Mary Brendan – Compromising The Duke's Daughter (страница 10)
‘But you recently gave him fifty pounds, didn’t you?’ Joan sounded perplexed.
‘Is that what he said during this private talk you had?’
‘Yes...no...’ Joan amended in confusion. ‘He told me you’d offered him that amount and I assumed he’d taken it.’
‘I did offer it, but he would not have it. He also refused to come and thank me for my most generous gesture.’ Alfred was still smarting over the snub.
‘You wanted a street fighter to come here?’ Joan’s dark brows shot together in disbelief.
‘Of course not, my dear,’ Alfred answered tetchily. ‘I travelled to his territory and waited in a carriage in Cheapside. The detective I engaged delivered the note asking him to meet me and claim his reward.’ Alfred snorted in indignation. ‘Rockleigh dismissed me as though I were a nobody! Deuced cheek of the man!’
Joan nibbled her lower lip while digesting that astonishing fact. People—even those with wealth and standing—kowtowed to her father, bowing and scraping to earn his favours. But Rockleigh was a breed apart, it seemed.
‘So...what are we to do about all of this?’ the Duke muttered to himself as he got up from the sofa and began prowling the Aubusson carpet. ‘I’m hoping the Squire, as my man Thadeus Pryke named him, is as honest and sincere as was Drew Rockleigh, but I’m not sure.’
‘What do you mean, Papa?’ A shiver of apprehension rippled through Joan. The Duke of Thornley was rarely lacking in confidence, or at a loss to know what to do about any situation.
‘Rockleigh is cognizant with our secrets. He has not once hinted to me about your youthful indiscretion since you committed it and in the past we’ve often met at clubs and functions. But he is a different person now; who is to say the Squire will not seek to capitalise on what he knows? A man who has lost wealth and rank might claw his way back into society by whatever means present themselves,’ Alfred concluded bleakly.
Joan realised that her father’s attitude was horribly cynical, yet a similar fear had tormented her when Rockleigh had reminded her of her disgrace. ‘Your secret’s safe with me, my lady...but that might be all that is...’ A sultry gleam had been in his eyes, leading her to believe that lust was behind the threat. But perhaps the base desire he had was not for her, but for the riches lodged in her father’s bank vault. ‘He promised not to betray us, Papa,’ Joan said forcefully in an attempt to reassure herself as much as her father.
‘Promised? You talked about your disgraceful behaviour two years ago?’ The Duke had stopped roaming the room to bark questions at his daughter.
Joan nodded, inwardly berating herself for having brought her heated exchange with Rockleigh to such a dangerous point. The vicar had told her the Squire was a womaniser and she’d been unable to resist hinting at what she knew. He’d retaliated by bringing up the subject of her brazen visit to his hunting lodge.
‘If he means to blackmail me...’ The Duke left the rest unsaid, but his florid physiognomy told of the impotent rage he felt at the idea becoming reality. ‘He is no longer friendly with your brother-in-law so there is no loyalty at stake to make him hesitate.’
‘He will never risk you calling his bluff, Papa. A gentleman accused of seduction is not completely off the hook.’ Joan managed a wan smile, but her rapid heartbeat made her quite breathless.
‘It seems Rockleigh is no longer a gentleman and I doubt he gives a toss for fair play or etiquette.’ The Duke headed towards the sideboard to use the decanter. The cognac he poured was shot back in a single swallow. ‘Of course he might welcome marrying you now to get himself out of the mess he’s in.’ The Duke rubbed his chin with thumb and forefinger, adding rather wistfully, ‘If I truly believed that beneath the Squire’s scruffy exterior still beat Drew Rockleigh’s heart, then I’d hear him out if he called.’
A few of Joan’s slender fingers stifled her horrified laugh. ‘Well, thank heavens he made it clear he wants no more of me now than he did then.’
‘That must have galled,’ the Duke said gently, eyeing his daughter’s proud profile. His little Joan was easily wounded; indeed, when he’d told her two years ago that Rockleigh had declined several thousand acres of prime Devon farmland, together with a handful of Mayfair freeholds, rather than contract to marry her, Alfred had thought she might blub. Of course she had not...pride had seen to that. His daughter had concealed her humiliated expression. Then she had acted as though Rockleigh’s slight was to her liking. Just as she was doing now.
