скачать книгу бесплатно
‘Thank you for coming here with me. You have been nothing but kind and patient. You knew this was going to happen, didn’t you? If not Mr Alexander changing the house, then some other things would be different.’
‘I suspected the servants would bar you from entering. I had hoped to save you from that humiliation. That’s why I suggested we go to my home in Bath instead. I love you, Elizabeth, and I don’t want to see you hurt. Living with Skeffington was punishment enough for one lifetime.’
Lizzy turned and scanned the room once more. He had done an admirable job. The reproductions in the room were of very high quality. You would almost think they were made a very long time ago. If this room were in anyone else’s home, she would have said that she liked it. But not here. Not in Stonehaven.
‘Let’s finish our tea,’ Lizzy said with a sigh. ‘I only wish we didn’t have to have it in my Wedgwood cups.’
They walked back to the sofa and settled in.
‘I think you are right,’ Lizzy said after taking a long, slow sip from her cup. ‘I think we should go to Bath. There is nothing left for me here.’ She was proud of herself for being able to hold back the catch in her throat.
‘You will find your place, Elizabeth. All is not lost. You were able to make a home for yourself here in Stonehaven. You will find a way to do that at Clivemoore.’
It certainly didn’t feel as if she would be able to do that at the moment. She had spent only a few weeks at Clivemoore while she was married and she had found the old house rather dark and gloomy. It wasn’t the kind of place that inspired happy thoughts. It certainly hadn’t felt like home. And it was a far journey from Clivemoore down to London or to Aunt Clara in Bath. She had never bothered to learn much about the gentry in the area. Would she even have things in common with any of them?
‘I’ve spoken with Sherman, my man of affairs, and instructed him that I’d like to use the money that I inherited to purchase a small town house in London and use the income from Clivemoore to support me.’
‘Why is this the first I am hearing of it?’
‘I’ll tell you more about it on our way to Bath. I’d like to take a short look around to see what else he has changed before we leave. I can think of no reason I will ever be invited to return. I only wish the last time I had seen this place hadn’t been in the middle of winter with all the snow on the ground. I would have loved to walk one final time through the gardens when everything was in bloom.’
Her only solace was that she wouldn’t be seeing Mr Alexander again.
Chapter Four (#u9c7d5f07-a1ec-53fa-b007-7a685039553e)
Lizzy walked through the public rooms of Stonehaven with a heavy heart. She would miss this place. Peeking into them felt as if she were saying goodbye to an old friend. Short of chaining herself to the banister of the main staircase, she couldn’t think of one thing to do that would make Mr Alexander understand how much she wanted to live here.
She had considered asking to sit down with him to have a rational conversation to once more suggest they switch houses, but she knew he would view her need to live here as somewhat irrational. He was a man. If she discussed her desire to reside close to her family and friends it would sound like sentimental drivel to him and she was not about to let him know how truly alone she was feeling since her sisters had got married. She was a duchess. Sharing her feelings with him was beneath her position.
As she walked along the corridor of the first floor of the house past the rooms that held so many memories, all was quiet and still. It was as if the structure was waiting to be filled with the sounds of laughter and excited chatter. Those were the sounds that had reverberated around these walls when Lizzy was there with her sisters and Aunt Clara.
When she entered the library, she sat on the window seat that her younger sister, Juliet, would often curl up on to read on rainy days during the years she lived with Lizzy after their parents had died of consumption. In the breakfast room, she ran her fingers along the round table where she would often share meals with Aunt Clara and Juliet. In the silence of the room, she could still hear her aunt’s voice explaining the virtues of a strong cup of tea to start the day. And when she entered the conservatory, she still felt the pain in her heart from the time she held her older sister, Charlotte, in grief as she told Lizzy that she received word that her husband, Jonathan, had died during the Battle of Waterloo. They were everyday memories and some life-changing ones, as well, but they were the times that reminded her that in her horrible marriage without love she wasn’t completely alone. There were people who loved her and cared about her and valued her. Now she would no longer walk these halls and enter these rooms to be reminded of that.
