Page 21 of A Deviant Spinster for the Duke (The Gentlemen’s Club #3)
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“ Y ou seem rather subdued this morning,” Lionel remarked with a wry smile, drawing a folded piece of paper from his pocket.
“Do I?” Duncan replied drily.
Lionel chuckled. “I imagine you had an enjoyable evening.”
“It was… passable.” Duncan shrugged, lifting his gaze to the sky to watch a few seagulls wheeling.
The sun cast a foggy sort of light across the city, catching the mist that rolled up from the Thames. The afternoon heat would burn it away eventually but, for now, the air had a pleasant cool to it. Duncan would not have emerged from his townhouse at all if the day had threatened to be scorching, content to keep to the shade, away from streets where he might cross paths with Valeria.
“Passable?” Lionel frowned. “Were you forced to drown the tedium?”
Duncan flashed his friend a pointed look. “I am not suffering the ill effects of being inebriated, Lionel. I did not sleep well and, as such, I am a little grumpy. But what is grumpiness between friends?”
“It is just a surprise,” Lionel said, his gaze drifting down the street. “I cannot remember the last time I saw you grumpy. Why did you not sleep well? Did you have company?”
Duncan groaned. “No, I did not. I was alone, I could not sleep, and my mood is reflective of that.” He paused. “Now, for what exciting endeavor have you dragged me from my bed?”
He had already agreed to meet with Lionel that morning and was not the sort of fellow who cared to cancel plans with his dearest friends. Of course, he would have preferred to still be in bed, trying to force his inability to sleep into submission, but he had no doubt that a few hours with his friend would restore him in a different way. Sleep for the soul, rather than the body.
“I am meeting a man about a new horse,” Lionel replied, frowning. “As you are the horseman, I need you with me, so I do not make a poor decision. But first, my darling wife has asked me to put an order in at the dressmaker. I believe it is that one there.”
He pointed ahead to a charming shop with a jade green exterior, curved lettering above the windows and lintel marking it as: The Ladybird: Dressmaker and Seamstress. The bay window winked in the sunlight, where three wooden models displayed beautiful gowns of muslin, silk, and bombazine.
“You have brought me to buy gowns for your wife?” Duncan arched an eyebrow, smothering his annoyance.
Lionel laughed. “It will not take long, I promise.” He hesitated. “You still have not said why you did not sleep well. Are you unwell? Was there some disturbance in the night?”
Only the persistent bombardment of Miss Maxwell, seeking me out in the darkness, disrupting my peace.
He had thought of nothing but her since his return from the ball, finding no distraction from the visions of her that crept into his head. He could not go anywhere in his townhouse without thinking about her, wondering if she might come to him despite the lack of invitation. He had alluded to dance lessons, after all. And when she had not appeared—understandably—the disappointment had been rather bitter, leaving him restless.
“It was warm,” Duncan said instead.
Lionel nodded at that. “It was terribly warm. That, I suppose, is the peril of summer in the city.” He sighed. “Oh, how I miss Westyork.”
A bell jingled above the door as the two gentlemen entered. An older lady with lacquered gray hair waved amiably from behind the counter, welcoming the pair. Her keen blue eyes rested a moment longer on Duncan, who gave a subtle nod: they were well acquainted after his most recent purchases, though no one—particularly Lionel—needed to know that. Indeed, the proprietor, Mrs. Bird, was nothing if not discreet.
As Lionel proceeded onward to speak with Mrs. Bird, Duncan occupied himself with the bolts of beautiful fabrics that adorned the walls in boxed-off shelves: silks, satins, muslins, calicoes, cottons, finely woven wool, anything and everything for every season and style.
“What have we here?” he murmured, spying an exquisite roll of amethyst silk on one of the lowest shelves.
He crouched down to investigate, pulling one glove off with his teeth to feel the fabric for himself. It was cool to the touch, soft as a rose petal, and about as liquid as a fabric could be.
Valeria would look… remarkable in a gown of this. He closed his eyes to imagine it, picturing detailed beading and jewelling, so she glittered as she walked. A dark angel, descended straight from the heavens, carrying starlight with her.
He doubted anything could surpass the deep, garnet red of last night’s velvet gown, but a dress of this silk might just achieve it.
“She must have red hair,” Mrs. Bird said, startling Duncan.
She had appeared so silently, which might have made sense to his jolted mind if she did not walk with a cane and a limp. He frowned at her as he stood to his full height, wondering if the impediment was a charade of some kind, so no one would know that there was a creature of great stealth and strength beneath.
“The lady,” Mrs. Bird continued with a smile. “She must have red hair. Auburn, perhaps. Green eyes. A pale or ruddy complexion.”
Duncan quirked an eyebrow. “How can you guess that?”
“The colors you’ve been choosing,” she answered with a shrug of her bony shoulders. “You weren’t certain at first, with the midnight blue. Last time, you couldn’t decide between the garnet or the emerald. Now, you’re eyeing the amethyst. Such bold colors wouldn’t suit fair hair, and though they’d complement darker hair well enough, you wavered on the red last time.”
Duncan smiled. “I am glad that you convinced me.”
“She wore it well?”
He nodded. “Far better than I ever expected. I cannot thank you enough for working such magic with what I brought to you.”
