The Silent Duke’s Heart (Dukes of Deception #2)

Chapter One

"You are staring again, Vanessa."

Lady Vanessa Wayworth tore her gaze from the far side of the ballroom with the sort of violence usually reserved for removing splinters. Her mother stood beside her, fan moving in that deceptively lazy rhythm that meant she had noticed something worth commenting upon.

"I was not staring," Vanessa said. "I was merely observing. There is a significant difference."

"Is there?" Lady Wayworth's lips curved with the particular amusement of a woman who had raised three children and could spot a falsehood from across a crowded room.

"And what, pray tell, were you observing with such intensity that you failed to notice Lord Haberton attempting to catch your eye for the past five minutes? "

Vanessa glanced toward the unfortunate Lord Haberton, who stood by the refreshment table looking rather like a hopeful spaniel who had been denied a treat.

She felt a pang of guilt, which she quickly smothered.

Lord Haberton was perfectly pleasant, if one enjoyed conversations about crop rotation and the finer points of sheep husbandry which did not particularly interest Vanessa.

"I shall speak with him presently," she said, which was not entirely candid, and they both knew it.

Her mother's fan paused its movement. "Vanessa. You are two-and-twenty. This is your fourth Season. Your father is beginning to make noises about settlements and sensible matches, and I can only deflect him for so long."

"I am aware of my age, Mama. I was present for all of my birthdays."

"Your wit will not secure you a husband."

"Then perhaps I shall have to secure something else. A small cottage, perhaps and some cats. I am told spinsters are required to keep cats. I should like to make a start on the collection."

Lady Wayworth sighed the sigh of a woman who had deployed this particular argument many times before and knew precisely how it would end.

"You are impossible."

"I prefer discerning."

"You prefer…" Her mother stopped abruptly, her gaze shifting to something over Vanessa's shoulder. Her expression transformed into one of genuine warmth.

"Ah. Lord Montehood. How delightful to see you."

Vanessa's spine went rigid.

No. Not now. She had been doing so well. An entire forty-three minutes at this wretched ball without having to endure his presence, his insufferable smile, his way of looking at her as though she were a mildly amusing puzzle he had not yet bothered to solve.

"Lady Wayworth." That voice. Low and warm and carrying just the faintest edge of amusement, as though the entire world existed primarily for his entertainment.

"You are, as always, the brightest ornament in any room. I cannot imagine how Lord Wayworth managed to convince you to enter into matrimony with him. Bribery, I suspect or perhaps you have employed a touch of enchantment.”

Her mother actually laughed like a woman half her age being paid an outrageous compliment. "You are a shameless flatterer, Your Grace."

"I am merely an observer of obvious truths."

Vanessa turned as she had no choice, really. To continue facing away would be rude, and more importantly, it would suggest that his presence affected her in some way which it obviously did not.

Martin Hale, Duke of Montehood, stood before her in evening black, his dark hair artfully disheveled in that manner that suggested he had spent no time on it whatsoever and yet somehow looked better than every other man in the room.

His expressive grey eyes, framed by a luscious set of lashes which were irritatingly expressive, swept over her with lazy assessment.

"Little Wayworth," he said. "What a pleasure."

Little Wayworth. She had been "little Wayworth" since she was sixteen years old, when Edward had first brought his Oxford friend home for the summer holidays.

She had been gangly then, all elbows and poorly concealed admiration, trailing after them like a lovesick duckling.

Martin had been kind about it, in the careless way of young men who do not notice the devastation they leave in their wake.

He had ruffled her hair once and called her Edward's "little shadow. "

She had been overwhelmed by a sense of acute mortification, yet her heart remained shamefully eager for a repetition of the encounter.

Six years later, she was no longer gangly. She had grown into herself, learned to wield wit like a weapon and composure like armor. And yet, he still called her little Wayworth, as though she were eternally frozen at sixteen, forever Edward's inconvenient younger sister.

"Your Grace," she said, and was proud of how steady her voice emerged.

"I had not realised you were attending this evening. I was told the entertainment would be exceptional."

His lips twitched. "And yet here I am, proving the idle tongues wrong once again."

