Page 8 of A Deviant Spinster for the Duke (The Gentlemen’s Club #3)
CHAPTER EIGHT
“ W hat a treat for my weary eyes!” Duncan cried, opening his arms out as he spotted familiar faces in the Croston’s smoking room. “What the blazes are you all doing here? I assumed you would be asleep in your beds, lamenting your married lives, wishing you would awaken as bachelors. Not you, Vincent—I assumed you would be in your bed because you are an old man in a young man’s body.”
He could not have been gladder to see his good friends, for though he had acquaintances aplenty, he had missed being part of the quartet he used to rely upon. In recent years, it would have been easier to steal the crown jewels than to arrange a gathering with Edmund and Lionel, and Vincent had taken the opportunity to retreat from socializing altogether.
Yet, there they were, at a ball he had almost declined to attend.
Vincent smiled and pulled out an empty chair. “My knees would agree with you, my good man. I suppose I must blame the spring sunshine and my sister’s persuasive letters for my reappearance into society.”
“Which sister?” Duncan asked, taking the seat.
“Isolde. I tasked her with escorting Teresa through the Season’s events, but she has insisted that it ought to be me,” Vincent explained. “I mean to journey to London to do just that, as soon as I have finished this brandy.”
Duncan gestured around him. “Is this not a society event?”
“Not one that Teresa wished to attend,” Vincent replied, pulling a face. “I can hardly blame her. The Croston Ball is always so… overcrowded.”
Edmund nodded. “And I agreed to meet Vincent here, to ensure he did not lose courage and venture back to the Grayling Estate.”
“Truthfully, I do not know why I am here, when my wife and son and sister are in the city,” Lionel remarked, stifling a yawn. “Edmund made it sound exciting, but it has been rather… ordinary. We could have done this in London.”
Duncan chuckled to himself. “Well, you will be pleased to know that the entertainment has arrived. It cannot be boring as long as I am here.” He glanced at Lionel. “Although, I do agree, we could do this in London, and should do it, far more often than you allow me to.”
“Why, dear Duncan, it almost sounds as if you have missed us,” Edmund teased, pouring a hearty measure of brandy for his friend.
Duncan took the glass and downed half. “I will not deny it; I have missed you all. Who would not miss the friends who have abandoned you?”
“Come now,” Lionel protested. “We have not abandoned you.”
“I saw you four times last year,” Duncan replied with a raised eyebrow. “What is that if not abandonment?”
Edmund smiled, swirling the amber liquid in his glass. “When you have convinced some poor lady to marry you, you will understand. It is not that we want to spend less time with you, my good man, it is that there is less time to spend with friends. I swear, once you have a child, life moves at ten times the pace.”
“And I would not exchange it for anything,” Lionel interjected, his eyes shining with love for the wife who was miles away in London. “The two of you really should hurry up and find yourselves a wife. It is… remarkable. It is the best gift in the world.”
Vincent nearly spat out the mouthful of brandy he had just sipped. “ I am in no hurry,” he said, dabbing his mouth. “Sometimes, I think I will not bother at all. When you have been surrounded by women your entire life, there is less inclination to bring a new one into your home, by choice. No offence to you, Lionel, but I plan to enjoy some peace before I even consider taking a wife.”
Lionel frowned, apparently forgetting that there was a time, not too long ago, when he had been equally averse to the idea of marriage. Then again, maybe that was the reason why he was so determined to get everyone else to marry—because his mind had been changed, his friends’ minds could be changed too.
“I suppose I can understand that,” Lionel said with a shrug. “But what of you, Lockie? Surely, you cannot continue being a libertine forever?”
Edmund sat back in his chair. “Speaking of which, where did you disappear to?”
“Disappear? I do not know what you mean,” Duncan replied, putting on an expression that was the very picture of innocence.
There was no way that his friends could have seen him slip out of the ballroom to sneak to the library. Indeed, he had not even known they were there until two minutes ago.
“I saw you head out into the gardens,” Edmund replied. “I was coming over to greet you, then off you went, slinking out like a fox on his way to the henhouse.”
Duncan pulled what he trusted was a confused face and drank the rest of his brandy to buy himself a moment. “I did what everyone does when they venture outside during a ball—I took in some fresh air, wandered awhile, and did my very best to see if there was anything scandalous afoot.”
“Was there?” Vincent asked, pouring more for the quartet.
