Tamed by her Duke (Seductive Mysteries #4)

Chapter 21

CHAPTER 21

“ Y ou want,” she said flatly, wondering if this was not actually her husband but instead some very convincing lookalike—a changeling, perhaps, if changelings came as massive Scotsmen, “to go to a garden party?”

“Well,” her husband said reasonably—which was another point in her changeling theory, as Caleb was many things, but reasonable was not one of them, “I wouldnae say I want to go, no. But we came to London to find the identity of the man who is selling the mill if we sit around here all day, will we now?” He gestured with the knife he’d been using to spread butter on a piece of toast.

This was all annoyingly logical, but when Grace tried to picture her big, broad, wicked husband at a demure London garden party…

She simply couldn’t do it. She simply could not do it.

“I could go by myself,” she ventured, putting some truly divine orange marmalade on her own toast. The Montgomery townhouse might have been where good taste had gone to die—even after the several days’ worth of good effort that Mrs. O’Mailey had put in to clearing the most frequently used rooms—but it had a well-stocked larder.

She glanced up to see Caleb scowling at her, which, frankly, was a relief. Perhaps he wasn’t a changeling, then.

“No,” he said firmly.

“I am a married woman,” she pointed out. Now it was her turn to use reasonableness as a sword. “I don’t need a chaperone.”

“I’m nae going as your chaperone ,” he said as if disgusted by the very idea. “I’m going as your husband . And because there’s someone out there who may come to wish ye harm, once realizes we’re askin’ questions. I cannae very well protect ye if I’m not with ye, now can I?”

He said this with so much smugness—the air of a man who was right, knew he was right, and planned to continue to be right—that it took Grace a moment to realize how nice the sentiment was.

He wanted to protect her. Because he was her husband .

Grace tried not to confuse duty with affection. Caleb was an honorable man; it stood to reason that he’d feel himself duty- bound to protect her from insult or harm. He was also, however, a man who had been very clear about what he did and did not want from their marriage. If he no longer outright avoided or insulted her as he’d done early in their marriage… Well, they understood one another better now. And the townhouse was much smaller than Montgomery Estate. Harder to hide in.

Even so, she could not help but be the teensiest, tiniest bit flattered.

“Very well,” she said, as if making a great concession. “We shall attend the garden party together.”

Caleb mumbled something that sounded a great deal like damn right we will , and which Grace, a lady, chose to ignore.

Several hours later, as she and her husband entered the garden party only to see four separate conversations come grinding to a halt so their participants could gape at the duke and duchess, Grace was regretting her earlier choice not to kick up more of a fuss.

She struggled against the desire to shrink back against her husband’s body as the stares rapidly gave way to eager whispers. Blast it all, the gossip was already flying, wasn’t it?

I hate stupid London , she thought, then blinked at herself for even having the thought. She didn’t…hate London. She was from London. And she’d been disappointed to find herself packed off to the north like an unwieldy parcel.

It was just that the city seemed to very noisy after the weeks at Montgomery Estate. And everyone was so obsessed with gossip. There had been gossip in the village, too, of course, but it had been less insidious. Before he’d told them about the mill, after all, Mr. Creedy had lovingly complained about his daughter’s husband, only to have the man himself, the tavernkeeper, come out, affectionately cuff the older man on the shoulder, and say, “Aye, but I give ye free drinks, so mayhap ye ought to speak a bit nicer about me, eh? When talking to the grand folks?”

“Not on yer life,” Mr. Creedy had replied, grinning. The tavernkeeper had refilled his drink anyway.

Here, however, Grace knew that very little of what was currently being whispered would be said to her face—and what people did say would be shrouded in innuendo. She’d only get the full story tomorrow in the gossip pages.

She glanced up at her husband, wondering if this was why he so reviled the city and fearing that he regretted accompanying her on this search for answers.

Caleb’s face, however, was impassive, almost bored. It was only when he looked back down at her that the look cracked slightly, became a little softer.

“Into the breach, aye, then, lass?” he teased.