"I did not say you were the disappointment, merely that your presence was unexpected. Like discovering a spider in one's slipper. Startling, but ultimately insignificant."

"A spider." He pressed a hand to his chest in mock offense. "You wound me, Lady Vanessa. And here I had come specifically to request a dance."

Her heart performed an extremely inconvenient maneuver but she ignored it. "How unfortunate. My card is quite full."

"Is it?" He reached out and plucked the dance card from where it hung at her wrist, examining it with exaggerated interest. "Curious. It appears rather empty to me. Unless you are saving space for Lord Haberton? I marked the way he devoured you with his eyes. One might mistake it for the purest affection …or merely his next delectable morsel is a matter of some debate.”

No sooner had he spoken those words , he produced a small lead pencil from somewhere inside hi coat, of course he carried a pencil, the presumptuous creature that he was and scrawled his name across one of the lines.

"There. The supper waltz. I shall look forward to it immensely."

"I did not agree to dance with you."

"No," he said, returning the card with a smile that made her want to commit violence. "But you will. You always do."

It was the pinnacle of her mortification realising that, despite his audacity, he had perceived the reality of her heart with absolute precision.

She did always dance with him, had done so at every ball where their paths crossed for the past four Seasons.

She told herself it was because refusing would cause a scene.

Because he was Edward's closest friend and it would be rude.

Because dancing with him meant nothing, less than nothing, a mere social obligation to be endured and forgotten.

She told herself many things and very few of them were true.

"If you will excuse me," she said stiffly, "I believe I see someone I must speak with."

"By all means." He stepped aside with an elegant bow that somehow managed to convey both perfect courtesy and utter insolence. "Until the supper waltz, little Wayworth."

She swept past him without another word, her cheeks burning, her pulse doing something deeply irritating in her throat. Behind her, she could hear him greeting her mother with renewed charm, saying something that made Lady Wayworth laugh again.

Insufferable…the man was completely and utterly insufferable.

She found refuge near a potted palm, which offered the dual advantages of partial concealment and proximity to a servant carrying champagne. She claimed a glass with rather more enthusiasm than was strictly ladylike and took a fortifying sip.

"Vanessa? Are you quite all right? You look rather flushed."

Her friend Miss Helena Crawford appeared at her elbow, pretty and blonde and wearing an expression of gentle concern. Helena was everything Vanessa was not; soft-spoken, agreeable, the sort of young woman who inspired protective instincts in gentlemen rather than the urge to argue.

"I am perfectly well," Vanessa said. "I have merely had the misfortune of encountering the Duke of Montehood."

"Ah." Helena's concern transformed into something rather more knowing. "I see."

"There is nothing to see. The man is a plague upon polite society. He is arrogant, presumptuous, and entirely too convinced of his own charm."

"He is also extraordinarily handsome."

"That is beside the point."

"Is it?" Helena took a delicate sip of her own champagne. "I only mention it because you are gripping your glass rather tightly, and I should hate to see you shatter it. The scandal would be tremendous."

Vanessa forced her fingers to relax. "He signed my dance card…without permission. He simply took it from my wrist and wrote his name as though he had every right in the world."

"How dreadful," Helena murmured, in the tone of someone who did not find it dreadful at all. "The supper waltz, I presume?"

"How did you know?"

"Because it is the most intimate dance of the evening, and if I were a devastatingly handsome duke attempting to torment a young lady I had known since she was sixteen, which is precisely the dance I would claim."

"He is not attempting to torment me. He does not think of me at all. I am merely Edward's little sister, a mild amusement at best, an inconvenience at worst." The words tasted bitter on her tongue, more bitterly than she had intended. She took another sip of champagne to wash them away.

Helena was quiet for a moment. Then, gently: "Are you quite certain of that?"

"Of course I am certain. Martin…His Grace…

has never shown the slightest interest in me beyond the bounds of familial obligation.

He teases me because it entertains him, dances with me because it would be strange not to, and calls me 'little Wayworth' because he cannot be bothered to remember that I grew up years ago.

" She realised she was gripping her glass again and deliberately loosened her hold.

"I am nothing to him. Less than nothing. "

"Vanessa…"