Page 28 of To Defend a Damaged Duke (Regency Rossingley #2)

STEP ONE OF public rakery commenced the following day with Rossingley strong-arming Benedict into his tailors on Clifford Street. It was the sort of expedition that, if it held any redeeming qualities, Benedict had yet to glean them.

Private rakery, on the other hand, had much to commend it.

However, Francis’s teasing as Benedict had helped himself to an ungodly amount of ham at breakfast made him wonder exactly how private his spooning with Tommy had truly been and also to ponder whether Lyndon wasn’t his only brother adept at listening at doors.

As he trailed after Rossingley, feeling like a duckling shadowing its mother, Benedict replayed his intimacies with Tommy.

His own behaviour had confused him. Faced with Tommy’s beauty, his impulse was to possess it, to give it weight.

To order it about! All the odder as it warred with his weak nature in every other aspect of his life.

And that Tommy—clever, experienced, controlled Tommy—had gifted himself so pliantly was…

“Shield your eyes, my darling. These are not for you.”

Truly in his element, Rossingley swept past fifty shades of charcoal grey cloth as though they weren’t there.

Wasting no time in ordering the tailor’s apprentice to tidy them away, he proceeded to issue a lengthy prescription for all manner of garments and in a rainbow of colours and fabrics.

Benedict prayed his friend was making some opportunistic purchases of his own. Alas, no.

For several long minutes, the earl fingered a length of emerald-green before laying it over a bolt of dazzling fuchsia-coloured silk. Nervously, Benedict waited. “Adds an air of assurance to any neutral palette,” the earl commented finally. “Fuchsia is the new black, don’t you know.”

“I didn’t know,” Benedict hazarded, unsure whether a response was required.

A powder-blue and mud-brown waistcoat corseting the tailor’s dummy snagged Rossingley’s attention.

Benedict held his breath. Already, he’d spent longer in the outfitters than his last three previous trips combined.

With a wave of his elegant hand, Rossingley dismissed the waistcoat. Benedict breathed out.

“If that isn’t proof those two colours should never be seen together, then I don’t know what is,” the earl declared.

Rossingley studied Benedict as the apprentice scuttled over to remove the offending palette.

“A light shade of bilberry would be an excellent choice for you, darling, if only we could find the right one. I’m not saying for a minute that you’re not ravishing in slate grey and black.

” He treated Benedict to the kind of smile that reduced him to a blushing youth again.

“Far from it. But a pop of colour will ensure you are so much more welcoming .”

Before Benedict could mutter something about disliking the tartness of bilberries or, indeed, appearing welcoming, Rossingley pounced on a bolt of cloth named something or other complicated and tapped on it.

“Yes! This is perfect. It will effortlessly bring out the deep tones in your complexion and provide a most alluring look.” Stretching the cloth out, he sighed.

“You are lucky you can get away with it, Ashington. My dear Kit carries these shades off marvellously too. But when one is as fair as me and Tommy, it can be the devil’s work ensuring one’s colour isn’t sapped by one’s waistcoat.

The two of us lament it often. But, on you, this Persian indigo, here, paired with that papaya silk, there, will have the ton positively salivating. ”

“Um…yes.” Benedict nodded at the cloth, feeling a need to contribute.

Focusing on the task at hand had proved difficult ever since Rossingley’s mention of Tommy.

He could have agreed to dress in a monk’s habit trimmed with gold leaf, for all it would have dislodged the delicious memory of yanking the man down into his lap and Tommy’s warm palm curled around—

“Papaya is so summery. It lifts one’s mood even in the depths of winter, don’t you find?”

“Um, yes. Absolutely.” Benedict didn’t care to admit not knowing the colour of papaya. It seemed too much to hope the fruit was an acceptable shade of dark blue. He ran his hand over both bolts of cloth as it seemed the right thing to do. “I have a navy cravat similar to this,” he ventured.

“Persian indigo,” corrected the earl in a voice brooking no disagreement.

“And I think we should also have it made up into a tailcoat.” Lips pursued in concentration, he made an unexpected lunge towards Benedict and ran expert hands along the shoulder seams of the duke’s tailcoat, then tracked them down the length of Benedict’s arms, something no man except his valet had done—ever.

