Page 12 of The Duke's List

Captain Thorne’s grin, however, was contagious. “Major Bourne here has directed his martial efforts into keeping the cottage ship-shape. And the barn. Bert gets nettled every week when the major here throws himself into righting the mess out there.”

“And what about firewood?” He swept his hand toward the massive pile next to the fireplace. “Do the two of you have enough to get you through the winter? Along about January, the weather can get right zneesy along the coast.”

“What with Bourne the younger chopping firewood in a frenzy of trying to ignore Lady Harriet, and then his father trying to forget God knows what, we won’t need to worry for at least another year.” Thorne tamped his ever-present pipe against a table leg only to get a pointed look from his cottage mate.

“Are you?” Sidmouth looked up at Bourne with renewed interest.

“Am I what?” The elder Bourne folded his arms over his stomach and gave Sidmouth a piercing glare over the top of the spectacles he’d donned when they’d returned to the cottage.

“Trying to forget something?” When there was a long, awkward pause, Sidmouth leaned forward and glared back just as hard. “Or someone?”

Bourne stood suddenly and clenched his hands into fists. “You know what you need?”

Sidmouth blinked and stood as well.

“I have a stash of fine Irish whiskey.” He pointed back at Sidmouth’s chair. “Begging your forbearance, Your Grace, but please sit down, and I’ll bring you the finest dram you’ve ever had.”

Sidmouth eased back onto the wobbly chair and smiled. He had the feeling he was about to become great friends with Bourne the elder.

When Bourne returnedwith the dark, brown bottle, he poured three neat tots into the glasses Thorne had placed on the table. The minute the amber liquid slid down Sidmouth’s throat, intense heat snaked out to the very ends of his extremities.

He no more than smacked down the glass back onto the table than Bourne obliged with another pour. After the second dram, he convinced himself his duchess dilemma might not be as bad as he’d originally thought.

Captain Thorne leaned forward. “Now tell us what troubles you.”

“Indeed. Never thought a duke would have any problems, at least none to speak of.” The teasing glint in Bourne’s eyes were all that kept Sidmouth from shoving the man up against the cottage wall. Somehow, the second round of whiskey had so relaxed his limbs, he couldn’t work up enough rage to put the impudent Bourne in his place.

Instead, he bared his doubts and fears about his wife to his two drinking partners. “She left me,” he finally said. “On my honeymoon.”

Thorne intervened. “We gathered that much from Lady Harriet.” He threw Bourne an unreadable look. “What we don’t know is why.”

“I’ve tried to reason with her. I even had Cook put together a late-night supper in the conservatory at Bocollyn-oysters, champagne, and a fine roast beef…” He trailed off.

“And what happened? Did you manage to coax her back into Bocollyn House?”

“I gave her a list of what’s expected of the Duchess of Sidmouth.”

The other two men were silent for a long moment.

Bourne finally spoke, incredulity in his voice. “And how did she take that?”

Sidmouth sat, dumb-struck for a few seconds. He held out his glass for a third dram before facing them. “She gave me a list of her own.” When he tentatively pulled the much-crumpled piece of paper out of his pocket, Bourne grabbed it and pulled his chair close to Thorne’s.

After the short time needed to pore over the list of four demands, the two battle-hardened men sat back and stared at Sidmouth, disbelief on their faces. Thorne spoke first. “Is this it? Is this all she needs to come back to your bed?”

“Ye have a passionate woman living in your stable master’s cottage, less than a hundred yards away from Bocollyn House, she has the courage to tell ye what she wants, and ye’re still here with two old warhorses, drinking whiskey?”

Sidmouth mused that Bourne must have the same strange propensity as his son to lapse into Irish brogue in times of stress. “Yes,” Sidmouth admitted morosely, and lowered his head.

Thorne made a great show of packing tobacco into his pipe and fiddling with a piece of straw he stuck into the fireplace flames before lighting the pipe. “You still haven’t explained exactly why she left you on your honeymoon. I suspect it wasn’t just a tiff over a list of what a woman needs.”

Sidmouth jerked upright and gave the old captain an ugly look.

“Don’t know why you’re glaring at me.” Thorne drew deeply on his pipe and then puffed out elegant smoke rings. “I’m not the one she abandoned in Venice.”

Now he had Bourne’s attention as well. He’d leaned forward as if to wipe his spectacles with the cloth covering the table. But Sidmouth was not fooled. Both men were agog, awaiting the revelation of some great intimate gaff. Something the sensually inept Duke of Sidmouth had or had not done.

He came to a sudden decision. He leaned forward on both of his hands, palms down, on the table, fingers splayed. “I accused my duchess of being, um…”