Page 7 of The Good Duke (The Licentious Lords #1)

Years Earlier

Cheshire, England

F loating on his back in the serene waters of the country lake, Simon’s eye hurt like the very devil.

Not from the glare of the welcome summer sun but rather from the rapidly blackening eye, compliments of the latest beating he’d been dealt.

“ …S-S-Stuttering S-Simon. ”

“ …S-Stupid S-S-Simon. ”

“ You know what helps straighten out a village idiot? A good knock on the head. ”

The echo of cruel, mocking laughter and recent taunts reverberated around Simon’s mind, and his body recoiled under the reminder of this latest humiliation.

This time, it hadn’t been his tormentors at Oxford. No, home for the summer, he’d traded his university bullies for the village ones of Cheshire.

Here, there, or anywhere, one constant remained in his life—there was no shortage of fellows, of all ages, about to persecute him for his miserable stammer.

Sucking in a deep breath, Simon lifted his arms above his head and sank under the surface of Pickmere Lake. As the crisp, cool water enveloped him, it also swallowed up the earthen summer sounds, leaving the chirp of birds and the rustle of leaves muted and muffled in his ears.

He let himself sink lower and lower, deeper and deeper, and he wanted to keep on going until he reached some other place where no one existed, except for him.

There, some seven feet below, Simon forced his eyes open. He ignored the sharp sting and took in the crystalline sanctuary around him; the bright summer sun sent vast rays slashing deep below. Ripples and bubbles all danced on the water.

How much better it was down here, away from everyone, away from everything. Free from mockery and jeering stares. Free from pitying looks.

A solitary world would be far better than the current one he found himself inhabiting.

His lungs burned under the chore he asked of them and, unable to remain submerged any longer, he propelled himself up to the surface.

He exploded from the water, gasping and sucking in great gasps of air.

“ There you are!”

He looked to the shore where a familiar figure stood with her hands propped on her hips.

Seph.

From the edge of the lake, she waved wildly, with the same enthusiasm as when he’d first arrived home from Eton all those years ago.

He grinned and shot a hand up, waving in return.

The world wasn’t all awful. She stood there, a shining beacon to remind him there was one person in his life.

“I’m naked,” he shouted over to her. Had he uttered those words to anyone else, they’d have emerged as a stammer. Seph was different.

Cupping her hands around her mouth, she called back, “I should hope so. Were you to do something as prudish as to swim in your garments, I daresay it would mean I would have to break off our friendship.”

Wading there, Simon grinned and then splashed water in Persephone’s direction. “No, you wouldn’t.”

She grinned. “No, I wouldn’t.”

“Turn around, Seph.”

She rolled her eyes. “We’ve seen one another without clothes plenty of times.”

Yes, when they’d been babes in the nursery, but it’d been several years now since he’d bared himself before her.

With the tip of her boot, she kicked water in his direction. “What? Nothing to say?”

He grunted. “It’s different. Will you just…turn around?”

Persephone blew her tongue out noisily. “Oh, fine.”

“My—”

She’d already gathered up his garments, and keeping her back presented to him, she dangled his shirt over her shoulder.

Scrambling from the water, he grabbed the white lawn article and swiftly donned it.

Next, she handed back his trousers.

Hopping on first his left leg and then his right, Simon drew his pants on.

“Are you decent, my lord?” Persephone asked in a perfect impersonation of old Mrs. Richter, the ancient wife to the even more ancient village harness maker.

“It depends by whose standards we’re speaking of. Society on the whole? Not so much,” he said wryly. “By mine and your standards…”

Persephone whipped about and smiled a big, wide smile that went on for days. “Those are the only ones that matter!”

And funny that…it was true. Mayhap that was why he’d never had a stammer around her. For when they were together, he and Persephone, Simon just…was. He didn’t worry about how she viewed him or did not view him.

“Don’t let Polite Society hear you say that,” he said drolly.

She snorted. “As if I would or could.”

Nay, for as close as their fathers were, the fact remained, Simon and Persephone hadn’t been born to the same world. But for short periods throughout the year, he and she moved in different orbits.

“You aren’t missing anything, Seph,” he said quietly. In fact, he would have given anything to trade his current life for a more anonymous one.

She spoke on a rush. “No, I know that. I would be rubbish, absolutely rubbish, at all the proper lady stuff.”

Throwing her arms wide, Persephone sank into an exaggerated curtsy. She let her long, gangly limbs drop to her side. “I just hate that I—” The rest of her words ended on a sharp gasp. “Those cruel, contemptible maggot pies.”