‘I don’t know why the matter cropped up,’ Joan rattled off airily. ‘Our lucky escape from a forced marriage was of little importance then or now.’
‘Yet crop up, it did,’ Alfred said. ‘And who raised it?’
‘It wasn’t raised...just hinted at.’
‘By whom?’ The Duke stubbornly insisted on knowing, even though he could tell that his daughter desired the subject to be dropped.
‘I don’t recall, Papa.’ It was a fib. Joan could remember everything that had occurred during her meeting with Rockleigh. She’d wanted to know whether a street fighter regretted turning down the chance of netting a fortune and a duke’s daughter. And she’d received an answer without asking the question. ‘Nothing’s changed for me...’ he’d drawled while looking privately amused that she might have thought otherwise.
‘Do you believe him corrupt, Papa, and capable of blackmail?’ Joan asked solemnly.
For a moment the Duke said nothing, simply shaking his head slowly from side to side. ‘I always liked the fellow; Rockleigh was not only your brother-in-law’s chum, but a friend to you and me when he dealt so coolly with your misbehaviour. But now...who knows? An empty belly might turn a saint into a sinner...’
‘You are lucky, Joan! Nothing thrilling ever happens to me.’
‘Lucky?’ Joan spluttered, gently extricating herself from her friend’s welcoming embrace. ‘You think it fortunate to be set upon by beggars while an elderly relative swoons at one’s side?’
‘I almost swooned with boredom in Kent,’ Louise Finch riposted. ‘There was nothing to do in the evenings but play bridge with my elderly relatives. I did attend a jig at the local assembly rooms, but I can’t recommend a country affair. The ladies were quite standoffish and all the gentlemen had ugly clothes and loud voices.’
‘Not so different then from the people we are used to,’ Joan commented wryly as they strolled past two young bucks in garish waistcoats, quaffing champagne and chortling at their own jokes.
‘Speaking of coarse fellows...’ Louise winked slowly. ‘Vincent mentioned that a pugilist nicknamed the Squire acted the hero, putting an end to the skirmish in Wapping.’ She grinned on noticing Joan’s heightened colour. ‘A gentleman down on his luck who is acquainted with your brother-in-law, is how Vincent described him. I’ll wager your Mr Rockleigh is a very handsome rogue.’
‘Handsome is as handsome does...’ Joan bit her lip, feeling uncharitable. Her saviour might fight for a living, but just minutes spent in Rockleigh’s company proved him to be mannerly and intelligent. And protective...and provocative. Intriguing, too, she realised; she certainly couldn’t stop thinking about the infuriating individual.
Joan forced her concentration to another gentleman as they strolled on towards the supper room. She was miffed that Vincent had blurted out her news before she’d had a chance to tell Louise in her own way about the drama.
Within hours of his aunt and cousin arriving home from visiting his family in Kent the vicar had made a point of paying a call on the Finches. He’d been eager to report how one of the Duke’s coachmen had taken a wrong turning, landing his female passengers in a dreadful pickle. Louise had listened, open-mouthed, to her cousin’s account, but had been keen for more gory details. The invitation to the Wentworths’ ball, propped on the mantelshelf, had provided a prime opportunity for a chinwag with the main protagonist. Louise was confident that Joan would attend as the Duke and Duchess of Thornley were chummy with their hosts.
Moments ago the two young ladies had spied one another through the throng of guests. Simultaneously they’d left their groups to have a fond reunion beneath the scintillating chandeliers.
Joan linked arms with Louise and they began to perambulate the edge of the dance floor, avoiding the sets forming for a quadrille.
‘This is something else I’ve greatly missed,’ Louise said. They had arrived in the supper room, where a dining table was spread with silver platters filled with delicacies. ‘Country fare leaves much to be desired.’ Louise popped a marchpane pineapple into her mouth, enjoying it and licking her lips before adding, ‘Vincent’s people are nice folk, but I couldn’t live on broth and stew as much as they do.’
‘I enjoy a good pheasant casserole.’ Joan fondly remembered the hearty meals served up at Thornley Heights, her father’s primary ancestral seat. During dismal Devon evenings, when the winds sometimes blew so loud that it seemed banshees inhabited the chimneys, she’d loved to curl up by a roaring fire with a book, feeling cosy and content after a satisfying repast.