Page 14 of Duke with a Lie (Wicked Dukes Society #4)
Instead, she had invented a visit to their great-aunt, informing Monford that her aunt’s maid would attend her and that there was no need for Monford—who detested train rides because they made her ill—to accompany her.
The explanation had assuaged her lady’s maid’s feelings of loyalty and had also ensured that she wouldn’t need to fib on Rhiannon’s behalf.
A bit of scent at her wrists and throat, the fastening of some earrings and a necklace, and Rhiannon surveyed herself in the looking glass, deciding she was ready.
She turned to leave her room before the dinner gong went but doubled back hastily, realizing she had yet to don her mask again. With the scrap of silk retrieved and tied in place, she ventured back into the mayhem of the house party.
A swarm of guests was filing in and out of the drawing room as they awaited dinner to be announced.
Fortunately, all evening meals here, much like breakfast, were informal in nature.
With many guests electing to remain anonymous, place settings weren’t set, aside from those established at the head of the table for their hosts, including Rhiannon’s brother Rhys, the Duke of Whitby.
With two of the founding duke members recently married—the Duke of Brandon and the Duke of Camden—that left Richford, Kingham, and Riverdale to round out the four.
And equally fortunate for Rhiannon was that she didn’t need to find Lady Blue herself.
“There you are,” said her friend from breakfast with a smile beneath her half mask as she approached Rhiannon. “I was beginning to wonder if you would be joining us for dinner.”
“I couldn’t decide upon a gown,” Rhiannon confided quietly, casting a glance around the room in search of Richford and trying not to be too obvious about it.
She didn’t see him just yet, and she would recognize his tall, lean form anywhere.
“You have certainly chosen a lovely one,” Blue praised.
“Thank you. Your gown is beautiful as well, although I reckon I ought to call you Lady Green now instead.”
Lady Blue was wearing an emerald-green gown with a gold underskirt, the bodice ornamented with gilt sequins and jet beads. Her mask matched.
She laughed at Rhiannon’s lighthearted joke. “Whilst you are still fully capable of being called Lady Pink. Tell me, are all your gowns this color? It will make it easier to find you in a crush.”
Rhiannon smiled back at her friend, thankful she had found at least one amiable person with whom she could converse. “I do admit to a partiality for pink. However, I also own dresses in other colors.”
Most of which were presently scattered across her floor and bed. She truly was a dreadful mess without Monford to keep her in order. It had taken Richford’s unexpected presence in her bedchamber to make her realize that, however.
The gong sounded then, and their fellow revelers began filing from the drawing room in search of the dining room and their dinners. Rhiannon was in no hurry to be seated anywhere in the vicinity of her brother, so she intentionally stayed where she was on the periphery of the drawing room.
Her friend gave her a questioning look but didn’t comment upon her hesitation.
They chattered about their afternoons, with Rhiannon intentionally leaving out any mention of the Duke of Richford or the observation room.
The less she thought of what had occurred in that narrow viewing chamber earlier, the better off she would be.
Rhiannon had no wish to reignite the fires of longing that she had so recently banked.
If last night was any indication, dinner would take at least two hours to complete with all the courses and guests in attendance, and she would be forced to sit at the table in pained agony for the duration.
“Are you ready to go in to dinner now, my dear?” Lady Blue queried with a solicitous air.
Richford hadn’t come to the drawing room. Rhiannon tamped down the fresh surge of disappointment that rose within her at his absence.
“I suppose we had best do so if we wish to be seated,” she said with a sigh.
“You didn’t happen to be looking for a certain duke, did you?” her friend asked slyly.
Was she that obvious?
“Merely because I wished to avoid him,” she lied airily as they began moving together toward the drawing room door.
“I understand the feeling, believe me.” Lady Blue’s voice possessed a wry note.
“Has your husband discovered you’re here yet?” she asked her friend, keeping her voice low so that it wouldn’t travel to any prying ears as they journeyed down the hall.
“He remains blissfully ignorant,” Lady Blue said. “And that is just how I wish for it to be until I’m prepared to enact my plan.”
Ah, yes. Her plan to incite her terrible husband into divorcing her.
“Have you found anyone of interest?” Rhiannon asked, hoping for her friend’s sake that she had.
What kind of a husband would fail to notice his own wife beneath the same roof? And what manner of man would be so terrible that he’d drive his kindhearted wife to adultery just so that she could obtain a divorce?
