LAST NIGHT’S SUPPER had turned into a bloody bacchanal, and William was feeling the effects of it. Beck, damn him. Ten years ago William would have imbibed with abandon, but he’d long ceased being willing or able to pass the hours with drink. Ten years ago he would have bounced back to form like Indian rubber, but today every part of him ached.
This seemed to happen every time he was in London. It was his own rotten fault. He’d believed that because his old friend, Beckett Hawke, the Earl of Iddesleigh, was a husband and a father now, there would be none of the debauchery of yore. What a bloody fool he’d been to think it.
He’d intended to get plenty of rest before a day he knew he’d need all his wits about him. He’d assumed, quite incorrectly, that supper on Upper Brook Street would come to an early conclusion given that Beck’s four young daughters were being reared without any sort of proper discipline and required a near army of parents and servants to corral them into bed.
But Beck’s wife, the ginger-haired, plump Blythe Northcote Hawke, had taken the children to the old Honeycutt House where their bachelor uncle Donovan generally resided. Donovan would keep them for the night and, she reported with glee, would tell them ghost stories and frighten them out of their wits. Her happiness stemmed not from the fact that her children would likely refuse to sleep in their own beds for a fortnight, but from the fact that for one night, she and Beck could behave indiscriminately.
For the occasion they’d included Beck’s good-for-nothing friends, Lord Montford and Sir Martin.
William should have sensed the minute he was shown into the drawing room that trouble was afoot. He should have begged off the minute Beck introduced “very fine Scotch whisky” that might have been obtained “from a smuggler’s den.” But he hadn’t, and the next thing he knew, his valet, Ewan MacDuff, had come to fetch him at four in the morning.
That was how he’d come to be staring bleary-eyed at the imposing, three-story facade of Prescott Hall. He hated mornings like this. The ride from his house in Mayfair had jostled every bone in his body and had only worsened his wretched headache.
He removed his gloves, and then his hat, and shoved his fingers through his hair. He did not miss Ewan’s grimace—the man took great pride in his work, and even though he had not personally combed William’s hair, he considered it part of the overall effect of his sartorial work.
William turned from his valet’s judgmental countenance, and his gaze landed on a young groom, come to take the horses. William meant to dismount, but he blinked at the house again. More than a house, really. A sprawling edifice practically bulging at the seams with opulence, one of the many homes owned by the Duke of Beauford and one of the few grand enough to house a royal princess and her entourage. He understood the gardens were extraordinary. He would like to take a look at them—how pleasing it would be to meander about while the sun burned the fog from his brain. But alas, there was no time for that. William intended to pay his call and depart for his house on Arlington Street as quickly as possible, have Ewan draw him a scorching-hot bath, then contemplate how, in a universe as vast as this, he kept ending up in these untenable situations.
One would think that William Douglas of Scotland, the Marquess of Douglas and Clydesdale, the future Duke of Hamilton and Brandon, might have a wee bit more control of his own life at the ripe age of three and thirty, and yet, nothing could be further from the truth. The older he became, the less things seemed in his control. His sister Susan was right—he ought to have been wed by now and have children of his own. He ought to have become one of those tinkering country gentlemen with a painting hobby who demanded reports on the number of sheep in the fields and read poetry to his wife. But no, he was a bachelor, who had been abroad as much of the past ten years as possible, and had been asked—no, commanded—to mollycoddle a bloody European princess.
The groom kept sliding looks at Ewan, his brows clearly asking his unspoken question of what the devil was going on here. Ewan straightened his vest, pulled his cuffs from the sleeves of his coat and returned a look that clearly conveyed he didn’t rightly know.
“Fine,” William said to them both. He slid off his horse and nodded at the impatient groom to take the reins, then nodded at Ewan, indicating he should go ahead and announce his presence.
As Ewan was the sort of man who liked to have a mission, he immediately began to stride for the entry. He was a very large man, six inches taller and broader than William, and when he jogged up the steps to the double doors, one half expected the ground to tremble. He rapped so loud that William could hear it on the drive.
William pulled on his gloves, but he did not reseat his hat. He turned his face to the afternoon sun. Lord, he could use a cup of tea and a nap. One last toast, indeed.