She trudged further down the corridor and stopped at the closed door of the Duke’s study. Her husband had very rarely spent any time at Stonehaven. He would customarily visit the house twice a year to meet with his steward and inspect the house and grounds for himself. When he was in residence the door to his study would always be closed. All other times, the door to the room was left open. Even though she knew that Mr Alexander was probably inside with Mr Finley, the sight of the closed door made her muscles tighten as if she was anticipating Skeffington throwing it open and berating her for some minor faux pas. She could still picture his wrinkled lips, his yellowed teeth and the spittle that would form in the corners of his mouth when he would yell. The only consolation to leaving Stonehaven and finding a new house in London was that she would never have to look at that door or be inside that room again.
The next room was the Blue Drawing Room. When she tried to turn the door handle and go inside, she was surprised to find the room was locked. Why would he bother locking it? There was nothing of real value inside. Did he fear she would steal a deck of playing cards on her way out of the house? Or perhaps he believed she was inordinately fond of the Meissen dogs that lined the carved cream-coloured mantel of the fireplace?
The man really was a mystery. All that she knew about him was what she had been told by Lord Liverpool and Mr Nesbit. After Skeffington had died, they had informed her that his nephew, who was his presumptive heir, had also died two months prior in a riding accident. The ducal seat was to go to a distant cousin of her late husband and it had taken great pains to finally track Mr Simon Alexander down somewhere in Sicily. She didn’t know why he had been there, or how long he had been staying there. No one really seemed to know.
What she did know was that he had not returned to England for almost six months after Skeffington had died and the delay meant that for almost six months she was a woman without a home—until the will was read and she learned the remainder of her life would be lived out in the far north of England, away from everything that was familiar to her.
When she reached the armoury, she was relieved to discover it had remained unchanged. As she walked inside, she immediately recalled the sound of Juliet’s laughter the summer they decided to take fencing lessons with Monsieur LeBatt. Skeffington had decided to spend that summer at his ancestral home and there was no chance that he would be venturing down to Dorset in the heat. It felt like a form of rebellion to take the lessons and she found they helped to release some of the anger she felt towards her husband and towards her deceased parents who had arranged the marriage.
The four suits of armour that had belonged to Skeffington’s ancestors still stood sentry in the corners of the red room, gleaming in the late afternoon sun that was streaming in through the long windows. Ancient broadswords and ceremonial swords were hung on the great expanse of wall opposite the fireplace and the small swords that Monsieur LeBatt had used to teach her to fence were hung on the wall between the windows. There was no telling the last time a fire had burned in the hearth and when she took one of the small swords off the wall, the metal grip was cool in her hand through her silk glove.
The weight of the weapon felt familiar and, with a swish of the blade, Lizzy saluted the imaginary image of her old fencing master. He had taught her so much that summer and she tried to recall why she had not taken lessons with him the following year. She did remember Monsieur LeBatt telling her on one particular afternoon that she had quick instincts, which made her a formidable opponent. She liked to believe he was telling her the truth and not simply flattering her because she was paying him to teach her. False flattery was one of the things she liked least about possessing her prestigious title.
She lifted the blade straight out to her right side and lowered her knees a few inches. Placing her left hand up in the air at a ninety-degree angle from her body and turning her head towards the blade, she lunged to her right. The stretch of her thigh muscles felt heavenly after spending a good portion of the day in her carriage and she let out an unladylike groan.
The movement had somehow also relieved some of the tension in her shoulders that she hadn’t been aware was there and she tilted her neck from side to side to stretch it, as well. Rolling her shoulders, she adjusted her grip, then resumed her position and lunged again. This time she bounced off her soles as she lunged, taking a leap forward before retreating back to her original stance. The narrowness of the cut of this particular gown was somewhat restrictive and prevented her from lunging as far as she wanted. Needing a deep stretch of her legs, she picked up the skirt of her gown with her left hand so the hem was above her knees and once more she bounced off her soles and lunged towards the window.