Despite the misery of the earlier part of his day, he found himself smiling.

Persephone glared. “I’m glad one of us finds this amusing.” Muttering under her breath, she went up on tiptoe and proceeded to examine his left eye more closely.

“I’m fine, Seph,” he said, making soothing noises.

Given how effortlessly she ignored him, he may as well have saved both his breath and efforts.

Her eyes flashed fire. “They said they’d paid you a visit. Told me I could find you back this way.”

“You saw them,” he said dumbly.

“Oh, I saw them all right.” Persephone confirmed with a nod.

Simon went instantly cold. Something in knowing his bullies had jeered about him to his best friend left a sharp ache inside. Not that it would have been the first, or second, or even third or fourth time. It never, however, grew easy.

“You shouldn’t have spoken with them,” he said, his words emerging sharper than he intended and she deserved.

Persephone gave him a look. “Why are you behaving this way? They stopped me when I was on my way to visit you. They called me all kinds of names and mocked me.”

“Why would they mock you?” Incredulity brought that question creeping up an octave.

“For the same reason they would be unkind to you,” she said, giving her small shoulders a little shrug. “People hate anyone different than themselves.”

His features spasmed.

“Simon,” she said gently and took a step nearer. “We are different.”

“You are not,” he rejoined, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice. “Me, on the other hand.”

Persephone snorted. “Simon, I love you and would go into battle against Boney himself if you so asked it, but you are either lying to yourself or being deliberately obtuse.”

“You’re perfect!” he exclaimed.

“Just as you are perfect to me ,” she said simply. “But the fact remains, you overlook all the odd things about me.”

He opened his mouth to launch an immediate protestation, but Persephone cut him off.

“How many women do you know with an interest in husbandry—that doesn’t involve two-legged ones?”

His lips twitched.

“Or who concoct remedies for rickets?”

He knew what she was doing. She did it often, and even as he’d forever love her for wanting to lift him up, he’d never be fine with her cutting herself down—especially on his behalf.

“Or,” she mumbled, “who love to sketch topics unsuitable to a lady.”

With that, she gave the leather journal he’d failed to note—but one she usually didn’t go without—a small kick.

Her sketch pad went sliding and kicked up gravel and rocks until it settled near against a moss-covered boulder.

At the same time, their gazes locked on the book.

Simon and Persephone reached for it at the same time.

“Hey, now,” he said reproachfully. “You’re never one to—” His words cut off quickly as he caught sight of Persephone’s swelling and red knuckles, and he knew in an instant.

For this hadn’t been the first time she’d come to him so. And just like all those other times before, she’d not raised attention to the tell-tale marks.

“Seph,” he said gruffly, reaching for her hand, just as she would have tucked it behind her back.

Simon cradled her palm in his and stared for a long time at her bruised flesh. His earlier joy at seeing her faded.

This is what she got for being friends with a dolt like him.

“Oh, do stop looking like someone snuck ink into your chocolate, Simon,” Persephone chided.

She tugged free of his delicate hold. “I’ve never been a fragile miss, and I’ve got scores of old injuries far graver than a couple of bruised knuckles.”

Before he could speak, she stuck her forearm so close to his face, he went cross-eyed.

“Remember this one? Hmm?”

He edged back a fraction so he could make out the stark white scar where her elbow met her lower arm—the legacy of a night they’d been poring over a book together, and Seph, in a bid for more light, had gotten too close to a dwindling taper.

“Or this?” She pointed to the slight scar at the right top corner of her forehead from when she’d asked Simon to use hot tongs to curl her hair.

“And these two.” She’d already hiked her skirts up.

Simon glanced down at the matching pair of faded marks and promptly wished he hadn’t.

He’d been present for the “birth” of those as well—injuries she’d sustained after she had fallen in the gravel while running to meet Simon on his first break from Eton.

At some point, Persephone’s gangly limbs had become shapely ones and, Lord forgive Simon, the sight of Persephone’s bared legs brought him back to another time. Back when she’d asked to kiss him so they might see for themselves what it was like.

And as she continued displaying her impressive array of previous injuries sustained, he found himself as discombobulated as when she’d ended that kiss, matter-of-factly declared it over, all while Simon had struggled to slog his way from the dazed state left by his first taste of desire.

“… and this one here, you surely remember ,” she was saying.

There were all manner of things that made him an awful friend…

“ Then there was the time I scratched a hole in my forehead … and stuck a flower …”

But ogling one’s best chum?

“… the best scar of all came from when you stepped on my tail and pulled it straight… ”

This was the most unforgivable of crimes against friendship.

