1
Provocation
Georgiana Harrington would recall the summer of 1816 as one in which she led a duke astray.
And was foolish enough to follow.
At the outset, however, Georgiana had been much too occupied with her own unhappy assignment to anticipate dukes, desire, or downfall.
With her father’s passing had come a letter for each of the eight Harrington sisters, written in his hand and sealed for delivery after his death. Regretting the sheltered world in which he had raised his daughters, he’d set each of them an assignment attached to a modest inheritance, something meant, no doubt, to draw them further into life. Celeste, her twin, had been charged with founding a charitable institution, and in typical Cece fashion, had done soandfound a husband besides. Her eldest sister, Honoria, had been instructed to complete a portrait, only to fall in love with the subject in the bargain.
Which left Georgiana next on the docket, tasked with the mostabsurd charge of all: play matchmaker and arrange a marriage. A difficult assignment given how thoroughly she disdained the institution. But when the only example she had was her parents’, disillusionment was hardly difficult to understand.
As time was running out for her to complete her task, the matter weighed on her mind during the second of the season’s country parties, that careless custom by which London society removed itself from the city whenever the heat turned oppressive and illness began to spread.
Currently, she sat on the veranda steps of a Hertfordshire estate belonging to Mr. Anthony Vale, a wealthy manufacturer whose fortune was too new for thetonto know what to do with him. Georgiana, for her part, had given society something else to puzzle over. She’d begun to be whispered about in a new way—as a bluestocking, a rumor far from the truth—merely because she carried a folio and made notes at odd moments. She spent her evenings in parlor corners rather than at the center of things, observing the proceedings. Her dance card remained empty more often than not, as her father’s assignment required close study of the suitable candidates.
She’d already rejected some of the attendees for faults too obvious to overlook. Baron Comby’s hands wandered at every event she attended with him, repeatedly grazing any female hip within reach. The Earl of Nesbit spoke of little besides gambling and the expectation that his future wife would fund his endeavors. Georgiana overheard that depressing confession while lingering like a haunt in the billiards-room doorway. Marquess Allendale, by all accounts one of the most eligible men in England, had been removed from the list the evening before—not because Georgiana had deemed him unsuitable, but because he’d made the badly timed decision to fall in love.
Pen digging into the page, Georgiana sighed and struck Lady Miriam Penrith from her list. Though she and Allendale did make an attractive couple.
Georgiana counted the souls remaining: five men and eight women, including one name she’d been trying not to dwell upon: Renwick Bellamont, the Duke of Dunmere. Society called himHisBrooding Grace, though after two days of steady evaluation, Georgiana privately preferredThe Duke of Disapproval. Every time he looked her way, his expression suggested she’d done something objectionable, though she hadn’t yet knocked a handsy lord into a fountain like last year. Moreover, there hadn’t beenonemention of the incorrigible Harrington sister this summer, not one.
Personal objections aside, Georgiana had to admit Dunmere made an attractive candidate.
Widowed some time ago, he had a little boy in need of a mother, though he was making a muddle of it if he was looking. Of course, as with any man, there were drawbacks. He was unapproachable, belligerent, and known to have affairs, discreet though they were. There were advantages as well. A title secure enough to require no fortune, which likely explained why he’d gone so long without remarrying. And he seemed…capable. He had the air of one who could manage an estate, a household, and a crisis without collapsing into nonsense. His son adored him, which proved some hidden softness resided beneath the severity. His advanced age—Georgiana chewed on her quill, guessing him to be at least ten years her senior—mattered little in their world, no need to even footnote it.
A duke was a duke, so long as he was breathing.
There was also the obliging reality that he was gorgeous—broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped, with eyes so startling a shade of blue they shone like gemstones in sunlight and lapis beneath chandeliers. His hair was as lustrous as any she’d seen on a man, shot through with an incredible blend of sable and ginger, the teasing threads of gray only adding to the effect. It curled delightfully in humid weather, an allure he would have despised, had he known it was being discussed over tea that morning.
Suffice it to say, he was indecently well made. If not for the glower that scared off mothers and daughters alike, women would have been leaping into his path. His moodiness and the apprehension surrounding it might be her way to secure him a wife and complete her father’s dying request.
Because she wasn’t afraid of him.
Not that any of it truly mattered to Georgiana.
The Duke of Dunmere had never paid her the slightest bit of attention.
Unlike Cece, her more reticent twin sister, Georgiana wasn’t used to being ignored. She could be discreetly flirtatious when the occasion warranted it. One suitor had called her “almost a chap”—a compliment in her book—after a race in which she beat him across three sheep fields and half a moor besides, at which point he dropped his courtship, stating he hadn’t wanted a rival as a spouse. She’d agreed with a hidden rush of relief.
Unfortunately, not all creatures liked to be bested.
Certainly notmalecreatures.
It was true: she had a better seat than most men, no small feat for a woman built with such generous curves. She’d been managing spirited horses since she was old enough to sit one, though she no longer rode with quite the same heedless abandon due to society’s censure and her body’s lushness. But she wasn’t going to change for any of them, even if it meant being alone forever.
She would only change forherself.
An afternoon storm broke seconds later with a distant roll of thunder. Partygoers rushed up the marble stairs and past her in a flurry of laughter and silk, making for the house as the first drops began to fall. Georgiana stepped beneath the portico, tucking herself into a hidden nook. She recognized the forlorn pulse in her belly, the dense quiver near her heart. Her sisters were finding love, finding lives that no longer included her in quite the same way. She hadn’t seen Cece in more than a month. Soon, she and Honoria would have children, families. Georgiana didn’t even have a friend here this summer, only an elderly maid and a distracted footman.
She drew the folio close to her chest and let out a soft breath. Surrounded by amusement and midsummer joy, it was a regrettable moment to realize she was lonely.
With her spirits dashed, she saw a flash of color through the mist: a dark emerald riding coat. Georgiana squinted to find the Duke of Dunmere striding across the lawn, drenched to the skin, his sonclinging to his back as though his father was both horse and rescue party. The boy’s laughter carried ahead of them, and, more startling still, the duke was laughing too. His grin was dimpled and unguarded, the most genuine she’d seen on him.
Leather boots darkened by the damp, he took the veranda steps two at a time, shaking rain off his superfine coat and lowering his son to the terrace, never once glancing her way. The boy was describing a puppy he wanted, his reasoning what one could expect. (I promise to feed it, bathe it, train it.)Dunmere’s amused response—perhaps, boyo—and his smile worked together to spark like lightning inside her.
She might have believed the charming, broad-shouldered, duke-and-heir spectacle was for her benefit, except Dunmere seemed unaware that she stood ten feet away, and equally unaware that he was devastating when wet. Why, his dark hair shimmered more than it did in sunlight.
