Chapter 11
“Married…to the Duke of Argyll?”
From the other side of the thick oak door panel, silence met Viscount St. John’s question.
Reclined against the wall opposite Viscount St. John’s office, with the bottom of his boot propped against the ghastly bright floral wallpaper, Argyll waited for it.
The moment his new bride discovered she’d been wrong and Argyll right, as usual. No sane nobleman would dare reject all the benefits that came from an alliance to—
“Argyll?” That thunderous shout rattled the door panels. Then came St. John’s scathing diatribe.
Argyll’s smug smile slipped, as did the heel of his shoe. His boot hit the floor with a sharp, loud clack.
An unbroken, agonizing sob split through St. John’s rabid rant. “No. My God, Daria,” the Dowager Viscountess St. John wailed. “What have you done?”
It turned out his enigmatic little wife had been right all along. The viscount was not at all pleased. An understatement at that.
Folding his arms at his chest, Argyll tapped his fingers against his elbows.
This was what it felt like, then, being an average chap.
Unlike she’d done at their wedding earlier, his bride didn’t rush to Argyll’s defense.
Nor should she.
Why should she? The whole reason she’d wanted to wed him was to inflict maximum suffering upon her family, so they’d find solace in her death. He’d not spelled it out that way before. But now that he had… He grimaced.
His pride continued to take a beating, and a rather violent one, that made up for years of only platitudes and fawning.
Another lady’s voice broke through the furor. “Perhaps we’ve misunderstood, Daria.”
Ah, Viscountess St. John. Argyll shuddered.
The founder and ape-leader of the Mismatch Society, that organization of men-hating ladies.
She’d managed to quell the chaos. The first quiet since Daria marched herself in alone, closed the door behind her, and stated calmly and clearly that she’d married.
The commanding bluestocking’s polemical pastime had some benefits.
“Now, Daria. Are you saying you want to marry the Duke of Argyll?” Lady St. John said gently. “If so, I strongly advise against that.”
Clever woman there.
“Oh, no. I didn’t want to marry him.”
Argyll ceased his drumming.
Fuck.
“You. Did. Not. Want to marry him?” A fresh thread of panic had found its way into the dowager viscountess’s voice.
“No,” Daria confirmed, almost cheerfully.
Now she’s cheerful. Here he’d taken her as largely a blank canvas of undefined emotion.
A sudden throbbing hit the center of his forehead and he rubbed a fist against the fast-growing ache.
“I had to, Clayton,” she explained.
Oh, Christ.
“You had to?”
“Yes.”
Argyll closed his eyes. His vexing bride couldn’t detect a rhetorical question had it been handed to her in a basket.
Glass shattered.
He was beginning to believe one of his many enemies sent her after all, with this very intent.
What a diabolical plot it would be. Send him a virgin in black.
Convince him to marry. Then drag him before her Argyll-hating family to meet his end.
And Argyll would deserve it for having somehow agreed to her mad proposal.
Yes, his moniker for her, Little Raven, proved apropos for the chit was about to get him killed.
“You needn’t be angry, Clayton.”
Brother—and bridegroom—waited for Daria to finish the rest of that with some solid reasons.
When St. John erupted for a third time, Argyll gave up any hope of some sound, justifiable rationale and helped himself to the wood seat St. John’s adamant butler earlier insisted he take.
“I needn’t be angry, Daria!” St. John raged. “I am bloody incensed.”
Argyll did a cursory study of the monk’s bench and the shaped oak arms beneath his palms. A piece made for prayer.
Fitting.
Hell, at this point, he’d rather she just swiftly get onto the curse and dying business.
“Are you mad?”
Argyll perked up. At last, something he and the irate brother agreed on.
Viscountess and dowager viscountess scolded St John at the same time. “Clayton.”
Finally, the other ladies in the room would air their voices.
“That is unkind, Clayton,” Lady St. John was saying. “Do not speak so of your sister.”
Clomp-clomp-clomp.
The steady beat of the viscount’s footfalls abruptly stopped. The floorboard groaned. “Daria, forgive me.”
“There is no need to apologize, Clayton,” Daria said softly, forgivingly.
Argyll frowned. There it was again. An unexpected warmth and softness to his bride’s affect and tones.
Granted, he required neither from his wife, but she managed them for others and couldn’t for Argyll’s charming self.
His lips dipped into a deeper frown. Not that he’d gone overly out of his way to do so, but the times he had…
The deep, heavy breath St. John drew reached all the way outside. “No, Daria. You are all that is good and pure a-and…”
St. John’s voice broke.
Argyll recoiled. Good God, was the man about to…cry?
He eyed the nearest exit.
“I’ll bloody kill him.”
That took a fast turn.
Argyll ought to have welcomed the pathetic display of weakness from St. John.
