Dukes Are Forever Read online

  “Has my father fallen ill, Your Grace?” she asked with a flash of guilt that she hadn’t thought to ask immediately about Papa, and also with the hope of distracting his roaming gaze away from her.

  His eyes flickered coldly back to hers. “No.”

  “Then my apologies, sir, but someone is playing a joke.”

  “Whose joke, Miss Benton—yours or your father’s?”

  She caught her breath. The icy edge to his voice was even more alarming than his fury had been only moments before. Who was this man? And he was certain he’d been named her guardian—oh, good Lord, what was Papa up to now?

  She had no idea, but it was time this man left, handsome duke or not.

  She started toward the door to show him out. “I apologize, truly, that you came all the way here on a wild-goose chase—”

  Stopping to glance back, she’d noticed with aggravation that he hadn’t moved an inch even though she clearly wanted him gone. Oh, this man was as arrogant as his title!

  Holding her gaze, he wordlessly reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew a piece of paper, then held it toward her.

  “What’s that?” she asked warily.

  “The guardianship agreement.”

  Hesitantly, she took it. In legalese, complete with official wax seals and signatures, the agreement was clear—Phillip Benton had signed away all rights and responsibilities to his daughter, Katherine Anne Benton, to be placed into the guardianship of His Grace, Edward Westover, Duke of Strathmore, Earl of Hampstead, Viscount Loudon, until such time as she marries and transfers all responsibility for her care to her husband.

  Kate’s mouth fell open in disbelief. No, this couldn’t be! Her father was selfish and irresponsible, but he would never simply hand her over to a stranger as if he were selling livestock. And he certainly wouldn’t give up the tangential claim he had to Brambly.

  But he had. His signature covered the bottom of the page.

  She glanced up and caught the duke’s gaze on her, watching her reaction closely. Those black eyes…she’d never seen anything like them, or the man behind them, and she trembled.

  “It’s not true,” she whispered.

  “I assure you it is,” he stated evenly. “Apparently, Miss Benton, we have a lot to discuss.”

  His grim expression sent an icy chill cascading through her. Whatever her father had done, it was deadly serious if it involved a man like this. “Yes.” She felt the blood drain from her cheeks. “Apparently.”

  As he took the contract from her, she was unable to read the emotions behind his inscrutable expression, but she knew he was studying her, contemplating her. Like some problem he needed to solve. Her stomach knotted with confusion and sudden worry in warning not to trust him.

  “If you don’t mind,” he proposed evenly, “I’d like to remain here for a few days. I want to make certain everything is settled properly before I leave.”

  Remain here? Oh no…No, no! But even as dread sickened her, she knew she had no choice. She couldn’t refuse a duke, especially one with a legal document naming him as her guardian, no matter how badly she wanted to toss him right out on his aristocratic backside. And a very fine backside, too, she thought with chagrin.

  “Very well,” she acquiesced grudgingly, then said as politely as she could between clenched teeth, “I would be honored to have you as my guest. Why don’t you wait here while I have refreshments prepared?”

  He raised a quizzical brow, his eyes sweeping around the empty room. “Wait…where?”

  Oh, curse Dorrie for not putting him into the sitting room! Taking a patient breath, she forced a sickeningly saccharine smile. “May I suggest London, Your Grace?”

  With that, she spun on her heels and stormed from the room, her hands clenched into fists at her sides.

  * * *

  Edward frowned after her. This chit was a handful.

  Provoking, strong willed, with an irreverence for authority—he didn’t know whether to laugh at her or throttle her. Standing there in front of him as she’d done, so primly with her hands folded and the sunlight falling onto her shoulders, she could have passed for an angel. But while her body might have been divinely crafted, that personality belonged solely to the devil.

  Yet something about her puzzled him, and he glanced around the empty room. There was more going on here than just a guardianship agreement. No horses or grooms in the stable, few barnyard animals, fewer household furnishings—what exactly was her situation here?

  Apparently, nothing in Phillip Benton’s life was as it seemed.