“Nonsense, Your Grace. I haven’t seen Italian velvet like that in years,” Mrs. Bird cooed. “It was my pleasure, though if you’re wanting something made in its entirety, you’d best order it swiftly. There’s a difference between amending a gown that exists and making one new.”
The two gowns he had gifted to Valeria had come from a lonely armoire at Thornhill Grange, where dresses of all kinds had remained abandoned since he was little more than a boy. It had always been his mother’s hope that, one day, they would be passed on to daughters-in-law or granddaughters, but neither of those things had come to pass.
He had considered getting rid of them many times over the years, selling them to anyone who might desire a rare gown, but every time he had given it serious thought, he had closed the doors instead. He did not know what had possessed him to fetch the gowns for Valeria, but he had no regrets; they deserved to be altered and given new life, and she had worn them as if they had always been hers.
“In that case, I should like to order a gown from this silk,” he said suddenly. “With beading and spangles. I leave the design up to you. I trust you implicitly, Mrs. Bird.”
“For the same lucky lady?” she asked.
He nodded. “Yes, thank you.”
“What lucky lady?” Lionel’s voice rattled up Duncan’s spine, startling him for a second time.
He had not seen his friend lurking behind a tall arrangement of hats and bonnets, too engrossed in the thought of how Valeria would look in a gown of that amethyst silk to pay attention to Lionel’s whereabouts.
“Are you buying something, Lockie?” Lionel edged out from his hiding place, as Mrs. Bird made herself scarce. It appeared that she, too, had not noticed Lionel’s approach.
Duncan grimaced. “Can a gentleman not enquire about a gown without suspicion?”
“Well, I highly doubt you are buying a gown for yourself, my good man, and I am always curious to know what my dear friend is up to,” Lionel replied, running his fingertip across the edge of a bolt of pink silk. “Is this the real reason for your ill temper? Have you encountered a lady, at last, who will not be wooed? Is this an act of persuasion, perchance?”
A crossroads lay ahead of Duncan. He could either tie himself into knots trying to lie his way out of the situation, certain that Lionel would not believe any falsehood anyway; he could tell the truth, and perhaps find relief in having someone to talk to about the situation, at last; or, he could walk out of the shop and pretend the conversation had never taken place.
“I am tired because I did not sleep well, and this is none of those things,” he answered at last, running a hand through his hair. “It is part of a… debt.”
Lionel furrowed his brow in confusion. “You owe gowns as a debt? To whom? Did you destroy someone’s dress or something?”
Puffing out an exasperated breath, Duncan explained the situation with Valeria, as quickly and in as little detail as possible. “So, you see, I am helping her. And ensuring that she stands out is a significant part of that assistance. That is the purpose of the gowns. This will be the third.” He glanced toward the counter. “Thank you again for your help, Mrs. Bird.”
“Not at all, Your Grace,” she chirped back, a little shamefaced.
Lionel stood frozen, as though time had stopped around him. He did not blink, did not move; he just stared at Duncan, slack-jawed. It was not quite the reaction Duncan had expected, but it was a complex matter. It appeared Lionel was still trying to process what he had heard.
“Amelia did not mention any of this to me,” Lionel said, after a moment.
“I doubt Amelia knows,” Duncan replied with a shrug. “Valeria wanted discretion.”
“But she tells her friends everything.”
“And Amelia tells you everything?”
Lionel tilted his head to one side. “I assumed as much.”
“Well, you must not tell her what I have told you,” Duncan urged. “It is Valeria’s secret. She will tell Amelia when she is ready. Maybe not at all, if things go well. Indeed, I suspect Valeria has not mentioned it to her friends because… well, would you consider it a good idea if you were her?”
Leaning back against the shelves, Lionel squinted as if trying to imagine the scene. “I do not see why not. You are well connected. There is nary a gentleman in society who you do not know in some capacity. In terms of matchmaking, you are a veritable encyclopedia.”
“Think harder,” Duncan said. “Consider my reputation.”
Lionel’s eyes widened. “Ah… I see.” He pushed off from the shelves. “Of course, there is an obvious solution here.”
“Hmm?” A tremor ran through the center of Duncan, a shivery feeling that he did not like.
A stilted chuckle escaped Lionel’s throat. “Forgive me, but do you not think that Valeria would make an excellent duchess? You said you were seeking a wife, she is seeking a husband with some urgency—is the solution not right in front of your eyes?”
Duncan cast his friend a mock-withering look, mustering a stiff laugh of his own. “For another duke, I do not doubt she would be exceptional, but she would not do well as mine, nor would she want to be mine.” He shook his head. “I could not be so cruel as to put her through that.”
He was not capable of changing his ways; he had proven that time and time again. For now, he could not stop thinking about her, yearning to be close to her again, but he did not trust himself beyond that. He would not be the cause of her hurt when he inevitably lost interest; she was worth so much more than that, deserved so much more than that.
If he was to marry, he needed a duchess who barely cared about being married—a woman who cared more about her freedom than anything else, who wished to do as she pleased, who was identical to him in behavior. That was the only way that no one would get hurt.
“You care for her,” Lionel said softly, a sly smile upon his lips.
Duncan snorted. “I care about paying my debt and getting her married as swiftly as possible. Now, if you are done here, we have a horse to look at.”
He headed for the door, unwilling to continue a conversation that led nowhere. No, he would not even entertain the idea of marrying that enchanting, exciting, incredible, rare bird of a woman. He would not be the one to cage her.
I must put an end to it…