Page 43 of Duke with a Lie (Wicked Dukes Society #4)
T hey found the Earl of Carnis at the Black Souls Club, which proved a godsend because Aubrey was good friends with the club’s owner, Elijah Decker. Decker was more than happy to provide a private room for an audience between Carnis, Whitby, and Aubrey.
The three of them closeted themselves behind the privacy of a closed door, Carnis going pale as he took in the state of Aubrey’s face.
“Do you see this, Carnis?” Aubrey asked, grinning even though it hurt like the devil to do so. “This is what your face shall look like if you continue trying to force an unwilling woman to wed you.”
“See here,” Carnis sputtered. “No one is unwilling. Lady Rhiannon and I have had an understanding for months now.”
“As I comprehend it, the lady told you she didn’t want to marry you any longer,” he said softly, allowing menace to lace his voice.
“And you threatened her with scandal and ruin if she failed to do what you wanted,” Whit added, cracking his already bruised knuckles.
Carnis swallowed hard. “There was no threat, and neither was there force, I can assure you.”
“Again, that’s not what Lady Rhiannon said,” Aubrey stated calmly. “And do you know who I believe, Carnis?”
“Y-yes. N-no,” the earl stammered, clearly understanding that there was no good way for him to answer the question.
“I believe Lady Rhiannon,” he said. “I believe that you flew into a jealous rage when you learned Lady Rhiannon was in love with someone else, so you decided to blackmail her into doing your bidding.”
“I was doing nothing of the sort,” Carnis blustered, drawing himself up.
Whit cracked his knuckles again. “Do you know who did that to Richford’s face, Carnis?”
The earl stared.
“It was me,” Whit said conversationally. “And Richford here is one of my closest chums. What do you think I intend to do to you?”
“Please. I…I don’t want any difficulties,” the earl said, eyes wide. “I didn’t mean to blackmail her. I…I wouldn’t have hurt her. I’m in love with Lady Rhiannon. I just… I wanted her to be my wife.”
“That makes two of us, Carnis,” Aubrey told the bastard. “But you aren’t the one who is going to win this particular battle. I am.”
“You can have her,” Carnis said, eyes darting wildly about the room as Aubrey and Whit drew nearer. “I won’t tell a soul what I know. I swear it.”
“Good,” Whit said. “Because if you do, I’ll thrash you. And then I’ll see that you’re ruined everywhere. You’ll be turned out of this club and every other. I’ll haunt you even when you’re dead. Do you understand me?”
“And if you do anything to harm Lady Rhiannon’s reputation or cause her distress in any way, I’ll gut you like a bloody fish,” Aubrey concluded. “Understood?”
“Y-yes.” Carnis nodded wildly. “Understood.”
“Good.” Aubrey shot a look toward Whit through the eye that wasn’t swelling closed. “I believe we have another call to pay.”
Perdita’s smile vanished when she saw both Aubrey’s face and that he had brought a companion with him for his impromptu visit.
“Your Graces,” she greeted them with forced cheer. “You honor me with your call.”
Despite her words, she appeared anything but pleased to see them.
As if remembering herself belatedly, she dipped into a curtsy in her small drawing room, which was laden with objets d’art and other bric-a-brac.
Aubrey didn’t bother returning a polite bow, and neither did Whit.
He moved toward her with a calm he didn’t feel. “It has come to our attention that you have been spreading false tales about Lady Rhiannon,” he said, keeping his voice carefully polite and low.
She wetted her lips. “I would never?—”
“Enough,” he interrupted before she could offer a lie he wouldn’t believe and hadn’t the patience to hear uttered. “I know that you did so, as does Whitby. In fact, it was your tales that led to Carnis attempting to blackmail Lady Rhiannon into marrying him.”
Her eyebrows rose. “I had nothing to do with the earl’s decision concerning Lady Rhiannon. I merely thought it fair for him to be apprised of the manner of woman he wanted to make his wife.”
“And what manner of woman is that, Lady Heathcote?” Whit asked sharply.
“I…I…” Her gaze went from Whit to Aubrey and then back as a flush crept over her cheeks. “Forgive me. I didn’t mean to say something untoward.”
“But you did,” Aubrey pointed out coldly. “Apologize.”
“I’m sorry,” she said hastily.
“You will also apologize to Lady Rhiannon, in writing,” he added, knowing Rhiannon wouldn’t wish to face Perdita again and sparing her the discomfort.
She was owed an apology, however.
“Richford, you cannot come into my home making demands of me,” she began.
“Yes, I can,” he countered. “Because if you don’t do exactly as I say, I’ll go to Lord Heathcote with everything I know about you, my lady. Every vice, each lover. I have detailed notes concerning the particular…activities of the members of our club, you see.”
