The Duke of Dark Desires Read online

  “I need your help, Cynthia. I’m desperate.”

  Lady Windermere looked up and laughed. “I can it hear in your voice, Julian. Sit down and tell me what’s got you so bothered.” Her husband grumbled at the interruption but set aside his brush. Julian felt not an iota of compunction; Damian was going to enjoy hearing about his difficulties.

  And he did, chuckling with irksome delight when he heard Julian had had three girls foisted on him. Cynthia was equally amused, though less irritating in her expression of mirth. “Of course you couldn’t say no to such a request,” she said.

  In retrospect, Julian still wasn’t quite sure how his mother had managed it. He thought himself a master when it came to selfishness but he’d proved no match for her devious maneuvers. His defeat annoyed him no end.

  “Anyway,” he concluded, sitting next to the countess on the sofa and giving the sniggering Windermere a dirty look, “I need a governess, and soon. Those girls are running wild. They have no attendant but an old nurse who spends most of the time asleep, not surprising since she was already ancient when I was a boy. I found Fenella sitting on a bench in the Hanover Square garden, feeding bread and cheese to a crossing sweeper. My mother will kill me if she elopes with a lad whose sole means of support is shoveling . . . dirt.”

  Cynthia set aside her cat, smoothed her lap, and gave him her full attention. “Which one is Fenella? How old is she?”

  “The middle one. She’s about fourteen, I believe.”

  “Poor child. She has a kind heart. Those crossing boys are out in all weather and never have enough to eat.”

  “I leave care for the poor to you, Cynthia. I have enough trouble on my hands. The eldest is worried about my immortal soul.”

  “Already? What did you do?”

  “Apparently it’s not personal; Maria worries about everyone’s, and damn tedious it is too.”

  “And the third?”

  “She’s nine. That’s nuisance enough.”

  “They are your sisters, Julian,” Cynthia said with disapproval. “And what you need is a wife to look after them.”

  “Since you’re not available, I’d rather not.” He done his very best for almost a year to seduce her, and she’d ended up reconciled with her husband. Not content with breaking his heart, now she wanted to marry him off.

  He exaggerated. His heart wasn’t broken, though it would have been if he possessed one in the poetic sense. He’d wanted Cynthia very badly, and he was still fond of her. They were comfortable together, like former lovers but without the inevitable bitterness that followed a spoiled love affair.

  While she relapsed into wedded bliss and motherhood, he’d moved on to another liaison. He was between women now, but trawling the theatrical greenrooms and the salons of the demimonde for a mistress held little appeal. He used to take satisfaction from charming a lady out of the arms of wealthier men. Now he could have anyone he wanted merely by offering money and jewelry. Where was the challenge in that? It was perhaps his empty bed and lack of an object for his pursuit that made him restless. That and having to share a house with three infernally tiresome females.

  “I do not need a wife, but a governess, and I don’t know a damn thing about them. I have come here to beg you to find one for me.”

  Cynthia’s little red mouth, which he’d always found desperately enticing, twitched. “You are the most incompetent supplicant I’ve ever encountered. You could try kneeling. Or at least not sound like you’re giving an order.”

  Windermere, who had so far confined his observations to unseemly mirth, watched from his stance by the mantelpiece. Successively friends and enemies in the past, he and Julian were now on cordial terms. Still, Julian knew Damian hadn’t forgotten that Lady Windermere had been the object of Julian’s designs. “If you had your own wife you wouldn’t need mine to perform these tasks,” he said. “Or get yourself a secretary.”

  Julian groaned. “Don’t even mention that word. One of the minor provisions of my settlement with the family was to hire Fortescue Blackett, some kind of distant cousin. He’s scarcely old enough to shave and jumps at every shadow.”

  “Patronage is the duty of the head of the family,” Damian replied, not without a hint of malice. “Now that you’re a rich duke you have to behave like one.”