A choking sound came from behind her and she spun around, sword in hand, and instinctively pointed the blade directly at the figure of the Duke standing in the doorway. His surprised expression must have matched her own because she felt her eyes widen and she immediately let go of her skirt. The downward swoop of the fine woollen fabric of her grey travelling gown pushed her cotton petticoat and chemise against her legs. For a moment, she feared she would trip if she took a step forward.
‘How long have you been standing there?’ she demanded, wanting to run out of the room from the embarrassment of knowing he had seen her legs.
‘Long enough to hear you utter an impressive grunt and appear to wish to attack the curtains.’
Thank God he hadn’t mentioned her legs. ‘I was not attacking the curtains.’
‘It wouldn’t bother me if you were.’ His gaze shifted to the red-velvet curtains behind her. ‘I don’t really care for them.’
‘These curtains were quite expensive and complement this room perfectly. The colour speaks of past battles and is a testament to the men who fought them. Your ancestors, I might add.’
‘I should have known the design of this room was your idea,’ he said, glancing around the room before striding towards her with his open banyan billowing out behind him, revealing an impressive chest, which was covered up by his blue waistcoat.
Once more that bare neck of his caught her eye and his commanding presence made the large room feel smaller. Lizzy shifted in her stance before she unconsciously tightened her grip on the handle of the sword and steadied her hand.
He walked right up to the tip of the blade so it was pointing at his heart, all the while looking into her eyes as if to challenge her. ‘This room is a bit too theatrical for my taste.’
She narrowed her gaze on him. ‘Are you insinuating I’m theatrical?’
‘I have seen curtains just like those in the opera houses in Italy,’ he replied offhandedly.
He had ignored her question. She hated it when people ignored her. She was the Duchess of Skeffington. ‘You didn’t answer my question. Are you calling me theatrical?’
‘That might be one word to describe you. I suppose dramatic is a more accurate word.’ With the tip of his finger he slowly guided the blade of the sword away from his chest.
‘And the other words you think describe me?’ she asked, lowering the small sword to her side, annoyed that he had the ability to fluster her so much that she had forgotten she had been aiming a weapon at him.
‘I don’t think you really want me to say what the other words are.’
‘If I didn’t want you to tell me, I wouldn’t have asked.’
He walked to the wall between the windows and selected a sword, testing the grip in his very masculine-looking hand. Without gloves, she could see he did not have the hands of a man who led a pampered life. They weren’t smooth and pale like many of the men of the ton whose hands resembled a larger version of those of a child. His hands were tanned, like the colour of the gardeners’ skins when they worked outside in the summer. The pronounced veins on the top of his hand seemed to pump while he adjusted his grip—and she took note of a narrow scar about two inches in length near his wrist. Lizzy didn’t think she had ever paid this much attention to a man’s hand before now.
He waved the blade in the air towards the window and the setting sun glinted off the metal. With his eye, he appeared to check the straightness of the blade. ‘I suppose another word I would use to describe you is wilful.’
Lizzy pushed her shoulders back and raised her chin. ‘That doesn’t sound like a compliment.’
‘It wasn’t meant to be,’ he replied with his back to her as he selected another sword.
‘Are you ever civil, Mr Alexander?’
Calling him Skeffington just felt wrong. He was not her late husband—far from it. She could have referred to him as Duke, but at this moment she had no wish to remind him they shared their elevated status. At this moment, she wanted to remind him that she was a duchess and had been given the title long before he ever stepped foot into Mr Nesbit’s law office.
‘Mr Alexander, is it?’ A small smile tugged at his lips, as if he found her amusing.
Kittens were amusing. Small children were amusing. She was a duchess. She was not amusing!
‘That was the name you were given, is it not?’ she replied sharply.
‘It is and I had gone by that name for thirty-five years until people began to call me by my new one. It has been a while since anyone has called me Mr Alexander.’
If she thought it would have pleased him in some odd way to refer to him by his original name, she would have called him Skeffington instead. ‘Why do you consider me wilful?’
