Page 29

C arter Abbott, the newly minted Duke of Belmont, sighed and stepped into the grand entry at Weyland House.

“Good evening, Warton.” He handed the butler his overcoat and leaned in to speak low. “How small is this small dinner, in reality?”

“Middling sized, I would venture, Your Grace,” the old retainer answered with a carefully blank face.

Cart sighed. “As I suspected.”

“The company is gathered in the parlor in the east wing, sir.”

“Thank you. Don’t trouble yourself. I know the way.”

“I hope you don’t mind if I say it’s good to have you back, sir.”

“Thank you, Warton. It’s good to see you, too.”

The sound of laughter and easy conversation grew louder as Cart approached the parlor. He paused outside the door a moment, observing the sparkling company. This was to be his life now. Long, lonely hours at his own estate, a bit of country company now and then—

He stopped as the large and utterly unbalanced number of young females inside finally registered. Oh yes—and endless matchmaking until he did his duty and stuck his neck into parson’s mousetrap.

“Belmont! Stop lurking in the passage and come in, boy!”

Cart stepped inside. “Good evening, Whiskers. Thank you for the invitation. It was kind of you to think of me.”

Colonel Gillows, his godfather, his neighbor, and his late father’s closest friend, slapped him on the back.

“Nonsense, my boy. It’s time you started getting out again.

” Beckoning a footman, the colonel took a glass of wine from a tray and handed it to Cart.

“But please, don’t call me Whiskers in front of the ladies. ”

“Why? Have you got your eye on one of them in particular?” Cart scanned the room. “Which one?”

“Saints, no! I’m too old for such shenanigans. But it’s not dignified, eh? It was adorable when you were in short pants, but those days are long gone.”

“And yet you’ll still always be my Whiskers, sir.” Cart raised his glass. “And you are still the man who has always had my back.”

“Yes, yes. Don’t get sentimental on me, boy. Save it for the ladies. I may not be on the lookout, but you, good sir, are exactly the right age and circumstance to be galumphing through this field of fillies, eh?” The colonel gave him a little shove. “Now, get out there, boy!”

Cart went, as there was no use in defying the old man. Whiskers could scold as bitingly as a Billingsgate fishwife, and would not hesitate to do it in company.

Cart quickly discovered he knew almost no one there.

It had been years since he’d spent any significant time in Devonshire.

Not since he was a boy. Since he’d returned, forced to leave his real life behind, he’d kept to Breakwater Hall.

He was busy enough learning what he needed to know about the estate, the ducal empire, and taking up the duties that had never been meant for him.

He also discovered everyone appeared eager to meet him. Cart nodded and smiled. He spoke affably. He endured condolences on the loss of his brothers and congratulations on his elevation to the title. Most of them meant well.

At least no one was so crass as to allude to them both, together.

Until Orwen Chesil clapped him heartily on the shoulder.

“Cart. There you are. I was hoping to see you tonight.” Chesil was one of the local boys Cart and his brothers had run wild with in their younger days. “I was just telling our lovely visitor that Cliffstone has finally come available. I thought you might be interested in the news as well.”

Despite his lingering dislike for the man, Cart stopped, interested. “Chesil.” He nodded, then frowned. “Cliffstone, you say? But what of Mrs. Maestor?” The old woman owned the rambling cottage that sat on the cliffs, high above the sea and not too far down the coast.

“Passed on to her last reward,” Chesil said, without an ounce of dismay.

“I’m sorry to hear it.” She had been a formidable old lady, scolding and chasing Cart and his brothers away from the stunning structure she’d built into the cliffs below her house—but she had always sent them off with their pockets full of biscuits.

“The cottage is to be sold, then? And the theatre along with it?”

“Part and parcel.” Chesil eyed him with speculation. “Perhaps you’ll be interested, as it’s adjacent to your own lands now?”

Cart shrugged.

Chesil ran an assessing eye over him. “Well, Cart—” He stopped.

“I suppose I should call you Belmont now, though I honestly never would have thought to find you at the helm of Breakwater. All those summers we spent digging, fishing, swimming and sailing up and down the coast—you were the cleverest of us, I’ll give you that.