He shifted his gaze to the park spread before him. The grounds were perfectly manicured, including a field before the house where sheep were grazing, and stately trees lining the drive. Chestnut trees, he thought. They looked like the dozens upon dozens his father had planted at Hamilton Palace in Scotland several years ago.
Father. He was the one who’d put William up to this. Just a month ago he’d called William home from Paris with an urgent telegraph—come at once. Naturally, William had feared that his father was ill and was holding off the Grim Reaper. And then he feared his father would die and saddle him with massive debt and the monstrosity they called Hamilton Palace, and he’d be a duke and the surviving descendent of the Scottish throne—if his father’s claims were to be believed—and stuck in Lanarkshire, far from the sort of society he enjoyed.
But it turned out his father was very much alive and very pleased to see him. Clad in a dressing gown at two in the afternoon, he’d hugged William tightly, patted him on the back, said William looked fatter since the last he saw him.
His father chatted about the new ewes he’d personally bought at market, about the chicken pie the cook had made for supper. He eagerly showed William the new rooms he was adding to the house. He reported that William’s mother had gone to visit her sister, and that Susan had brought the children around last week, and poor little Arthur had gotten lost in the house and they’d searched the better part of a day for him before they found him crying in the blue drawing room.
Oh aye, William’s father was very well, thank you. The emergency for which he’d summoned his heir home was that he was in desperate financial straits.
Again.
William loved his father. He enjoyed his company—the old man could always be depended upon for a laugh. He’d been the best father one could hope for. Though he was prone to excess, he really did care about things like the Hamilton seat. His father had one great flaw. Well, two, really—William and Susan agreed that the duke’s oft-made claim of being the true and rightful heir to the Scottish throne due to the tracing he’d done on the family tree was suspect at best. But his greatest flaw was that he was horrible with money. Utterly and thoroughly awful. He hadn’t the least bit of financial sense and would not listen to reason. He’d come close to ruining the storied Hamilton family more than once.
One had only to look at the sumptuous and obscenely large palace his father had spent his entire life adding to. The huge monolith rivaled Buckingham and required extraordinary sums to maintain. Even now his father was adding more rooms! This house was the reason the coffers were bleeding. The duke had even forced William to sell the ship he’d purchased with his earnings from high-stakes gambling, and had used the funds to pay off some of the debt.
Naturally, everyone in Britain thought William was the profligate, the spendthrift, the foolish man soon to be parted with his money. But in truth, he was the sensible one.
A movement caught his eye, and William turned his head. In a patch of garden at one end of the house, two figures were dressed in white fencing attire with masks covering their faces and necks. Interested, he moved closer to see them better.
The green was just off a terrace where three gentlemen stood, observing the bout. The opponents were not evenly matched in terms of size—one was broader and taller than the other—but the smaller of the two was the more aggressive, pushing his opponent back with some hard advances. William winced as the larger opponent was pushed off balance, onto his heels. William was no fencer, but he knew sluggish footwork when he saw it.
He turned his face to the sun again. What had he been thinking? Ah, yes. His father’s latest debacle.
In spite of William’s strong recommendation that he not do so, his father had apparently gone ahead and invested in the Weslorian coal industry. His father had been enticed by the new Weslorian Prime Minister, Dante Robuchard, a vague acquaintance of the family. When one possessed a title and a fortune, one tended to end up in the same salons with like titles and fortunes.
William knew Robuchard to be ambitious. So ambitious that he’d convinced a wealthy Scottish duke to invest a considerable amount, which, William suspected, was Robuchard’s way of shoring up the Weslorian economy. And now, his father had explained, there were suddenly currents of concern with the investment and the continued prosperity in Wesloria. The king was dying and the young crown princess had been involved in a scandalous incident with a bounder. It looked as if the princess would assume the throne within months, and Robuchard feared a rebellion might result if she ascended without a husband. “I understand she hasn’t the brain of a bloody hare,” William’s father had declared. “Our investment could be lost.”
William had to bite his tongue to keep from reminding his father that it was not our investment.
