The Duke's Bridle Path Read online

  His shoulders were tense within his inexpensive blue coat. “Ah, well. Honesty is the one thing I can afford, I suppose.”

  “There. That was a lie too. Your face went all twitchy.”

  “I…meant that, sincerely. I was merely twitchy at the realization that there’s not much I can afford, especially when up against a foe such as yourself.”

  “Flattery again? You need some new tricks, sir.” She held up a hand. “Please don’t think that I misunderstand you. I know that I am privileged because of the circumstances of my birth. I must do my best to earn the moral right to my good fortune.”

  “Morality again,” Colin sighed.

  “Yes. Morality again.” A smile touched her lips. “So. I want to be left alone, and you want to mock my family for coin.”

  “Not exactly,” he hedged.

  “But close enough?”

  “Close enough,” he allowed.

  Frequent missives for two to four weeks, he had promised Botolphus Bright. They could appear in serial form in the magazine for months, at the end of which time the articles could be collected into a small pamphlet and sold for twopence.

  Bright wouldn’t allow him to write under his own name, but that was all right. Colin had already picked a name under which the series would appear. Vir Virilem. A virile man. The outlandishness made him laugh.

  Lady Ada had sharpened a quill. She had blotted a ledger. She had folded and unfolded her spectacles, and now she seemed at a loss what to do next. “I could have you thrown out of town, but I think you’d come back. And I am not unfeeling. I know that you seek betterment.”

  “And you seek?”

  “At this time? With you? A bargain.”

  Innnnnteresting. He shoved at the edge of the desk, tipping the chair onto its back legs. “Let me hear the terms before I agree.”

  “Of course.” She hesitated, then leaned forward. “Beginning this evening, and for the next fortnight, a certain person will be visiting the area. He intends to buy horses of Talbot and Ramsdale, who hold a partnership in the horse farm that adjoins my brother’s lands.”

  “How am I to help with that? Do you wish me to arrange for this visitor’s murder? Skewer him with a quill, or whatnot?”

  She didn’t turn a hair. “He doesn’t deserve such a clean end. Mr. Goddard, this visitor is Lord Wrotham, the heir to the Baddesley earldom. Four years ago, we were betrothed. Scandalous talk related to my eldest brother’s death—in large part, the clever on-demandes from your delightful publication—led his lordship to break the engagement.”

  She looked so calm, so sober—but a muscle twitched in her jaw. She was gritting her teeth on some deep emotion. Anger? Sadness? He couldn’t put a name to it. But the one that washed through him, he recognized as guilt. Or its cousin, shame.

  “He wasn’t worthy,” Colin said. Hoped. Wished.

  “At this point in time, I’m inclined to agree. However, he still holds the opposite view. And as he is newly wed, I will be obliged to host him and his new bride with a smile on my face.”

  Colin sucked in a sharp breath. “My sympathies. That’s going to be difficult.”

  When the smile spread over her features, it was of the sort that would strike fear into any man who wasn’t an ignorant fool. “That’s where you can help. Mr. Goddard, for the next fortnight, you are to be madly in love with me.”

  He blinked.

  “Because you are so deeply infatuated, you will spend the two weeks as I choose,” she went on. “And how convenient! You will be living the life you wish your readers to experience through your work. If you are caught out by Wrotham as a fraud, you lose. If you surrender before the fortnight is up, you lose. But if you survive the two weeks, you win.”

  “What do you mean by surrender?”

  “That you allow a breach in your character. For example, if you attend a formal dinner party in a borrowed set of my brother’s clothes, and you must fawn over me, and instead, you communicate in any way that you would rather not.”

  He had to be missing something. “Fine clothes? Twenty-four dishes served to me by a servant? Goodness, I can’t imagine how I will bear it.”

  Again, that little shrug. “Fine talk. Do you accept?”

  “Do I? Of course. I can’t believe you’re offering me this chance.” He held up a staying hand. “So when I win—”

  She laughed.

  It was more disconcerting than anything she could have said, but he soldiered on. “When I win, you will give me any information I need to complete the series of articles for The Gentleman’s Periodical.”