But Robert always seemed to be particularly suited to take on the ducal role. ”

“I couldn’t agree more.” It felt like the first time Cart had ever agreed with the man on any topic. Orwen Chesil had always been his least favorite of the local boys.

“It just goes to show that we are all at the mercy of the whims of fate, doesn’t it? A freak storm, that was. No one could have predicted it, not even two experienced yachtsmen like Robert and James.” Chesil shook his head. “Ah well. It was an ill wind that blew you some good, wasn’t it?”

Aghast, Cart stilled. Had the worm truly just said—?

“How stunningly rude,” a feminine voice said clearly. The woman behind Chesil, the one he’d turned away from in order to greet Cart, stepped up to frown at the man.

Chesil was forgotten as Cart stared. It seemed unfathomable that he hadn’t been aware of her earlier.

She’d been fashioned to draw attention. Even standing stiff, chin high and dripping disapproval, she was magnificent.

Her dark eyes flashed. Candlelight caressed her chestnut curls and gilded skin like pure cream.

She stood straight—tall enough for the top of her head to reach his chin—and the stance put all of her curves on display.

“Mr. Chesil, you disappoint me. I believe you owe your friend an apology.”

There was a warning in her tone and Cart was immediately wild to know what it meant. His curiosity spiked further when Chesil blanched.

“Of course. Didn’t mean to offend, Belmont. Fond of both of your brothers, I was. And you too, of course, though we haven’t seen much of you—”

“Why don’t you introduce us?” the woman interrupted.

“Of course. Of course. Your Grace, may I present Lady Merritt Beving. Lady Merritt, the Duke of Belmont.”

Cart bent over her hand, letting his gaze run over her gown of deepest-maroon silk.

The bodice was cut just the smallest bit lower than most of the women here would countenance, and graced with delicate golden embroidery.

A center panel in her divided skirts featured a matching rich brocade of maroon and gold.

A pearl cuff adorned the wrist he held and a rope of luscious pearls wound repeatedly around her neck. “A pleasure, Lady Merritt.”

“The pleasure is mine, Your Grace.” She spared Chesil a dismissive glance. “You may go away now, Mr. Chesil.”

Chesil stiffened and frowned, but he quickly wiped it away. “I will let you two get acquainted, then.” With a nod for them both, he slipped away, heading for the nearest footman with a laden tray.

“Well, I daresay that was unpleasant,” Lady Merritt said frankly. “I do apologize if I made it worse, but really, the man must not be allowed to get away with such callous behavior.”

“He was the same when we were young,” Cart said, unable to spare any attention for the retreating Chesil, or for anyone else, for that matter. Her voice was as enchanting as the rest of her, low and with a slightly husky edge to it. “I would have thought he might have outgrown it.”

“Not that I have noticed, in my short time in the village,” the lady said. “And like any other person who always claimed to be just stating the truth , he only brings it out when he means to discomfort, unbalance, or humiliate.”

“I see you are fond of a bit of brutal honesty yourself.”

“I am, but I try to direct it mostly at myself and not swing it around as a weapon.”

“You must have some weapon tucked away.” Cart held her gaze, although he wanted to let his own slide over her. “I don’t ever recall him so easily chased off.”

She waved a hand as the corner of her mouth turned up. “Oh, Mr. Chesil needs to stay in my good graces.” She gave a raspy little laugh that set his pulse to racing. “And it seems I am perfectly willing to use that as a weapon.”

“Is he courting you, then?” The notion seemed suddenly and unequivocally wrong.

“He’s stalking my pocketbook, rather, and looking for my help with his plans for transforming Shoring into a coastal spa town.

” Snapping open her fan, she waved it before her.

“That is quite enough of my evening spent on Mr. Chesil. It’s growing warm in here.

” Her brilliant gaze softened. “Would you care to step out on the terrace?”

Agreeing with alacrity, he led her out to where others had gathered on the stone expanse.

Cart rolled his eyes. “The colonel said this was to be a small dinner party,” he said with a sigh.

But his ire was forgotten as he allowed himself to feel the soft sea breeze.

He was drawn like a magnet to the farthest edge of the stone balustrade, where the moon was rising over the sea.

Breathing out, he took it all in. The wind, the sound of the surf far below, the path of light across the water.