That Princess Justine Ivanosen was involved in a scandalous incident did not surprise William in the least. He certainly hadn’t forgotten his own scandalous incident with her in London eight years ago. When he asked his father what her current predicament had to do with him, his father had smiled in that way he did when he meant to ask for something and knew he shouldn’t. Over the next weeks, he’d said, the princess would be in London meeting potential matches. He needed William to go and keep an eye on things and just...let Robuchard know every week how things were progressing. A small favor, he said. A simple task.
At first, William had been struck mute. He couldn’t make sense of those words. Go and keep an eye on things?
So his father had explained it all to him again. It was imperative, he said, that someone keep Robuchard in the loop.
“No,” William had said flatly to that outrageous request. “I’ll no’ do it, Father. I’m no’ a nursemaid, aye?” He knew how these things worked—many people had to be consulted and appeased on such a match. What did he have to do with it? Wouldn’t the Weslorians have scores of people to report back?
As evidenced by the fact that he was here, in London, calling on the princess, he’d lost the debate. When it was clear his father would not yield, William had groaned and asked, “How long?”
His father had put aside the lamb shank he’d been eating and wiped his hands on a linen napkin embroidered with an H in the corners. “Until the lass is engaged.”
“Diah!” William had exploded. “That could be weeks! Months!”
“Months,” his father had scoffed. “She’ll be in Wesloria before the year ends. The king hasna long to live.”
“I won’t do it,” William had said with conviction.
“Need I remind you,” his father asked as he pulled a piece of meat from the bone of the shank, “of the favor I’ve done you?”
William groaned again, but this time, in pain. “No, you need no’ remind me.”
Unfortunately for the Hamiltons, William’s father wasn’t the only one who made unwise decisions. William’s had been an act of honest concern for a woman... And of course, because his decision was unwise, it had turned into a financial burden. This was what he got for trying to help someone—he was to be a bloody nursemaid.
Ewan startled him by suddenly popping up in front of him. “For God’s sake, Ewan,” he said, and yanked at the ends of his waistcoat. “Well, then?”
“You are invited in, milord.”
“Invited in. What does that mean? What of the princess?”
“The gent said he would inform Her Royal Highness you’d arrived.”
William sighed. “Did you tell him that it was the Marquess of Doug—”
“Aye, milord,” Ewan said.
William studied Ewan. “Do they understand that I—”
“Aye, I believe they do, milord.”
William frowned. “Very well.” She had better see him after he’d come all this way. He turned, and when he did, he caught sight of the fencers again. The larger one was on the ground with an épée at his throat, courtesy of the smaller one standing over him. That had escalated quickly.
He turned fully toward the entrance of Prescott Hall and set his mind to meeting Princess Justine again, eight years since the last time. He remembered a young, vain and ill-behaved princess. He thought she might have been pretty, but with no curves to speak of. Ah, and the strange white streak in her hair that marked the royal family of Wesloria. They all had it somewhere on their head—a streak or forelock of pure white that would not accept color. Odd.
How old had she been then? Sixteen years? Maybe seventeen? Old enough that she’d accompanied her parents to London. Young enough that he recalled she’d said when she was queen, she would host a ball every weekend. That was what one could expect when children ascended to thrones—they thought of nothing but the number of ponies and balls they would have.
He would have this over and done. William set off with verve, striding toward the mansion’s entrance so abruptly he caused Ewan to stumble in his haste to catch up.
He’d first met the princess at a ball. He’d danced twice with her, two dances one right after the other, which had been scandal in and of itself. She’d decreed that she wanted two dances, and he’d not declined, as that would have been impolite. He’d been a bit amused by it, really, that girl telling him what to do. She’d worn a pale blue gown, cut in the body-hugging style of Alucia and Wesloria, which he found to be a very pleasing style on grown women, but on her girlish frame, too heavy.
He’d met her again at another soiree, this one at the same Upper Brook Street house where William had sallied forth into debauchery just last night. Beck had reminded him of the incident, a bit of a contretemps over a game of Chairs at a Christmas party. William was blamed for it, of course, and it might have been all his doing, but in his defense, his memory was made hazy by the absinthe he’d drunk. He’d brought the drink from France as a gift to his host, and it had flowed freely, and chaos had ensued with a delightful vengeance.