  Including his daughter.

  She wasn’t a child, yet Benton signed her over. But why? Did he simply want to cause trouble, his own petty revenge? Or was something more despicable at play? Even though she’d not batted an eye in recognition when he’d spoken his name and her reaction to the agreement seemed too startled, too earnest to be faked, could he trust the daughter any more than he could the father?

  No matter Benton’s motivation, Edward wouldn’t protest the guardianship. Releasing her from their agreement when he didn’t know Benton’s endgame was unthinkable. What was that saying from his days when he’d served as an aide to General Hollingsworth?—keep friends close and enemies closer. At this point, there was no telling if Katherine Benton were friend or enemy, and he doubted as he caught the lingering scent of honeysuckle that he could keep her any closer without ruining her.

  He knew one thing for certain, however. He wasn’t leaving until he had answers.

  If she were truly innocent and knew nothing of the guardianship, he would give her whatever help he could. But if she were trying to deceive him, then God help her.

  Because he would destroy her.

  * * *

  As she raced upstairs, Kate struggled in her panic to catch her breath and slow her pounding heart. She felt as if the rug had been ripped out from under her. A rug? Oh, it was so much worse than that—her life had been upended. And she had no idea what to do.

  She hurried into her room and caught her reflection in her dressing table mirror, halting in mid-step. A look of horror reflected back as she glimpsed the full extent of the splattered mixture stained down her dress and smeared across her forehead. She was a complete fright, her dress filthy and stinking, and her unruly red hair falling loose from its braid. Good Lord, she looked like a street urchin. Who had been rolling in the mud. For days.

  Well, that certainly explained why he’d stared at her like that.

  But the guardianship agreement, could anything explain that? Or why her father would sign such a thing? Lately, on those rare occasions when he visited, it seemed Papa did nothing but argue with her about ownership of Brambly. Yet he was still her father, and he would never sign her away as if she were nothing more than a knickknack to be sold for his convenience…wouldn’t he?

  No. That would be going too far, even for Papa.

  The guardianship was obviously a mistake, except that Edward Westover didn’t seem the kind of man who made mistakes. Duke or not, he was unlike anyone she’d ever met. And there wasn’t an inch of him she trusted.

  But if the guardianship was legally binding, if her life was truly at his mercy—

  She shuddered. She’d seen how miserable and anguished life had been for her mother under her father’s control, her freedom and choices dependent upon a man who did not love her and regarded her only as a burden. Mama had surrendered everything for love and suffered horribly because of it. Her father never loved her mother, yet he’d made her regret every day of their marriage that she loved him. Only in death did she finally escape his control.

  No, living her life bent beneath another’s will was not an option.

  Mrs. Elston knocked at her door, but the plump woman didn’t wait for an answer before huffing and puffing inside, struggling to catch her breath from hurrying up the stairs.

  “I just arrived…from the village.” The words emerged in wheezing bursts. “Saw Dorrie…A duke?…What on earth?” />
  “Thank goodness you’re here.” Kate hurried to her writing desk. “I need you to go back to the village—”

  “Back to the village?” she gasped.

  “Yes.” She scribbled out a letter, then folded it carefully before sealing it with a drop of wax and handing it to Mrs. Elston. “This has to go to my father on today’s mail coach.”

  Mrs. Elson shook her head adamantly, already exhausted from the first trip to the village. “No, not unless it’s a matter of life and death—”

  “It might very well be,” Kate assured her gravely. “Please, go. I’ll tell you everything once you’re back.”

  With a sigh, the old governess took the letter and headed heavily toward the door.

  CHAPTER THREE

  If she isn’t downstairs in five minutes,” Edward warned Mrs. Elston through gritted teeth, “I will go up to her room and drag her down myself!”

  The old governess bristled. “As I told you, Miss Kate is feeling unwell—”

  A sharp curse exploded from him, telling her exactly what he thought of Miss Kate’s sudden illness.