  Fire sparked in her gray eyes. “If you win, Mr. Goddard, I will help you write them myself.”

  “It’s a bargain,” he said. “When shall we begin?”

  “Why not at once?” She rang for the butler. Behind that wide, long desk, she sat back in her chair and folded her hands.

  “Chalmers,” she said when the butler appeared, “please show Mr. Goddard up to a guest room, where he might change into some of His Grace’s spare clothing.”

  Colin bounced to his feet.

  “From…” Lady Ada eyed Colin, her gaze lingering on his chest, then thighs. “Two seasons ago, I believe. And alert Cook that we will be adding one to the party dining here today.”

  “Very good, my lady,” said the butler.

  Too right, thought Colin. Two weeks to live the high life and to end by cementing his and Samuel’s future at The Gentleman’s Periodical?

  This would be very good indeed.

  Chapter Two

  * * *

  When one moves out of his or her class to attempt to snare a wealthy mate, awkward situations will inevitably arise. To show one’s awkwardness will make one an object of pity. To hide it, and to act at ease with whatever arises, will make one an object of respect.

  Better yet, it will irk the jealous and insecure.

  Vir Virilem, Ways to Wed for Wealth

  This dinner would be awful, and he was sure Lady Ada had planned it that way. Colin was going to kill her.

  Though not until after he completed his articles.

  The duke’s clothes from two seasons before were made for a tall man of athletic build who delighted in bespoke tailoring. Colin was physically fit enough; one didn’t live in London without pounding the streets half the time. But the duke was several inches taller, Colin guessed, from where the seams hit. The buckskin breeches that ought to have fit like paint were too high at the waist and too baggy at the knee.

  The coat was another matter. Colin suspected this one hadn’t belonged to His Grace since the duke was a youth. The butler, Chalmers, had helped Colin shrug into it, but as a result, his shoulders were drawn together, his arms awkwardly restricted. By drawing in a huge breath, then holding it, he was able to do up one button and somewhat hide the terrible waistcoat the butler had also foisted upon him.

  “Why does the duke still own this clothing?” he grumbled, tugging at the bottom of the too-short coat.

  “Her ladyship encouraged him to, as she thought it might serve some purpose,” said the butler. “Which it now has.” He packed Colin a trunk of similar clothing to take back to the inn with him.

  Colin would be damned before he’d wear clothes of Lady Ada’s choosing again, but he had to admire the lady’s style. So, he was forbidden to display the smallest amount of displeasure? Fine. Good. He’d show her just how delightful he could be despite wearing the coat of a boy and the breeches of a Goliath.

  Because there was one thing for which she hadn’t accounted: He couldn’t afford to give up.

  * * *

  Ada watched Colin Goddard closely as the other guests arrived. Would he be boorish and vulgar to try to embarrass her? She almost wished he would, so she could have him tossed out of her house.

  Her brother’s house, that is. Ada was in charge only by chance, and her borrowed power wasn’t real.

  But it must have been good enough for Goddard and the story he hoped to sniff out, bec
ause he wasn’t boorish at all. He wasn’t exactly polite either, not in a deferential way. But he was charming. He was charming in the way that only people who are utterly at ease can be charming, unconscious of themselves, their whole attention given up to the interest and comfort of others. In the too-tight coat and not-quite-fashionable accent, he chatted and laughed with all of the neighbors.

  “I’m a writer,” he explained, “staying in the area. As Lady Ada and I have been acquainted through her brother”—oh, he was a slippery one!—“she invited me to dine tonight. Unfortunately, I’m not an elegant fellow, so she offered to help me out.”

  “Wouldn’t say she’d done you any favors!” bellowed Squire Martin, a ruddy man with a luxuriant mustache and almost no hair on his head. “Should’ve let you wear your own kit. No need to stand on ceremony with friends.”

  And just like that, Martin was in Goddard’s pocket.

  Curses. She hadn’t accounted for the common masculine dislike of elegant clothing.