He turned back to her with a different sword in his hand. ‘You truly are asking me that question? You? The woman who wanted to switch houses with me and, when I refused, came to the house she wanted anyway and proceeded to enter—uninvited, I might add—and order my servants around.’ He brought the handle of the sword to his eye and looked down the length of the blade, once more appearing to see how straight it was. Then his eyes met hers. ‘I would say that was wilful. What would you call it?’
A warm rush was rising up her neck and into her cheeks. ‘I don’t know what I would call it. Resourceful, maybe.’
‘Rude...you could also call it rude.’
‘I have never been called rude in my life.’
‘Maybe not openly, but I suspect it has been whispered about you behind your back.’
‘Of all the nerve!’ Lizzy tightened her grip on the sword’s handle that she was holding down by her side.
He lowered his sword and cocked his head, looking her in the eye. ‘Why are you still here? I was very generous to allow you and your aunt to take tea before continuing on your journey to harass another homeowner somewhere in the country. I agreed to allow you to stay with the understanding that when you were finished, you would go on your merry way and leave this house. Imagine my surprise when I showed Mr Finley to the door and was asked by my butler if he should have my housekeeper arrange for rooms for you and Mrs Sommersby to stay the night.’
She felt a small weight lift from her chest at the idea she might have another day to walk the halls of this house she had long thought of as her home. ‘And what did you tell him?’
‘That it wasn’t necessary to have rooms arranged for the both of you since I would make sure you left shortly. I did, however, tell him to make certain your servants were fed so they had something warm in their bellies for the journey ahead. Your servants should not have to suffer because their mistress had made a foolish decision.’
‘I don’t make foolish decisions.’ Not any that she would admit to him at least.
He arched his brow and did not appear convinced. ‘You arrived on my doorstep in the middle of winter, from who knows how far away, assuming I would not be here and you and your aunt would be granted use of my house by my staff. That sounds foolish to me.’
‘It was a risk worth taking. My aunt resides in Bath. It is not too far a journey from here. If we had been unable to stay, we would simply have continued on to her home. Haven’t you ever tried something just to see if it was possible?’
‘More times than I’d care to admit. Is that what you were doing in coming here today? You were just trying to see if you could indeed stay here for a while. What is it about this house that makes you want it so badly?’
She couldn’t confess the complete truth to him. It would make her sound pathetic and needy. Let him believe whatever he wanted. Maybe there was still a way to convince him that he would be happier in the dark and sombre designs of Clivemoore House. Its dark colours would suit his grumpy disposition.
Chapter Five (#u9c7d5f07-a1ec-53fa-b007-7a685039553e)
Simon was well aware his mouth had dropped open and his breeches had tightened when he saw the Duchess of Skeffington raise her skirts and unknowingly give him the chance to admire her very shapely long legs from the open doorway of the armoury. He didn’t want to admire anything about her. She was a haughty, materialistic woman who could agitate him like no other. But there was no denying she had legs that went on for ever and, for just an instant, he imagined skimming his hands up them.
Then she turned and pointed that sword of hers at him and he was reminded that she had the type of temperament that made it distinctly possible that she could turn that metal sword to ice simply by holding it.
In the late afternoon light that was now casting her face in a warm glow, he watched her attempt to gather the right words to explain to him why she couldn’t give up Stonehaven. He suspected she was trying to think of something to say that didn’t reveal that she wanted the higher income Stonehaven would bring to her over Clivemoore. He waited for her to offer some sentimental tale, like she had spent her honeymoon here, but she remained silent. Shortly after the old Duke’s will was read, he met with the man’s secretary, Mr Mix, and was informed of the profitability of each of the estates. Surprisingly, Clivemoore was the least profitable, bringing in eight thousand pounds per year. Stonehaven brought in ten thousand.
Simon was not about to give that income and this house to the Duchess. The Blue Drawing Room currently stored items that had come over on the ship with him from France and, although he would barely be spending any time at Stonehaven, the estate provided him with a tidy income that he could use to support both the house and some of his future excavations.
