must be it. She was in bed and this was a delirium.

  ‘Well, Miss Wingate?’ That could not be right. The Queen was addressing her. No one was naked and there were no geese to be seen, only Her Majesty looking at her, unsmiling, outwardly severe and yet with just the hint of a twinkle in those tired, faded, blue eyes. ‘The Duke can leave or you may retire to a private room with your aunt. Or you may give him your answer now.’

  With an effort she dragged her gaze from the Queen and looked at Will. He was smiling at her; he seemed unconscious of the fact that every person in that crowded room was staring at him, agog, but what she could see, and they could not, was that William Xavier Cosmo de Whitham Calthorpe, Fourth Duke of Aylsham, was nervous, that her answer mattered to him, that the love and affection for her that he had just professed, without hesitation, were real.

  Verity took a deep breath and looked back at the Queen. ‘Thank you, ma’am. You are very gracious. I have no need to withdraw because I have an answer for His Grace.’ She curtsied again, not the deep obeisance that Court etiquette required, but as low as her shaky legs would let her. Then she stepped to the side and held out her hand to Will. ‘Yes.’

  She said it clearly, loud enough for everyone four ranks back to hear, but the room was suddenly filled with a buzz of conversation and shocked exclamations as he took her hand in his and raised it to his lips.

  ‘You have our permission to retire, Miss Wingate. Lord and Lady Fairlie will doubtless wish to accompany you. Aylsham, I suggest you also retire. Doubtless you will need time to prepare for an immediate journey.’ She inclined her head, a half-inch of cool acknowledgement. Will bowed, stepped down and backed away towards a side door. Verity and her aunt and uncle followed, made their way out as the throng parted to let them through.

  ‘This way, my lord, my lady.’ Someone, a very senior official by the weight of silver on his coat, ushered them into a room where Will was standing alone except for an elderly man with thinning hair who was speaking earnestly to him.

  ‘Yes, I know,’ Will said as they came in. ‘Most irregular, enough to have me clapped in the Tower, I have no doubt, Edgerton. I will write a grovelling apology to Her Majesty, but it appears she is letting me off without threat of the headsman’s axe. Now, if you will excuse us, I believe my betrothed wishes to have words with me.’

  It could have been her imagination, but Mr Edgerton, whoever he was, muttered, ‘I cannot say I blame her,’ as he gave a stiff bow and stalked out.

  Verity looked around, but she and Will were alone in the room, its heavy red-velvet hangings muffling all sound from outside. She should say something, but she had no idea what and, besides, how could words escape? She felt as though she had inhaled a great cloud of happiness and her lungs could not cope with anything as prosaic as words.

  ‘Did you mean it?’ Will asked, his gaze dark and intent over the few feet that separated them.

  ‘Of course. Did you?’ she said.

  ‘I would never lie to you, Verity.’ Then somehow they closed the gap between them and she was in his arms, hers tight around him, the hooped skirt tilting up and the metallic embroidery edging his formal coat scratching her cheek. The chapeau bras dropped to the floor unheeded from beneath his elbow. ‘These damned feathers,’ he growled, batting at them. ‘How is a man supposed to kiss you?’

  ‘I have no idea.’ She took a step back, her skirts swinging like a bell. ‘Will, that was the most—’

  ‘Embarrassing? Ridiculous? Shocking?’ he suggested, the side of his mouth tilting into that faint smile she found so irresistible.

  ‘The most romantic thing I ever heard of. Will, do you think we will be banished from Court?’

  ‘It would be a saving in ostrich plumes,’ he said. ‘Come here, my darling, turn around.’ When she did, he flipped up her skirts, caught hold of the strings that fastened the ludicrous cage of hoops, gave them a tug and they fell to her feet.

  ‘Will!’ But her shriek was muffled by her three feathers as they were tweaked from her hair, slid down her nose and fell to the floor.

  ‘Now that’s better,’ he said as he pulled her tight against him. ‘Verity Wingate, I love you. I have been in love with you ever since I fell into your excavation and you set your Druid on me. I just did not realise it until that day in the park.’

  ‘The day I fell out of the phaeton? But that is when I realised I loved you, too.’ She stood on tiptoe and pressed her mouth to the corner of his lips. ‘Why didn’t you say so, you provoking man?’

  ‘Would you have believed me? I decided I would woo you patiently over all the months of my mourning, hoping that eventually you would realise that I wanted to marry you.’

  ‘And I was supposed to just guess that you loved me?’ she demanded, indignant now. ‘We have wasted days.’

  ‘My only excuse is that I am new to being in love. We could make up for it now,’ he offered.

