Chapter Twenty-Two
Lady Margaret Baverstock looked at her husband’s pocket watch.
Three more minutes, and then she was to stumble upon the Duke of Trent and Iris en deshabille in the morning room.
They would be compromised, and as good as married.
However … sticky the idea of purposely ruining her own niece felt, by doing so she was giving Iris a better life, one where she didn’t have to beg relations for money, or stay in houses that didn’t belong to her in the hope that someone would come along to save her.
And she didn’t have to cling to silly ideas like the granddaughter of an earl running a boardinghouse, of all things, having strange women—and worse, men—living beneath her roof, and hoping by virtue of some miracle that she would have enough income to support herself and to see Edmund into an acceptable career.
That made all of this a good deed. For heaven’s sake, how many women ever became duchesses?
Very few, indeed. Perhaps only one every seven or eight years, even.
And Iris would be that one, thanks to her.
Yes, thanks to Lady Margaret Baverstock.
And while she wouldn’t receive any credit for it, that was unnecessary.
The drippy girl Rebecca refused for some reason to go upstairs and change, and instead insisted on chatting with her grandmother about the best way to remove orange stains from a pink gown.
The Dowager Lady Hentrose looked irritated, and Margaret didn’t blame her a bit.
If a messy, sticky nine-year-old girl attempted to hug her with meringue all over her front and in her hair and dripping onto the very expensive carpet, well, someone would be forcibly removed from the house and a bucket of water dumped over her.
The girl had even managed to fling some of it on a number of guests.
“Rebecca!” Lady Hentrose finally snapped. “You are not coming anywhere near me while you’re covered in dessert. Go away. I have things to manage.” With that the dowager marchioness turned on her heel and left the drawing room.
Because Margaret noticed everything, and listened to every bit of gossip, she could guess where Georgiana, Lady Hentrose was going.
It would be to the library, where she would find her son and Lady Pauline Grenedy alone together, hopefully even more scandalously than her niece and Trent, and they would be well on their way to a wedding, as well.
No one appreciated the effort, the skill, and the timing that a family’s matriarch put into all the behind-the-curtains maneuverings. No one but themselves.
She handed the pocket watch back to Harold.
It was time. A shiver of excitement ran through her.
She hoped whatever Trent and Iris were up to wasn’t too scandalous even for discussion, but she did expect to see perhaps a bare breast in addition to kissing.
Bad enough to force a marriage, but not so bad that even becoming a duchess wouldn’t render Iris palatable to the ton.
“Bradley, is it? I wish to go to the morning room,” she stated, tapping the arm of her wheeled chair.
“Are you certain, my lady? No one is—”
“Now.”
“My lady.”
The footman pushed her forward. Half the room seemed to be watching her, or at least all the Howards were.
That was why Trent had chosen her to make the interruption, though; he didn’t trust any of his own blood to do it.
They didn’t want their patriarch married again.
They didn’t want Trent bestowing money and favor on anyone but themselves.
But the duke had made it clear to her and to Harold—he would be exceedingly grateful for the part they’d played in putting him together with Iris.
Gratitude from a duke was a very good thing.
“The morning room door is shut,” the footman observed as they reached the foyer.
“So it is. Continue.” She bumped a little in her seat to urge him forward.
When the devil was Suzette due back, anyway?
The ungrateful thing had said a fortnight, and it had been nearly twice that long.
Just one letter, that her mother’s illness was lingering, and then nothing else.
Well, when the maid finally bothered to return, she might well find that she’d been replaced.
“Should I knock, my lady?”
“Why? It’s dark beneath the door. No one’s inside. Open it and push me in. Your employer holds odd parties, you know. Inviting children and servants to eat at the table, and then vanishing. I need a breath of air. In there.”
The door was also locked, which she considered a very good sign. Bradley turned the key, shoved it open, and rolled her chair through the doorway. The room was black as pitch after the bright hallway, and for a trio of heartbeats she thought it empty, after all. Damnation. All this effort and—
“Blast it, close the damned door!” came the duke’s voice, not quite as they’d planned it, but close enough.
Margaret took a deep breath and screamed.
The duke roared. “No, you bottle-headed fussock! We’ve been—”
“No! Let me out!”
The angry female voice wasn’t Iris’s. A hand wrenched at her wheeled chair, and Margaret shrieked again.
“What the devil?” Lady Hentrose grabbed a lamp from the hallway and skidded into the doorway directly behind Margaret and Bradley. “Pauline?”
“Yes, but—”
The dowager marchioness echoed Margaret’s scream with one of her own. “Oh, the scandal!” she wailed. “How could you, Beckett?”
“I’m not Beckett,” the Duke of Trent snapped. “Get your damned chair out of the way, Margaret, before you ruin everything.”
By now the rest of the guests were stomping into the hallway outside the morning room. Bradley squeezed by her in a very improper fashion and began lighting candles, and only her very strong will prevented her from fainting.
Pauline had backed behind the couch and frantically attempted to rebutton her gown, while Trent stood in the center of the room, roaring, his trousers and coat draped over a chair several feet away. Even worse, Iris didn’t seem to be in the room at all. Oh dear. What the devil was happening?
Beckett and Iris ran through the front door to see most of the guests and his staff crowded into the front hallway and honking like geese. Everyone chattered, no one seemed to know precisely what was going on, and he dodged past Lord Harold with Iris on his heels.
“What’s happened?” he demanded, pushing forward.
Ahead of him in the open morning room doorway, Bradley intercepted a charging Edmund and Rebecca, grabbing one under each of his arms, and began plowing against the flow of guests back toward the depths of the house. “No, you don’t, you two. No need for you to see that.”