  Perhaps the female guests would be more skeptical of this unknown writer. Besides the Martins, there were the Ponsonbys, the vicar and his wife; the local schoolmaster, a Mr. Johnson; and the headmistress of the girls’ school, a widow named Mrs. Semple.

  Just as she had invited Lord and Lady Wrotham upon learning of their stay in the area, she had added Colin Goddard today. The timing was fortunate; with Goddard, the number of men and women would match. Ada would not be superfluous.

  Old Mr. Talbot had been invited, as usual, but he was frail and crotchety and missing his daughter—Harriet, the new duchess—too much to attend. Ada would have a basket packed for the old gentleman later.

  She hosted these dinner parties every month, a tradition she’d carried on from the time of her parents. As the heart of the Berkshire economy, the old duke and his duchess had thought it important to maintain connections with the appendages: church, schooling, horse-training. Farmers and tenants were welcomed during open days and the annual harvest ball. Would Harriet and Philippe keep up these traditions?

  It wasn’t Ada’s business to know or care, but she cared nonetheless.

  While the locals trickled in at whatever early time their feet or horses carried them over, Lord Wrotham and his lady wife arrived precisely at the appointed hour.

  When Samuel Johnson created his dictionary in the previous century, he surely foresaw the existence of his lordship in the definitions of punctilious. Scrupulous. Meticulous. No attention was overlooked by his lordship—and no trespass either. He was a handsome man of about thirty years, with brown hair and a long, narrow nose. His clothing was expensive but not flashy, beautifully tailored.

  Reluctantly, Ada admitted that he cut a fine figure. She was glad she’d donned a new gown, one in shades of cream and white, all dotted over with silk embroidery and finished with a lovely trim of twining vines in the same silk. Colin Goddard, who was looking as ridiculous as Ada had hoped, cast her an appreciative look that had her stomach in a flutter.

  All part of the act, she reminded herself.

  Lady Wrotham looked near Ada’s age, twenty-four or thereabout. She had a crown of blond braids, sparkling brown eyes, and a pleasant smile. Ada had intended to dislike her, but she couldn’t manage the feat.

  “Thank you for the invitation,” the viscountess said, introducing herself as Serena. “I wouldn’t have felt right about being so near Wrotham’s old acquaintances and not paying my respects.”

  From the frank look she gave Ada, it was clear she knew exactly what sort of acquaintances Wrotham and Ada had been. From her smile, it was clear that she hoped to set it behind them. Ada was willing. How long ago that betrothal seemed now.

  Through the numerous courses of dinner, as they sat around the table in proper man-woman-man-woman fashion, Colin Goddard kept his dinner companions smiling. He kept firing heated glances in Ada’s direction. A particular favorite of his was to sip at his glass of wine, then look at her over the top.

  Over the top indeed. Well, she’d asked for it. And Wrotham, stick-stiff and serious, was noting these attentions with a grave expression that gave Ada a lowly sort of satisfaction. Just because you didn’t want me doesn’t mean I’m unappealing. Unattractive. Unlovable.

  Even if the proof of this was false, nothing of the sort, she found herself forgetting… almost. Goddard was a most convincing actor.

  After the last dishes had been removed, the women went into the drawing room—but just barely had Ada settled next to Serena Wrotham when the men filed into the room as well.

  “Couldn’t stay away any longer,” said Goddard blithely. “Port and politics have nothing on you ladies.” When he fired another lovesick look at Ada, Lady Wrotham looked at her knowingly.

  “Shall we have cards?” Ada asked. “Or a dramatic reading? Mr. Goddard, as a writer, surely you’d enjoy reading aloud to us all.”

  He hitched at his ridiculous huge breeches. “I’d make a dull job of it,” he said. “I never can do justice to another man’s words. But if you’ll allow me to mangle them a bit, I could monologue for you.”

  Putting a hand to his heart, he intoned,

  “My mistress’ eyes are like a stormy sea;

  Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;

  Her breasts are darker than a blond lace be;

  If hairs be wires, brown wires grow on her head.”

  Ada’s cheeks flamed. “That is horrid. You should apologize to William Shakespeare right now for treating one of his sonnets so.”