  “Your Grace.” Her brows shot up, offended. “With all due respect—”

  He rolled his eyes, knowing that whatever she was about to say would lack all respect.

  “—you have swept into our home without warning, upset both my little Katie and the entire household, and are now making demands as if you own the place.”

  “I do own it,” he drawled.

  “Brambly House is entailed,” she informed him pointedly. “It is owned solely by Miss Kate to be relinquished only to the gentleman she marries.” Her emphasis clearly implied that despite his title, she found him to be no gentleman. “If she wishes to forgo your company, you should have the decency to give her peace!”

  She stood squarely in front of him and blocked the stairs like a bulldog guarding its dinner. While ordinarily he would have found that loyalty admirable, tonight he was ready to throttle her for it.

  “Mrs. Elston,” he growled, tired from a long day of traveling and now hungry since dinner was over an hour late, “if Miss Benton doesn’t come downstairs, I swear I’ll—”

  “You will do what, Your Grace?” a soft voice challenged from the landing.

  He glanced up, and when he saw her, the rest of the threat vanished from his lips. Sweet Lucifer, she was a vision. Although a decade out of fashion, the ice-blue silk gown she wore was cut just carefully enough to tantalize without being improper, with its fitted bodice accentuating her slender waist and its neckline revealing a hint of firm breasts beneath. As she descended toward him, her upswept red hair shining like fire, the dress shimmered enticingly over her curves with each move.

  She stopped two steps from the bottom, her eyes level with his and just the hint of a self-assured smile at her lips. The sweet scent of honeysuckle wafted down to him like a cloud, and his gut clenched with unbidden arousal.

  The disheveled woman who greeted him earlier had transformed into a beautiful woman, like a caterpillar into a butterfly. And left him speechless.

  “You’ll do what?” she pressed.

  His lips twisted impishly at his now-empty threat. “Throw you over my knee and spank you.”

  “Your Grace!” Mrs. Elston swung her gaze at him, appalled that he would even suggest such a thing.

  Kate raised her head defiantly, her green eyes blazing. “I’d like to see you try.”

  Good God. His cock twitched at the temptation.

  “Miss Kate!” Mrs. Elston blurted out, aghast at her charge’s scandalous behavior.

  Ignoring the old governess and fighting back an amused chuckle, Edward held out his hand. “Truce?”

  She hesitated, clearly not trusting him.

  “Until dessert at least?”

  She placed her gloved hand into his and allowed him to help her down the last two steps and toward the dining room as she conceded, “Until dessert, Your Grace.”

  “Edward, please,” he corrected. Given their odd situation, such formality seemed inappropriate.

  “Then you must call me Kate,” she insisted, a mischievous glint in her eyes. “All my guardians do.”

  “You have a lot of guardians, do you?” he asked dryly.

  “Oh yes.” She gave a flippant wave of her hand, the mocking gesture indicating how ludicrous she found their situation and her desire to be free of it. “Lately, it seems there’s a new one dropping by every day.”

  He paused in mid-step, then slid her an irritated sideways glance as she continued on, slipping her hand away from his arm to precede him into the room. As his gaze roamed down her backside, the curves beneath the gown and the soft sashay of her hips once again reminded him that this was no child in need of a guardian. This was a woman.

  Worse, he thought grimly as the man now responsible for guarding her reputation, she was beautiful. The moment she debuted, every man would set his sights on her. And it wouldn’t be with the intention of marrying her.

  Heaven help him, he was in serious trouble.

  An old servant in a worn butler’s uniform stood beside the doorway and bowed from the waist. Edward grimaced at the formality. All he wanted was a quiet country dinner.

  “Your Grace.” Kate lightly touched his arm. “It is my pleasure to introduce you to Arthur, Brambly’s butler. He has been employed by my family for over forty years. Isn’t that so, Arthur?”

  “Yes, miss.” The man proudly inclined his head.

  “Arthur, this is His Grace, the Duke of Strathmore.”

