To Pleasure a Duke (The Husband Hunters Club 3)

“Marriage will sober her,” said the dowager duchess. “She must learn that people like us have a position to maintain. We cannot do what we wish. We must conform to our breeding.”

It was only what Sinclair knew to be the truth, for such pronouncements had been drummed into him all his life. He no longer questioned them. He no longer hungered for what he could not have. Or so he told himself.

“We cannot have Annabelle turning into a hoyden,” he muttered to himself. “Like . . . like . . .”

The name rang in his head.

Miss Eugenie Belmont of Belmont Hall.

His lip curled. It was his trademark expression and others saw it as a sign of his disdain for those less fortunate than himself. It was an affectation he’d learned as a boy and now it came so automatically to him he didn’t even know he was doing it.

But was Miss Belmont a hoyden? Surely it was her family who were the hoydens! It still stung him when he remembered the father trying to ingratiate himself with Sinclair and then making that outrageous offer. Sinclair didn’t entirely understand why he’d paid for the privilege of keeping an animal on his estate that he hadn’t wanted in the first place. He supposed it was partly because of the boy, Jack, and the

tears in his eyes. And partly because he had seen in Jack a remarkable talent for taming animals—in particular horses. According to Sinclair’s groom the boy was a marvel. Within moments he’d had the wildest stallion eating from his hand.

Sinclair was very fond of his horses, and he told himself that by allowing himself to be fleeced by the father he was gaining the trust of the son.

As for Eugenie Belmont . . . her brother had artlessly told him that when his sister came home from finishing school her parents hoped she’d marry someone rich as a consequence. “Father is very proud of Eugenie. He says that when she comes home she’ll be a lady and we need her to marry someone who can put money into Belmont Hall before it falls down,” he went on, clearly too naïve to realize he was saying things he ought not.

“And has your sister a particular suitor in mind?” Sinclair inquired calmly, while a tingle of warning sharpened his senses.

“Oh, no, I don’t think so. Not yet, anyway.”

The tingle faded. Sinclair breathed a sigh of relief. Just for a moment he’d thought he might be the unlucky object of her desires! But surely Eugenie Belmont—royal blood or not—would be too canny to think she could ever be in the same class as the Duke of Somerton!

He wondered now whether it would be in his interest—in Jack’s interest—if he found someone for Miss Belmont. A wealthy gentleman of lesser birth? Or even a businessman, a manufacturer, with money to burn on a rundown hovel like Belmont Hall? It was something to consider. Miss Belmont would be grateful to him, he was sure, and therefore Jack would look upon him favorably. The entire Belmont family would be in his debt and would not mind him borrowing their son for the sake of his horses.

And yet it was odd how often he had found himself remembering Eugenie Belmont during the past three months. The smile in her green eyes, for instance, and the way they sparkled. And how, despite her lack of stature, she had stood up to him in the lane, so straight, for all that she was barely up to his shoulder. As if she meant to protect her brothers at all costs. That pink flush in her cheeks and on her soft lips, her wild curls, and those endearing freckles scattered across her nose, as she stood in the doorway of her home. The sensation that he knew exactly what had attracted a king to make her commoner ancestress his mistress. Surely in normal circumstances her features should have faded from his memory? Instead they seemed to become clearer, more distinct. . .

“Your Grace?”

He almost jumped—as if he’d been caught doing something wrong. When he turned he found one of his servants hesitating behind him, loath to interrupt his cogitations.

“What is it?” Not Annabelle again, he hoped. He would be relieved when the girl was on her way to London and the welcoming arms of her fiancé.

“A Miss Eugenie Belmont has arrived, with her brothers, to visit Erik the, eh, goat.”

The servant looked startled when Sinclair smiled; he had expected the lip curl for which his master was so famous.

Well, this was providential, thought Sinclair. He didn’t even consider avoiding them; the idea simply didn’t even enter his head. He told himself he was keen to observe Jack with the stallion, and of course there was the question of whether finishing school had made any changes in Miss Eugenie Belmont. He hoped she hadn’t become too conventional.

Is she still a hoyden?

He set off across the terrace with long strides which were undeniably eager.

Chapter 3

It was only the second time Eugenie had been to Somerton. The first time was when she and her parents had visited while the duke’s family was away and the grounds were thrown open to the public. Although she had not been able to enter the house—that was locked up tight—and could only stand gazing at it from various corners of the garden, she had found it quite dazzling. And she took the time to discover a little of its history.

Somerton in its present incarnation was built by the first duke, in the seventeenth century, after he’d covered himself in glory during the wars on the Continent, but parts of an older house remained hidden behind the new, grand facade. The Italian Renaissance architecture was meant to impress—after all this was one of England’s premier families—and one was not allowed to forget it.

“Are you sure you’ve got this right, Jack?” Terry ruffled his brother’s hair. “You’re not having us on? Are you really welcome here?”

Jack ducked away from his hand. “I’ve been before, you know,” he said irritably. “I’m allowed to visit anytime I like. The duke said so.”

“I was there when Erik introduced himself to the duke,” Eugenie reminded Terry. “And I think Jack has made quite an impression with the groom. You know how he is with horses.”

Terry shrugged, playing at being unimpressed. His hair was falling into his eyes, his neck cloth was untied, and he lounged as if there were no bones in his body. It was all an act, she knew that, but she wished he wouldn’t behave that way. She shuddered to think what the duke would think of him. Indeed she shuddered whenever she imagined the duke in the company of any of her family.