Page 8 of A Deal with a Rake (Wicked Widows’ League #35)

F ecking hell.

She was delicious. Absolutely fecking delectable.

Tavish stilled himself like a stone in the wind.

He’d thought it’d be a fun jest to frighten that bastard Summerset’s widow.

A cruel thing, especially in her dressing room.

Like a horse’s arse, he’d thought he would find an older woman—in her thirties—fully dressed, perhaps looking in the mirror.

No instead, he was being haunted by the devil incarnate sent to torture him.

He’d expected to frighten her, maybe send her into a fit of hysterics. Any sane woman would’ve had some sort of fear reaction when a strange man entered their bathing chamber. But not her. Not this fierce duchess in front of him.

The Dutchess of Summerset glared at him like she could slay him with a single glance. He was sure a lesser man would’ve run for safety, but he’d never been one to cower for anyone. Especially not some entitled princess.

“Get out,” she said, pointing to the door, water dripping down her arm.

The command, and the sound of her husky voice, stirred something deep inside of him. His cock hardened even more, threatening to come free from his dusty trousers.

Days of traveling didn’t have Tavish looking his best, especially when his brother insisted they travel straight to the solicitor’s office to make all the arrangements.

It was official. He was the Duke of Summerset.

He chuckled, amused and in awe of her fire. How did such a passionate person end up with an old bastard like Summerset? She looked young, barely older than his sister, if Tavish had to guess.

“I don’t take order from you, Princess.” He stepped back, intending to retreat before he did something wild like gaze down at her ripe body, wet and glistening.

He’d crossed the line of sanity moments ago and was skirting the precipice of being a complete bastard, which he was not.

Tavish had to get the hell out of there and free himself from the spell of this evil goddess in front of him.

She sat forward, her long blond hair swimming around her in the copper tub, long creamy legs officially blocking her perfectly sized breasts from his view. “I don’t care who you are. These are my private chambers?—”

He halted his slow retreat at her words. “Your private chambers?” Tavish raised one eyebrow in challenge. “Looks like these are the duke’s chambers, and you’re not the duke. I am.”

Tavish folded his arms across his chest, not missing how her gaze tracked his every movement.

“Since there hasn’t been a duke for a year, you do not get an opinion on where I reside,” she said, her voice filled with deadly venom. “Besides, society will never accept you. You’re clearly a brute.” Her eyes raked over him in disdain.

She was a rare one. No fear to be seen in that beautiful facade of hers, but there were cracks in her armor. He’d recognized them, because he too had cracks.

Deciding that it was indeed a terrible idea to come barging into a lady’s dressing room, Tavish was pivoting on his feet when suddenly she shocked the hell out of him and rose.

Fecking hell.

She stood, naked as the day she was born. Hard pink nipples greeted him, a firm, yet soft stomach led down to a thatch of blonde curls. The warrior princess was proud, her body on display like she was a grand statue in Italy or Paris.

Tavish balled his hands into fist, fighting the urge to march over to her and take her like the savage beast he felt like in her presence.

This was fecking madness.

“I don’t care if you were the bloody king himself. I need to get dressed. Please leave.” She carefully stepped out of the large copper tub.

Wrapping herself in a silk dressing gown, she officially covered her sinful body from his desperate eyes. Disappointment filled him, a shocking revelation as he never found himself disappointed about anything, except perhaps his da’s opinion of him.

She faced him, green eyes dark as a forest, surveying him, sizing him up, as if inspecting him, like any worthy opponent would.

And Tavish established in that brief meeting that she indeed was a worthy opponent.

He wasn’t going to tell her that he’d been trying to leave for minutes, but she kept provoking him. “Since you said please,” he said as he winked at her, loving the furious blush that tinted her cheeks, “meet me downstairs, my brother and Hughes are waiting.”

She stiffened like he’d attacked her. In their entire meeting, the duchess had not blinked as she sat naked and vulnerable in front of him, but one command and she was ready to flee.

Headstrong woman.

He forced himself to leave the bathing chamber before he did something mad, like kiss his late cousin’s widow. That would be a disaster.

Perhaps it had been too long since he’d had a woman. The last was right before his fight with The Butcher. A quick tussle that left him more wanting than anything. No woman had ever stirred such a violent hunger in Tavish like the current Duchess of Summerset.