  ‘We are in St James’s Palace,’ Verity said with a faint shriek, making a despairing grab at some kind of restraint.

  ‘My darling, are you going to prove to be a boringly conventional duchess?’ Will enquired, looking up from his determined assault on her neckline.

  ‘No. No, I promise to be an absolute disgrace—but may I work up to it? Oh, that is...not start by being discovered in flagrante by the Chamberlain? Oh, Will, kiss me like that again. Don’t stop.’

  Eventually he did and they clung together, laughing, shaking, trembling with frustrated desire.

  ‘If you can forgive me for stopping, how soon can we be married?�
�� Will asked as they struggled to return their clothing to some kind of order. Verity stepped into her hoops and he tied them, smoothed out her yards of skirt and train like the most competent of lady’s maids. ‘You must forgive me, I have bent a feather.’

  ‘Never mind.’ She took them, threw the damaged one aside and pushed the remaining two into her coiffure. ‘I can only hope you know a way out of the Palace, Will. And I would like to be married just as soon as possible, because I do not think I can stand stopping and behaving respectably much longer.’

  ‘I do know a way out. And I have an idea for a wedding that will be exactly right, considering that we are both in disgrace and I am in mourning. I will take you back to Bruton Street and then call on my godfather again and hope I have not exhausted his good will.’

  ‘The Archbishop?’ she asked as Will opened a door, looked out and gestured for her to follow out into a deserted corridor. ‘For a special licence?’

  ‘For a very special licence,’ he agreed. ‘For a very special wedding.’

  * * *

  The dozen musicians were managing remarkably well, Will thought, considering that one of the violinists had fallen in the lake getting into the rowing boat and they were all crammed into a hastily made clearing behind the tiny cottage. He had been tempted to try moving the piano across, but Verity had explained that Miss Lambert would not have been able to play because she wanted her to be a bridesmaid.

  He only hoped that none of the bridesmaids had fallen in. They must be on their way now.

  ‘Stop looking at your watch,’ his best man said.

  Will looked down and grinned. Most people would have said that he should have asked one of his adult friends to stand as groomsman, but he had wanted Basil, the little wretch who had started this. Basil had risen to the occasion. He was neat as a new pin, scrubbed painfully pink and swore faithfully that not a single live creature was about his person. ‘Is the ring safe?’

  ‘Of course. It is on a ribbon pinned to my pocket, just like it was last time you asked. Listen! Something’s happening.’

  The musicians, who had arranged signals with a footman, stopped playing vaguely twiddly music and launched into something more positive. The dozen guests—all that could be fitted into the space in front of the cottage—sat up, stopped surreptitiously flapping at the insect life and fell silent then stood as the music changed to the ‘Arrival of the Queen of Sheba.’

  Will’s stomach swooped, he felt the blood draining out of his face and wondered vaguely if he was going to faint. He never had, so it was only guesswork. Verity would never forgive him so he took a steadying breath and turned to face the temporary altar that the Reverend Mr Hoskins had set up. The Chaplain stood before it, smiling encouragement, and then the little congregation drew a collective sharp breath.

  I can turn now, he thought as Basil gasped. Verity was walking very slowly out of the trees. Benjamin and Bertrand in front, strewing rose petals under the supervision of Alicia in her first grown-up, full-length dress.

  The Bishop, stick in one hand, a beaming smile on his lips, had his daughter’s hand on his arm and behind them Will glimpsed Verity’s four friends with Araminta and Althea, the rest of the bridesmaids.

  But they were a blur. Only one figure, the veiled bride, was in focus. She stopped, called to Alicia, gave her the bouquet of roses and myrtle that she was carrying and threw back her veil. And then she smiled and the world tilted on its axis.

  * * *

  He is so white, Verity had thought as she came into the clearing.

  She had assumed that she would be the nervous one, that Will would negotiate the wedding with as much lofty ducal poise as he managed everything else. But she felt quite calm, buoyed up on clouds of happiness and the conviction that this was so perfectly right that nothing could go wrong now. She stopped and gave her flowers to Alicia, put back her veil and smiled at him and Will smiled back and raised his hand to his lips, then held it out to her.

  ‘The Bishop’s supposed to give her to you,’ Basil said bossily, but her father extended his own arm so Will could take her hand before Mr Hoskins could say the words.

  She turned and kissed her father and waited while a footman came and helped him to a chair at the side, then looked at her bridegroom, saw the love in his eyes and stood beside him as the Chaplain began to speak.

