To Desire a Wicked Duke (Courtship Wars)

They might have vanquished the castle ghost, but Richard’s ghost still haunted them.

Much to her relief, Ian was gone before Tess woke the next morning. After breakfasting, she had Alice pack her bags while she wrote farewell messages to Vicar Potts and her other Falwell neighbors. Then Tess thanked the Hiddlestons and the castle staff, promising to visit Cornwall again in the near future.

A chill rain was falling by the time her carriage departed for London. Ned had resisted riding inside like gentry, claiming it was more proper for him to share the driver’s seat with her coachman, Spruggs, and more comfortable besides, insisting that “a spot of rain will not fash me.” Therefore, there were only four passengers inside the traveling chaise. Alice sat beside Tess, with Basil and Fanny in the opposite seat.

Tess tried to keep up a pretense of cheerful spirits rather than staring out the window and dwelling on her morose thoughts. Yet she couldn’t help noting that the sea resembled a dull sheet of rumpled metal … gray and cold like her heart.

She was profoundly glad for the chance to be apart from Ian, however temporarily. By the time he followed her to London, perhaps she would have devised a better plan to save herself the pain and heartache she knew was coming.

At least her friends’ prospect for happiness had improved greatly. Very shortly Fanny would leave the glamorous, desperate world of the demirep behind her forever. Once the marriage took place, Tess intended to use her new social connections as Rotham’s duchess to help the courtesan become more respectable. With such a high rank, she should have considerable influence over Fanny’s acceptance by society, especially when combined with the power and influence of their other close friends—namely the Loring sisters—who had recently married into the peerage.

Meanwhile, Fanny meant to persevere in her return to propriety. She had recently sold her large London house, which had been her place of business, so she would live and write at her much smaller private home in St. John’s Wood, north of Hyde Park. Until the wedding, Basil would maintain his lodgings at Fanny’s boardinghouse and travel daily wherever he was needed by his new employer—either Rotham’s London mansion in Cavendish Square or Bellacourt in Richmond.

Fanny also planned to make renewed overtures to her remaining family members in Hampshire. Her mother in particular had barely spoken to her since she’d launched her wicked career as a Cyprian all those years ago.

As for Tess, with her marriage on such shaky ground, she was unsure where she should live, at least until she decided how to proceed with Ian.

No doubt it would be unwise for her to reside at Bellacourt just now, particularly without Ian present. His young ward, Jamie, could easily be confused by her uncertain role in his life. A motherless child seeking love could become too attached to her, and Tess knew she could become much too fond of the darling toddler in return. It would be painful for them both if they formed a bond that then had to be broken because she and Ian lived apart.

Her larger fear was the pain Ian could cause her. Sharing his bed, his breakfast table, his everyday life, was perilous enough. But if she risked creating a family with Ian, she would be that much more vulnerable to hurt, Tess reminded herself. She longed for children of her own—and even now she could be with child, given the passionate frequency of their lovemaking. But if not, then she desperately needed to keep as much physical and emotional distance from her husband as possible.

Moreover, her business affairs required that she remain in London for a few days at least. She had dozens of calls to make on the chief benefactors to her charities, to shore up their support after her abrupt marriage.

Even more immediately, Tess wanted to remain close to Ned so he wouldn’t feel abandoned among strangers when she delivered him to Marlebone Hospital. Most likely her best choice of residence just now would be Ian’s home in Cavendish Square, although she wasn’t particularly eager to face another strange staff of servants in her new role as the Duchess of Rotham.

At the thought, Tess winced inwardly and forced herself to rejoin the discussion regarding the ending of Fanny’s novel. Helping plot a fitting comeuppance for the villain was a welcome distraction for her, particularly when she feared her own story would end badly.

They reached London two long days later. Tess’s carriage dropped Basil at the boardinghouse, then took Fanny home to St. John’s Wood before proceeding to Marlebone Hospital with Ned.

Tess’s connections to preeminent physician Mr. Otto Geary garnered the veteran an immediate examination and admittance as a patient. Yet the alarm in Ned’s eyes was unmistakable.

“You have nothing to fear, Ned,” Tess promised, adopting her most soothing tone. “My cousin Damon chiefly built this hospital, and I have raised funds to establish a wing for veterans, so Mr. Geary is happy to help our special friends. And you are certainly my special friend, Ned. Mr. Geary will take excellent care of you, is that not so, sir?”

The portly, ruddy-cheeked gentleman responded by smiling fondly. “Indeed it is, your grace. If not for you and Lord Wrexham, I would still be a poor country hack and this hospital would not even exist.”

“You see, Ned?” Tess said, patting his hand. “You will be an honored guest here—and not only because you are my friend. You are a valiant soldier and a recent hero besides. I mean to tell my many acquaintances how helpful you were in foiling a vicious gang of thieves at our home in Cornwall. And if you have need of me for any reason whatsoever, you have only to ask Mr. Geary to send a message and I will come immediately.”

At her reassurances, Ned seemed finally to relax and even managed a wan smile. “Thankee, Mum. You’re as kind as me daughter, Sal, that you are.”

Tess squeezed his bony hand. “That is a high compliment indeed.”

Before leaving Ned a quarter hour later, she pledged to call at the hospital the following afternoon as soon as she returned from Chiswick.

Although weary of travel after the hard journey from Cornwall, Tess decided it best to return to her own home first. She not only needed to collect her companion, Dorothy Croft, to lend her countenance when she called to reassure her benefactors, but she also wanted to fetch what she knew would be a mountain of correspondence that had gathered dust in her absence.

Spruggs drove her carriage the remaining hour through a pouring rain, and Tess was grateful to arrive home to a heartwarming reunion with Dorothy. The absentminded elderly lady claimed to have missed her dearly and ordered a hot supper prepared at once, treating Tess like a beloved prodigal daughter.

After a long coze with Dorothy, Tess retired to her rooms for the night. She should have been pleased to sleep alone in her own bed, but despite her fatigue, her dreams were fitful, and much to her dismay, she found herself yearning for the nearness of Ian’s hard, warm, sheltering body.

Seeking a distraction the next morning, she tackled her correspondence with ruthless determination. But Tess’s mouth twisted with self-deprecating irony. Throwing herself into her work was her normal mode of dealing with her darkest emotions, and her emotions just now were every bit as conflicted as her initial distress at being forced to wed her longtime nemesi

s, Ian Sutherland, the Duke of Rotham.

It was nearly noon when Tess came across a bank draft that oddly reminded her of her marriage. The large charitable donation was from one of her most generous benefactors and was dated the day of her amateur theatrical at her godmother’s estate in Richmond, the same day she had kissed Patrick Hennessy and set in motion the events that had disastrously changed her future.

When Tess examined the accompanying letter more closely, the signature at the end made her frown. She had seen that same hurried scrawl very recently: Mr. Daniel Grimshaw, Esquire—the same solicitor who had signed the documents detailing her marriage settlement.

When Ian had given her the sheaf of legal papers his first night at Falwell Castle, she’d been too preoccupied at the time to notice the particular details.