“As do I, my lady,” Whit added smoothly. “And I won’t be afraid to use those details to protect my sister as I must. I’m sure you understand.”
“Please, Your Grace,” she entreated. “I meant no harm. You cannot go to my husband with what you know. It would be disastrous for me.”
“I don’t suppose Heathcote is a very forgiving man, is he?” Aubrey asked idly.
“I don’t reckon he is,” Whit agreed. “It would be a pity to have to sow marital discord, but if I were to learn that tongues were wagging about Lady Rhiannon again, I would have no other choice, I’m afraid.”
“Nor would I,” Aubrey added. “Especially not since Lady Rhiannon has done me the great honor of agreeing to become the next Duchess of Richford.”
Perdita gasped. “You’re marrying her?”
“Yes.” Aubrey grinned, his split lip hurting like hell. “I am.”
Perdita shook her head. “I promise never to speak another word against Lady Rhiannon.”
“See that you don’t,” Aubrey told her.
The carriage proceeded on, the next destination Whit’s town house, where Rhiannon awaited their return.
“Do you think Carnis and Lady Heathcote will heed our warnings?” he asked Whit into the awkward silence that had fallen.
“I think they had better, or they will face our wrath,” Whit said. “And the outcome will be even uglier than your face.”
He winced and then winced again as the action shot pain through him. “Careful. You may wound my poor feelings.”
“You’re fortunate I didn’t kill you.” Whit raised a dark brow. “You have a great deal of explaining to do, Richford.”
“I am sorry for the way everything happened,” he told his friend at last. “But I cannot say I’m sorry that it happened. I love your sister.”
“Like a grasshopper or some such rot,” Whit muttered.
“It was a conversation we had about Eos and Tithonus,” he began.
Whit held up a staying hand. “I don’t want to hear about your romance with my sister, if you please. All I want to know is why you didn’t bloody well tell me that the hoyden had found her way into Wingfield Hall the moment you realized it.”
Why, indeed?
“I was being selfish,” he admitted. “I wanted her to stay. If I’m perfectly honest with myself, I can admit that I have harbored…tender feelings for Rhiannon for some time.”
“Christ.” Whit wiped a hand over his face as if he’d just been splattered with something dirty.
“Not always,” he defended himself. “In the last year or so, I’ve found her increasingly difficult not to notice.
She’s wild and bold and…” He allowed his words to trail off, feeling embarrassed heat creep up his throat and make his ears go hot.
“Well, I’m sure you see what I mean, given that you’ve newly fallen in love yourself. ”
“What happened between the two of you after the house party?” Whit asked, his brow furrowed. “What took so long for you to come to your senses?”
“You know my past,” he said quietly. “I was fearful because of what happened. I thought that she would be better off without me, that I couldn’t love her as she deserved.
Truth be told, I’m still not certain I can love her as she deserves.
She’s far too bloody good for me. All I can do is promise that I’ll love her and protect her with everything in me, as long as I’ve breath left in my lungs. ”
Whit stared at him in a tense silence for a few moments, seeming to look straight into the depths of Aubrey’s soul. He didn’t care. He had nothing left to hide. He stared back, unrelenting.
Finally, his friend gave a jerky nod. “If Rhiannon wishes to have your sorry hide, then I wish both of you happy.”
Whit’s approval. Relief hit Aubrey in the chest. He could breathe again.
“Thank you, Whit. You won’t regret this, I vow it.”
His friend gave him a pointed look. “If I do, then I’ll be decorating that ugly face of yours again. Only next time, I won’t be so gentle.”
Aubrey chuckled. “Touché, old chum.”
Several hours had passed by the time Aubrey returned to Rhiannon in the drawing room of Whit’s town house, where she was seated with her mother. The dowager Duchess of Whitby gazed at him with obvious alarm from behind her gold-rimmed spectacles as he and Whit crossed the threshold.
“Your Grace, what has happened?”
“The settling of a score,” he said wryly, casting a glance in his friend’s direction.
The blows he had received had been earned, and Aubrey knew it.
Moreover, Whit’s reaction was no less than what his own would have been had he a sister and Whit had seduced her.
What Aubrey had done was wrong. He ought to have asked for Rhiannon’s hand from the moment he had pulled her from naughty charades.
He should have carried her away to Villiers House, and they could have eloped and avoided all this blasted strife.
But he hadn’t carried her away, and neither had they eloped. Instead, their path to love had been long and winding and fraught with miscommunication and his own obstinacy and idiocy.
“What manner of score?” the dowager wanted to know, sounding scandalized as she glanced from Rhiannon to her son. “I had no notion Richford was such a ruffian.”