“Hmm. Whilst this is exquisitely made, Ashington, I feel we should cinch you a little more tightly around here.” Rossingley tugged at the material covering Benedict’s sturdy biceps. “And perhaps here.” He gave Benedict’s middle a squeeze.

The earl’s hands then trod a scandalous path over his thighs. “We’ll also get you measured for two pairs of silk breeches and tighten them up here.”

Benedict stared at the plain plaster ceiling above his head.

“That is if we really intend to draw attention to you, darling.” The earl smiled again, showing all his pointy teeth. “And who doesn’t love attention?”

*

THE MORNING DRAGGED on in a similar alarming fashion. By the end of it, Benedict had developed a theory that a rakish man’s dissolute, louche appearance had nothing whatsoever to do with excessive indulgence. It was all down to interminable shopping trips.

When they emerged from the tailors, Benedict noted with surprise it was still the same day. More perturbingly, there was no mention of lunch.

“And now for a carriage ride,” declared Rossingley, cheerily taking him by the arm.

“We will be seen, we will be convivial, and you shall be an absolute honeypot with the ladies. And we must insist each and every one of them put you on their dance cards for Lady Wardholme’s soirée this evening.

Which we will be attending, by the way.”

“We will?”

“We will. Don’t pull that face, darling. She’s a dreamboat once one looks beyond the wart.” Rossingley clicked the reins. “And, between you and me, plenty of gentlemen have.”

After the horror of the tailor’s, the carriage ride was a welcome respite, even if Rossingley did maintain a constant stream of chatter. Mostly about Mr Angel.

Benedict marvelled at how freely he spoke of him.

He spoke, too, a little of how they met.

And then, because Rossingley was an inveterate gossip, they moved on to the subject of the disgraced baronet, Lord Gartside, and Tommy’s minor role in bringing his downfall.

He spoke of Tommy with great familiarity too.

“You were…were lovers. Weren’t you?” Benedict asked daringly. He wasn’t sure what made him think of it, but as soon as he gave it voice, he knew it to be the truth.

Rossingley threw him an extended, sideways glance, his pale gaze assessing. “Yes. On and off, during periods of time when we both needed something and the other supplied it. Such as when I lost my first true love, Charles. And when Tommy had lost…well, everything a few years before that.”

Thanks to me, thought Benedict glumly.

They clip-clopped along. Sorry didn’t fix broken lives any more than it fixed shattered china.

They should invent another word, a nuanced, complicated one, something like those Prussian languages employed.

Something that meant sorry I selfishly left you to be arrested and potentially hung, but I’m a coward and not a day doesn’t pass when my actions don’t haunt me.

And, incidentally, I still love you, and is there any way you could find it in your heart to love me back?

“But have you guessed we’re business partners too?” Rossingley’s cultured tones dragged Benedict from his musings.

“Really? But he owns blackleg stands and gaming hells, and—” Benedict lowered his voice. “—brothels.”

“Beautifully decorated brothels,” Rossingley corrected. “So much fun to own, much more fun than cotton mills and draughty Scottish castles.” His lips twitched. “Though I have those too.”

“How on earth did you two meet?” As soon as the words left his mouth, Benedict regretted them. How did anyone meet a molly?

A smile played at the earl’s lips. “You’ll have to ask Tommy that. But we are old, excellent friends.”

“He has few friends,” Benedict observed. Indeed, he was unaware Tommy had any others, excepting perhaps Sidney. But that seemed less a friendship and more like mutual reliance.

“Yes.” Rossingley nodded. “ Be wary then; best safety lies in fear .”

He smiled at Benedict’s confusion. “The wisdom of Will Shakespeare. Tommy has faced imprisonment, poverty, and indescribable fear. He has learned to trust no one, and it has stood him in good stead. Hence the lack of close friends.”

The earl’s voice softened, though laced with amusement. “Secretly, though he has various convivial establishments, he prefers nothing more than quiet evenings at home with his ledgers and a good book. In that, you are well matched.” He gave Benedict a sly nudge. “Amongst other ways.”