The game consisted of ten adults trooping in a circle around nine chairs as music played, and once the musicians stopped, everyone had to grab a seat. The person left without a chair was eliminated. A chair was taken away, and the procession begun again.
The dispute occurred during a round that had come down to William, the princess and one other person he couldn’t recall now. The princess had said some very insolent things in the course of the game, and he, in turn, had bumped her with his hip out of the way to win a seat in the final round. She had shrieked with indignation, and he had remarked that it sounded much like he imagined the cry of the banshee. Someone had to explain to the little foreigner what a banshee was, and then she’d turned a lovely little face full of murderous rage on him and they’d argued, and all right, all right, it was badly done. But he didn’t think Beck had to toss him out on his ear like he’d done.
William reached the steps and took them two at a time, each stride bringing him that much closer to the child. The sooner he had this over and done, the sooner he could retreat to his bath.
Ewan, who had struggled to keep up the entire way, probably because he was ten years older and five stone heavier, was still breathless from the exertion of chasing his employer up the steps. He reached around William and knocked on the door again. A liveried footman answered it. “His Lordship...the Marquess...of Douglas,” Ewan panted.
“Please,” the footman said, stepping back into the vast entry hall.
William stepped inside and handed his hat and gloves to the footman. Another one appeared and indicated that William should follow him down the long entry hall to a salon. The room was pink and white, with pink velvet curtains tied back with cheerful gold ropes. The palette reminded him a little of a marzipan cake.
A settee and two armchairs were centered in the room, covered with floral brocade. The carpet, he noted as he walked deeper into the room, was thick and a grassy shade of green. He looked up at the painting over a hearth that was taller than he was. It was a woman in a black-and-white gown, smiling coyly over her shoulder while a pair of spaniels romped at her feet.
A noise outside caught his attention, and he walked to a pair of French doors that were opened onto the terrace and green where he’d seen the fencers earlier. The observers had gone, and now the two fencers were on the terrace, the larger one clearly instructing the smaller one.
Another sound, this one in the room. William looked to his right and very clearly saw someone or something disappear behind the drapes on the east wall. What tomfoolery was this? He walked over and pulled the drapes aside, starting at the sight of a woman looking back at him. She looked familiar...but she didn’t have the golden eyes of Princess Justine. And her hair was gold whereas the princess’s had been dark brown. He frowned with confusion. “I beg your pardon.” Was it possible he had misremembered her completely?
The young woman rose up on her toes, uncomfortably close to him, tilted her head back and smiled coquettishly. “You don’t remember me?” she accused in a slightly accented voice.
He did not remember her precisely like this, and was, in fact, baffled that his memory could betray him so thoroughly. “I do, of course. But I—”
“My lord.”
William turned; a man had stepped through the French doors. He was a Weslorian gentleman, judging by the long coat and the small patch of green on his lapel. It was a curious habit of the Weslorians to always wear a patch of forest green, much like a Scotsman often wore plaid.
“You don’t remember me.” The young woman sounded perturbed, and spoke as if the man had not entered, and William reflexively turned back to her.
“We met when I was in London last. Do you recall me now?” She coyly lifted her lashes, her brown-eyed gaze meeting his.
“I think—”
“My lord!” the man said again, and this time when William turned his head, he was startled to see one of the fencers step into the room. And after a moment of hesitation, the fencer was suddenly advancing on him, and William braced himself, feeling as if he ought to prepare to defend his person.
But something stirred in a nether region of his brain, distracting him. It had to do with the fencer’s attire. Or rather, the curves in that attire. Or rather still, the figure he imagined in that attire. The trousers fit loosely, but when the fencer moved, he could see the shape of a woman’s body. Hips that curved into slender legs. The jacket, fuller in the chest, narrowed at a trim waist. The épée bouncing against a shapely calf.
This person, this alluring figure, was...was the one he’d seen with an épée at the throat of the bigger opponent.
“If I may,” the gentleman said to the fencer, “Lord William Douglas of Hamilton, Marquess of Douglas and Clydesdale.”
