A Night of Desire with a Duke (Dukes and Roses #2)

Chapter 3 #2

The portfolio slipped from her suddenly nerveless fingers, hitting the floor with a thud that seemed to echo through the enormous room.

Her carefully prepared speech evaporated like morning mist. All her confidence, manufactured though it had been, vanished with the swiftness of servants hearing the call for chores.

"Miss Whitcombe," he said, and his voice held that same cultured amusement she remembered from the bookshop. "Or should I say, E. Whitcombe? I must confess, when I read your application, I was expecting someone rather more... masculine."

Heat flooded her face. "Your Grace, I can explain..."

"No need." He moved around the desk with that languid grace she remembered, though now it seemed even more pronounced in his own domain. "However I am curious whether you knew who I was at Hatchard's, or if this is merely the universe's idea of an elaborate joke."

"I had no idea," she managed, her voice sounding strangled even to her own ears. "I would never have… that is, if I'd known..."

"You would never have accused me of blocking every volume worth reading? Or suggested I was purchasing books merely for display?" His eyebrow rose in that infuriating way. "How disappointing. I rather enjoyed being taken to task by someone who didn't know I was a duke."

She should apologize and she should probably flee the room and never show her face in polite society again. Instead, her treacherous pride reasserted itself, lifting her chin and sharpening her voice.

"I stand by my assessment of your shelf-blocking tendencies."

Something flickered in his eyes before saying: "Even now? Standing in my library, seeking employment from me, you maintain I'm a literary obstruction?"

"Truth doesn't become less true simply because you've discovered someone's title." The words were out before she could stop them, and she immediately wanted to take them back in. "That is, Your Grace, I merely meant..."

"You meant exactly what you said." He leaned against his desk, studying her with those unsettling grey eyes. "Tell me, Miss Whitcombe, did you think I wouldn't remember you? Or did you hope E. Whitcombe would somehow deceive me?"

"I thought..." She took a breath, trying to gather her scattered thoughts. "I thought my qualifications should matter more than my sex."

"They should. Whether they do remains to be seen." He gestured to a chair across from his desk. "Sit down before you fall down. You look like you're about to faint, and Graves would never forgive me if you damaged anything while falling."

She sat, mainly because her knees were suggesting rather strongly that standing was becoming optional. He returned to his side of the desk, though he remained standing, looking down at her with an expression she couldn't quite read.

"Your application was impressive," he said after a moment that felt like several years.

"Your references even more so. I wonder why you did not think that your sex would be revealed through the references.

Professor Blackwood doesn't give praise lightly, and Lady Hastings's letter was. .. illuminating."

That took Eveline by surprise because indeed she had not thought of the references but she could not do anything now. ‘’Lady Hastings was very kind to recommend me."

"She threatened me, actually. Something about the waste of brilliant minds and the tragedy of narrow-minded aristocrats.

I'm paraphrasing, but the general tone was clear.

" He picked up what must have been Lady Hastings's letter.

"She also mentioned you once corrected the Archbishop's Latin at a dinner gathering. "

"He was misquoting Augustine."

"Naturally. One can't have archbishops running about misquoting church fathers. Think of the scandal." His tone was perfectly serious, but she caught the glimmer of humor in his eyes. "She also says you have a translation in the Classical Quarterly."

"Published under Professor Blackwood's name, but yes."

"Why?"

"Why was it published under his name? Because the Quarterly doesn't accept submissions from women, and Professor Blackwood thought that was idiotic."

"His word or yours?"

"His. Mine was somewhat less polite."

"I imagine it was." He moved to one of the towering bookshelves, running his finger along the spines with casual familiarity. "Do you know why I need a cataloguer, Miss Whitcombe?"

"Because your library is in chaos?"

He turned to look at her, surprised. "What makes you say that?"

She gestured at the general disorder surrounding them. "Books stacked horizontally on top of vertical ones, volumes on the floor, dust patterns suggesting nothing has been moved in months, possibly years. This isn't a library, Your Grace… it's a book cemetery where good literature has come to die."

"That's rather harsh."

"That's rather accurate. I can see at least three different editions of the same Virgil from here, none of them shelved together.

There's what appears to be a first edition Marlowe being used as a bookend.

And unless I'm very much mistaken, that's a medieval manuscript serving as a coaster on that side table. "

He followed her gaze to the side table in question, where indeed an illuminated manuscript was bearing the ring-stains of multiple tea cups. "Ah. Yes. That's... probably valuable."

"Probably?" She stood without thinking, moving to the manuscript with the kind of horror usually reserved for witnessing atrocities.

"This is thirteenth century, possibly earlier.

The illumination work alone..." She stopped, realizing she was handling his property without permission. "Forgive me, I shouldn't..."

"No, continue." He moved closer, close enough that she could smell that same cologne from the bookshop, something expensive and subtle that made her pulse do inappropriate things. "What can you tell me about it?"

She bent over the manuscript, her earlier nervousness temporarily forgotten in the face of scholarly interest. "The Latin is ecclesiastical, obviously, but with variations suggesting a monastery.

The marginalia here..." she pointed to tiny notations in the margins, ".

..that's a different hand, added later, probably fifteenth century.

Someone was using this for reference, making notes about.

.. theological interpretations, it looks like. "

"You can read the marginalia?"

