How to Tempt a Duke

That’s a very good question, Charlotte whispered inside her head. “Why, I am, of course.”

“You are? But you’re barely more than a girl yourself.”

“A few moments ago you had me donning spinster caps and leading apes in Hell,” she reminded him, mentally adding to her list of Reasons To Murder The Twins—an already lengthy list. Now they’d made a liar out of her.

“Then you’re staying at Ashurst Hall, and not simply on your way there for a visit? You were merely out for a walk.”

“All right…” Charlotte agreed slowly, wondering how deep a hole she could dig for herself in protecting Nicole and Lydia before the sides toppled down on her head. “That is, I mean, yes. Out for a walk. Visiting my parents. Mama…Mama has taken a putrid cold, you understand.”

“Probably acquired after walking outside in the cold wearing an inadequate cloak,” Rafe said, grinning at her. “There may be a lesson there for you, Charlie.”

She ignored his teasing. “But I’m not the twins’only guardian,” she said, improvising rapidly. “Their governess, Mrs. Beasley, is of course in residence, as well as a household staff numbering more than forty. Nicole and Lydia have hardly been left to their own devices.” Devices, machinations, mischiefs—oh, they would pay for this, the both of them!

“And my mother?” Rafe asked, obviously believing her. After all, why would she lie to him? Emmaline was right; men truly were gullible. “Is she also in residence?”

Charlotte shook her head. “No, I’m afraid not. Your mother, now, as she reminds us quite often, the Dowager Duchess of Ashurst, traveled to London for the Small Season, and from there to a house party in Devon, I believe it is.”

“Is she really the Dowager Duchess? God, I suppose she is. That must have tickled her straight down to the ground.”

“Except for the dowager part, yes,” Charlotte said, smiling as she remembered Helen Daughtry’s struggle between clasping an exalted title to her bosom and being thought old enough to be mother to a duke. “I think she has settled for Lady Daughtry.”

“My mother never settles for anything, Charlie,” Rafe said as he stopped at the bottom of the circular drive that led to the enormous front doors of Ashurst Hall and looked at the building. “I still don’t believe this. I still feel like one of the beggars come to town.”

He turned to look at Charlotte with those soul-deep eyes of his, and her stomach did another of those small flips. Really, she should try harder to control herself. “Now you sound like your cousin George.”

“I suppose I do. They’re really dead? This hasn’t all just been some long waking dream, and I’m about to be shown to my usual small room near the nursery?”

“The duke’s suite of rooms has already been prepared for you, Your Grace,” she told him rather kindly, for she could now at last see traces of the old Rafe, the less-sure-of-himself Rafe in those sherry eyes. “Your aunt Emmaline saw to it.”

“It’s still difficult to believe he’s gone. And his sons…”

“May they rest in peace,” Charlotte said, still looking at Ashurst Hall, all four floors, dozen massive chimneys and thirty bedrooms of it. Somewhere inside those massive fieldstone walls two unsuspecting tricksters were about to find themselves firmly under the control of one Miss Charlotte Seavers.

“Well, that sounded a tad perfunctory,” Rafe said, and she could feel his eyes on her. “You didn’t care for George or Harold?”

Charlotte averted her head as she answered, shivering slightly, and not from the cold. “I really didn’t know them that well these last years, once they’d for the most part taken up residence in London.”

“Yes, the mansion in Grosvenor Square. I stopped there for a week before heading here. I thought my wardrobe needed replenishing. Bought this cloak, that hat.” He looked at her questioningly. “Where’s my hat, Charlie?”

She really had to stop feeling sorry for the man. “It’s Charlotte, and I’m in charge of your sisters, Your Grace, not your hat.”

“And now I remember that tone of voice, as well. You left my new hat lying back there in the middle of the drive, didn’t you, to punish me for that remark about spinster caps?”

“In the middle of the drive? I most certainly did not!” she retorted quite honestly.

“No, I left it there, didn’t I? I take full responsibility. You know, Charlie, I wouldn’t tell anyone else, but it’s rather daunting, knowing I am now the custodian of all of this,” he said, indicating Ashurst Hall, the estate, all of his inheritance, with the sweep of his arm.

“I can well imagine, Your Grace,” Charlotte said, sighing as she thought of the twins. “Having an unexpected responsibility suddenly thrust on your shoulders is rather disconcerting.”