  Edward frowned, taken aback at the introduction. Why on earth would she introduce him to a servant?

  Yet she smiled adoringly at the old butler. “Would you attend His Grace while he’s here? He has no valet.”

  “I would be honored, Your Grace.”

  “Not necessary.” He didn’t need a valet, and even so, he doubted that Arthur’s arthritic hands would be much help. Besides, he suspected that the old butler was up well past his normal bedtime now, and they hadn’t even sat for dinner. By the time they finished, Edward wouldn’t be surprised if the man had nodded off.

  “Your Grace,” Kate admonished softly.

  He glanced between her and the butler, a look of disappointment flashing over Arthur’s wrinkled face and her cheeks darkening. Then he realized—the formality surrounding his visit wasn’t for him, it was for the servants. Most likely, none of them had been in the same house with a duke before, and the old butler would be pensioned being able to say that he had once personally attended the Duke of Strathmore.

  But Edward had unwittingly denied him that honor, and he felt the heat of Kate’s ire as her eyes narrowed.

  “I meant that I would like port by the fire before retiring,” Edward amended quickly. “Of course, I want Arthur for my valet.” He kept his face carefully blank to hide the lie told only to please Kate. And perhaps keep the truce beyond dessert.

  Another bow, this one so low that Edward thought the old man might teeter over. “You are too kind, Your Grace.”

  “Yes,” he sighed, “apparently.”

  Seeming mollified, Kate proceeded toward the table.

  As he followed, Edward glanced around the dining room, which was just as bare as the rest of the house, right down to the missing draperies in two of the four windows. The table extended the length of the room, but where there should have been chairs enough for sixteen guests, only five remained, and all the sideboards were gone. He said nothing about the room’s missing furnishings as he helped her into her chair, noting that kitchen dishes and mismatched silver set the table.

  Something was definitely wrong here, and as he took his place, he was determined to find out what.

  Arthur brought in dinner. As with everything else, the food wasn’t as expected. There should have been three times as many courses, cheese plates, bottles of white and red wines for each course, and bowls of fruits and nuts served between. But this meal lacked all of that. The roasted hen was small and simple, t
he wine watered down, and there were no footmen to serve and clear except for Arthur, whose gnarled hands shook so much as he ladled the soup that Edward feared he would end up with more of it on the tablecloth than in the bowls.

  Yet Kate beamed at the butler with open affection.

  “You’re quite fond of him,” Edward commented when Arthur left for the kitchen.

  “Very.” Her smile faded as her attention returned to him and to their conversation, and he suspected that she was considering just exactly how far she could trust him. “He was employed by my grandparents as a footman, and when my parents married, Grandpapa insisted Arthur accompany Mama to Brambly. He’s been here ever since.”

  “He’s dedicated to you.”

  “As I am to him,” she admitted quietly, fondness lacing her voice.

  His lips twitched at that. No lady of the ton would ever make such a comment and certainly not during dinner when servants weren’t discussed unless to complain about them. Just another reminder of how different Kate was from the quality. It was a difference he would have found refreshing except that she reminded him of Jane.

  Physically, the two women were nothing alike—Jane was tall and dark-featured, but Kate’s red head barely came to his shoulder. Jane was fashionable, slender, urbane, and always aware of propriety even when she didn’t follow it, but Kate…well, she’d greeted him wearing a stained dress. Their appearance might be opposite, but both women had the same outgoing and vivacious personalities that lit up a room the moment they entered it, the same quick wit and bright smiles.

  And both had fathers who attempted to control their daughters’ lives.

  Edward studied her over his wineglass, his eyes narrowing. Jane had succumbed to her father’s manipulations. Would Kate do the same?

  As they ate, he questioned her about the history of Brambly, and as hostess, she obliged by telling about the small farm and the handful of tenants and servants, its gardens, and the village. She caught his interest when she explained how she took care of the sick villagers, and he was fascinated by the way her eyes grew bright when she described the self-taught medical studies she’d undertaken, her laboratory, and experiments.