"It's abbreviated Latin with some Greek notation.

Monks were terrible about mixing languages when they got excited about theology.

" She turned a page carefully. "Oh, and here; this is interesting.

Someone's added a personal note. 'Brother Thomas is a fool and his interpretation of Matthew is heresy.

' Apparently theological debates got quite heated in monasteries. "

"Apparently they still do in London bookshops."

She looked up to find him watching her with an expression she couldn't interpret. They were standing rather closer than propriety suggested, both bent over the manuscript like conspirators sharing secrets.

"Your Grace," she began, stepping back carefully.

"You're hired."

She blinked. "I... what?"

"You're hired. Anyone who can read medieval marginalia and gets personally offended by books being mistreated is exactly what this library needs."

"But... you haven't examined my qualifications properly. You haven't tested my Greek or my French or..."

"Miss Whitcombe," he interrupted, "you've just correctly identified a thirteenth-century Scottish manuscript, read Latin marginalia that most scholars couldn't decipher with a magnifying glass and a dictionary, and you nearly wept at the sight of tea stains on vellum.

I think your qualifications are sufficient. "

"I did not nearly weep."

"Your eyes got distinctly misty."

"That was horror, not tears."

"A distinction without a difference." He returned to his desk, pulling out a sheet of paper. "The position pays forty pounds per annum..."

"Forty pounds?" She couldn't help her shock. It was a fortune for a cataloguing position.

"Too little? I could make it fifty, I suppose."

"No! That's—that's more than generous."

"Good. You'll work Monday through Friday, nine to four, with an hour for luncheon.

I'll rarely be here as I find London tedious and prefer my estate in Derbyshire, so you'll have the run of the library.

Graves will provide you with whatever supplies you need, though he'll probably look disapproving while doing so. "

"He looks disapproving while breathing."

"True. It's his particular talent." He wrote something on the paper with quick, decisive strokes. "You can start Monday if that suits you."

"Your Grace," she said carefully, "are you certain about this? I did deceive you with my application even though I was not quite successful at that."

"Did you? Your qualifications were genuine, your references legitimate. The only deception was my assumption that E. Whitcombe would be male, which is rather my own fault for narrow thinking. But it was for a little while because as soon as I read the references I realised it was a woman’s name."

"Society won't see it that way."

"Society can do as it pleases." He looked up sharply. "That's your phrase, isn't it? I remember you saying something similar about men who purchase books for display."

She flushed. "I may have been somewhat harsh..."

"You were absolutely right. Half my acquaintances have libraries they've never read. They order books by the yard based on binding color." He signed the paper with a flourish. "Your employment contract, Miss Whitcombe. Pending your acceptance, of course."

She stared at the paper, then at him. "Why are you doing this?"

"Because my library is, as you so eloquently put it, a cemetery where good literature has come to die.

Because you're qualified. And because...

" he paused, seeming to consider his words, "because anyone who dares to argue with me in a public bookshop is exactly the sort of person who won't be intimidated by eighteen thousand volumes of chaos. "

"Eighteen thousand?"

"Graves undercounted. There are also the volumes in storage, the ones in the country houses, and whatever my father hid in various forgotten corners because he ran out of shelf space." He held out the contract. "Still interested?"

She took the paper with hands that weren't quite steady. "Your Grace, I should mention that my brother will probably call you out for this."

"For employing his sister? How medieval of him."

"For potentially ruining my reputation."

"Your reputation as what? A woman who reads Latin? How scandalous." His tone was light, but his eyes were serious. "Miss Whitcombe, I won't pretend this arrangement isn't unusual. You'll face criticism, possibly worse. If you'd prefer to reconsider..."

"No." The word came out more forcefully than intended. "No, I want this position."

"Even knowing society will gossip?"

"Especially knowing that. At least they'll gossip about something I've actually done rather than about my failure to marry."

"A practical philosophy." He moved toward the door. "Graves will show you out. I suggest you don't mention our previous encounter to anyone as it will only complicate matters."

"Of course." She clutched the contract like a lifeline. "Thank you, Your Grace."

"Don't thank me yet. You haven't seen the storage rooms." He opened the door, revealing Graves hovering in the hallway with the expression of someone who'd definitely been eavesdropping. "Graves, Miss Whitcombe will be joining us as librarian. Please see that she has everything she requires."

Graves's face went through several interesting contortions before settling on professional neutrality. "Of course, Your Grace."

Eveline followed the butler back through the intimidating corridors, her mind reeling. She'd done it. She had actually done it. She'd gotten the position despite everything—her sex, her deception, her mortifying discovery that she'd insulted her future employer in a bookshop.

"Miss Whitcombe," Graves said as they reached the entrance hall, his tone suggesting he was suffering from severe indigestion, "I suppose I should offer my... congratulations."

"Thank you, Mr. Graves."

"Though I feel obliged to mention that this arrangement is highly irregular."

"So everyone keeps telling me."

"The staff will talk."

"I expect they will."

"Society will be scandalized."

"I'm counting on it."

Something that might have been approval flickered in his eyes before being quickly suppressed. "You'll need a key to the servants' entrance. Coming through the front door daily would be..."

"Highly irregular?"

"Precisely." He handed her a small brass key. "Monday morning, nine o'clock sharp. I trust you won't be three minutes late."

"Heaven forbid," she replied and left.