She felt her shoulders relax. “Perhaps we’ll aim for a few fewer casualties than at Agincourt, do you think?”

He shrugged. “Let’s see how it goes before making any hasty decisions.”

It was thus that Lady Grace Gulliver, the Duchess of Montgomery, wore a fond smile as she attended her first social event with her husband at her side. Let the matrons gossip about that .

“Lady Grace! Lady Grace!”

Grace pivoted at the sound of her name to see a dark-headed little cannonball headed in her direction, followed by a matching dark head and a bespectacled man.

Amanda Rutley stopped before she bodily collided with Grace, but only just, and only because Caleb, with his soldier’s reflexes, jerked his wife back a step before she could be bowled over.

The woman approaching behind Amanda was her twin sister, Rose, whose name was now, if Grace recalled correctly, Mrs. Cartwright. That would make the gentleman nervously but diligently holding on to her arm Mr. Cartwright, Grace supposed.

“Watch where ye’re going, miss,” Caleb scolded Amanda, who was now bouncing happily on her toes. “Ye nearly injured my duchess here.”

Grace tried to give him a quelling look, even as her traitor’s heart wanted to flutter over my duchess .

“These are Emily’s sisters,” she told him.

Caleb did not look at all impressed.

“She nearly knocked ye down,” he returned.

Grace rolled her eyes.

Amanda, for her part, did not look chastened by the exchange; she merely watched it with avid interest, like someone having a simply marvelous night at the theater. Rose and her husband looked a bit more uncertain.

Grace couldn’t let Caleb frighten them away, however, for she could not have asked for a better spy if she’d chosen one herself.

Amanda Rutley was—and Grace said this with the utmost respect—a compete terror, one who adored schemes, plots, and any form of chaos she could set her hands upon. Not only that, but she was close enough to Emily and Benedict to take note of any gossip that dealt with the Dowager Countess of Moore and the plot that surrounded her. And Amanda was an unmarried young woman.

Everyone always overlooked unmarried young women, no matter how often they were shown that they should not do so.

“Amanda,” Grace said, clasping the younger woman’s hands in hers, “it’s so good to see you.”

Amanda shot Caleb a challenging look, one that said, See? It’s so good to see me . This was brave in a way that bordered on madness, but it was, alas, also hilarious to watch, as this slender little miss smirked saucily up at the glowering Scot.

Grace forced herself to remain focused.

“I have something that I think you can help me with,” Grace said, lowering her voice. “Something that I would prefer to keep away from curious ears.”

Amanda forgot Caleb in an instant, her eyes growing bright at the promise of secrets.

“Of course,” she said, letting Grace lead her over to an arbor that was reasonably protected from the rest of the party. Caleb, Rose, and Mr. Cartwright followed accordingly.

Grace laid out their quest in broad strokes, not bothering with the details, but explaining that they were looking for some gentleman who was tied up in “the whole mess with Benedict’s mother,” who was selling a property in the north using a man of business to be covert about it.

Amanda was impish, impulsive, and loved a bit of mischief, but she was not stupid, and she was not unkind. She did not mention how the dowager countess’ mess was the same as Grace’s mess. Instead, she merely nodded thoughtfully.

“I don’t think I have heard anything related to that,” she said slowly. “But I’ll keep an ear out, of course, Lady Grace.”

Caleb grumbled slightly and Grace just knew it was because Amanda ought to properly be calling her Your Graced , but he managed to contain himself.

“Unless…” Amanda turned to her sister. “You haven’t heard anything, have you, Rosie?”

Rose had clearly already been thinking accordingly, for she didn’t even pause before she shook her head.

“No, I haven’t heard anything either, but I'll listen, too. Sometimes people will say things to married women that they won’t tell unmarried ladies.”

At this, Amanda gave an exaggerated eye roll that was, frankly, a masterpiece.

“Which is so foolish,” she complained, “because obviously Rosie tells me everything anyway.”

Not everything , Rose mouthed from behind her sister’s back. Grace had to bite her lip to keep from smiling too obviously.

