When a Duchess Says I Do - Grace Burrowes Page 0,95
on the part of the very people whose realm I’ve saved. Why is there no word to describe a woman’s brave deeds? Heroinic? There should be such a word. Pass the salt.”
Parker passed the salt and let her grumble, while he marveled that Matilda had an imagination after all. The quiet, pretty lady who’d always kept to the harmless side of art world gossip and never worn too many jewels was, in fact, fanciful in her way.
Parker told himself this was a good quality. He began to consider the possibilities her fairy-tale version of events offered for a war hero who’d uncovered a nest of spies and rescued a valiant subject of the Crown from possible assassination at the hands of traitors.
That version of the facts could work. It could work very nicely, indeed.
* * *
“Jinks says Matilda never attempted a struggle.” Quinn offered that observation casually, though Duncan longed to reply by knocking the duke from his horse and pounding on His Grace’s handsome face.
“How could she struggle?” Stephen retorted. “She was accompanied on either side by the Treacher brothers, then confronted with Lord Atticus and his liveried minions.”
Jinks had lurked in the inn’s stables, watching the drama unfold, while Duncan had been greeting his family and dreaming impossible dreams. The boy had lingered long enough to ask questions in the manner of nosy children the world over, though one result was that Parker had a good ninety minutes’ head start.
The other result was that Herman and Jeffrey were enjoying the hospitality of Squire Peabody’s saddle room, awaiting the magistrate’s next parlor session. On Monday both brothers would be bound over for trespassing, poaching in a forest, and assault with a weapon.
To bring them to justice had been profoundly satisfying, though Duncan had asked for a sentence of transportation rather than the most severe penalty.
“We will dispatch minions of our own to trail Parker’s coach,” Duncan said. “Quinn, who among your current coterie do you recommend for that task?”
“Ned,” the duke said, naming a boy who’d graduated from tiger to groom. “He knows how to stay out of sight, and he’s not in livery. You refuse to acknowledge that Matilda went willingly. Nobody reported any resistance on her part, not even when we questioned your poachers separately.”
“And who shall accompany Ned?” Duncan asked, for somebody needed to watch Parker at all times, and somebody else needed to carry intelligence back to Duncan.
Quinn brought his horse to a halt at the foot of Brightwell’s slushy drive, for a return to the house was necessary before anybody set out for London. “You might well be sending these fellows off on a fool’s errand, Duncan. Matilda never promised you anything but heartbreak. Now she’s delivered on her promise, and yet you persist. If she’s made her choice, why can’t you respect that?”
Stephen made a sound of exasperation and kneed his horse into a canter, while Duncan remained at the foot of the drive, wrestling with…what? Not his conscience, but rather, his heart.
And Quinn’s protectiveness. “You are preaching logic to a man who thought himself wedded to rational thought, Quinn, and yet, I know Matilda. She offered me more than a promise of heartbreak.”
The hoofbeats of Stephen’s horse faded, leaving only a chilly wind soughing through the bare trees. In a few hours the light would fade, and traveling would become more difficult as the temperatures dropped.
“Matilda offered you a traitor’s noose,” Quinn retorted, “and even I cannot protect you if you entangle yourself in high crimes. You are nothing if not sensible, and I rely on you to set a good example for my siblings. To chase off after a woman who has reconciled with a titled fiancé, to flirt with a traitor’s death…why do that? You of all people know where foolish gallantry can lead.”
Duncan no longer possessed a reasoning mind. His cognitive powers had been replaced with a morass of emotions, hunches, and questions, but he could reply to Quinn with certainty in two regards.
“First, your siblings are adults. They no longer need a good example, having matured into fine and formidable individuals, worthy of the ducal branch of the Wentworth family. We have to let them go, Quinn, and be there for them when they need us, as Stephen is here for me now.”
Quinn’s brows twitched down. He gazed up the drive, he fussed with his horse’s mane. “Go on.”
Meaning, Quinn would discuss Duncan’s observation with Jane, which was sufficient concession for the nonce.