His Unlikely Duchess Read online

Lily shook her head. ‘I fear I would be quite terrible at it. All the stares and whispers, every moment just perfectly correct, every smile to each person prescribed. Though maybe being a duke is rather the same? Someone told me the Lennox title is much older than the Hanoverian royal one.’ Lily sighed when she remembered all those dull evenings pouring over Debrett’s.

  Aidan’s smile faded. ‘Yes, it’s from before the Civil War. Ours, you know, not the one you had in America. But the first known ancestor came over from France with the Conqueror and Roderick land is in the Domesday Book. But that’s all dull stuff for such a fine day when I promised you a gallop!’

  Lily didn’t find it dull at all, but she studied the open stretch of empty bridleway before them. ‘I’ll race you!’ she cried.

  He laughed and urged his horse faster, gaining on her, leaving the groom quite behind. Together, they hopped over a shallow dip and Lily felt as if she was flying. All her doubts were left behind in that moment. There was no one around the paths at that hour and they could just gallop and gallop.

  Lily laughed again as she pulled far ahead of Aidan—just before a low-hanging branch snatched her hat from her head. She drew up sharply, laughing even more.

  Aidan caught it from the tree and tossed it to her just as a drop of rain hit her nose. ‘I declare you must be the winner, Miss Wilkins,’ he said as they drew up their horses near an empty bandstand. Prince Albert peered down at them from his gilded perch in the distance before the red-brick hall. Other than that, there were only flowers and trees, and the grey stretch of sky above, to see them.

  ‘No, I think it’s a tie,’ she answered, still laughing in delight as she put her hat back on. ‘That was wonderful! I haven’t felt so free in simply ages.’ Or ever, truly. Even while riding at home, she was carefully followed.

  ‘Free, yes—and, I’m afraid, rather damp soon.’ He glanced up at the sky, which Lily could see was darkening ominously. More droplets of rain landed on her cheeks through her veil.

  Aidan swung easily and gracefully down from his saddle and helped Lily from hers. Hand in hand, they raced for the shelter of the bandstand just as the clouds split open. Lily stood by the wrought-iron railing and watched as he tethered the horses, sent the groom away and came to join her. The rain pattered on the tin roof and surrounded their little shelter with a silver curtain. Aidan took off his hat and shook his damp hair, tousling it by running his gloved fingers through it. It tumbled over his brow in unruly waves.

  Lily felt a trembling surge in her stomach as she stared at him, yet she couldn’t look away.

  He grinned that wonderfully crooked smile of his and said, ‘I think we might be here for a while.’

  Lily wondered if he was sorry about that. Sorry he couldn’t just drop her at her door and be done with her for the day. ‘I don’t mind at all. I could stay here for hours, outside in the fresh air, no curtsying lessons or French grammar to study.’ And she could. It seemed the perfect place, with the faintly metallic-smelling breeze sweeping around them, the sound of the rain, the moisture on her cheeks. And Aidan, standing so close to her their shoulders brushed, giving off an electric spark she craved more of. She eased her veil up on to her hat and took a deep breath. ‘But if you have important appointments, Duke...’

  ‘I don’t. Not a single appointment to keep that’s more important than this one.’ He sat down on the railing next to her, one foot propped on the ironwork, one carelessly swinging free. He smiled down at her, a lazy, sweet smile that made her think perhaps he would rather be there than anywhere else. Just as she would. ‘And perhaps, Miss Wilkins, when we are here alone, you might call me Aidan? Every time someone says “Duke” to me, I look for my father or brother.’

  Lily nodded, sad for the reminder that he had lost his brother so recently. ‘You must miss him—and your father—very much.’

  He glanced away, frowning thoughtfully. ‘My father I did not know very well. He was always busy, looking after Roderick, attending Parliament, travelling abroad. But my brother—yes, I do miss Edward, very much. He was a kind, gentle soul and very dedicated to his studies and his duties. A much better Duke than a wanderer like myself could ever hope to be.’