  “I think I preferred being a poor, ne’er-do-well relation. If not for the cursed dukedom and my large house, my mother would have had to do something else with her daughters.”

  Cynthia’s frown marred her pretty face. “You are fortunate to have your family with you. And they need you. Imagine how those girls must feel, with their mother traveling far away, so soon after losing their father.”

  “Anyone would be better off without a father like Frederick Osbourne.”

  “What was so terrible about him?”

  Julian didn’t answer. He didn’t want to talk about his problems with his stepfather, and he had no reason to believe Osbourne had mistreated his daughters as he had his stepson. He hoped not. Little as he cared for family ties, he was vehemently opposed to beating females of any age.

  “You have been offered a wonderful opportunity to know your sisters.”

  “You are right,” he said, exploiting Cynthia’s penchant for sentimental twaddle. “I shall have months, years even, to cultivate the fraternal relationship. My first job as a responsible guardian and brother is to see to their education. I know you will pick the ideal governess for them.”

  “We leave for France the day after tomorrow.” Damian was gloating, no question. “I’ve been invited to join the delegation witnessing the signing of the treaty at Amiens, and then we’re going to Paris.”

  “Will you leave me to interview a queue of plain, poorly dressed, charmless, middle-aged spinsters?”

  “They aren’t all like that,” Cynthia said. “I once nearly became a governess myself. I will admit that I was poorly dressed.”

  “I’d hire you. Why don’t you allow Windermere to perform his diplomatic duties without distraction and move into Fortescue House?”

  Cynthia laughed and blew her husband a kiss. “Surely you don’t begrudge me the opportunity to buy the latest French fashions?”

  Julian bowed to the inevitable. “I recognize the futility of trying to come between a woman and a Parisian dressmaker. If you tell me what to look for in a governess, I’ll see to the matter myself, and soon. With peace on the way, I also plan to go abroad.”

  “Shall we see you in Paris?”

  “I’m going to Belgium to collect certain property of mine.”

  Windermere stopped ogling his wife and looked interested. “The Falleron collection?”

  “I think it’s time I retrieved it.” The famous art collection had been hidden in Belgium for almost ten years. The Windermeres had been intimately involved in an attempt to force Julian to hand over the paintings to an extortionist. They suspected a Foreign Office official called Sir Richard Radcliffe, but hadn’t been able to prove it.

  “Do you still insist on cloaking the business in a shroud of mystery?”

  Julian hesitated. He’d kept his counsel about his dealings with the Marquis de Falleron for so long that discretion was second nature. He half closed his eyes and returned to the time he’d been a callow twenty-year-old who thought life was a wonderful game and himself too clever by half. “I was sworn to secrecy by one John Smith, an operative of the British foreign secretary.” But that oath wasn’t the reason he’d never told a soul, even his closest friends, about his foray into covert diplomacy.

  “Though you hinted at it in the past, I find it hard to fathom that you acted on behalf of the government.”

  “That was my first mistake.” His first in a series of events that culminated in tragedy.

  “Things don’t always turn out well, even when one’s motives are pure,” Damian said.

  They had been friends long before they became enemies and, despite all their differences, Julian trusted Damian. More practically, as a diplo
mat Windermere might be in a position to help. He didn’t have to confess the worst.

  “You remember I returned to Paris alone in the autumn of 1793,” he began.

  “You never told us why, and it was a rash thing to do with things becoming dangerous.”

  “John Smith approached me in London.”

  “I never heard of anyone in the Foreign Office by that name,” Damian said dryly.

  “His real name was doubtless Bartholomew Snodgrass, or something similarly memorable.”

  “What did he want with you?”

  “He offered me a bargain.” A devil’s bargain designed to appeal to a young picture dealer with more ambition than sense. “He needed a wellborn Englishman with a reputation as a purchaser of works of art to act as liaison between the Marquis de Falleron and a high-standing member of the Committee of Public Safety. The marquis was about to be denounced to the committee and needed to escape from France. Smith and I would take the art collection out of Paris. The committee member, who didn’t wish his love of aristocratic art and susceptibility to bribery to be known, would issue safe conduct to the marquis and his family and would divide the spoils with me.”