“Now this,” he sighed, “ this I have missed.”

“You lived in London,” she said softly. “That’s what the gossips say. You had a career.”

He didn’t want to talk about everything he’d given up.

Not here. Not with her piercing gaze upon him.

“You must find it grating to your nerves,” he said, still staring at the nearly full moon hanging over the water.

“To have men like Chesil looking at you and seeing only your purse.” He knew how to lead a witness toward the subject he wanted to discuss—or away from the one he didn’t.

“Don’t worry, Your Grace. You will get used to it.”

Damn. She wasn’t going to be led. He didn’t respond, only lifted an intimidating bow.

It didn’t scare her off.

“They are looking at you and seeing only a man who has been handed one of the highest titles in the kingdom, and lands and fortune to go with it. Or they have enough heart to see the pain of losing not one, but two brothers in order to get it. But none of them are looking close enough to see what you are truly mourning, are they?”

Cart blinked, stunned. No one—not one other person—had looked at him and seen him so clearly. Who was this woman?

“You do get used to it, as I said,” she said on a sigh.

“Every young woman who has ever been thrown on the Marriage Mart understands that pain. The horror of being looked at and being seen only for what you could bring, how decorative you might look on an arm or at the head of a dining table, or at the bottom of a banking account. It hurts, when everyone looks right past the real person you are—and the pain grows worse when they never try to find out.”

Cart could not recall the last time anyone had so surprised him. Or, to put it more bluntly, had knocked him backward onto his metaphorical arse.

A throat cleared nearby. “Excuse the interruption. Might I have a word?”

Blinking, Cart turned and peered into the shadows at the edge of the terrace. “Evans?” Had the woman rattled his wits with her bludgeon of truth? “What in seven hells are you doing here?”

“A word, please, Your Grace?” John Evans was the solicitor he’d worked closely with for years—most recently on the biggest case of his life. The one he’d had to leave behind. John was also a friend. A real friend—one that Cart would do most anything for.

And yet he didn’t want to turn away from Lady Merritt Beving.

“Do excuse me, Your Grace,” she said into the silence, sounding not the least bit affected. “You are clearly needed, and I really must go and make sure I am not seated next to Chesil at dinner.”

With a sparkling smile distributed between them, she headed inside.

Cart stared after her.

He didn’t know how long it was before Evans cleared his throat again. “I wouldn’t have come if it wasn’t important.”

Cart gave himself a shake. “Yes, Evans. I’m sorry.” He reached out to clasp the man’s hand. “Damn, but it’s good to see you.” He peered at his friend’s face, seeing the solemnity there even in the moonlight. “What is it? What’s happened?”

“Someone has tried to kill Linwood.”

Cold dismay seized him. “Is he—?”

“He survived.”

Cart breathed out his relief. Henry Linwood was a playwright, a character in every sense of the word, and the key witness in the stunning murder trial that was about to take London by storm—the case Cart had been meant to bring before the courts. Before…

He turned his personal musings aside. “It was Allard?”

Deacon Allard was the accused murderer. He was also one of the richest and most powerful men in England.

“Who else?” Evans looked grim. “And he will try again.”

“What will you do?”

“Ask for help.” Evans raised a brow and waited.

“Evans, no. I am no longer—”

“I’ve brought him with me, sir.”

“What?”

“I snuck Linwood out of hospital in the dead of night. No one saw or suspected. We’ve been driving for days and there has been no sign of pursuit.”

“Allard is not stupid. He’ll come looking.”

“I sent a decoy carriage heading north, using my name.”

“That might slow him down, but eventually he’ll—”

“A couple of weeks,” Evans pleaded. “Just keep Linwood safe and hidden for a couple of weeks. We cannot lose him. The case would fall apart.”

“Keep Linwood hidden? He’s not the least-in-sight type. He lives to be noticed.”

“I’ve convinced him he can use this time away as a retreat, a chance to finish his latest play.”

The notion spawned an idea. Cart was more than sympathetic. Of all people, he knew how crucial the playwright’s eyewitness testimony was for the case.

“Yes, fine. You’re right. He cannot stay at Breakwater, though. Word will spread. But I know just the place.” He paused. “Yes, I think it will be perfect.”