“Anyway, consider us the Mayfield Runners,” Amanda said, giving a jaunty and highly incorrect salute that no doubt hurt Caleb down to his bones. “We’ll search high and low for your answers. No stone left unturned. No risk too great.”

“No, no!” Grace said, alarmed. “Don’t take any risks!”

“Of course not,” Amanda replied unconvincingly. “I’ll be safe as a baby bird tucked up tight in its nest. Don’t worry a bit. But, oh, there’s Lady Applethorpe. She knows all kinds of things and she adores me. I’ll start investigating right now.”

She hurried off, Rose trailing at her heels to provide a (much needed) voice of reason. Mr. Cartwright paused only long enough to bow.

“Good day, Your Graces,” he murmured before departing. Grace realized it was the only time he had uttered so much as a syllable in the entire conversation.

“Someone might want to tell yon lassie that birds get attacked by all sorts of things in their nests,” Caleb murmured to her.

Grace nearly choked on her laugh.

As they drifted through the party, Grace struggled to ignore the eyes that followed them wherever they went. Caleb never seemed to notice the looks they were receiving.

Grace wondered what it would feel like to be so unperturbed by the reactions of people around her. She knew Caleb’s life hadn’t been without its troubles; Mrs. Bradley had referenced his late brother, after all, and life in the army was not easy, even for an officer.

But somehow it seemed as though none of that could touch him. He just seemed so certain of himself.

It seemed as though it must be nice.

Though Grace knew that, objectively speaking, England had a temperate climate, she found the sunny London afternoon stiflingly hot after the cool sea breezes at Montgomery Estate. They’d scarcely been at the party an hour when she unfurled her fan.

Caleb glared down at the fan like it offended him.

“Ye’re hot,” he said. “Yer cheeks are pink. Too much sun. I’ll get ye a drink; stay here.”

With this delightful mix of solicitousness and high-handedness, he stomped off in the direction of the punch bowl. Grace looked after him, bemused and not a little entertained.

She did, however, listen to his command and stay where he’d left her. She was in a patch of shade, and there really wasn’t anyone else at this party that she wished to speak with. Maybe after her husband returned and she had her drink, they’d depart. No doubt there was nothing else they could learn at this event.

“Good afternoon, Your Grace.”

She turned at the salutation to see a smiling young man, one who looked vaguely familiar, but whose name she could not place.

She shot him an apologetic smile. “I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, sir.”

He didn’t look offended. “Nigel Beckwith,” he said with a bow.

Something tickled Grace’s memory. “Oh, Lord Beckwith?”

He shook his head. “My brother. Although you were likely to know him a bit better than me; he’s married now, but he was not yet wed when you debuted. He was a Society fixture, and I only recently on the matrimonial scene.” His expression was friendly and open in a way that made the reminiscences playful rather than pointed. “I remember my friend Alistair Fitzhugh danced with you once and was very impressed with himself for landing a turn with the star of the Season.”

“I do recall Mr. Fitzhugh!” she said triumphantly. “He was very passionate about his breeding stables, if I recall.”

Mr. Beckwith pulled a face. He was handsome, in that uninspired way that so many English gentlemen were. “Oh, indeed. Fortunately, he married a woman who is just as obsessed as he is. They’re deliriously happy together. They talk about horses from sunup to sundown.” He gave a playful shudder, and Grace laughed.

“Are you, too, hoping to find a match that suits you as well?” she asked.

“Oh, I suppose so,” Mr. Beckwith said vaguely. “I’m not set to inherit, so I’m in no rush. I can afford to wait for the right woman to cross my path. But,” he said, tone growing more focused, “that’s not why I wanted to approach you.”

“No?” she asked.

He looked a little abashed.

“No, what I really wanted to say was that I am very sorry about everything you went through—while you were gone, of course,” he hastened to clarify, “but the cruel bite of gossip once you returned to London, I mean. It was awful, the way people carped and sniped at you over something you couldn’t control—something you overcame.”

