Page 6 of It's All About the Duke
“It is,” the duke answered without any uncertainty in his tone. “Olingworth asked me, and after much deliberation—and brandy—I accepted.”
Her heartbeat surged again. Rebuffing his assertion still seemed her best defense. “He wouldn’t do that to me. He wouldn’t put me under the care of a—”
“Rake?” the duke asked as easily as he’d told her to shush before he’d wiped her cheek. He joined her in front of the fireplace. “I know what I am, Miss Fast. I had a difficult time believing Olingworth wanted me to do it, too. And even more difficulty when, the next day, I realized I had actually consented and the letter had been posted by my butler before I could retrieve it.”
“You agreed to be my guardian when you were inebriated?” she questioned in disbelief.
His ebony-dark eyes sparkled with playful mischief. “I’m afraid it’s the only defense I’ve been able to come up with for my unusual lapse in good judgment.”
“You? Good judgment?”
Marlena didn’t think she could become any more offended, but she just had. Where was this man’s honor? Oh, how had she forgotten, he had none. The duke was the epitome of the rogues she’d heard and read about. And had written about, too!
Now that she hadn’t been carted off to a cold dungeon to await the hangman’s noose, she was feeling strong and resilient.
“I can’t believe you’d admit something that outrageous.”
“It’s true, but I feel no pleasure or guilt in telling you.” He paused. “I know you’re thinking I’m the last person who should be in charge of an innocent young lady’s fate.”
“That, as well as many other things,” she answered from between tightly clinched teeth. “This is sheer madness.”
“I agree.”
Marlena’s mind swirled with too many thoughts to properly sort them all out at the moment. She remembered how the duke had studied her intently when he first saw her. She couldn’t blame him. She must have looked affright with her soiled garden apron and dirt on her cheek.
“Why would you accept this obligation for me knowing you are a scoundrel and you shouldn’t even be in Society? I take it no one was holding a pistol to your head and forcing you to do this no matter the amount of swill you had ingested.”
He grimaced. For a moment she thought she might have gone too far with her cutting words, but then his mouth relaxed into another smile and he chuckled softly. It was a husky, inviting, and intriguing sound that stirred her in a way she’d never felt before. He looked so natural and pleasing while finding pleasure in her discomfort that Marlena wanted to stomp her foot in frustration over the unfairness of it.
“The distiller of the brandy I drink would not take kindly to you calling his fine cognac swill, Miss Fast. But that aside, Olingworth wanted me to do this because it’s what is best for you.”
“Surely you jest.”
“That’s not in my nature.”
Yes, she could see by the look in his eyes that it wasn’t. She’d never know it, though, by the lack of starch in his collar and the relaxed bow in his neckcloth. Was it even a bow? She wasn’t sure. It was so carelessly tied, it looked as if he hadn’t even tried to manage it properly. Most noblemen wore their collar points so high and stiff they could hardly move their necks, which forced their chins into an abnormally high lift. And according to all she’d heard, titled men were usually just as rigid. The duke’s chin wasn’t haughty, just handsome. Maybe it was the more comfortable appearance of his clothing that added to the mesmerizing charm so many ladies in thetonswore he had.
“Olingworth knows my father would have done it for him if he’d still been alive. He believes because I’m my father’s son and a duke I will see to it that you make a good match, and I will.”
Marlena looked down at the envelope she held. Suddenly she felt as if she were choking again. She reached up and pulled on the narrow strip of satin around her neck, but knew it wasn’t the weight of the straw hat on her shoulders that made it feel as if her throat were closing. It was all the raw emotions stirring inside her like an apothecary’s brew in a steaming cauldron. Other than losing her parents so early in life, the Duke of Rathburne becoming her guardian was the worst thing that could have occurred.
Would she be able to continue to write about him and other rakes in her scandal sheet? Yes, she must. At least for a little longer. Until Eugenia could attend the Season and settle on a husband to take care of her so that she was no longer her sister’s responsibility. Then Marlena could give it up as she’d planned after the first Season.
But what would Marlena do if the duke somehow found outshewas Miss Truth?
No, what wouldhedo?
To her?
That didn’t matter right now. She couldn’t stop writing the scandal sheet. There was no arguing that point with herself. It was a small amount the publisher paid Marlena, but Eugenia and her married sister, Veronica, depended on it. It helped keep the sisters in their house and living next door to Marlena. She would find a way to keep writing the scandal sheet for now.
Yet what was she to do about the duke? She had absolutely no way to fight a change in her guardianship, no way to have the freedom to control her own inheritance. She would have to concede those facts.
“Oh, I don’t understand this,” she whispered more to herself than the man looking at her. “Mr. Olingworth has been kind to me all these years.” She placed the sealed envelope on the table beside the lamp. “He’s always allowed me more freedoms than most girls and young ladies would have. Why now would he be so cruel as to put you in charge of my life?”
“If it will make you feel better, perhaps you could look at this as it was meant to punish me, not you.”
“You?” Marlena exclaimed without a trace of caution in her words. His arrogance was of the highest order. But he was the typical rake, she thought. Thinking of no one but himself and his desires.