  And Edward had been in love with Lady Rannock—who loved Aidan? Lily could barely fathom that, if gossip was true. It was too sad. How it must haunt Aidan now. ‘I do envy the places you must have seen... Aidan.’ She blushed to say his name aloud, the one she had only held in her mind since they met. It suited him—ancient, Celtic, unusual. ‘But I think being at a place like Roderick Castle must be an adventure of its own. I love to read and when I lose myself in some ancient tale, like Chaucer, or a modern novel like Sir Walter Scott, I try to imagine what it must all be like. To walk hills your ancestors walked centuries ago. The oldest houses I knew growing up were no older than me! They still smelled of new wood and paint.’

  ‘Roderick Castle is an extraordinary place,’ he said, his face turning serious. He stared across at Prince Albert, but seemed far away. Far away from her. ‘When you move from one corridor to another, each built in a different time by different people, you see the progression of—well, of England, I suppose. The sort of lives they lived, what they needed and what they thought was beautiful. What they wanted to hand down and down. Their portraits always watching us. The people who need us, generation after generation, relying on us, helping us. It’s part of me, but also feels distant from me, in some strange way.’

  Lily could see that he really did love it, no matter how he might have loved his free travels as well. She wondered what that was like, to have a home like that, to know you were part of something. That you were important. ‘It must be so wonderful to belong to something bigger than yourself in such a way.’ And to be able to help the people on his land. She could see that it was important to him, never to let down those who relied on him.

  ‘It is...interesting, Miss Wilkins. Impossible to describe, really.’

  Impossible to explain to someone who did not grow up to know it all like the back of her hand? Someone not part of all this? ‘Do call me Lily, please. If I can call you Aidan, you must call me Lily.’

  ‘Lily.’ The soft sound rolled gently off his tongue and he smiled down at her. ‘You spoke of freedom, the freedom of being out here, of going for a ride. Do you sometimes feel imprisoned, then?’

  Lily considered this. Maybe it was the rain, the soft patter of it over their heads, the feelings of being alone with him in this strange new world. Just the two of them. Not a duke and ‘Old King Coal’s’ daughter, just Lily and Aidan. It all felt wonderfully intimate, secret, as if in here she could tell him anything.

  ‘At home, I feel I’m never alone, never have the chance to even keep a thought to myself. To know what I want to do,’ she said. ‘New York and Newport were even more restricted for young ladies than I’ve seen so far in Europe, with servants always at my heels, even going to Bailey’s Beach or the milliner and the bookstore. I don’t get to wear what I like, or eat what I like, or arrange my chamber how I like. It does seem different here in some ways. Ladies—married ladies—have real duties and responsibilities. A job, if you like, just as you men do. I am sure your wife or sister, if you had one, your mother, they have things they must do on the estate, things they must fulfil at Court. It would be nice to feel so useful, so needed.’

  Aidan leaned his chin on his fist and studied her closely, as if he took every word seriously. As if he was interested in what she said. ‘If you could think of what you wanted to do, Lily, what would it be?’

  She searched carefully for words, conscious every moment of his green eyes on her.

  ‘I think... I should like to help people. As you do on your estate. To work together with them to make sure we all have what we need. What can make our lives better.’ She laughed self-consciously. ‘And to grow roses. I do so love roses. The varieties I’ve seen here in England are so lovely, so much va
riety between each sort. We visited Kew Gardens one day. Mother and my sisters were thoroughly bored, so we didn’t go back, but I could have stayed there for weeks, pestering the gardeners with questions.’

  Aidan leaned back against the railing, folding his arms across his chest and the rain fell behind him in silver streamers. ‘My grandmother used to grow roses. Her gardens at Roderick were famous. She won all sorts of ribbons and trophies, but I fear it’s a shambles now.’

  ‘Really? But I’m sure there are some left, just waiting to be brought back to glorious life. I should like to see it.’

  ‘Would you really?’

  ‘Oh, yes! And the medieval tower you told me about.’ She leaned closer to him. ‘May I tell you a secret, Aidan?’

  He leaned towards her until they nearly, temptingly, touched. He still smelled of linen and lemons, of wool and faintly of horse. ‘I do love secrets, Lily.’

  ‘I very much dread going back to New York,’ she whispered.