  Damian frowned. “Everything to do with this collection seems to be ridiculously complicated.”

  “No question. Now that I am old and cynical, I would have turned down such an improbably convenient offer. Or perhaps not. I was ambitious enough, and to obtain even half of the Falleron collection would have been a coup of the first order for me. At the age of twenty I’d possess pictures that would have every collector in England beating down my doors. No, I would still take the bargain, but I’d ask a few more questions.”

  “Why you? Or is that another mystery?”

  “The marquis was a stiff-necked, old-style aristocrat who didn’t trust the common people. Not without charm, but narrow in his opinions. He trusted me, poor fool, because I was related to a duke. He believed in the honor of his kind.” Julian found it painful to think about the marquis, whom he had liked for his genuine love of art. He’d said he felt better about relinquishing his precious pictures to a man like Julian who would take care of them.

  “I assume things didn’t go as planned.”

  “Before the planned escape, we delivered the passports to Monsieur le Marquis. The pictures had been taken down from the walls and packed in quilts. We loaded them into two carts in the middle of the night. Everything went smooth as silk. Our secret partner was as powerful as promised, and we got out of Paris and through northern France without incident. But when we reached the rendezvous, where we were supposed to meet the official and divide the spoils, we were ambushed.”

  “The French authorities?”

  “Maybe, but I’m not sure. Smith said we had been betrayed, and I had the impression he believed someone at the Foreign Office responsible. He died in the exchange of fire before he could explain.”

  “How did you get away?”

  “In addition to the French carters, we had hired a Fleming to guide us over the border with my half of the booty, avoiding official interference. Jan turned out to be a wily old bird and an excellent shot, hitting two of the three men who ambushed us. The carters fled at the first hint of trouble, but Jan helped Smith and me fight off our attackers. When Smith fell, Jan and I took a cart each and escaped with all the pictures. I owe him my life. I’m sure I was supposed to die too.”

  Damian nodded. “I understand now why you are so sure that someone in the Foreign Office was involved, and Sir Richard Radcliffe seems the best candidate. I assume you found a new hiding place for them after Radcliffe’s attempt to locate them last year.”

  “I couldn’t get the pictures out of Belgium because of the war, but we moved them. Jan won’t hand them over to anyone but me. If they kill me, they’ll never find them.”

  “Why didn’t you bring them to England straightaway, after you removed them from France?”

  “I went back to Paris.”

  Cynthia gasped. “How could you, Julian? Why would you do anything so dangerous?”

  “Because I was a young fool who thought he was immortal.” And for the reason he would not speak of, even to his friends. He had wanted to make sure the marquis and his family had escaped from France.

  Are you sure, Monsieur Fortescue? Do you give me your assurances that my family will be safe?

  I promise. I swear on my honor.

  Those final words to the marquis, before he left the Hôtel Falleron with the pictures, had haunted Julian for nearly nine years.

  He could hide his guilt, but not the result of it. Damian knew what had happened. “As I recall, the Marquis and Marquise de Falleron and their daughters were arrested, tried, and sent to the guillotine.”

  “That wasn’t Julian’s fault,” Cynthia said. “He did everything he was asked. He didn’t know he would be betrayed.”

  Julian hadn’t known but he’d suspected, based on the attitude and certain remarks of his French official contact. The risk had seemed worthwhile to him and he’d never thought about whether he had the right to make that decision for an entire family. He clenched his jaw. There was nothing to do about it now.

  “Of course I didn’t know,” he said. “And now I have the Falleron collection without having to share it with a corrupt French official.”

  Cynthia, the little saint, quibbled, “Is it really yours? Is there not an heir?”