He couldn’t imagine why she had wandered into the armoury. Had she left something here that she wanted back? He understood that the contents of all the houses were his and she had no right to take any of the items with her to Clivemoore unless he granted her permission. He had no attachment to any of the things that were owned by his predecessor. He felt no sense of fondness for the family who had deserted his father when he married Simon’s French Huguenot mother. If the Duchess were honest with him about what she was looking for in the house, he might be inclined to give it to her, but she was not getting Stonehaven. It was the one thing he was grateful he had inherited with this damned title that placed too much attention on him and disrupted his plans.
She toyed with her emerald necklace. ‘Surely you must know by now that I was responsible for redecorating a number of rooms in this house. I simply like it here. It suits me.’
‘You say this house suits you,’ he said, ‘but as you can see, I am slowly going to be redecorating it to suit my taste. This house will not look the way you will fondly remember it when I am through with it.’
There was a slight twitch to her eye, letting him know that his statement had affected her.
‘You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? You are enjoying taunting me with the fact that the one thing I want, I cannot have.’
‘Is this truly the only thing in this world that you cannot have?’
There was a hesitation and he could tell her thoughts had wandered to something else—probably the grand ducal seat in Somerset that was the most profitable and prestigious of the Skeffington estates that could never be used as a Dowager House. But he knew by the set of her posture that she wasn’t about to share her thoughts with him. At least she was not a hysterical female. He would give her that. Some women would have pleaded and cried to try to sway his decision. He had the impression the Duchess would have preferred to walk for days in the desert without water before she shed one tear in front of him.
‘This house means a great deal to me as you can see,’ she said, looking away towards the windows, ‘however, I will not have you taunt me about it. You will be very happy to hear I will be leaving now. I find I cannot stand to be in your presence much longer.’
She walked over towards the window and lifted her small sword to hang it back up on the wall. Knowing that she was about to leave should have made him happy. And yet...
‘How is it that you know how to hold a sword such as that one?’ he asked, trying to understand even an insignificant thing about her.
She appeared somewhat startled by the change in conversation. ‘I took fencing lessons here years ago.’
‘Are you any good?’
‘I’ve been told I am.’
‘By whom?’
She raised her chin. ‘By Monsieur LeBatt, my fencing master.’
He hadn’t heard of the man, but he’d been out of the country most of his life. In all likelihood Monsieur LeBatt had given her the compliment to ensure she continued to pay him for his instruction.
Their eyes held for several heartbeats, neither one seeming in a hurry to look away. There was something between them. He could not name it, but he did know that whatever it was, it had not been settled yet, and in his gut he didn’t believe it had anything to do with the house.
‘I believe you put that sword away prematurely,’ he said, feeling the edges of his mouth curl up with the idea that popped into his head. He had a way to ensure that the issue of who got to live in Stonehaven was settled once and for all. He didn’t want her showing up on his doorstep to be a regular occurrence. The only question was, would Elizabeth, the Duchess of Skeffington, be up for the challenge?
Her brows furrowed. ‘I don’t understand. You do not wish me to return the sword to the wall?’
He walked over to her so they were only a few feet apart. Standing this close to her, he could make out faint freckles on her nose. He had never noticed them before. It must have been a play of the light. ‘I have a proposition for you.’
‘What kind of proposition?’ she asked with a dubious expression.
‘Fear not. I am not interested in your virtue.’
A flash of what might have been anger flickered in her large brown eyes, which didn’t make any sense. Did she want him to seduce her?
The waning sunlight bounced off the blade of the sword he held down against his side. ‘What do you say we make a wager for this house?’
Her expression changed to one of interest, although it appeared she might be holding her emotions in check and trying to suppress some form of excitement that now danced in her eyes. ‘I’m listening.’
He stalked around her, taking open measure of her form just to irk her. She moved in a circle with him so they remained face-to-face. Perhaps Adam was right. She could be considered attractive with her fine features and her big doe-like eyes.
Simon wet his top lip with the tip of his tongue. ‘I was wondering if you would care to duel for it?’
‘You expect me to shoot you for this house?’ Her astonishment was evident in her tone.