“Alas not,” Duncan replied. “Perhaps, it is a dull ball after all.”
Though I have had at least one thrill… It would take him a while to forget the sight of Valeria in that gown, the blaze of her auburn hair, the moonlight gleam of her pale skin, the hitch of her breath as she looked into his eyes. Even now, he wondered what she would have done if he had kissed her; rather, how badly his cheek would be stinging, and how long the handprint would last.
He had not enjoyed himself so much in ages.
“You still have not answered my question,” Lionel pointed out. “When are you going to settle, Lockie?”
Vincent snorted. “I reckon around the time that the sun starts rising from the west and setting in the east.”
“No, no, I think when pigs start flying,” Edmund remarked. “I have been keeping watch. As of now, I have seen only birds, but who knows?”
Duncan smiled, shaking his head. “I do not know why Vincent is given leniency from your teasing because he grew up surrounded by women. Should that not, in truth, make it easier for him to find a wife? There is nothing a woman likes so much as a man who is familiar with women and all their odd habits.”
“A fair point.” Edmund grinned, relaxing. “In all seriousness, Lockie, it is as much a matter of legacy as finding happiness. It is on your shoulders to secure the future of your title and name. As Duke of Thornhill, it is your duty.”
There was a stillness in their corner of the smoking room, the four men holding a weighted silence for a moment. They knew what Duncan had endured, they knew his situation, they knew that he was not alone because he had chosen to be.
“It is harder to do,” Duncan broke the silence, a wry smile upon his lips, “when the duty was never supposed to be yours.”
Lionel sighed, the way a wearied father might. “Perhaps, old boy, but even second sons have families.”
“Indeed,” Vincent agreed, “being a second son is not an immediate initiation into perpetual bachelorhood. They marry, they have children, they do—I hear—go on to live very happy and fulfilled lives. The duty would still be there, even if the situation was different.”
Duncan laughed, groaning as he tilted his head up to the ceiling. “You are supposed to offer sympathy!” he protested, forcing amusement into his voice. “What is the purpose of a dead brother, a dead family, if I cannot have pity whenever I please? It is supposed to get me out of things, not add more urgency.”
Edmund chuckled, the sound faintly sad. “Of course, you shall always have our sympathy.”
“I sense a caveat,” Duncan replied, his eyebrow raised.
“You are a duke, Lockie,” Edmund said. “You need a duchess at some point. A lady born to be one who can, at the very least, rein you into some form of seriousness. I realize that ‘rake’ and ‘duke’ share two letters, but it is high time you exchanged one fully for the other.”
Duncan nodded, feigning consideration. “I understand.” He paused, smirking. “You wish me to turn all of my attention toward infamy. Why, in my pursuits, I might even find a lady who is the same as me. Society would not know what to do with us—a duke and duchess like none the ton has ever seen before!”
“You are incorrigible,” Vincent said, laughing into his glass of brandy.
Lionel tilted his head. “Or, perhaps, there is some truth in your jest, Lockie. Maybe, in your pursuits, you will find a lady—not one who is like you, but one who completes you. A lady you find you cannot be without. A lady who, against all odds, captivates you so greatly that you change your ways.”
“I refer you to an earlier point,” Vincent interjected. “Pigs will fly first.”
Glancing at his friends, Duncan took a small sip of his drink, his mind wandering to thoughts of Valeria. She was certainly unlike any lady he had encountered before, and he had sought to delay the repayment of his debt in order to see her again.
But someone I could not be without? Someone who could make me give up the delightful life I have? He laughed to himself at the very thought, for who in their right mind would exchange variety for repetition? He did not want a dull existence or to abide by expectation, not when tomorrow was not guaranteed for anyone.
“What is so amusing?” Lionel asked, squinting at his friend.
Duncan waved the question away. “Nothing at all.”
Just how ludicrous it would be for me to ever settle…
No, for now, he was quite content to be moving in the opposite direction. After all, if marriage, legacy and boredom were what he wanted, he would have allowed that lady in the gardens to trap him in her net.
Valeria is an amusement, that is all, like reading a good book or listening to a stirring piece of music. It ends, eventually, and you move on to the next.
He downed what was in his glass and poured another, until thoughts of her grew fuzzy around the edges, blurring her into the peaceful fog of inebriation. For reasons he could not and would not deign to explain, he had a sudden need to drown her out of his mind.