When a Duchess Says I Do - Grace Burrowes Page 0,36

gangs are now stealing the widows of German dukes, she left this household of her own volition.”

No press gang would willingly tangle with Matilda Wakefield, known on the Continent as Matilda, Dowager Duchess of Bosendorf.

“Have you ruled out a foreign government taking an interest in her?” Parker asked. “She accompanied her husband to various pumpernickel courts, attended all manner of social events, and called upon diplomats and influential people without number. Perhaps her former in-laws have decided she was privy to too many state secrets. She also traveled with you from her girlhood on and saw much even before her marriage.”

Almost all of which she recalled, if what she’d seen had been in print or handwriting. She had that sort of mind, but was less accurate with spoken words, thank heavens.

Wakefield took a leisurely sip of his tea and set down the cup and saucer with an equal lack of haste.

“Most children who’ve lost their mothers end up in their father’s care,” he said. “I could not trust servants to tend to a grieving girl in my absence, and Matilda seemed to enjoy the travel. As for her in-laws, German dukes are thick on the ground, though in point of fact, Duke Karl was Germano-Danish. I’ve made inquiries, and her former in-laws have no idea of her whereabouts.”

He popped the tea cake into his mouth, the casual gesture only adding to his elegant, relaxed demeanor. Wakefield was very, very good at what he did, and he’d been doing it for a very, very long time.

“His Grace of Bosendorf promised Matilda a home and family of her own,” Parker replied. “She told me that she married him because she longed for a place to settle down and raise children.” That rare admission from a woman who was usually so self-possessed had formed the basis for Parker’s courtship of her.

“And Matilda—my Matilda—thought an officer in the British military would afford her a fixed address? Doesn’t that strike you as odd, Colonel?”

“Yes.” And yet, Matilda had spoken as earnestly about longing for a home as ever she’d spoken about anything. Had she spoken too earnestly? Deceptively?

Not that it mattered. “I’m in truth off to listen at keyholes rather than foxhunt,” Parker said. “Galloping to hounds is good sport, but the fellows usually get to gossiping while they’re riding in and enjoying their hunt breakfast.”

“Then the serious drinking starts around the card table,” Wakefield said. “Ah, the stupidity of youth.”

The insult was almost undetectable amid the affability.

“The serious drinking can lead to seriously honest talk. If someone’s mama has recently hired a new companion answering to Matilda’s description, if someone has heard talk of a governess particularly adept at languages or chess, then I’m more likely to catch that bit of gossip among the lordlings at Melton than I am in your drawing room.”

Wakefield refreshed his tea. “I must ask myself, though, why you persist in this quest, Colonel? You have no claim on Matilda, she’s been gone for months, and my best efforts—your best efforts—to locate her have been fruitless. I applaud your tenacity, but at some point, tenacity becomes a curious obsession.”

Wakefield was clever, declaring the betrothal null and void, casting devotion as obsession, and doing all of this damage over tea and jam.

“You claim to have loved your wife,” Parker said. “If I told you she was alive and well somewhere, but troubled, or unable to come to you despite yearning to do so, would you sit here sipping tea and reading Ovid?”

Wakefield peered at him over his teacup. “Outraged swain does not sit well upon you, Colonel. You might, in your way, love my daughter, but as the man who has known Matilda since her birth, I can assure you, she does not love you. I would also hazard that the regard you developed toward her during the months of one social Season in no way matches what a man and woman married for years can share. I must ask you to desist in your attempts to locate my daughter.”

And there it was, the gauntlet Wakefield had declined to toss down since Matilda’s disappearance.

“Have you heard from her, sir?” Parker asked.

Wakefield looked him straight in the eye. “I have not. Have you?”

Parker bit off half the tea cake. “Of course not.”

“Then please take her departure and her silence for your congé.”

A sensible man would, in the usual circumstances. “I’ve had another idea regarding her whereabouts.”

“None of your ideas have had a happy result, Colonel. Again, I must insist that you