Daring To Love The Duke's Heir. Janice Preston

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СКАЧАТЬ does not become you. Am I correct in assuming that you and your sister will be making your debuts this coming Season?’

      Liberty turned to her sister. ‘Come, Hope. We are wasting our time expecting any assistance from His Lordship.’ She glared again at Dominic. ‘I shall write to your father, as you suggested, sir, in the hope that he possesses the conscience you so clearly lack.’

      Hectic pink flushed Hope Lovejoy’s cheeks as she shot a furious look at her sister. She stood and smoothed out her skirts, then dipped a curtsy as she smiled apologetically.

      ‘Do please excuse us for invading your home, Lord Avon,’ she said. ‘Good afternoon.’

      Dominic bowed. ‘No apology is necessary. Good afternoon, Miss Hope Lovejoy.’

      He then glanced at Liberty and guilt thumped him hard in the chest at the despair that dulled those extraordinary eyes. He stifled a sigh.

      ‘I shall have a word with Alex and make sure he and Wendover are not getting in too deep, Miss Liberty Lovejoy—’ and her name still made him want to smile ‘—but other than that there is little I can do. Alex will not take kindly to any attempt by me to tell him how to behave.’

      Gratitude suffused her features.

      ‘But I am still convinced you are worrying over nothing,’ he added.

      ‘I thank you nevertheless, my lord.’

      Liberty’s face lit with a more-generous smile than his offer warranted and, before he could stop himself, he found himself responding. He blanked his expression again and crossed to the bell pull. Liberty Lovejoy provoked strange emotions in him—emotions he did not care to examine too closely—but he was reassured by the knowledge their paths would rarely cross. Wendover, as a peer—even a hellraising peer—would find acceptance everywhere, but his sisters, raised in obscurity and with a grandfather in trade, would likely only frequent the fringes of society.

      William, thankfully, answered his summons promptly.

      ‘Please see the ladies out, William.’

      He bowed again, avoiding eye contact with either of his visitors, then stood stock still after they had gone, staring unseeingly at the closed door, wondering how one voluptuous, sweet-smelling woman had stirred such unaccustomed feelings within him. He had always kept his emotions under strict control, as behoved his father’s heir. Alex and their younger sister, Olivia—before she had wed four years ago—had always been the lively, mischievous ones of the family, but Dominic had grown up with the weight of expectation on his shoulders. It was his duty to make his father proud, to uphold the family name and to always behave as befitted a future duke.

      Also, strangely, he felt compelled to protect his father—a nonsensical-seeming notion when one considered how powerful Father was. But Dominic recalled his mother’s death all too clearly, and how Father had suffered from guilt. Dominic had seen and heard things no eight-year-old boy should ever see and hear and, by shouldering the responsibility of being the perfect son and the perfect heir, he had vowed to shield his father from further distress.

      He shook his head, as though he might dislodge those memories and the thoughts they evoked, clicking his tongue in irritation. He swung round to face the room. Betty hovered not five feet from him, having been unable to get past him to the door as he stood there like a mindless idiot, blocking her exit.

      He frowned and moved aside, motioning for the maid to leave, his promise to Miss Lovejoy—it had been a promise, had it not?—nipping at him. He would speak to Alex.

      ‘Betty?’

      ‘Yes, milord?’

      ‘Is Lord Alexander currently in residence?’

      Dominic did not live at Beauchamp House, preferring the privacy of his own town house when staying in London. He had travelled up to town yesterday from Cheriton Abbey and had merely called at Beauchamp House to warn the staff that his father’s butler, Grantham, would be arriving shortly to prepare the house for the arrival of the Duke and Duchess and to find out what day his sister, Olivia, and his brother-in-law, Hugo, were due to arrive in London.

      ‘No, milord.’

      ‘Ask downstairs if anyone knows where he is staying in London, will you please?’

      Betty nodded and then scurried past him out of the room.

       Chapter Three

      That glimpse of kindness in Lord Avon just before they left almost changed Liberty’s impression of His Lordship. Almost, but not quite. That one final concession was simply not enough to wipe out the many black marks against him, and Liberty, crotchety and restless after that interview, was in no mood to forgive. She clambered into the carriage behind Hope and sat down before knocking on the roof with her umbrella as a signal to Bilk to drive on. As soon as the carriage was in motion, Hope swivelled on the bench to face Liberty.

      ‘I was never more embarrassed,’ she said. ‘Do you never stop to think of the consequences of your actions on me and Verity? Lord Avon is the most eligible bachelor in the ton and Mrs Mount had grand hopes that one of us might catch his eye. She told me the family estates in Devonshire are vast, but now you have ruined our chances because you will never listen to anybody. You always think you know best. Oh! To think! I might have been a duchess.’

      ‘A marchioness, Hope. Lord Avon’s father is very much alive and well. And do please stop dramatising everything. That man would never seriously consider either you or Verity as suitable...he was utterly contemptuous about us not being raised with the expectations of moving in high society.’

      ‘But we have our looks on our side. Why, Lord Redbridge called me an Incomparable the other day! And, oh, Liberty! Isn’t Lord Avon the most handsome, well-set figure of a man you have ever seen?’

      ‘Hmmph. A person might think that, if she cared for the Corinthian type, but he is also arrogant, haughty, conceited—’

      Words failed her but, next to her, Hope unexpectedly giggled.

      ‘He has made you cross, hasn’t he, Liberty? Do you not realise all those words have the same meaning?’

      Liberty pursed her lips. ‘Unfeeling. Rude. Superior—’

      ‘Superior means the same again,’ crowed Hope.

      ‘Well, we can’t all have a way with words like you, Hope.’

      Now Hope was relieved of the necessity to earn a little money by teaching in the local school, she either had her head buried in a novel, or was madly scribbling poetry and plays, while Verity was rarely seen without a sketchbook in her hands.

      They were happy to leave the practicalities of running the family to Liberty—a responsibility she had taken on after their parents died, having promised her dying mother that she would look after the family and keep them safe.

      ‘Well, it matters not what your opinion of His Lordship may be, Libby, for I am very certain he would not consider you as marriageable after the way you spoke to him.’

      ‘I СКАЧАТЬ