Grace was shocked—partially, yes, because it was a bit outré of Mr. Beckwith, a man she did not know, to approach her to make such a comment. But she was even more surprised to find that someone had found the gossip insidious enough that they went out of their way to mention it.

“I… Thank you,” she said.

“My sister, Miranda, debuted last year, and someone spread a rumor about her,” he explained. “It proved false, and her name was cleared, thank goodness. But I saw how it pained her, to have people talking about her like she was an object of speculation.”

“That’s a good way to put it,” Grace murmured.

“In any case,” the gentleman concluded, “I shan’t take up more of your time. I just wanted to say that I am quite pleased on your behalf, that things seem to have turned out so well for you. You clearly make a marvelous duchess, and you deserve all the happiness in the world.”

He was already half turning to go, the idle pat on the arm he gave her clearly an innocent gesture of farewell.

“Get yer hands off my wife immediately .”

Mr. Beckwith’s eyes went wide and he snatched back his hand at the sound of that telltale burr, low and thick with ire.

“Of course,” he said hastily. “My apologies, Your Grace. And yours, Your Grace,” he added, nodding to Grace. “Good day.”

He fled like he was on fire. Grace turned up to glare at her husband, who was still staring after the poor gentleman like he was planning how, precisely, he intended to tear him limb from limb.

“What in the world was that?” Grace demanded, keeping her voice low, though it shook with her own anger.

Caleb had two glasses of lemonade in his hands; from the way he was squeezing them, they looked liable to shatter in his grip. Before any such disaster could transpire, he placed them, still full, on a nearby table and grasped Grace by the arm.

“Come on. We’re leaving.”

Though Grace had wanted to leave, she’d wanted to do so of her own accord—not dragged behind her husband like a misbehaving puppy being brought to heel.

“Do not yank me, Caleb,” she insisted quietly. People were watching.

He lessened his grip, but did not release her entirely.

“Let’s go,” he said again.

Torn between making a scene—the primary thing she’d been raised to avoid—and acquiescing, Grace followed behind him, trying not to let it show on her face that she was growing angrier with every step.

She held her tongue until they were ensconced in their carriage and the last echo of the slamming of the door had faded. Once they were officially in private, however, she could hold it no longer.

“What,” she asked bitingly, “the hell was that?”

Caleb—of course, she thought irritably—was entirely unmoved by either her temper or her language.

“That man,” he said, his tone suggesting she was stupid for even asking, “was touching you.”

Grace let loose a derisive sound.

“He was being kind . He was offering me his apologies for the wretched way that the ton gossiped about me after my return. Something, that I might add, you got upset about the other night at my father’s house, so I really don’t think you have a leg to stand on in all this.”

Caleb shook his head sharply, a dark lock of hair falling over his brow.

“Nay. That was different.”

She scoffed. “Indeed, it was. Because then, at least, we were away from prying eyes—among family. Now, however, the whole of the ton will be gossiping about you being a brute ?—”

He cut her off by reaching across the carriage, hooking her under the arms, and hauling her into his lap until she straddled him, her skirts a puddle between them. He moved his arms lightning fast to encircle her, holding her head so that he could not avoid his gaze.

“Look at me now, leannan ,” he commanded as her heart pounded and her blood rushed—with anger, with desire. “Look at me and tell me if I care a feckin’ whit about what some noisy English gossips have to say about me.” His grin was wild and vicious, and it sent a thrill through Grace.

“In fact,” he said, using the grip on her head to press her forehead against his, “I welcome it. Let them call me a brute. Let them whisper that the Duke of Montgomery, the great Scottish beast, will rip apart anyone who dares to lay a single finger on his wife.”

He ground his hips against her, and even against far too many layers of fabric, the movement made Grace go weak with longing.

“Caleb,” she moaned, no longer sure if it was protest or encouragement.