“That cunning, utterly unscrupulous, lecherous, libidinous…” With every slander hurled, Lord St. John’s voice grew louder. “Wretched, degraded, villainous pig-widgeon.”
Argyll’s brows lifted. That was quite the lengthy cut upon his character.
“Buffle-headed, sappy, chuckle-headed.”
Oof. The fellow wasn’t finished.
“Scapegrace, raffish,”
Not even near close.
“Swag-bellied badgers.”
Argyll glanced at his very flat stomach and frowned.
Well, I never.
“I don’t think you’re swag-bellied either.”
Christ! Argyll’s gaze shot to his silent visitor.
A tiny, dark-haired girl stared back with big, dark eyes. Getting sneaked upon by mere children. God rot him.
The tiny girl hopped up onto the seat beside him. “You’re on the ‘in-trouble’ bench.”
Ah, now the butler’s insistence Argyll take the seat made sense.
“Spend a lot of time here, do you?”
“A fair amount.”
Shocking.
His lips quirked in a droll half-smile.
“One of the sisters, I take it,” he drawled.
“Yes. Cunning, utterly unscrupulous, lecherous, libidinous, wretched, degraded, villainous pig-widgeon, buffle-headed, sappy, chuckle-headed, scapegrace, raffish, swag-bellied badgers, I take it.”
Argyll raised his eyebrows. “Impressive memory.” He brought his hands up together in a slow clap. “Well done.”
An impish glitter lit her eyes. “I am Eris.”
“Eris,” he repeated. “As in the sister of Ares?” God of War.
“And the personification of conflict and defiance?” She sprang to her feet and dropped an insolent curtsy. “The same.”
Not missing a beat, Argyll stretched a palm out. “Argyll.”
With a guileless that bespoke a family weakness, Daria’s aptly named sister slipped unsuspecting fingers into his and gave them a pump. “Did you really marry Daria?”
“Would it surprise you if I said yes?”
“No,” she said. “On account she just said you did and you are seated on the ‘in-trouble’ bench.”
He found himself smiling. “Then why did you ask?”
“Well, it is just you do not seem like a man Daria would marry.”
His grin slipped. What manner of man suited Argyll’s wife?
Argyll angled sideways on the bench and dropped his arm along the bench top rail. He was not miffed. Rather, curious. The small girl would freely tender information about the wife he could not read. “How so?”
“For one”—her regret-filled eyes went to the top of his head—“you have golden hair.”
His hand went reflexively to the blond hair in question. “And?” He frowned. “There is something wrong with blond hair?” he couldn’t keep from asking.
It didn’t mean she intended to answer—nor did she.
“You have blue eyes.” She sounded thoroughly disappointed. “Not dark, almost black-blue ones.”
She sounded thoroughly disappointed because she was thoroughly disappointed.
Eris scooted closer and shifted into the same position as him. “Daria was meant to marry a dark gentleman. One with black hair and menacing eyes, and your eyes…” Getting onto her knees, she peered close.
Argyll edged back.
“They are not that, Argyll.”
The imp’s sigh went on forever, then Eris plopped into her original seat with enough force that he winced in commiseration.
“One would think, given my lack of menace…” Yet another phrase never uttered about the Duke of Argyll—him or the distinguished line of depraved scoundrels before. “Your brother would be more agreeable?”
“Yes, but yours are a different kind of menacing.”
A girl aged beyond her years. Her brother was going to have his hands full with this one. But then, with Daria as an older sister to set the course, could any path other than peril possibly await?
A fresh shout went up. “You wanted to marry?”
They turned their attention back on St. John’s freshly shaking door panel.
“…and it was him, that debased, debauched scapegrace, Daria?”
Argyll cast a sideways glance at the little girl to see how she fared under the full force of her brother’s fury.
Daria’s sister absorbed it all without reaction. At some point, she’d resumed her examination of his unfavorable hair.
“Argyll will break your heart, Daria.”
He would. The viscount wasn’t wrong on that score. Lord St. John’s warning came entirely too late. The deed was done.
“We do not necessarily know that, Clayton.”
Argyll’s ears pricked up with interest. He’d picked up a defense from Daria’s mother.
Lord St. John snorted. “Do you truly believe that, Mother?”
There was a beat of silence so that Argyll couldn’t determine whether he’d simply missed the response.
“No,” came the dowager viscountess’s reply.
He leaned back.
Little fingers tugged at his coat sleeve.
Argyll looked down. “Yes?”
“If you are married to Daria…” she began slowly, like one unwrapping a riddle.
“I am.”
“Then would it not make sense for you to be in there with her?”
A frown touched his brow, and he reconsidered the door.
Argyll narrowed his eyes. “Do you believe I should?”
“I asked what you think.”