The fencer, in response, removed the mask. A thick, dark brown braid of hair tumbled down the front of the fencing jacket. The streak of white—he would never forget it—was still as prominent as ever. But her hair looked thicker and more luxurious than he recalled. This was not the teenage girl who lived in the attic of his memories. This was a grown woman, with curves and swells and lips and dark brows that arched above her eyes with surprise, and Lord, something bothersome and distracting was fluttering in his chest.
That it was, in fact, Princess Justine in the fencing attire, caused him to smile from the sheer absurdity of it. A bit lopsidedly, to be fair, but a smile nonetheless. Look at how well she had turned out. Oh aye, that was Her Royal Highness—William would know her anywhere.
She said pertly to the gentleman, “I know who he is, thank you.” And she handed the gentleman her mask with such force that William heard an oof of breath escape him.
William bowed. “Your Royal Highness, welcome to England.”
The woman he’d found behind the drapes sauntered around him to stand by Princess Justine. The two of them blinked back at him. How could he ever have mistaken the other one for Princess Justine? The woman with fair hair was obviously the younger sister, Princess Amelia.
“You’re much grown now,” William said, the thought hopping onto his tongue before his head had even registered it.
The two women exchanged a look that was almost identical. “And you are...thicker,” Princess Justine said.
Thicker? He’d just had this suit of clothing tailored and the gentleman had proclaimed him perfectly trim.
“He doesn’t remember me,” Princess Amelia said, and folded her arms. Like her sister, she was slightly taller than average. She had a streak of white in her hair, too, but as her hair was golden, it looked more like a bit of blond.
“I beg your pardon, Your Royal Highness. It has been many years.”
Princess Amelia sniffed disdainfully.
“If I may, I am the master of Her Royal Highness’s chamber, Lord Bardaline, at your service.” The gentleman bowed, and the two princesses rolled their eyes in almost perfect unison.
“How do you do?” William was very much aware that Princess Justine’s gaze was moving over him, taking him in.
“Have you come alone?” Princess Amelia asked. “Or did you bring your friends?”
“Pardon?”
Princess Justine put her hand on her sister’s arm to silence her. “A better question is, why have you come?”
Princess Amelia sighed, clasped her hands behind her back and slunk away to the far end of the room to look at the painting. Bardaline’s eyes followed her every step.
But Princess Justine kept her gaze fixed on William, one dark brow arching above the other. She seemed bemused by him. But why? Surely, she knew he was coming. Or had there been some mistake? Perhaps she’d expected him another day? Or, hopefully, his father had it all wrong and he was not expected to be her nursemaid, after all—stranger mistakes had been made at Hamilton Palace. But as often was the case, William proved to be his own worst enemy and said, “Am I no’ expected?”
Both of her brows sank into a vee. “Certainly not by me, my lord.”
What the devil? Had no one told her?
“Your Royal Highness?” Bardaline stepped forward with a smile so forced and pained that William thought he should have hid it altogether. “Perhaps you might prefer to receive Lord Douglas at tea?”
William almost choked—he had no intention of staying for tea. Tea was hours away. What about his scalding hot bath? He meant only to come and greet her and say whatever he must and leave. “Thank you, but I’d no’ take—”
“Je,” she said before he could finish his thought. “I should like to change.” And with that, she turned and walked out of the room, without inquiring if that would suit him, without any polite discourse at all, no asking after his health, no how-do-you-do after all these years. The épée bounced against her calf as she went, her hips moving in a manner so distinctly female that William had to swallow.
Princess Amelia scampered after her.
William looked at Bardaline, who, he noted, did not seem terribly surprised by her abrupt departure, but merely chagrined. He gestured lamely to the door. “If you will please come with me, sir.” He stepped into the hall.
William hesitated—he had the sinking sensation that he was about to walk off a plank into an untenable situation. And yet, instead of thinking of all the excuses he might make here and now, his mind’s eye was fixated on the image of Princess Justine walking away.
He followed Lord Bardaline like a milk cow headed to the barn.
Copyright © 2022 by Dinah Dinwiddie
Don’t miss Last Duke Standing by Julia London, available February 2022.
Keep reading for an excerpt from Inherited as the Gentleman’s Bride by Carol Arens.