Chapter One
London, Late 1750s
Inside was nothing but ashes.
Eoin Aucourte, the newly minted Duke of Foxglen at the age of only twenty-two, stared unblinkingly at the contents of the ornate box, the very container that had tempted him for more than a decade. It had always rested on the desk of Eoin’s paternal grandfather, the late duke. When the old man had called Eoin into his office to upbraid him, Eoin had stared at the relief of silver serpents twisting and turning on the metal exterior.
Slowly, Eoin pivoted in the direction of his Uncle Hugh. Guffaws racked the forty-six-year-old man’s body with such intensity that he barely managed to nudge Eoin’s Uncle Francis, who was sitting next to Hugh for the solicitor’s reading of the late duke’s last missive. Although the peer had only died in the wee hours of the morning, his surviving children—Eoin’s two aunts and two uncles—had insisted that they gather in the dining room with Eoin and the solicitor to learn what they would inherit.
“Do you see that, Francis?” Uncle Hugh asked as he clumsily batted at his younger sibling’s arm.
Uncle Francis was laughing too. “I did. Nothing but char.”
“All the times our nephew danced to our father’s tune—just to get soot in the end.” Uncle Hugh snickered.
Under the dining room table, Eoin’s fists were clenched, but otherwise he displayed no emotion. Just as he’d been taught. Because his grandfather had promised that if Eoin transformed himself into the perfect heir, then he’d give him the mementoes of Eoin’s mother locked away in the silver case.
“I don’t even know why John wants to findthat womananyway. After all, she did abandon him at the tender age of six.” Aunt Joan used the English version of Eoin’s name rather than pronouncing it as “Owen.” The late duke had insisted that no one use the Irish one that Eoin’s working-class mother had chosen at his birth.
Although Eoin didn’t bother to correct how Aunt Joan addressed him, he wouldn’t allow her other falsehood to stand. Not anymore. Not with the former Foxglen dead and the precious clues to his family’s whereabouts destroyed. “Mama and my older sister didn’t leave me of their own free will. You know that the law dictated that your father—my grandfather—had the right to be my guardian.”
“Why wouldn’t the statutes favor my papa?” Aunt Joan tilted her delicately shaped chin in the direction of the solicitor. At forty-two, she was a strikingly handsome woman with golden hair and cornflower-blue eyes that matched her brothers’. “Should John’s mother, a poor widow of a dead traitor, have been entrusted with raising a future duke? The laws of primogeniture prevented my father from disinheriting John despite John’s regrettable maternal line, but at least Father had the right to raise John as he saw fit after my eldest brother died.”
Frustrated rage burned in Eoin’s gut, but he did not allow it to show on his face. He’d heard these accusations for the past sixteen years.
Before the solicitor could opine upon Aunt Joan’s rather rhetorical question, a moan came from her sister Eliza. The forty-year-old was the youngest of the Aucourte siblings and, as far as Eoin knew, had always possessed the weakest disposition. Her hair and skin were both a shade paler than her more robust sister’s, and she looked like an ethereal fairy queen.
“I cannot tolerate hearing about our late brother’s death.” Aunt Eliza’s voice was so soft that Eoin wouldn’t have understood her if he wasn’t adept at reading lips—a skill his grandfather had thought would make Eoin an excellent choice for a courtier to the king.
“Eh? What did you say?” Uncle Hugh asked in his booming voice. He and his brother looked like graying princelings with their blond waves threaded with silver. Their behavior, though, had always been boorish.
“Eliza said she didn’t want to listen to tales about our dead brother,” Aunt Joan snapped. “And neither do I. I am here to learn what Father left me. We already know that the entailed portions of the estate are unfortunately John’s. But what am I to receive?”
Eoin noticed that the left side of the otherwise sober solicitor’s mouth twitched. Upward. A glint of amusement?
Eoin stared closely at the staid man, whom he knew well. As part of his training to become the next duke, Eoin had accompanied his grandfather since the age of nine on most of the peer’s business dealings. His task had been to silently observe without showing any inattention. Eoin understood the character of Foxglen’s cronies better than his own personality. And the attorney, Mr. Lewis, was not prone to amusement. Ever.
At first glance, Mr. Lewis looked like a jolly sort with neatly trimmed white whiskers and perennially pink cheeks. Yet closer inspection revealed his true character. Even thoughhis hazel eyes were bright, it was more with shrewdness than kindness. And he never smiled but always remained calm and self-possessed.
Except for today.
Now, instead of sitting perfectly straight, Mr. Lewis leaned forward as if in anticipation. Normally when the lawyer reviewed documents, he kept them flat on the table. Currently, though, he gripped the pieces of parchment tightly enough that they crinkled at the edges. And… was that sound of a tapping foot emanating from Mr. Lewis rather than one of Eoin’s aunts or uncles?
“Shall we resume?” Mr. Lewis asked as he glanced around the room, and Eoin wondered what he saw—probably a hulking young man with dark hair surrounded by his golden bevy of relatives. With his giant frame, Eoin had never fit in with his paternal family and their finely hewn features, a fact he was never allowed to forget.
“Yes. Get on with reading the letter.” Uncle Hugh waggled his fingers in the solicitor’s direction.
The man’s mouth quirked northward once more, but his voice betrayed no emotion as he intoned the words penned by the late duke. “‘I am sure that my surviving offspring are eagerly awaiting news of my bequest to them. They are, unfortunately, spoiled beyond redemption. I am afraid I should have not left their raising to their nursemaids, governesses, and tutors. Children, I have learned, require a firm hand, so I did not repeat my mistake with Viscount Malbarry.’”
Of course, his grandfather would refer to Eoin by his courtesy title. Because that’s all Eoin ever was, an heir for molding into a perfect duke.
“Must we listen to the chidings?” Uncle Francis asked. “We had enough of that when Father was alive.”
“Most definitely.” Aunt Joan heaved out a sigh. “I much preferred his benign neglect in our formative years. He became much too invested in our lives after our eldest brother died in an otherwise forgettable uprising to overthrow King George. Father even forced us all to live with him if we wanted any luxuries in life instead of giving us an income, as was our due.”
“Well, we are finally going to receive what we deserve,” Uncle Hugh said impatiently. “That is, if you would all stop interjecting and allow the solicitor to continue reading.”
Without ceremony, Mr. Lewis began anew. “‘As both my sons drink like fish, I have arranged these flasks for them…’”