  Goddard bowed. “As long as the lady doesn’t ask me to apologize for sincere words, Mr. Shakespeare may have my heartiest plea for pardon.”

  What a flirt he was. Stop pretending, she wanted to say. Never stop pretending, she wanted to say too. Lady Ada Ellis, daughter and sister to Dukes of Lavelle, had never been the sort of woman with whom men flirted outrageously.

  Goddard contorted a few more poems for the group’s amusement, then the Ponsonbys and Martins settled to cards while Lady Wrotham played several pieces on the pianoforte. Beautifully, of course. When her husband joined his voice with hers in a duet, Ada had to look away for a moment, studying her ringless hands with fierce determination to hold back tears.

  Lord and Lady Wrotham were well suited, and that was a fine thing. Ada neither missed him nor regretted him. No, she regretted the four years that had passed—that she had allowed to pass—without another journey to London, another Season, another suitor. Grief for her eldest brother’s sudden death had brought her home; her father’s death the following year had kept her here. But why did she stay here so constantly now? The dukedom needed her, she thought, in her brother Philippe’s absence.

  Maybe that was only an excuse.

  She kept a polite smile on her face for the remainder of the evening. The Ponsonbys were the first to depart, as usual; the vicar was an early riser. Squire Martin had more than once fallen asleep in his cups in the armchair before the drawing-room fire, but tonight his wife elbowed him out of a drowse and hurried him along. The Wrothams and teachers left with gracious thanks for a fine evening too, and before the sun had fully sunk sleepy below the horizon, Ada was alone.

  Wait. Why was she alone? Where had Goddard got off to?

  He wasn’t in the dining room drinking port. He wasn’t in the chair before the fire, and he certainly wasn’t hiding beneath the pianoforte or behind a potted palm.

  Ada found Chalmers and asked him whether he’d spotted their wayward guest. With a pained expression, the butler directed her ladyship to the study.

  The study? Where a hungry sort of reporter could make a meal of the dukedom’s accounts? Could browse through Ada’s favorite books, or crack open the seals of her correspondence?

  She strode down the corridor to the study, picking up speed. She was almost at a run by the time she reached the familiar old door and wrenched it open.

  “Ha!” She sprang into the room, prepared to catch him doing something inappropriate.

  But he wasn’
t. He’d shrugged out of the tight coat—she couldn’t blame him for that, since Philippe hadn’t worn it since he was fifteen—and was sitting in waistcoat and shirt-sleeves on the desk, flipping idly through a poetry book she’d left out.

  At her dramatic entrance, he looked up mildly. “Hullo. What a lovely noise that was. Feeling rambunctious, are you?”

  She sniffed, drawing herself up straight. “You’re meant to leave with the other callers, Mr. Goddard, not go prowling around the house.”

  “Ah, my manners went begging.” He sat in her favorite chair before the fire, the one in which she’d been planning to sit, and stuck out his legs, slinging one ankle over another.

  “They have. You shouldn’t sit in the presence of a standing lady.”

  “I know. But I behaved myself so well this evening, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Better than I expected. I’m becoming familiar with your wiles, though.”

  “Say it isn’t so! Doesn’t familiarity breedeth contempt, or so goes the old saying?”

  “That depends on the one with whom I’m becoming familiar.” She slid around the desk to scan its surface. Writing implements. Paper. The ledgers were tidied away, and she couldn’t tell whether he’d opened the desk’s drawers to get at them.

  “So suspicious,” he said. “I do have a code of ethics, of sorts. If it’s closed, I don’t open it. If it’s on a shelf, I don’t take it down.”

  Mollified, she left the desk—though not before snapping up the book he’d been paging through. “An unconventional code for a reporter.” She found another chair, wrenched it over to the fireplace and stuck it beside his. “I wonder if it puts you at a disadvantage.”

  “Maybe so. But that’s my problem, isn’t it?” His calm was unfailing.

  She tried to reply in kind. “The neighbors hadn’t had such a nice time in a while. I thank you.”

  His grin was pure wickedness. “And what about Lord Wrotham? We put his nose out of joint a little.”