“Nay, Grace,” he said. One hand was on her lower back; he used the leverage to press her firmly against him, to hold her there, to prevent her from moving as she pleased. “Ye are my wife. My duchess. Mine . Do ye hear me? I’m prepared to make certain that everybody knows who ye belong to, but I’m happy enough to start with ye, right here, right now. Do ye ken?”

There really wasn’t anything she could do, after that, but kiss him until her lips bruised with the force.

He met her accordingly, all lips and tongue and teeth. She opened her mouth to him, let him possess her; but she possessed him, too, darted her tongue to feel him, pressed back into him with all the force that he was pulling her down atop him.

Maybe Caleb had a point, she thought dizzily—though not even in the midst of passion was she foolish enough to say that out loud, lest she be reminded of it every day for the rest of her natural life. Maybe there was something to be said for brutishness.

Because she wanted him marked as hers until nobody could doubt it.

Their movements grew messy, clumsy, frantic. Faint stubble was already growing on her husband’s cheeks, for all that it was barely teatime, and Grace relished the way it rasped against her sensitive skin. She wanted to feel that stubble everywhere—along her stomach, her breasts, the inside of her thighs.

She was nearly far gone enough in her lust-fueled haze to ask for such a thing when, suddenly, at the worst possible moment, the carriage drew to a halt outside of the Montgomery townhouse.

Caleb looked at the place like he was considering burning it to the ground.

“Feckin’ London,” he growled, not releasing Grace from his lap immediately. “Get where ye’re goin’ too bloody fast.” His accent had thickened with desire and, drat everything, it only stoked Grace’s fires even more.

“But,” she said, her own voice notably breathy, “we’ve a bed, inside.”

Caleb’s gaze snapped back to hers, the deep, deep blue of his eyes nearly obscured by his blown pupils.

“I always did say ye were a clever lass,” he murmured approvingly.

Grace felt unsteady when he set her on her feet. She half wished he’d give fully into his desire for brutishness and throw her over one shoulder and carry her off to bed, like he was some sort of ancient marauder claiming his prize.

Maybe they’d be better off reenacting that particular scene once they were back home and away from the prying eyes of Londoners, she thought, scarcely sparing a moment to recognize that she’d thought of Montgomery Estate as home .

They barely made it all the way up the stairs before Caleb was tugging at her laces.

“You’re going to scandalize the servants,” she panted, wriggling out of his grasp and lunging toward her bedchamber door, only to be stopped before she’d made it more than two paces.

“Was I no’ clear,” he asked, pausing to bite her hard on the nape of the neck that made her gasp and consider presenting herself like a sacrifice to be devoured, “when I said that I daenae care who knows that I’m a brute, so long as they understand that I’m a brute for ye ?”

That comment left her too fuzzy to really care if he got her stark naked in the hallway.

Caleb, however, seemed to possess enough presence of mind to only loosen her gown before they made it all the way into the bedchamber, even if he did slip the neckline further down her shoulder to press hot kisses along the skin there.

The door clicked behind them in the split second before Grace’s dress hit the floor.

“What the hell is this?” he demanded when he found himself looking at the back of her stays. “Where are the damn ties?”

She giggled and whirled in his arms, then brazenly pressed her breasts against him.

“These unlace in the front,” she said, running a finger down her decolletage to where the ties were knotted securely. “It makes it much easier to take them on and off by myself.”

Caleb gazed down at the shadowed valley between her breasts, his throat bobbing and his eyes dark.

“Ye’ll no’ be doing it by yerself today,” he said.

Watching her husband undergo the painstaking process of unlacing her stays would be a delicious tease, Grace decided with a shiver?—

Or it would have been, she amended, for her husband did no such thing. Instead, he pulled a knife from his boot and— snick, snick, snick —cut through the laces until he could pull the entire garment from her body in a single grasp.

She gaped at him, shocked and utterly aroused.

“You cut them!” she exclaimed.

“I’ll buy ye more,” he said at once.

“I mean, you can relace them?—”

“Then why are ye complaining, woman?” he demanded, sounding so disgruntled that it startled a delighted laugh out of her. Why was she complaining? “And now ye’re laughing,” he said, but there was a note of humor in his voice, too.