  ‘I can understand that, if you’re followed everywhere there.’ He leaned just one, teeny tiny inch closer and she wondered if he would perhaps kiss her. ‘And I dread—’ He broke off and leaned back.

  Lily swallowed a cold, hard knot of disappointment. ‘Dread what, Aidan?’

  ‘Never being caught in the rain like this again,’ he said hoarsely.

  She reached up to touch his face, trailing her fingers over his finely carved features as she marvelled at him. He made her feel so strangely safe with his quiet strength, but at the same time she was dizzy with feelings she’d never known before and couldn’t understand.

  ‘Lily,’ he whispered, and then he did what she longed for. He kissed her.

  She went up on tiptoe to meet him, twining her arms around him so she wouldn’t fall from this dream. So he wouldn’t leave her. His arms closed around her waist, pulling her even closer to him.

  She marvelled at how they seemed to fit together. Their mouths, their hands, their bodies, as if they were made to be just like they were now. She parted her lips instinctively and felt the tip of his tongue sweep over hers. Lightly, enticingly, then the kiss turned frantic, hungry, full of burning need.

  Until a loud crash of thunder rumbled overhead, reminding her where they were.

  He stepped back from her, his arms falling away from her body. She shivered, suddenly so cold, sad, as if she had just been dropped from a great, dizzying pink cloud on to the hard earth again. She didn’t know where to look, what to say, what to think.

  She only knew everything, absolutely everything, had changed in some unfathomable way in only an instant.

  ‘I think the rain has stopped,’ he said gently, his voice rough. They glimpsed the groom hovering discreetly in the distance with the horses.

  Lily opened her eyes and looked up at him. His eyes were vividly green, but he, too, looked terribly sad as he looked down at her. ‘My mother will probably be missing me,’ she said. Though she knew Stella wouldn’t, not really. Her mother was probably hoping Lily had eloped with the Duke to Scotland.

  Not that such a thing was possible, she knew that. She could see now that he needed a different sort of wife than her, an English wife who could know what the work of his title required and jump right into it. Not a pampered American girl.

  She found her hat where she had dropped it on the wooden planks of the floor, now with the veil sadly torn and the brim crushed. She pinned it back on as best she could and let him help her back into her saddle. Star seemed none the worse for wear for her dampening and pawed at the ground as if ready to gallop again. Aidan gently adjusted her train and for some reason his careful movements made her feel even more sad.

  ‘Thank you, Aidan, for listening to me,’ she said, afraid that might be the last time she would say his name. ‘For listening to my ramblings.’

  He gave her a crooked, sad, little smile and touched her gloved hand for one lingering moment. ‘Lily. It was certainly my pleasure.’

  Chapter Eight

  When Lily came down to breakfast the next morning, she was surprised to find her mother already there, dressed in an elaborate bronze taffeta morning gown, a plate of eggs and kidneys in front of her, along with all the morning newspapers. A teetering stack of invitations, creamy cards just waiting to topple and scatter, stood by her coffee cup.

  Fortunately, they had been to the opera the night before and there’d been no time for Stella to interrogate Lily about her ride with Aidan, or why he didn’t come in for tea when they returned. But Lily knew questions were coming and she wished she didn’t have to face them after a sleepless night. She’d lain awake so long in the darkness, feeling his lips on hers again, the surge of emotion she had never known before, the excitement she’d never imagined. What did it mean? Did it mean anything?

  Trying to explain it to her mother would just make it all the more complicated.

  She fetched her eggs and toast from the covered dishes on the sideboard and sat down gingerly across from her mother. A cup of coffee was left at her place and a jar of homemade marmalade from Lady Heath’s stillroom.

  ‘Lily, darling, we’re to have luncheon with Lady Heath today. I’ll have Doris lay out your blue velvet suit.’ Luckily, Stella seemed to be in a good mood. Planning Lily’s wardrobe always cheered her up. ‘And you will never guess what arrived with the morning’s post!’

  ‘An invitation to dine and sleep at Windsor with the Queen?’ Lily teased.

