Page 28 of Love, the Duke
CHAPTER8
MAN’S PRACTICAL GUIDE TO APPREHENDING A THIEF
SIR BENTLY ASHTON ULLINGSWICK
Assess motives with discretion.
Through the window at White’s, Hurst could see dense fog had settled over the cold, damp afternoon. No one would know spring was more than six weeks old. Hurst had arrived at the club early to meet his friends and had garnered one of the coveted tables near the fireplace. He liked the warmth, but Rick would complain that it was too damned hot to sit that close to the fire. Hurst would smile, and they’d both shrug it off.
Later, when he returned home, he’d send a message off to his cousin and ask that he come see him. Hurst didn’t think for a moment that his cousin had anything to do with the missing chalice, but he was more than a little curious about what William was doing in the area of Wickenhamden and at Winston’s church.
Feeling unsettled after his visit with Mrs. and Miss Stowe, Hurst looked around the room. He liked the quietness of the famed club. Distinguished gentlemen sat talking in hushed tones while sipping a coffee, brandy, or their favorite afternoon drink. Occasionally there would be loud laughter from someone, or an acquaintance might stop by and say hello, but mostly the members left oneanother alone if they didn’t have a pre-appointed time to meet. Respect for privacy was of utmost importance to most everyone who entered.
Knowing his afternoon drinking habits, the server had brought Hurst a glass of claret almost as soon as his backside hit the chair seat, but he had yet to take a sip of the dark-red wine. He’d been too busy thinking about things he had no business thinking about as he stared into the crackling, popping fire. The past being one of them.
Hurst had often wondered what his father would say if he had lived long enough to see his son sitting in the most renowned club in all of England, and as a duke at that. Hell, what was he thinking? His father would have been the duke instead of Hurst if he’d been alive. It wasn’t that Charles Kingsley couldn’t have been a member of White’s, but he’d never had the money. Not that his allowance and inheritance from his grandfather, one of the former Dukes of Hurstbourne, wasn’t enough to sustain a membership. It was, and more. Or would have if his father hadn’t wasted the generous amount bequeathed to him on livelier, less distinctive clubs and gambling hells that suited his habits better, and all the drink he could hold.
As the first son of a third son of a duke, Hurst’s father had advantages but never learned how to use them to make his own way in life. He didn’t have the discipline that would be required for military duty, or the control and temperament that would be needed for the service of a clergyman. Those were about the only two means of work a man of the ton could boast of having and expect to maintain even a smidgen of his status as a gentleman.
Hurst had considered the life of ministry for a while. Courtesy of the steadiness of Winston and his family’s influence when they were boys. That was before his mother’s sister paid for him to go to Eton and later to Oxford, and before he became close friends with Wyatt and Rick. There was a short time Hurst had acted as carelessly as his father, but it hadn’t taken him long to realize that lifestyle wasn’t for him. He wanted to be nothing like the man. He’d been reasonable, responsible, and respectable for too long to change into a reckless wastrel about Town.
His father had never learned to manage anything in his life. Not his allowance, nor the amount of his drink, gambling, or his temperament. So, Hurst had to learn how to manage them all—well, perhaps he hadn’t learned not to raise his voice in a heated argument. Still, some of the lessons he learned were hard and he hated when thoughts of them came to mind.
There was another person he’d been thinking about the past couple of days. Miss Stowe was at the top of his short list of two. It didn’t take much to remember her. And it was much more pleasurable than thinking about Charles Kingsley. If Hurst was awake, it was a sure bet she’d cross his mind every few minutes. She was inherently more and more compelling every time he saw her. He sensed an innocent vulnerability in her that matched a need inside him to protect her as if she were his very own. That had him fighting the feeling she was the lady for him.
She was rash, foolhardy, and wouldn’t listen to his good, sound advice, and she irritated the hell out of him because of it. She was stubborn too. He wanted, expected, to marry a proper young lady. Not one whoinsisted upon going into people’s houses to secretly search for a chalice.
Despite all that, he felt responsible for her. Maybe because he hadn’t gone to see Winston but kept his plans to visit his aunt and the round of winter parties she’d planned for him to attend. Or because he hadn’t followed through on his youthful promise to do whatever his friend might ask of him but instead took care of his lands. Possibly his feeling of being responsible for her was a combination of both and other things as well.
None of that usurped the fact that Miss Stowe was a danger to herself. Her courage was undeniable and admirable, but she still needed someone to look after her. Her mother would be the obvious choice, but she had the same feelings as her daughter in wanting to make sure Winston wasn’t labeled a thief. All that was understandable to a degree. He didn’t think either of them fully understood the ramifications of Miss Stowe’s actions if she was caught pilfering through someone’s belongings—no matter the reason. Love, loyalty, and a sense of right and wrong were driving them. Those were difficult things to fight.
Heat from the fire settled into his bones and reminded Hurst there was more to think about Miss Stowe. Touching her had been a nice reward for helping her wiggle out of that blasted chest. Thinking of it made him smile. He liked the way she’d felt beneath his hands. Her shoulders were slim but not bony. The muscles surrounding her rib cage were firm but not hard. He’d been tempted to slip his hand down to the curve of her waist, over the flare and roundness of her rump. But that wasn’t his way.
Miss Stowe puzzled him. Everything about her toldhim that with her he had met his match. That she was the one he was waiting for even though he kept rejecting the idea of it. He’d always expected to be knocked off his feet by a lady who looked and acted like the ones he’d met when he was visiting Aunt Sophie’s house, the ones he danced with at parties and balls in London. All of them lovely, shapely, and demure. Not one of them would have ever dreamed of taking him to task over anything nor would they consider going after a thief.
But they didn’t have Miss Stowe’s intoxicating scent, sharp wit, or blue eyes. No, not just blue eyes—incredibly blue eyes that at times seemed to be peering into his mind and searching for his soul. The demure ladies his aunt introduced him to hadn’t shown courage, determination, or strength to match wits with him. Not one of them had given him the desperate desire to pull her close to his chest and kiss the warmth of her neck. Not one of them had made him think that she was strong, intelligent, and brave enough to take care of herself even though it would be his responsibility to do it. Only Miss Stowe.
She had to be the one he was waiting for. Even with her boldness, her temperament, and her outlandish ideas of hiding behind men’s clothing and sticking her head and shoulders into a chest.
Frustration over what he’d felt for her caused him to grit his teeth. He had to come to terms with the fact that her lips beneath his, and the weight of her breast—
“Good afternoon, Your Grace.”
Hellfire.
Hurst straightened in the chair and cleared his mind of the enjoyable and purely masculine thoughts that were about to lead him to some heavenly daydreaming.
“Good day to you, Lord Gagingcliffe.”
The man bowed. “Pardon my interruption, but I couldn’t help but notice you were alone and wondered if you might enjoy some company.”
“Gracious of you, but I’m waiting for someone. And I see they have just walked in the door.”
“Perhaps another time. I wanted to talk to you about the Brass Deck Club.”
That was odd. Gagingcliffe had to be a few years older than Hurst. “Are you interested in being a member?”
The baron laughed. “No, I’m afraid not. I know it’s a younger men’s club. I have a friend who is interested in joining. Mr. Wilbur Sawyer. I thought perhaps I could put in a good word for him.”