“I have a few gentlemen in mind,” Lady Blue said with a sigh. “Alas, engaging in a wild, passionate affaire de coeur isn’t nearly as easy as I had previously supposed.”
“Surely there are more than a few eligible potential suitors.” They were almost at the massive dining room now, and their conversation would necessarily have to revert to a far less personal nature given the proximity of others at the table.
“My dear, I have seen you, and you’ve only eyes for one of the men here,” Lady Blue said slyly. “I daresay you haven’t even taken a single look at the rest. But I can assure you, they are all well enough. Until they open their mouths and begin speaking.”
Her grim pronouncement won a startled laugh from Rhiannon, even if Lady Blue’s observation about her having eyes for Richford alone had cut rather close. “That seems to be the problem with most gentlemen, I fear.”
Richford included.
She and her friend entered the dining room then, putting an end to their chatter.
As if she had conjured him with her thoughts, Rhiannon spied the duke at the far end of the table.
Her pulse leapt at the sight of him, a low tingle taking up steadfast residence in her stomach.
There he was, drat the man, dressed to perfection in evening black with a white necktie and matching waistcoat, his honey-gold hair glinting beneath the light of the chandelier.
He was so handsome it hurt to look at him.
And of course, all Rhiannon could think about was his sinful kisses and his wicked touch. His hand beneath her skirts, his fingers on her pearl, stroking and sending pleasure skating through her. His mouth, his words, his heated stare.
Across the sea of revelers between them, their gazes met and held. Rhiannon was gratified when his eyes dipped to her bodice, taking in the swells of her breasts, pushed scandalously high by her corset and immodest décolletage. His brows snapped together, and his expression turned thunderous.
“It would seem a certain someone has spied you, my dear,” Lady Blue said in an aside.
Rhiannon smiled serenely in Richford’s direction, as if she hadn’t a care.
His glower deepened.
Dinner was going to be an interesting diversion, she thought as she seated herself beside her new friend. Richford was on the opposite side of the table, which meant she could still see him quite well if she tilted her head to the left and shifted in her chair accordingly.
Doing so meant she was unintentionally giving the gentleman at her side an unimpeded view straight down her bodice. Rhiannon only realized it when she caught the masked fellow leering at her with unabashed interest.
She straightened, flicking a glance back in Richford’s direction. He looked furious.
“Brava, my dear girl,” Lady Blue said at her side. “Make him jealous.”
Rhiannon didn’t think she had such a hold on him. But there was no denying the irritation she saw flashing in his eyes.
“I’m not certain I am capable of it,” she told Lady Blue quietly. “I seem more of an irritation to him than anything.”
The company tittered around them, awaiting the first course, oblivious to their conversation, which was just as well to Rhiannon.
Lady Blue was her sole acquaintance here at Wingfield Hall aside from Richford and her brother, and she could hardly seek out Rhys.
Her brother would scold her and send her directly home in shame.
In matters of the heart, she had always found it best to seek the counsel of her female friends.
“You are far more than an irritation if the way he looks at you is any indication,” her friend said. “There was a time when I would have given anything for my husband to gaze at me like that.”
There was sadness in Lady Blue’s voice that tugged at Rhiannon’s heart.
“And now?”
“Now, I simply don’t care. But enough of my woes, Lady Pink. Let us enjoy the sumptuous dinner, shall we?”
Her friend’s words held a grim resignation. Rhiannon wondered if Lady Blue had ever loved her husband. Was he a rake like the Duke of Richford? What had happened between them to make her new friend so jaded, so desperate to escape her marriage?
As the questions rolled through her mind, Rhiannon couldn’t resist another glance Richford’s way.
However, this time, he was distracted, speaking to a brunette near his end of the table.
Her stomach curdled. No doubt the other woman was the sort who appealed to him.
Someone who was experienced and bold. Someone he didn’t think of as a na?ve girl.
Perhaps it was for the best.
She had the earl to consider after all. Her feelings for Richford would likely never be returned. Even if she captured his attention momentarily, he was the sort of man who would inevitably stray. She had no wish for a marriage like Lady Blue’s. That was why she had agreed to wed Carnis.
Rhiannon turned her attention to the soup course with dour resolve, vowing that she wouldn’t spare the duke another glance for the duration of the meal.