  “I obtained the pictures from the marquis in good faith in return for a service. They are mine.” Nothing he did would bring back the Fallerons, so why let himself be bothered by scruples? There had been times in the last nine years when he’d considered forgetting about the pictures, but they weren’t doing anyone any good buried in a dark cellar, and he had plans for them.

  “Did he have any sons?” she asked.

  “Just the three daughters.”

  “And they all died. How old were they?”

  “I don’t know exactly. Children, young women perhaps,” he lied, fighting to keep his face blank. He knew their ages and their names too.

  “How tragic and barbaric and dreadfully sad.”

  He’d missed the execution of the parents, but he made himself go to the Place de la Révolution to witness the next day’s batch of victims going under the blade. Only the two eldest girls had ridden in the tumbrel to meet their gruesome fates. The names had been called out, imprinted on his memory: Jeanne-Louise de Falleron and Marie-Thérèse de Falleron. Only two. The youngest, Antoinette, wasn’t there. It was unlikely, however, that one had survived. She had most likely died in prison and cheated Madame Guillotine.

  Julian fixed his eyes on Cynthia’s pretty face to block the image of the blade slamming down on those fragile necks.

  Chapter 2

  It was a long time ago, almost nine years now, but Jeanne de Falleron had once been under the tutelage of a governess, so it stood to reason that she could be a governess herself. All she had to do was remember what the original Miss Grey had taught her, and how. She had long ago usurped Miss Jane Grey’s name and identity. Stealing her occupation was a mere bagatelle. But to enter the employment of Duke of Denford, first she had to get past an interview.

  Jane hadn’t been back to Hanover Square since she saw the advertisement, for every hour had been spent preparing. Fortunately she’d worked hard during three months in London to improve her rusty English.

  She hesitated before the shallow flight of steps, white stone blackened by coal dust, leading to the front door, which was in need of a coat of paint. Swallowing her pride, she wended her way down to the servants’ entrance. She was a servant. And she’d been Jane Grey so long she no longer even thought of herself as Jeanne, except in the secret corners of her soul. What did it matter which door she used, as long as she gained entry to Fortescue House?

  The unfavorable impression conveyed by the less than pristine main entrance was reinforced by the wizened little man in a soiled leather apron who opened the lower door, and the tumult behind him.<
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  “Watcherwant?” he said, brandishing a villainous-looking brush whose fearsome bristles were caked with soot. She shrank back. The English spoken by London menials was a trial to her, not helped by the high volume of shouting emerging from the depths of this basement level. “I am here about the governess position.”

  “Don’t know about any governess.”

  “Who is in charge of the female servants? The housekeeper?”

  The fellow scratched his head with filthy hands. “Don’t know about any housekeeper.”

  In a way this was a good thing. A female servant would be loath to hire a young and pretty governess. Should she ask for the majordomo? Somehow such a grand individual didn’t seem plausible in this strange ducal household. As she was about to suggest the butler, an unmistakably Gallic scream cut through the commotion. “Jamais, jamais, jamais. Les anglais sont impossible.” A torrent of French drew nearer, excoriating the manners, morals, parenthood, and sexual abilities of every Englishman and promising to leave this accursed house toute de suite. By the time he reached the door, Jane had his measure. He was a French cook, and she was acquainted with the breed.

  He took one look at her and stopped mid-tirade for perhaps two seconds, long enough for a Frenchman to manage a comprehensive ogle, then started again with less volume and considerably cleaner language. She gathered that the kitchen at Fortescue House, where he had just started to work, was filthy, as impossible as the English servants, who were incapable of understanding his very reasonable requirements. It was even worse than the household of the earl of quelque chose whose employ he’d quit in a fit of pique. She uttered a soothing sentence or two, to the effect that his situation was affreux but soon all would appreciate the sublime creations of his art.

  Her little speech provoked another torrent, this time of rapture. Never in England had he heard his language spoken with such precision, such elegance. She spoke the true French of the noblesse, before those Jacobin villains destroyed La France. Almost he could imagine himself back in the hôtel of his master, the Duc de Fleurigny.