To Bed a Beauty (Courtship Wars 2)

In sharp contrast to her icy meeting with the Duchess of Arden, Roslyn found the lovely summer afternoon particularly pleasurable, riding with Drew over the Kentish countryside, viewing his beautiful estate grounds and tenant farms.

He put himself out to be the perfect companion, even more agreeable and charming than usual. And yet she noticed a distinct change in him. He seemed less guarded now. Less practiced. More at ease. More natural.

And she saw a different side of Drew than she’d ever seen before-the serious, responsible, generous side. He took unmistakable pride in his holdings and obviously cared for his tenants, unlike many great landowners in England, who cared only about bleeding the land and laborers for whatever revenues they could provide.

As a duke, Drew commanded respect and took it as his due, yet there was clearly a measure of affection between him and his people. But then, Roslyn had expected as much after seeing him with Mathers. The way he cared for his old governess had warmed her heart.

Toward the end of their ride, she learned why he was so fond of the elderly upper-class servant.

They were riding beside a small lake in a meadow when they came to a cottage on the edge of a wood and Drew reined his horse to a halt.

“This was my favorite place as a child,” he said a little wistfully. “This cottage belonged to our gamekeeper and his wife. Mathers would bring me here to escape the schoolroom. We would make paper sailboats and float them on the lake and play pirate. Afterward she plied me with hot scones baked by the gamekeeper’s wife.”

In other words, you were allowed to be a child, Roslyn thought with silent empathy. “It must have been lonely living here as a young boy,” she said aloud.

He shrugged. “I rarely saw my parents. And of course I wasn’t allowed to associate with other children-certainly not the staff’s children, since we had our consequence to uphold. But Mathers made it bearable. And after I met Marcus and Heath at school, I was never lonely.” Drew shot her a wry glance. “But you can see why I was glad to leave here.”

“Indeed I can.”

She would have been glad to leave, too, Roslyn thought with a shudder. The huge house, though magnificent, was cold and intimidating, devoid of life and warmth. She couldn’t imagine living in such a house.

Thankfully her own upbringing had been quite different from Drew’s. For the first eighteen years of her life she’d had the love of her mother and her sisters, and her father to some extent. Now she had her academy and her friends to provide mutual warmth and affection, in addition to her sisters.

Her own mother was very different from Drew’s, as well. Even though Victoria Loring was a noblewoman in her own right, she had sincerely loved her daughters. Thanks to Marcus, they had recently been reunited with Victoria and learned the truth about why she’d been forced to flee the country with her lover. She hadn’t wanted to abandon her daughters, and in fact grieved over it.

But clearly the Duchess of Arden bore little love for her son. Instead, Mathers had taken the place of Drew’s mother.

Roslyn was glad that he’d had someone to love him when he was such a young child, and disliked the duchess intensely for the emotional barrenness she’d inflicted upon him.

Imagining Drew’s loneliness as a boy-and seeing his strained maternal relationship now-brought out Roslyn’s protective instincts. Which was absurd, since Drew was a fully grown man, perfectly capable of defending himself against his mother.

“You were fortunate to have Mathers,” Roslyn murmured.

“Extremely fortunate. She was one of the few people who treated me as a normal boy and not a duke’s son…and one of the fewer still whose motives I never had to question.” He hesitated, glancing at Roslyn. “By the time I was out of short coats, I had learned that most people want something from me.”

“Because of your wealth and consequence?”

“Yes. And when I was sixteen, that lesson was driven home quite painfully.”

“What happened when you were sixteen?”

“I let myself be seduced.”

Roslyn met his eyes, wondering if he was jesting. But she could tell by the rough shadow of emotion there that he was in earnest. “That seems hard to imagine.”

“Regrettably, it’s true. She was strikingly beautiful and my first lover…a young widow only four years my senior but far more experienced. I should have known better than to trust her professions of love, but I was in the throes of lust, suffering a young man’s infatuation. I was heartbroken when I discovered how

she’d schemed to ensnare me so she could become my duchess. She had another lover all along, a lover she planned to keep after we were wed.”

“So that is what made you so cynical about love?” Roslyn asked quietly.

“I expect so.” He gave a short, mirthless laugh. “Truthfully, though, I haven’t thought of her in years.” Drew suddenly shook his head. “Enough maudlin sentiment for one afternoon. Let me show you my newest drainage ditch. The science can be quite fascinating.”

There was a glint of sardonic humor in his eyes as he turned his horse away from the cottage, yet Roslyn was not surprised that he’d deliberately changed the subject.

What did surprise her was how vulnerable those vibrant green eyes had been for a moment. Even more surprising was that Drew had let her see his vulnerability.

She could no longer blame him for his cynicism, though, Roslyn reflected as she urged her horse alongside his. And the fact that he’d been hurt so bitterly as a young man roused even stronger protective instincts in her. She wanted to wrap her arms around him, to kiss away his hurt-