His brows drew together. “ Pulled your— ”

Persephone’s big, fulsome laugh interrupted the rest of that question. “Were you even listening?”

No, because I’d been busy noticing you’re all grown up, and—

In a very sisterly way, she punched him lightly in the arm. “ Stop. ”

Oh, Lord save me. She’d seen him gawking like a green lad at her. “S-Stop?” His voice cracked much like it had that long time ago when they’d kissed.

Only, this time, she glared at him. On both instances, however, he’d been deserving of that dark look.

“I know what you’re thinking…”

Of course, she did. She’d always been the cleverest person he knew.

“I’m so sorry, Seph,” he said hoarsely.

“You should be. I should be allowed to beat up whomever I like, for whatever I like.” She paused and wrinkled her nose. “Well, not for ‘whatever’ I like. That’d make me a bully.”

Then, as she continued chattering on with her lecture, it hit Simon with a force greater than the punch Bruce Brewster had landed on Simon’s face earlier that day.

“You’re talking about beating up Brewster’s gang,” he blurted.

Persephone stopped mid-sentence and cocked her head. “What did you think I was lecturing you about?”

“N-No! Th- that .” His stammer chose to make a liar of him; a telling weakness Persephone would know all too well.

Though rare, that blasted fumbling for words reared its head, even on occasion with Seph—only during those instances when he felt the sting of embarrassment.

“Simon—”

He spoke on a rush, and this time he steadied his speech. “I don’t want you to fight my battles, Seph.”

“Bah, I’m fighting our battles. Just as you’ve done for me in the past.”

He let out a sound of frustration. “It’s not the same.”

She scoffed. “Of course it is.”

Persephone spoke so convincingly, he actually believed she believed that too.

The truth remained that even having begun taking lessons with Gentleman Jackson himself, Simon still didn’t possess the right hook Persephone did, and he certainly hadn’t managed to take down the village bullies as she did.

“I did it for you, and for me,” she repeated.

His own misery and embarrassment forgotten, he looked at Persephone. Really looked at her—she who had a gaze so strong and direct that were the king himself presented, he’d glance away first—continued to evade Simon’s gaze.

He followed her stare right down to her beloved sketch pad, a sketch pad that now rested forlornly upon the ground.

Simon frowned. Among Persephone’s very many accomplishments and talents, her art proved some of her very best skills—which was saying a good deal indeed.

“They were making fun of your sketches?” he asked in disbelief.

Persephone gave a tiny nod. “Big Bruce took the pad from my hands when I was on my way to see you, and…and flipped through the pages, and started laughing, and I popped him good. Like I said, it was for the both of us, Simon.”

His own altercation forgotten, ire rose on his best friend’s behalf, and Simon picked up Persephone’s book. She didn’t attempt to stop him.

But then they’d always had the most open relationship. No secrets existed between them.

Still, before he opened up Persephone’s sketch pad, he looked over. “May I?”

“Of course,” she said as if he’d been mad to even ask.

He opened the cover, and his gaze immediately landed on the lifelike rendering of her father’s hounds. “Seph,” he said, turning the next page. “These are bloody brilliant.”

“Keep going,” she mumbled. “It gets worse.”

“It c—”

Simon stopped on the next page, and that assurance went unfinished.

“They weren’t wrong to laugh. It is mortifyingly bad.”

Heat climbed his neck, and he coughed into a fist. “It’s not all w-wrong. J-just your…” Oh, God. “P-proportions are off.”

“How would I know that?” she exclaimed, throwing her hands up. “I’ve seen your bits and pieces before.”

Simon strangled on his swallow, breaking into a fit of choking.

“Not in years, and I just assumed it grew like arms and legs did.”

It being none other than the male penis.

Persephone began to pace before him, back and forth in a tight, quick, short path over the graveled shore. “I pride myself on my art, you know that.”

He did.

“I really am quite good,” she said more matter-of-factly than with the bravado her work certainly merited. “As long as I can see something, I can draw a fairly accurate rendering.”

“ Very accurate rendering,” he corrected.

“Exactly,” Persephone said, not breaking stride. “But I’ve never seen a man’s naked body.”

Good. Simon would have had to call the fellow out, and he was a poor shot.

The blush on Simon’s cheeks flared several degrees hotter. “Where would a fellow put s-something like this?” he couldn’t help from asking.

Persephone scowled. “I don’t know, Simon,” she burst out with increasing the speed of her strides. “I don’t have a penis.”

No, she didn’t. She did, however, have a shapely pair of le—

He snapped her book closed.

Persephone remained blessedly oblivious to those impure thoughts still intruding.