  Her mother gave her a stern glance. ‘Don’t be flippant, Lily, it is not becoming in a young lady. But I will say such an invitation might indeed be in your future. The Duchess of Lennox has invited us to a tea party in the garden of Lennox House!’

  ‘The Duke’s mother?’ Lily said, stunned, a forkful of egg suspended in mid-air. She quickly put it back down at her mother’s frown, but her breath felt caught deep inside of her. What would her mother say if she knew he had kissed Lily? She would be booking Westminster Abbey for the wedding right away.

  Could this really be happening, now, to her? Could the Duke really be seriously interested?

  And what was he interested by, really? Her—or those American dollars?

  The doubt ached deep inside of her, simply because she found herself so very fascinated by him. Looking forward to every moment she could snatch with him.

  ‘Yes, indeed, the Duke’s mother. They say she was once a great beauty and will probably be married again soon, to an earl.’ Stella frowned at the stiff, cream-coloured card beside her plate. ‘Though an earl is not as good as a duke.’

  ‘No.’ Lily remembered all Lady Heath’s careful lessons. Barons, viscounts, earls, marquesses, dukes. But then there was the age of the title to consider when arranging precedence, age of title holders, all sorts of things. And what about archbishops?

  She shook her head. She would make a very bad duchess, she feared. If only it was all just kissing in the rain.

  ‘You’ll need a new gown,’ Stella said, pouring out more coffee, as if to fortify herself for garden party battle plans.

  Lily thought of her grand Worth gown and the simple organzas of the other young ladies. ‘Oh, no, Mother, please. Surely my lavender muslin will do very well. It’s very pretty and it has such a lovely matching hat.’

  ‘Nonsense. Everyone says the Prince of Wales likes Americans so much because we have dash and style these dour English ladies sadly lack. I’ve seen it myself now.’ She studied Lily closely over the gilded edge of her cup. ‘We can’t do much about the lack of dash, I suppose, but we can work on the style. Show them what we’ve got.’

  Lily lowered her gaze and took a nibble of toast. It was true she didn’t often feel dashing, except when riding a horse, or when Aidan smiled at her. Violet was the dashing one and Lily had never minded that.

  Until now.

  ‘The party is too close to order a new frock,’ her mother said. ‘You
could borrow my green brocade—I haven’t worn it yet—and my emerald earrings. It will have to do...’

  Lily followed her old habit of no longer listening as her mother made plans, of escaping into her own thoughts. Her mother never required anyone else’s opinion, anyway. Instead, she took herself back to the park, to the rain, to Aidan’s green eyes, to the touch of his hand.

  * * *

  After breakfast, she ran into the small library as her mother summoned all the maids to look through wardrobes and jewel cases. Lily took out her little velvet journal and made notes instead, writing down every detail she remembered of their ride in the park so she could never forget it.

  When Rose peeked around the door, Lily could still hear the clamour from upstairs. She waved Rose inside, who gratefully shut the door and curled up next to Lily on the sofa.

  ‘Is it true, Lil?’ she said softly. ‘You’re going to a party with a duchess?’

  ‘Yes, the invitation came this morning. That’s why Mother is scouring her jewel boxes to deck us out like two Christmas trees.’

  ‘And you went riding with him yesterday, the Duke himself. I saw him from upstairs. He was very handsome.’ She frowned thoughtfully as she toyed with the silk fringe on a cushion. ‘Will you marry him?’

  Lily laughed. One ride, even one world-changing kiss, was far from matrimony. No matter what her mother thought. ‘Darling, riding and tea in the garden hardly constitute a proposal, even here in England.’

  ‘But it must be close. That’s what Lady Heath says. A gentleman never endangers a lady’s reputation by paying her too much public attention. And we know it’s what Mother dreams of above all else—to be the mother of a duchess.’

  ‘She would like it, certainly. Mrs Astor would have to call on her then,’ Lily said, trying to be light.

  ‘But what do you want, Lily?’ Rose said. Lily could never hide from her, the most serious, the most watchful of the Wilkins. Rose was quiet, but wise. ‘You did rather like Lord James Grantley, I thought. He sends such pretty bouquets.’