“Harris, my majordomo in London, grew rather weary of calling me Your Grace, just for me to not answer him. I know it has been some time, but it’s only now that I’m back in England that I’m beginning to realize the full consequence of what has happened. I was comfortable as Captain Rafael Daughtry. I’m not sure I’m up to this, Charlie.”

Her heart went out to him at his unexpected honesty and humility, and without thinking she placed her hand on his arm. “You’ll be fine, Rafe. And everyone at Ashurst Hall will help you.”

“That’s better. You called me Rafe. Please always do that, Charlie—Charlotte.” He sighed, nodded, and then seemed to remember that he was the Duke of Ashurst and should not be admitting fear or apprehension or anything else remotely human or vulnerable. “I’ve kept you outside in the cold long enough. Let’s go inside.”

Charlotte pictured the look on the twins’ faces when they were confronted not only with their brother—and if he looked huge and imposing to her, what would the twins see when they saw him?—as well as one Charlotte Seavers standing next to him, looking at them with a knowing glare in her eyes.

“Yes, let’s do that. At the least, you should have that head of yours attended to.”

“Funny, my friend Fitz says that a lot about my head, although he makes the suggestion not half so politely. You two will doubtless become fast friends.”

“Pardon me?”

“Never mind. Fitz and my coach will be along soon enough, making explanations unnecessary.”

The front doors opened even as they walked up the wide stone steps.

“Ah, I see my late uncle’s footmen are still as curious as ever. We’ve been observed, Charlotte. A good thing I didn’t attempt to seduce you as we stood here, casting your reputation to the four winds.”

“You wouldn’t do that,” Charlotte said, suddenly sober again.

“No, I wouldn’t. Should I?”

She collected her scattered thoughts. “You know, Rafe, you’re not half so amusing as you seem to think you are.”

“Yes, Fitz tells me that, as well.” He took her arm and, together, they entered the imposing foyer of Ashurst Hall, the cold and damp of the day immediately closed off behind them by the shutting of the door.

“His Grace has returned from Elba,” Charlotte informed the fairly dazzled young footman who, instead of jumping-to to help Rafe with his cloak, just stood there, his mouth at half-mast, goggling up at his new master.

“Billy,” Charlotte prodded quietly. “His Grace’s cloak?”

“A big ’un, isn’t he, ma’am?” the wide-eyed Billy muttered before he was pushed aside by Grayson, the starchy, silver-haired majordomo of Ashurst Hall.

“Allow me,Your Grace,” Grayson said, deftly sliding the cloak from Rafe’s shoulders even as he executed a perfect bow, one caught somewhere between perfunctory and fawning. “And may I be so bold as to welcome you home. I have already sent someone to alert the Ladies Nicole and Lydia. They await you in the main saloon.”

“Thank you, Grayson,” Rafe said solemnly before turning to assist Charlotte with her own cloak. “It’s good to be home. My traveling coach will be here shortly. Please see that my luggage is attended to, and that there will be ample assistance shown my good friend Captain Fitzgerald, who has sustained an injury and will needs must immediately be carried to a bedchamber.”

“It would be my honor, Your Grace,” Grayson said, bowing yet again.

“His honor? Poor fellow is probably near to bursting his spleen, having to bow to me. The man would much rather kick me down the stairs,” Rafe whispered as he and Charlotte made their way across the wide black-and-white marble tiled expanse toward the pair of doors leading to the main saloon. “I once put a toad in his bed, you know.”

“I know. And it was two toads, one under his pillow and one deep beneath the covers, so that he thought he was safe once he’d removed the more obvious one.” He took her arm, and she didn’t even bother to pretend she didn’t feel a small frisson of awareness course through her body. “And one thing more, although I would have thought you’d know. There is something about the configuration of the ceilings of the entrance hall that allows even whispers to carry to every corner.”

“The devil you say.” Rafe and Charlotte both then looked over their shoulders at Grayson, the man a good twenty feet from them. A man whose rather large ears had turned a most alarming shade of puce.

“Carry on, Grayson, carry on,” Rafe called brightly to the majordomo, and then, his hand tightening slightly on Charlotte’s forearm, he hastened her the rest of the way as Billy scampered ahead to fling open the double doors. “I’m not making the best of starts, am I?” he whispered.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Charlotte said as she looked ahead into the enormous main saloon, anxious to locate Nicole and Lydia. “I thought falling at my feet a nice touch. Ah, there they are, your dear, sweet sisters, eager to welcome you home.”