Page 5 of My Disastrous Duchess (The Untamed Ladies #2)

M argaret had been so happy to escape London and her mother that she hadn’t considered the consequences of returning to the place where her father was known best. Helena and Jane had told her to prepare herself in the carriage, but Margaret – naive, diplomatic Margaret – had assumed the worst she would encounter were a few words of pity.

Wiltshire was her home. Things wouldn’t be like in London.

On that account, she was right.

When the master of ceremonies had announced her party at the doors, the Pembroke name ripped through the crowd, causing all the nearby guests to turn abruptly toward them.

Margaret froze, feeling like she was in some sort of warped reality.

What had she done to earn such frightened looks from the people she had known all her life?

She turned to whisper to Jane. “Am I imagining things, or...”

“Or is everyone looking at us?” Helena completed her scan of the room. “I mean, really looking at us. Anyone would think we had just brought in the plague.”

Margaret tried not to take that personally, swallowing hard as the whispering started. The sound of her father’s name being hissed was unmistakable, her own name alongside it.

“It is lunacy, utter lunacy, and we should treat it thusly,” Jane said, sucking in her cheeks and hurrying the girls forward. “Looking at you as if?—”

“As if they will lose their own respectability too, just by being in my presence,” Margaret murmured, a cold sweat breaking out on her forehead. “Perhaps this was a mistake.”

“Nonsense, Margaret. There can be no backing down now.” Jane stopped in her tracks, smiling facetiously at a passing gentlewoman whose mouth was hanging open in shock. “Allow me a moment to work my magic and ready the room for you. Logic – and if not logic, then good manners – will prevail.”

She nodded encouragingly and took off in a blur of magenta silk. Helena looked sideways at Margaret and said, “When has it ever?” She scoffed and pulled Margaret away, leading her toward the drink table while Jane warmed the room for them.

It would take a blistering wildfire to unfreeze this lot , Margaret thought, refusing the goblet of punch Helena handed her.

Her stomach was doing somersaults, and vomiting punch all over the assembly room floor wasn’t going to help matters.

Helena was undeterred, thrusting a wafer into her hand.

Margaret nibbled at it pathetically as Helena pressed forward, keeping to the walls until they found a relatively quiet corner.

“Look on the bright side,” Helena said with forced levity, elbowing Margaret in the ribs. “At least Baron Faversham is nowhere to be seen.”

Margaret groaned and dropped her wafer, discarding it in a nearby potted plant.

The mention of Faversham did not have the intended effect, and she hung her head to take in a few deep breaths.

Helena tried her best to calm her, talking about the anthology she had abandoned back at home.

Between comparisons of William Cowper to Lord Byron, Margaret started to feel a modicum of relief.

But that would only last so long. Not two minutes later, she heard something that made her blood run cold.

Two men were standing behind her. Maybe they had always been there, maybe not. At present, they were discussing her father’s disappearance like the results of a horse race, and Margaret couldn’t ignore them even if she had tried.

“The man is dead,” one of them said flippantly. “Loaded pockets with stones... Long walk towards France... Not a great loss...”

The image he conjured made her stomach churn all over again.

She wished now that she had been in possession of a drink – would have turned around and thrown it right in his face.

Her sadness and fear slipped away, giving way to a hot anger.

It raged inside her with nowhere to go, until she couldn’t stop herself from turning around and letting that wretch know exactly what she thought of him. ..

Except he chose that moment to turn as well, and whether she had a drink or not didn’t matter, because he did.

The rest was history.

“What have you...” The man cut himself off, looking down at himself. His formerly pristine cream vest was ruined. He looked up at Margaret, and she watched as recognition sparked in his eyes.

Margaret’s breath hitched. He was Alexander Somerton, the Duke of Langley – the man who had snubbed her so badly two years ago that she had taken herself off the marriage mart altogether.

Neither of them spoke for a beat as the surrounding guests turned to look at them, the sound of glass shattering having suddenly drawn their attention.

The duke wasn’t alone. The man beside him was Viscount Simon Stockton, a friend of a friend whom Margaret had met once or twice in London before her life had irreparably changed. He smiled like this was the funniest thing in the world to him, beaming as he examined Margaret from head to toe.

