Royce watched him go, and muttered to himself, “However, abstinence is hell on the temper.” And his was worse that most to begin with.
In search of relief, he located Lady Osbaldestone and would have immediately gone to her side, except for the numerous guests who lined up to waylay him.
Not family, but the ton’s elite, including Lord Haworth, representing the Crown, and Lord Hastings, representing the Lords. None were people he could dismiss with just a word, not even a word and a smile; he had to interact, engage in social exchanges all too often layered with multiple meanings…he was reaching, had come close to socially stumbling, when Minerva appeared beside him, serenely calm, a stately smile on her lips, and the hints he needed ready on her tongue.
After just a few words, he realized she was an adept in this sphere, and gratefully, if reluctantly, attached himself to her apron strings. The alternative was too damning to permit him to indulge in any pretense.
He needed her. So he had to metaphorically grit his teeth and bear the sexual abrasion of her nearness—it was that or come to social grief, and he’d be damned if he did that. Failure in anything had never been an option, yet this arena was not one in which he’d had any real experience. Yet now he was Wolverstone, people expected him to simply take on the mantle; they seemed to have forgotten the sixteen years he’d spent outside their pale.
For the next half hour, Minerva was his anchor, his guide, his savior.
Courtesy of her vows, she had to be, or, damn him, he’d founder on the social shoals, or come to grief on the jagged rocks of political repartee.
She managed the glib exchanges with half her brain—the other half was entirely consumed by something akin to panic. A frenzied awareness of what would happen if he brushed her shoulder with his arm, if, for some benighted reason, he thought to take her hand. Beneath her smiles, underneath her ready replies, ran an expectation of disaster that clenched her lungs tight, leaving her nearly breathless, every nerve taut, ready to leap with hypersensitive reaction.
At one point, after she’d excused them from a group where the exchanges had looked set to grow too pointed for his—or her—good, he seized the moment of fleeting privacy to lower his head, lower his voice, and ask, “Was my father any good at this?”
Ruthlessly suppressing the effect of the subtle caress of his breath over her ear, she shot him a glance. “Yes, he was.”
His lips twisted in a grimace. “So I’m going to have to learn how to manage this, too.”
It was the look in his eyes as he glanced around, more than his words, that had her feeling sorry for him; he’d had to take on the business of the dukedom unprepared, and he had made and was making a huge effort in that regard, and succeeding. But this arena of high-level political and social games was one in which he also had to perform, and for that his exile—from the age of twenty-two to thirty-seven—had left him even less well prepared.
“You’re Wolverstone now, so yes, you’ll have to learn.” She had every confidence that, if he applied himself—his incredible intellect, his excellent memory, and his well-honed will—he would succeed. To ensure he accepted the challenge, she added, “And I won’t be forever by your side.”
He met her gaze at that, his eyes so dark she couldn’t read anything in them. Then he nodded and looked ahead as the next wave of guests approached.
The next time they moved on, Royce murmured, “I’ve been commanded to attend Lady Osbaldestone.” Her ladyship was conversing with one of his cousins at the side of the room just ahead of them. “I can manage her if you’ll keep the rest at bay. I need to speak with her alone.”
Minerva caught his eye. “About this bride business?”
He nodded. “She knows the reason—and once I prostrate myself before her, will take great delight in informing me of it, no doubt.”
“In that case, go.” She smoothly stepped forward to intercept the next couple seeking an audience with him.
Lady Osbaldestone saw him approaching, and with a few words dismissed his cousin Rohan; hands folded over the head of the cane she didn’t really need, she waited before one of the long windows for him to join her.
She arched a brow as he halted before her. “I take it you have, by now, been informed of the need for you to wed with all speed.”
“Indeed. In various ways, by a number of your cronies.” He fixed his eyes on hers. “What I don’t understand is the reason behind the supreme urgency.”
She stared at him for a moment, then blinked. She regarded him for an instant more, then murmured, “I suppose, having been in social exile…then you were summoned back here before…” Lips compressing, she narrowed her eyes. “I suppose it’s conceivable that, omniscient though you are rumored to be, you might not have been alerted to the recent developments.”
“Obviously not. I will be eternally grateful if you would enlighten me.”
She snorted. “You won’t be grateful, but clearly someone must. Consider these facts. One, Wolverstone is one of the wealthiest duchies in England. Two, it was created as a marcher lordship. Three, your heir is Edwin, already one step away from senile, and after him, Gordon, who while arguably a legally entitled heir, is nevertheless sufficiently distant to be challenged.”
He frowned. “By whom?”
“Indeed.” Lady Osbaldestone nodded. “The source of the threat.” She held his gaze. “The Crown.”
His eyes narrowed. “Prinny?” His voice was flat, his tone disbelieving.
“He’s neck-deep in debt, and sinking ever faster. I won’t bore you with the details, but I and others have heard from reliable sources close to our dear prince that the search for plunderable funds is on in earnest, and Wolverstone has been mentioned, specifically along the lines of, if anything should, heaven forbid, happen to you, then as matters stand it might be possible to press for the title, and all its entailed wealth, to revert to the Crown in escheat.”
He could understand the reasoning, but…“There’s a significant difference between Prinny, or more likely one of those panderers close to him, making such a suggestion, and it actually being acted upon, even were something to mysteriously happen to me.”
Lady Osbaldestone frowned; something like exasperated alarm showed briefly in her eyes. “Don’t shrug this off. If you were married, Prinny and his vultures would lose interest and look elsewhere, but while you aren’t…” She closed a clawlike hand about his arm. “Royce, accidents happen—you of all people know how easily. And there are thos