When a Duchess Says I Do - Grace Burrowes Page 0,96
good example you allude to. I am no longer the man who came down from York ten years ago, full of learning and determined to outrun a bleak past. My family has given me the time and resources to deal with what troubled that fellow, and I realize now he wasn’t wrong. I am not now, nor have I ever been, guilty of foolish gallantry. I did the right thing when I involved myself in Rachel’s situation. Those around me acted shamefully, but I would make the same choices again, given the chance, and they would be the correct choices.”
These concepts weren’t complicated, but they were painful. Honor was not a promise of good outcomes and worldly rewards, it was simply a promise to the world of integrity in all circumstances.
A promise Duncan had kept. He’d promised Matilda safety at Brightwell, and that promise had not been kept.
He urged his horse forward, because time was of the essence. Quinn’s mount came along, though Duncan didn’t particularly care if the duke was paying attention.
“You’re older,” Quinn said. “I know that, but I fail to see how embroiling yourself with spies, liars, and an ambitious younger son makes any sense.”
“Nonetheless, I am honor bound to pursue this matter, Quinn. You can either support me in that end or take your ducal consequence and run back to London like a good boy.”
The silence that followed was interesting. Nobody told Quinn Wentworth to run along, probably not even his duchess, but the safe course where Matilda was concerned was also the cowardly course.
And I am not a coward.
That thought was a gift, and the one that came after it dealt the last blow to Duncan’s doubts:
Matilda is not a coward either, else she’d never have been able to love a man such as me.
“Duncan, you aren’t making sense.” That was a plea, not an accusation. Quinn was begging Duncan to return to the rational, taciturn posture of a man who’d rather translate Virgil than wade through Byron’s messy subtleties.
Alas, that careful, hurting man was no more. “Quinn, shut your mouth. You are trying to be helpful, but you’ve failed to mention the one hypothesis that explains all the facts.”
Not a hypothesis, a great, blooming, sunny certainty.
“You’ve lost your mind?” Quinn was warming up for a ducal tirade, which amounted to a series of pithy verbal slices that left a subordinate’s confidence in ribbons. These displays were less and less frequent, but Duncan could not afford to indulge his cousin’s moods.
And he was not Quinn’s subordinate.
“The signal reality of my dealings with Matilda is that she is an honorable woman. She left London to protect her father. She made shift without resorting to outright crime even when that left her nearly starving. She told me her circumstances as soon as she realized she could safely do so. She has worked harder for her wages than anybody I know born to service, and she has not once complained about the burdens thrust upon her.”
“What has this to do with anything?” Quinn began. “Of course, she’d present herself as the pattern card of feminine—”
“Matilda is protecting me, you lackwit. She’s protecting me, you, the Wentworth name, her father, likely her father’s entire household. If she’s intent on preserving others from harm, then of course she would sail into Parker’s arms impersonating a muddled and weary bride.”
The horses slopped into the stable yard, where Stephen waited on the steps of the ladies’ mounting block. Grooms took both mounts, though Duncan gave orders that the duke’s horse should be walked rather than unsaddled.
“You’re going after her,” Quinn said. “You’re sending me ahead to scout the terrain—lackwit that I am—and then you’ll come charging to her rescue.”
“Thank the celestial intercessors somebody can make Quinn see reason,” Stephen said, heaving to his feet. “I thought we’d have to get Jane involved.”
“We’ll get Jane involved,” Duncan said, striding for the house. “We’ll get the entire staff, King George, and the Archbishop of Canterbury involved if needs must, won’t we, Quinn?”
Stephen came up on Quinn’s other side. “Won’t we, Quinn?” He elbowed his brother in the side, hard. Quinn shoved him back, but Stephen had apparently been ready for that, because he caught himself on his canes and flashed a wicked grin. “Won’t we, Quinn?”
“If you get Jane involved,” Quinn said, “then…”
Duncan marched onward, mentally preparing for a solitary ride to London by moonlight.
“Then,” Quinn said, “I suppose the Duke of Walden must interest himself in this little drama as well.”