A SON CONFESSES
Meanwhile, in the billiards room
“I couldn’t help but notice your absence when I returned from Parliament yesterday,” George remarked after he took his first shot on the long billiards table. None of his balls made it to any of the pockets, but he wasn’t playing to win on this night. “You mentioned you rode in the parade in Rotten Row, but I didn’t see you there, either.”
David dipped his head. “I was there. On horseback,” he replied. “But... I was with someone.”
George straightened and turned to regard his son with a furrowed brow. “A woman, by chance?”
Giving a start, David scoffed. “It wasn’t likethat,” he replied. “That is, I was... I was with my betrothed.” He let out a breath, as if he’d been holding it for too long.
Placing his cue on the green felt, George crossed his arms and leaned against the table, a combination of emotions playing across his face. “This is unexpected, at least so soon after your return,” he said. “Best wishes,” he added with a grin.
“Thank you.” David’s eyes darted to the side. “Aren’t you going to ask me who it is?”
“Well, seeing as how Grace Foster is already married, I should hope it’s Lady Rose. There isn’t another young woman on the list for whom you showed as much regard when we talked the other night.”
David set aside his cue. “She proposed. In the park yesterday.” At seeing his father’s widening grin, he chuckled softly. “We’ve had a bit of a rocky start, and so I told her if she wanted to marry me, she had to do the proposing. Duke’s daughter and all,” he added with a shrug.
George’s chuckle erupted into full-throated laughter. “You’ll have a story to tell your son,” he said when he finally sobered. “I can just imagine he’ll be the one who gets a proposal from a princess.”
David blinked. “I think it’s a little too soon to be talking about heirs,” he said, and then clamped his mouth shut.
Given what he and Rose had done in a townhouse in Green Street earlier that day, it was possible she was already pregnant.
He hadn’t intended to take her virtue. Hadn’t intended to be alone with her in a townhouse for which she had a key. Hadn’t intended to even be in Green Street when he had fetched her from Ariley Place. They were going to spend the day shopping in Jermyn Street, New Bond Street, and make a stop in Ludgate Hill followed by a visit to Gunter’s Tea Shoppe in Berkeley Square for an ice.
Rose had other plans, though.
Earlier that day
“Turn right at the next street,” Rose said as David maneuvered the phaeton around a dray cart that had stopped in front of a Mayfair mansion.
“I was going to turn at Oxford Street,” he replied. “Won’t that be faster?” Although it had been over three years since he negotiated the streets of London whilst driving a phaeton, it didn’t appear much had changed in the arrangement of the streets in this part of Mayfair.
“We’re not going shopping,” Rose stated. She pulled a key from her redingote pocket and held it up. “We’re going to my townhouse.”
“Your townhouse?” David repeated as he had the Cleveland Bay making the turn onto Green Street.
“Well, it’s my father’s—where he raised his first two daughters—but when I told him I was going to marry you—”
“You already told him?” David asked in alarm.
She gave him a pained expression. “He spoke with me after dinner last night. Wanted to know about our ride in the park,” she explained, her hand suddenly on his thigh. “It’s that one, with the green door,” she added, nodding her head toward a white stuccoed townhouse with black shutters and and green window boxes.
David’s eyes widened. “You’re sure?” he asked, rather liking how her gloved hand gripped his thigh.
“Well, of course I’m sure,” she said. “It’s an entailed property of the dukedom, of course, but father always said it would be mine should I wish it, and last night, when I told him what I’d done, he said that since I was the one to propose then I’d best provide a place for us to live.”
Rolling his eyes, David scoffed. “We could live at Bostwick House,” he said. There are plenty of bedcham—”
“We will after you inherit,” Rose interrupted. “I’ll insist on it when I’m your viscountess. But for now, I should like my own household. My own servants.” She realized where her hand was and attempted to pull it away, but one of David’s gloved hands covered it. “You don’t mind terribly, do you?” she asked in a quieter voice.
Halting the horse in front of the townhouse, David gazed up at the façade and let out a low whistle. He glanced over at her and chuckled. “You are a minx, aren’t you?”
Rose’s eyes rounded. “I don’t know what you mean,” she said, even as her cheeks reddened.
He leaned over and kissed her temple, glad her felt hat was angled in the other direction. “Of course you don’t,” he whispered. “And no, I don’t mind. In fact, I should like a tour. I’m especially interested in seeing how it’s decorated,” he added.