Walking through the opulent duke’s chambers, he passed the stern-faced maid, who still clutched a brush like a dueling pistol.

He laughed at the older woman before he left his new chambers.

He jogged through the large mansion, remembering the path he’d taken to reach the duke’s rooms, where the butler had informed him the duchess had been in residence since the old duke perished nearly a year ago.

“Your Grace,” one servant said to Tavish as he passed down the long hall toward the grand staircase.

He kept walking, before stopping suddenly, realizing that the woman was speaking to him.

“Welcome, Your Grace,” a footman said with a bow, as he reached the top of the staircase.

Jotting down the stairs, servants greeted him as he passed, and he’d nearly tumbled to the marble floor from the shock of it.

He was the bloody duke, and word had quickly traveled around the mansion that he’d arrived to claim the dukedom. The weight of it all threatened to disarm him like a punch to the gut.

Reaching the parlor where he’d left Declan and the over eager solicitor, Mr. Hughes, Tavish examined the luxury of his surroundings. Paintings from God knew where and furniture that looked more like it belonged in Windsor Palace than a regular home decorated the space.

“Where is she?” Declan asked, standing from a gold-plated chair.

He loved his brother, but five days in a carriage alone with him was enough brotherly bonding to last him years.

“She’ll be down shortly,” Tavish said, perching himself on the arm of the green and gold upholstered sofa.

“Good, once the widow is gone, we can move Ma, Adara, and Caitrin in with you.” His brother spoke more like he was the duke and Tavish was the younger brother.

Looking over his shoulder, he eyed his younger brother, having had enough of his superior attitude. “Do you have any other fecking plans I need to know about?”

Declan stood, coming to stand in front of Tavish. “I’m trying to help.”

“I don’t need your fecking help, Declan. As you’ve told me repeatedly on the ride to London, I’m the Duke of Summerset now, and I’ll decide who moves into my house and who leaves it, not you, deartháir beag ,” he said, calling him the Gaelic word for little brother.

Declan had long hated the term little brother since they were children.

His brother never enjoyed being reminded that he was the younger of the two of them.

He’d always wanted to be the eldest of the family, the one that everything went to, and in some ways, he was.

Tavish never wanted to run his da’s precious gentlemen’s club or make decisions for the family, like their father did.

Tavish shook his head. It was comical to think that his ma would ever leave the home that Da had purchased for them when they all had come to England.

She was never going to leave the home where she raised her family.

His sister, on the other hand, would be happy to move into the mansion with him and… the duchess.

“Fine, but don’t expect me to clean up your mess when it all goes to hell, like everything else you touch,” Declan said, holding up his arms in frustration.

Tavish knocked his brother’s hand away before rising. He rolled his eyes, used to his brother’s antics.

He needed a damn drink. The sinful woman upstairs had undone him completely.

He’d been prepared for a duchess. Of course, everyone knew his father’s bastard of a cousin had remarried in a last-ditch effort to produce an heir.

But Tavish could admit that he was not prepared for the fierce warrior goddess upstairs.

Brandy. He hated brandy. Now that he was the duke, he’d throw all the rubbish out and replace it with fine Irish whiskey.

“Send over a case of whiskey, will ya,” he called to his brother, who was still glaring at him.

They were a year apart, if that. Often, people had mistaken them for twins, but Tavish’s hair had more brown in it than Declan’s bright red hair.

“Anything else, Yer Grace?” his brother mocked from behind him.

Tavish poured the brandy, needing something to make his cock soften before he had to face the duchess again.

“I think that’ll be all, but I’ll let you know if I need anything else as head of the family?—”

“Head of the family!” Declan shouted, losing the composure he’d been holding onto in front of the quiet and meek solicitor. “You’ve been gone for fecking years, and I’ve held this family together. And now you want to come here and pretend to be the head, just because you have a title!”

He faced his brother, leaning against the sideboard as he drank the brandy in one big gulp. He shuddered at the taste.

That was fecking vile.

Tavish poured himself another glass. “Don’t get mad now. You came and found me, not the other way around.” He pointed at Declan, the glass of brandy in his hand. “So obvious you couldn’t handle it deartháir beag ,” he teased.

“You’re still a bastard,” his brother accused him, and Tavish couldn’t help but to laugh.