When he’d stripped her of her shift, too—“Do not cut it again, Caleb; it slips right off!”—he seized her around the waist and tossed her on the bed, where she nearly tumbled off again on the bounce before he caught her in his arms.

“Ah,” he said gruffly. “Finally, I’ve got ye where I want ye.”

“I haven’t got you where I want you,” she retorted, scrabbling for the fall of his trousers, yanking his shirt out of the way so she could access the fastener. When the loose linen kept hindering her work, she tugged the shirt up and up until he gave in and pulled the garment over his head, then pushed on his shoulder until he let her roll them onto his back.

“It’s so nice to know that you can be reasonable when properly motivated,” she told him saucily as she tugged open his trousers.

His eyes went dark. “Woman, I?—”

The words were cut off when she bent down and gave a tentative lick over the length of him. He let loose a long stream of Gaelic that could not be anything but filth.

Grace beamed with pleasure. She’d been wanting to try that ever since he’d applied his mouth to her person; the effects had been so marvelous that they’d quite overridden the crude mutterings she’d heard, during her time away, that alluded to such an act.

She was more than gratified with the effect it had on her husband.

She bent to lick him again, but he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t,” he gritted out.

She frowned. “Did you not like it?” He’d certainly seemed like he’d liked it, his muscles clenching and his face going all intense.

“Aye, I liked it. I liked it too bloody much,” he complained, drawing her up his body and kicking off the remains of his trousers in an impressive show of coordination. “If I’m to spill, I want it to be inside ye.”

Right. The heir they were trying to make.

The reminder was a flicker through her haze of desire, but she ignored it. The consequences would be what they would be. She’d learned the merits of seizing upon good things when they came.

And this, she decided as he pulled her atop him—atop him! She’d not even realized it was possible!—was unquestionably a good thing. After all, from this angle she could see all of him: the pronounced muscles of his chest, shoulders, and arms; the ridges of his stomach; the fine dusting of hair on his thighs that grew thicker as it reached down toward his ankles.

Her husband might not be lithe and fashionable, but his body was like a classical statue—like Atlas, strong enough to hold the earth on his back.

Grace’s fingers were greedy as she ran her hands over the planes of him, were fierce when they gripped at his shoulders as he positioned himself at her entrance and then used her own weight to guide her down, until she was fully seated inside him.

He’d come to her bed regularly since that first time they were together, even if their couplings always were in the dark. Her body had learned the feel of him.

Even so, there was always a stretch at the start, and in this position it was more pronounced, or at least slightly different. Their bodies pressed together in slightly different ways. Her weight worked with her. His hands went to her hips to help her move.

Feeling entranced, she looked down at him as she slid up and down, the muscles in her thighs stretching and aching at this novel use. Caleb, for his part, was looking lower, down at where they were joined, and the knowledge made a shuddering surge of pleasure race through her—not her crisis, but something like it.

His gaze snapped up to hers. “Christ,” he murmured. “If ye only knew how beautiful ye were right now, Grace.”

She tried not to let his sweet words reach her heart. She focused on the needs of her body to keep those thoughts at bay.

“More,” she demanded, her voice hoarse. “Faster. Harder. Please.”

With another growled curse, Caleb rolled them, those powerful muscles bunching and flexing until she was beneath him, their bodies still connected. He could thrust more powerfully from this position, could control his movements more—and, beyond that, he knew how to play her body from this direction, knew it already like he was the master of it, knew that if he moved just so , she would?—

With a cry, Grace fell, her eyes fluttering shut as her climax overtook her. Caleb was mere moments behind, his own pleasure pulling from him with a groan.

Grace’s body was satisfied, but her mind was not. She threw her arms around his neck before he could pull away. She knew he would draw back, sooner or later, but she needed just a bit more, needed him here with her just a bit longer.

Except he didn’t withdraw, did not pull away. Instead he let her embrace him until, in the hazy afternoon light, they both drifted off into a light doze, each held in the other’s arms.