  ‘Dearly beloved—’

  * * *

  ‘Dearly beloved,’ Will said, tucking her hand under his arm as they stood on the beach and waved as the last of the little fleet of rowing boats pulled away and the voices and laughter of the guests became fainter over the water. There had been a great deal of good wine at what Will had insisted on calling the Wedding Picnic and now they were heading back to a more substantial meal at the Old Palace presided over by the Bishop and Will’s stepmother, who had struck up an unlikely alliance during the preparations for the ceremony.

  ‘I do love you,’ he added, looking down at her. ‘Are you very tired now?’

  ‘Is that a polite husbandly way of asking whether I want to go to bed and sleep or go to bed and make mad, passionate love?’ Verity asked. Her heart was doing very strange things and she was not at all certain it was designed to flutter quite like that, but if Will could control himself, so could she. Duchesses probably did not drag their husbands through the undergrowth in their eagerness.

  ‘It was,’ he agreed, very serious.

  ‘Perhaps I should go and lie down and see how I feel?’

  ‘An excellent idea. Allow me to carry you in case you feel faint on the way.’

  ‘If I hadn’t before, I am now,’ Verity said against his neck as Will adjusted his grip on her and began to walk back to the cottage along the path that the gardeners had scythed the day before. ‘This is quite indecently romantic, Your Grace.’

  He made a very satisfactory growling sound as he ducked and carried her through the doorway into the cottage, then set her down on the bed. The staff had worked miracles with the tiny building. The walls were whitewashed, the windows clean with gay cotton curtains. The bed had a feather mattress and heaps of pillows, there was a rug on the floor and hampers of food, some on ice. There was even a discreet tent with commode and washstand and the fire was made up so that they could heat water or make tea.

  ‘I find I am wide awake,’ Verity said and stood up. ‘And now I am going to take all your clothes off because I want to inspect my new husband very thoroughly.’

  It was unkind to tease him, but perhaps Will was enjoying it, she thought, seeing his blue eyes turn indigo, his lips part, as she unbuttoned and untied, removed his stickpin and neckcloth, slid off his coat and waistcoat, pulled his shirt from the waistband. He did nothing to help her, but nor did he hinder, letting her hands go where she willed, holding his own away from his sides and not touching.

  When she dropped to her knees and began to roll down his stockings he kicked them and his shoes away, then went very still when she stayed where she was, studying the evidence of his arousal through the fine cloth of his breeches.

  Would he stay still if she continued to explore? Verity began to undo the buttons fastening his falls, then slipped her hands inside to touch.

  Will said something under his breath, moved abruptly, then stood stock-still as she began to caress the hard heated flesh. She flipped the final button open, drew him out, stared, at the beautiful raw masculinity of desire.

  I want to kiss him there.

  Was that allowed? She had no idea, but she was now a disgraceful duchess, so she could try to see.

  Under her lips he was smooth and hot.

  ‘Dear God. Verity.’

  His hands closed around her head, she could feel him fighting the urge to move against her mouth. ‘You shouldn’t.’

  ‘You don’t like it?’ She looked up.

  ‘I shouldn’t ask it of you,’ he ground out.

&n
bsp; ‘But you aren’t asking and I want to.’ And when she bent her head and began to lick he stood there and let her.

  Smooth and hot and hard and musky with the scent of man, of her lover. Of Will. Impatient, Verity pushed at his breeches, pulled them down over his narrow hips, closed her hands over his taut buttocks and took him into her mouth.

  It lasted one dizzying moment of discovery, then he pulled her to her feet, kicking his breeches away. ‘I can’t... Too good... Not this time. Verity.’

  She sank into the feather mattress under his weight, his mouth sealing in her whimpers of need as he caressed her, palms skimming over peaking nipples, down over her belly, down to push her legs gently apart and tease his way between the folds that were wet for him already.

  ‘Let me,’ he murmured, lifting on one elbow as his fingers continued to work wicked magic. ‘I won’t hurt you, tell me if you want me to stop.’

  ‘You won’t. I won’t.’ The words were wrenched out of her as he slid two fingers into her and her whole body convulsed into pleasure. ‘Will.’

  ‘Yes, my love,’ he said, and shifted over her. ‘I’m here.’

  And he was, filling her, possessing her. He was true to his word, it didn’t hurt, not like it had with Thomas, but it was overwhelming, even so. But she trusted him and her body wanted him and adjusted and welcomed him in. She rose up to meet him, dug her fingers into his back and wrapped her legs around his waist and cried out her encouragement, urging him on when he would have held back, learning to move so he gasped out his own pleasure with each thrust and she lost herself, not sure where she stopped and Will began.

  She opened her eyes and found his were intent on her, every line of his face taut and racked as though in pain. ‘Yes,’ she said and the world unravelled as he shouted her name and shuddered in her arms and the world swirled around her.