Page 10 of Defying the Duke
Miss Westfall smiled, letting out a long breath. “You know, it’s a relief to have you aware of the problem. I should have come to you sooner.”
“Yes, you should. But I understand that you wanted to protect your father. What would you have done if you determined him to be guilty?”
She shrugged. “I suppose I would have found a way to pay the money back. Altered the figures in the opposite direction, adding money to the shift reports, I guess. I don’t know, but I would have made it right.”
Jack nodded. “I believe you. You’re your father’s daughter.”
When they reached her building, Jack said, “I shall see you bright and early tomorrow.”
She shook her head. “Tomorrow is Sunday. I shall be in church. Unless you insist otherwise, of course.”
“Of course, you will. I wasn’t aware of what day of the week it is today. Monday, then. I’ll see you then. Enjoy your day of rest.” He nodded farewell and left.
Before going into Sutcliffe’s on Sunday, Jack thumbed through his personal correspondence to see if there was anything he needed to take care of or if his secretary could do it all. He easily tossed aside the apparent invitations, as he had no intention of attending anything Polite Society would invite him to.
He almost added an envelope bearing the seal of the Duke of Greenborough to that pile but caught himself. He knew what the letter would pertain to but not the specifics.
The specifics had him leery of opening the envelope. He dreaded what he’d read inside, but Greensborough clearly wasn’t going to go away just because Jack ignored him. This letter was proof of that.
Breaking the seal, he skimmed the precise handwriting. Blast and damn. According to this, the duke and duchess were holding a ball on the sixteenth of June to announce the engagement of their daughter, Lady Joyce, to the Duke of Abingdon. Jack should expect a formal invitation closer to the date.
Jack would expect no such thing. He’d repeatedly told the duke he had no intentions of following through with the marriage his father and Greenborough had proposed eighteen years ago when Lucy was born.
He’d met the girl once when she was twelve, and he was twenty-five. She was pretty enough then and likely had grown into a lovely young lady, young being the key descriptor. When he decided to marry, he wanted a woman with some experience, maturity, a woman closer to his own age. Lady Joyce was still a child and should be allowed several Seasons to discover what sort of man she wished to marry.
Taking out a sheet of paper, Jack composed what he hoped was a polite repetition of the refusal he’d sent twice already. Sealing it, he put it to one side to have his secretary post for him.
Next, he wrote to his father’s solicitor just to be certain there was no formal agreement between his father and Greenborough.
Lastly, he wrote to his father’s friend, the Duke of Cranbrook. Cranbrook had an interesting circle of friends, all dukes, who’d vowed to come to each others’ aid in matters of an undesirable engagement. This was certainly such a case. Jack detailed the situation in his letter to Cranbrook and explained what he’d already tried to extricate himself from Greenborough’s plans. He asked if there was more he could do, just in case the letter he’d just written didn’t end the farce. He took another signet ring from his desk, the one his father said should be used when contacting the other dukes in the alliance, and sealed the envelope.
Satisfied that he’d done all he could, he headed to Sutcliffe’s to deal with the thefts.
CHAPTER 5
Within a few days, Abingdon had reviewed six more months of the senior dealers’ ledger. As he returned the book he’d just finished auditing to the bookshelf, he said, “I think we can safely say nothing was taken before November.”
Miss Westfall looked up from her work. “Your work here is done, then. You don’t need to sit in this office to determine who’s been stealing from you.”
He cocked his head, hearing what sounded like hopefulness in her voice. “Are you so eager to be done with me?” Standing, he circled his desk, strolled to hers, and sat on the edge beside her chair.
She scooted her chair a few inches away.
He slid along the edge of the desk the same distance. “Is my company so unbearable?”
Where he expected to find panic in her expression, he instead saw obstinance. She turned up her nose at him. “I’m here to perform a service that doesn’t include feeding your ego.”
Delight filled him. This was the Miss Westfall he wanted to know better. He clutched his hand to his chest. “You wound me. I’m shattered by your indifference.”
“Have you ever considered the stage? The ladies of Society would gladly spend their allowance to see you strut and crow.” She was growing more confident in her sass, he could see. The tension had left her body, and her eyes had a twinkle.
Jack preened for a moment, smoothing his hair and stroking nonexistent whiskers on his chin. “Do you see me as Romeo, perhaps? Or Orsino. He’s more like me, I should think. A duke, a man grown.”
She let a moment pass in dramatic perfection. “Bottom, I believe.”
He couldn’t stop the laugh that burst out. “You see me as an ass?”
“Those are your words, Your Grace, not mine.” Her smile said he’d understood her meaning perfectly. “He was an actor, a leader in his troupe, and quite fond of his skills. Do you not see the similarity?”