“Miss Pembroke,” Simon said to break the silence, glancing amusedly at Alexander. “You are here and not in London? What a... surprise. We were, in fact, just talking about you.”

“I know – you and everyone else,” Margaret said through gritted teeth, the better part of her decorum evaporating like the wine.

“But at least the other gossips had the decency to keep the volume of their slandering to a minimum. You were speaking loudly enough for assembly rooms, Herbert, Shakespeare, and Cradock to hear what you thought, I am sure.”

Her unfettered response stunned Simon. He turned haplessly to the duke, who by now had recovered from his shock and was clearly looking for an apology.

She remembered his type: proper, perfectionist, the coldest gentleman she had ever met.

He was still disarmingly handsome, taller than most men, with dark hair and hazel eyes.

An almost perfect appearance, except for a ruggedness he tried desperately to conceal, inherited from his French mother.

Oh yes, Margaret had heard everything about the Duke of Langley’s bastard history.

His past had been blemished by a scandal just like Margaret’s, which made him a hypocrite for talking about her as well as a wretch.

“What have you to say for yourself?” the duke asked, ignoring Simon. He cocked his head angrily, eyes burning like hot steel and cutting right through her. “Miss Pembroke, I am speaking to you, and I will have an answer.”

She didn’t appreciate his tone, duke or not. “It was only a glass of wine.”

“A glass of wine that you poured all over me,” he argued, shaking the wine off his hands for emphasis.

Margaret winced, trying to avoid the splatter.

He looked down at his vest again and sighed, storming over to the drinks table to grab a napkin, forcing Margaret and the rest to follow. “The least you could do is apologize.”

“I beg your pardon?” Margaret watched him dab aimlessly at his vest, then throw the napkin aside. “After what you said about my father, you should be apologizing to me .”

“Come now, Margaret...” It was Simon speaking, trying to defuse the situation now that more onlookers had come to gawk. “Just give the man what he wants and be done with it.”

Margaret glanced nervously around. Helena stood faithfully by her side, shaking her head at Simon in disappointment.

More guests were gathering by the minute, and they all looked at her the same way: she was an irritation, vermin that should have stayed in London in the ruins of her house rather than disgracing them with her attendance that night, and now she had gone and upset the duke.

Something snapped inside her. What good were manners against prejudice like that? Everyone in that room already thought the lowest of her. She would not trade the remnants of her self-respect for the Duke of Langley’s approval. He would be receiving no apology from her that night, or ever.

Margaret spoke through labored breaths, staring at the duke intently: “How about this, Your Grace? Had I known it was you standing behind me, I would not have turned so abruptly. For in fact, I would not have been standing anywhere near you. That was my first and only mistake of the night... Is that answer acceptable to you?”

The duke smiled in disbelief, looking almost impressed. Margaret still vibrated from the callousness of his words, but his rage was delicious. She hadn’t felt so alive in years.

“Sadly not.” The duke kept his tone frustratingly neutral, probably hoping to make her look like a madwoman. “I find your attempt at an apology lacking. For one, I have always found apologies much more effective when they come with a smile."

It was a dare, an insult, trying to get her to smile for him even though he was in the wrong.

“And I have always found pink to be a much more becoming color than beige.” She nodded at his vest. “You might thank me for the improvement to your appearance instead of begging for apologies that you are not owed.”

“Ah.” The duke paused, then let out an offended laugh. “So now you would add insult to injury. I had not known you were a fashion-expert as well as a hoyden.”

“I am many things, Your Grace, none of which I would expect you to know. What few meetings we have shared have been fleeting at best.” She waved at the watch hanging from his pocket, igniting what she hoped was an unpleasant memory for him – if he remembered her at all.

“Perhaps you might look at your watch again and tell me it is time to leave for old times’ sake. ”

“Oh, it certainly is time to leave, Miss Pembroke. But not for my benefit, I assure you. Your behavior tonight is inadmissible, regardless of your current circumstances.”

“Circumstances of which you have evidently apprised yourself in full. That you could say such a thing about my father... He once considered you a friend?—”

He cut her off, eyes widening at the accusation. “We were nothing of the sort, and you will not cast me in with him.”