Too busy blushing, Benedict missed Rossingley’s next comment.

But what with warts, papayas, Rossingley’s revelations, and a reddened, lasting imprint of Tommy’s mouth barely tucked below the line of his high collar, Benedict needed a moment to himself.

Alas, it was not to be. A smart barouche pulled up alongside the earl’s curricle, and two ladies, whom the duke should have known by name, fluttered their greetings.

Fortunately, Rossingley was much more capable.

“Miss Caldicott and Miss Gresham! How delightful you are this fine morning! His Grace and I were only saying not five minutes hence how this overcast afternoon was in sore need of brightening with keen wit and vivacity. And here you both are!”

Two pretty, wide brimmed hats bobbed in unison. Two silk fans swished into action.

“Miss Caldicott insisted we admire the early spring blooms along the northern park border, my lord,” cooed Miss Gresham. “The promise of that season’s arrival is enough to survive the most bitter of winters, is it not?”

“Goodness, how marvellously you have conjured my own scattered contemplations into poetic verse.” Rossingley produced a flirtatious smile. “You are a lady of hidden talents, Miss Gresham.”

Something sharp pinched Benedict’s thigh. “This is the part of the conversation where it’s your turn to speak, darling.”

Goodness, discourse was so much easier when the ladies he was addressing were Lady Isabella and the Honourable Beatrice Hazard. Their expectations had been set at a suitably low bar years ago.

Benedict girded his loins. “Uh…sadly, without rain, the flowers will not flourish. According to a…um…botanical pamphlet from the Royal Society, the fallow months and rainfall are a necessary evil in order for the ground to build up good—”

“I trust our names are writ in bold gilt on your dance cards for the Wardholme soirée this evening, dear ladies?” the earl interjected, and Benedict’s thigh endured another harsh pinch. “His Grace here is positively itching to accompany you both for a turn around the floor. Aren’t you, Ashington?”

“Um…yes. Thrice! With both of you!”

The ladies tittered whilst Benedict tried to look like a man desperate to perform three polkas.

“Steady on, old chap,” Rossingley murmured. “We’re turning you into a rake, not a dancing bear. Issue our fond farewells, add something pithy and charming, and we’ll move on to the next.”

Benedict excelled at farewells. They were his favourite part of any social interaction. Doffing his hat, he bared his teeth in what he hoped was more a suave smile than a snarl.

“May the remainder of your afternoon ride be edged with sunshine and illuminated with beauty, ladies,” he declared, pleased with himself. “And I very much look forward to our reacquaintance this evening at Lady Wart— Ward holme’s.”

Rossingley was still tittering when they paused to exchange pleasantries with the occupants of the next carriage. And the next, and the one after that. By the fourth encounter, Benedict was struggling to maintain a polite facade too.

“So,” Rossingley surmised as they turned into the home straight.

“Our plan of campaign for this evening—Eat heartily, as you have committed to practically every dance. Special attention, however, will be paid to the delightful and Honourable Beatrice Hazard, our dear, blemished Lady Wardholme herself, and the divine Mrs Catherine de Villiers.”

“I am not well acquainted with the latter.”

“You shall be,” responded Rossingley with a glittering smile. “In fact, the ton will believe you to be most thoroughly acquainted with her before the night is out. And trust me, nothing would amuse that delightful lady more.”

“She may reverse that opinion after time in my company.”

Ignoring him, Rossingley carried on. “My valet informs me that Lord Lyndon has no plans to appear at any evening soirées for the foreseeable future, as he has travelled down to the south coast to nurse a twisted ankle and some unfortunate facial bruising. So, we have several occasions during which to firmly establish your rakery.”

“My enthusiasm knows no bounds,” muttered Benedict.

“Meanwhile,” continued the earl, “Tommy and my darling Kit will spend their evening overtly seeking and monopolising Lady Isabella’s attentions whilst Lord Francis mopes from the sidelines yet behaves impeccably. On board so far?”

Benedict was on board with an intent to sail off into the sunset (having first kidnapped Tommy), never to be seen again, thereby resolving all his problems in one fell swoop. He wondered if the Prussian’s had invented a fancy long word for that.