“Bruce Brewster said he’d show me his so I can get it right, and that’s when I punched him good,” she was saying.

She paused mid-stride and scrunched her brow up in that way she did whenever she’d hatched one of her ideas. “But maybe I should,” she said, more to herself. “Maybe—”

Simon growled. “Bruce is a ruffian, and our first rule of friendship—”

“Is to never make friends with a bully. I know. I know ,” she said, throwing her hands up.

They went silent, both thinking their own thoughts: Simon about happily bloodying Bruce for making Seph sad this day. And…who knew what was going through Persephone’s mind.

Slowly, she looked up and over at Simon. “I could…”

He stared at her, waiting for her to finish her thought.

Persephone nodded.

He shook his head. “I don’t know what—”

“I could draw you.”

Simon blanched.

“It was a stupid idea,” she said quickly and rushed over to reclaim her book from his motionless fingers. “You don’t want to be my male model.”

No, he didn’t want to. Hers was the understatement of the century. But she’d do anything for him. And they were best friends. And it was…just his…bits and pieces, as she called them.

Simon dragged a hand through his damp hair, sending flecks of water flying. “I’ll do it,” he said before he talked himself out of it.

Persephone’s big, expressive eyes flew even wider.

And then her face fell. “I don’t want you to do something you’re uncomfortable with. I wouldn’t do that to you.”

“It’s my decision, Seph,” he said more forcefully. “I’m offering. I want to…do this for you.” And…he did—even as he didn’t want to.

Persephone searched her gaze over his face. “You’re certain, because—”

“I’ve never been more certain of anything. Friends help friends.”

That proved the other mantra of their friendship.

Her entire face brightened and, dropping her sketch pad, she tossed her arms about him, nearly knocking him to the ground.

Grunting, Simon caught her swiftly and steadied his legs to keep from tumbling back under the force of her unexpected hug.

She did give the best hugs. Her unexpected ones were always her best.

Persephone ended the hug as abruptly as she’d started it.

She scrambled from Simon’s arms and went to rescue her leather sketch pad. “You won’t regret this,” she said, flipping through the pages of the back of her book.

She plucked free a small charcoal pencil she’d tucked there, hurried to a nearby boulder, sat, and stared expectantly at him.

Persephone gave a little nod.

A fresh set of embarrassment filled his cheeks. “I…close your eyes.”

“But I’m going to see—” Persephone stopped herself before finishing her sentence and then did as he’d requested.

Yes, she was right in what she’d been about to say—she was going to see all of him.

Keeping an eye on her, Simon shrugged out of his trousers first. All the while he disrobed, Persephone kept her eyes firmly shut.

He kicked his pants aside, and then, drawing a deep breath, collected the hem of his lawn shirt.

“You don’t have to do this, Simon,” Persephone said gently, her eyes, as she’d promised, still closed.

With that second, selfless pardon, Simon pulled his shirt off. He’d do this for her. He’d do anything for her. Just as she’d do anything for him. She was, quite simply, his best friend.

He nodded before remembering she couldn’t see him.

Clearing his throat, Simon called out, “Y-You can open them.”

In an apparent offer for him to change his mind, Persephone hesitated a long moment more and then, slowly, she opened her eyes.

Her gaze landed on his, and then she crept her focus lower and lower, still lower—and then she stopped.

His entire body went hot. Who knew a person could wear a blush everywhere? Including on that very part of him Persephone now examined.

At his sides, he balled and unballed his hands into tight fists and relaxed into being Seph’s art study.

After an endless stretch of time, she finally looked up; shock and wonderment glimmered in her expressive eyes. “You’ve grown, Simon.”

Present Day

Simon Broadbent’s Bedroom

You’ve grown, Simon?

That was what she’d say?

Simon shook his head hard, dislodging thoughts of the last time Persephone uttered those very same words she’d now just spoken in his bedroom.

Determined to send her on her way so that he could make himself decent, Simon gave Persephone a pointed look.

“Given my state of undress and your presence, Persephone,” he said with all the calm he could muster, “I’m not going to discuss anything further with you. If you will find a room, I’ll be along shortly.”

She beamed. “Splendid!”

Apparently, that wasn’t even enough to dispel the minx.

“I am so looking forward to speaking with—”

“Get the hell out, Persephone.”

That did the trick.

Whipping around, Persephone bolted for the exit. She paused briefly with her fingers on the handle.

“ Which room—?”

For the love of God. “Any damned room, Seph. I’ll find you.”

At last, and with only the very slightest bit of urgency, she let herself out.