“Bradley?” Beckett demanded, reaching the senior footman.
“You’d best see for yourself, my lord. The little ones and I will be in the kitchen.”
As they passed, he noted that Rebecca seemed to be coated in something very messy, and he caught the scent of oranges as she vanished behind him.
One thing at a time. Had something happened to Trent?
Had the duke turned up his toes in the morning room?
Good God, he would have to move if he ended the evening with a dead duke on his davenport.
Beckett reached the doorway. His mother and Lady Margaret’s chair blocked the entrance, and he pushed Iris’s aunt forward a foot so he could get around them. “What—”
He stopped. Stopped talking, stopped moving, even stopped thinking for a moment. His eyes saw things that his mind couldn’t—or didn’t wish to—explain.
In front of him, Lady Pauline stood behind the couch, her hands over her face and her dress unbuttoned halfway down her back. As he took that in, the Duke of Trent stalked up to her. Trouserless, his hands on his hips, the duke glared at Lady Pauline.
“Who the devil are you, anyway?” he demanded.
Lady Margaret coughed. “Your Grace, this is Lady Pauline Grenedy. You sat across from her at dinner.”
“Yes, but who is she? Her lineage, damn it all!”
Iris’s aunt flinched. “She…”
“She’s the Duke of Milton’s granddaughter,” Beckett’s mother finished crisply.
“Milton’s granddaughter? Albert and I came up together.” He guffawed, the sound dry and contemptuous. “So to speak.”
Whatever the devil was afoot, Pauline, at least, looked mortified. “That’s enough of that,” Beckett snapped, removing his coat and walking forward to put it around her shoulders.
“Oh, thank you, Beckett,” she said, grabbing for his hands. “I have no idea what’s going on here! It was so dark, and I thought you—he—they locked us in here, and I had no idea he wasn’t wearing any—”
“Why aren’t you in the library?” he asked, freeing his fingers.
“I … Your butler said to meet you here. The—”
Beckett whipped around. “Butler?”
The butler, pretending to be a statue against one wall, shrugged. “I’m as startled as anyone, my lord.”
“Lady Pauline,” Beckett’s mother said succinctly, “claiming your intention was to cavort with a different man does not help anything. Please … collect yourself and leave this house. I will not tolerate such … lewd behavior beneath my son’s roof.”
“Just a moment,” Trent stated, eyeing Pauline again.
“I came here for a wife. You’ll do, Lady Pauline Grenedy.
” He took a step toward the hallway. “Francis! Send someone to Canterbury. I need a marriage license. John Howard, Duke of Trent, wed to Lady Pauline Grenedy, granddaughter of the Duke of Milton.” He turned to pin Iris, standing at Beckett’s shoulder, with a glare.
“Better than you, I’d wager. Younger, too. Ha! I’m cleverer than any of you.”
This man had been waiting, trouserless, old lobcock swinging about, in the morning room. For Iris. The words Beckett wanted to say would get him banned from every ton soiree and several gentlemen’s clubs. “Put your damned trousers on, Trent,” he growled, closing his teeth over the rest of it.
“But His Grace is to marry Iris,” Lady Margaret exclaimed.
“I am not marrying Trent!” Pauline shouted, yanking her sleeves back over her shoulders again. “He’s old! I want Hentrose! And that stupid daughter of his can go to the devil! This is all her fault! I’m certain of it!”
“Stop complaining, you hoyden. I’m making you a duchess.” Cackling, the duke took his trousers from Butler and sat on the couch to pull them on.
Beckett glanced over the duke’s head at Iris.
What had just happened? More to the point, what had they just escaped?
After this, it would be Trent’s duty to wed Lady Pauline, and hers to accept Trent’s offer.
Given what Pauline had just said about Rebecca, he didn’t have a quarrel in the world with any of that, but how in the devil had he mistaken her animosity toward the nine-year-old as mere awkwardness?
“I am ashamed I ever considered a match with you, Your Grace,” Iris said, her voice a little unsteady.
“If this was meant for me, then I can only express support and pity for Lady Pauline for falling into your trap.” She took a breath.
“Though given Lady Pauline’s state of undress, it seems she had compromising someone’s honor on her mind, as well. ”
“You shrew,” Pauline snapped. “No doubt you’ve already g—”
“The evening is over,” Beckett broke in, turning his back on Pauline and Trent. “I apologize to everyone not involved in this fiasco, and I can only recommend that you follow your own conscience where … discussing this event is concerned.”
“Beckett, we have an understanding,” Pauline said, her voice plaintive.
“And my daughter?” he snapped, facing her again. “You have some thoughts about her?”
“Not once she left for boarding school, the stupid little wretch.”
“Ahh. Congratulations on your upcoming nuptials, then.” He lowered his voice. “Return my coat, Pauline. And never speak to me or to Mrs. Silbern again.”
“But Beckett—”
“One more thing. The mare, Delilah? She’s Iris’s. Not yours. She won’t be leaving my stable. Good evening, Lady Pauline.”
Lord Elmond shoved his way into the room.
“That does it, you old rooster,” he snapped at his father.
“Marry her. But now you’ve embarrassed the Howard name.
My legacy. You will therefore reside in quiet, contented domesticity with…
” He sent a glare at Pauline. “… your new duchess, in the country. Pop out however many brats you choose. They will get nothing. And you, my lady, will be out of Trent Park on your arse an hour after he finally kicks off. Though it’d serve you right if the old fool lives for another decade. ”
“No! I was tricked! I—”
“Shut it, wife-to-be. I don’t like whining.”