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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's
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C O NT E NT S
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Epilogue
Coming next
Also by Sofie Darling
About the Author
C HAPTER ONE
NEWMARKET RACECOURSE, MAY 1822
T he most beautiful woman in the room had nowhere to hide—except behind her smile.
Life had taught Celia that much—how to nod and smile and pretend.
A woman didn’t reach her thirtieth year without having learned to do all three at once—
convincingly.
What a useful hiding place was a smile. No one could see the nerves shimmering behind a
pleasant curve of the mouth or an inviting crinkle of the eyes. The mechanics were simple.
And her smile was that good.
Take the lord presently pontificating at her. Oh, what was his name? Perhaps it began with D?
Anyway, even with all Lord D’s banging on about a coffee farm on the other side of the world,
today Celia’s smile was genuine for two very good reasons.
First, her filly Light Skirt was the favorite to win the One Thousand Guineas, the second race of
the popular Newmarket weekend that attracted the cream of society, dressed in their most fashionable
silk and superfine, dripping in their most sparkling jewels and smiles.
And Light Skirt would win.
Celia knew it in her bones.
The second reason for Celia’s smile was the proposal of marriage from the eminently eligible and
eminently wealthy Duke of Rakesley that she would be receiving any day now.
And her stables would be saved.
It had been years—more than a decade—since she’d had so much to smile about.
Her gaze shifted discreetly away from Lord D, beyond the second floor of the grandstand where
all the haut ton were congregated, and toward the racecourse. Truly, the day was a beautiful one for a
race. The sky was clear, and the air possessed of the right amount of nip for horses and spectators
alike. And the turf, green with spring and ready for the action it would see within the hour, was
perfection. The rains had stopped a week ago, so the Ditch Mile held a firm spring.
Celia’s heart tapped out a few extra beats as it always did at the races—especially when she had
a horse in the running.
Nothing could touch her smile today.
Lord D stumbled over his words, and she couldn’t help wondering if her eyes appeared as glazed
over as they felt. Possibly, she was being rude. Probably. But it was a very mild rudeness, and she
was a duchess.
A dowager duchess, a small voice reminded her.
As if it needed to.
Besides, the man’s conversation bordered on the soporific. In recent years, it had occurred to her
that society was structured to protect the delicate feelings of men. After the death of her husband a
year ago, however, a mildly rebellious thought had lifted its head—what about her feelings?
Then the thought gained momentum and carried a step further—who in all her life had ever given
her feelings a lick of consideration?
No one—not even herself.
“But, oh, poor Lady Artemis,” came a feminine voice behind Celia.
Her ears perked up, even as her gaze remained fixed sightlessly on Lord D, his fleshy mouth still
going on and on and on about coffee, and she listened to the gossip.
“Did you ever hear such a wail?” asked a second lady, distaste evident. “Over a horse?”
The first lady’s voice lowered to a whisper. “So common.”
And there it was—Lady Artemis’s sin: to show feeling—over a horse.
No matter that Lady Artemis was the daughter of one Duke of Rakesley and the sister of another
Duke of Rakesley—Celia’s soon-to-be fiancé. It was a small world occupied by the ton.
Celia’s hands wanted to clench into fists, but she didn’t allow them the luxury. Her smile slipped
not a notch. In fact, it might’ve broadened and sent entirely the wrong message to Lord D, who
stepped closer, emboldened by her appearance of renewed interest.
Celia took an instinctive two steps back.
Smiles had their limits.
All the talk today—except Lord D’s, of course—was about Lady Artemis and the death of her
filly Dido during yesterday’s race, the Two Thousand Guineas. Just as the filly had been on the verge
of winning, she stumbled and fell in the final furlong. But it had been no mere stumble. It had been a
total collapse from which the filly never recovered. As Dido drew her final breath on the turf, Lady
Artemis had been inconsolable.
Emotion still clogged Celia’s throat at the memory.
Not that her smile showed it.
Lady Artemis, on the other hand, had never learned Celia’s smile. She’d never needed to. Though
almost thirty herself and unmarried, the lady had never in her life once smiled for anyone she hadn’t
wanted to.
Celia couldn’t imagine such freedom.
She gave herself a mental shake and reminded herself of the two reasons for her optimistic mood.
Light Skirt about to win the One Thousand Guineas and Rakesley would be proposing any day now.
“Ah, there you are, Celia,” came a most welcome lady’s voice. A hand slipped into the crook of
her arm, accompanied by the familiar scent of lily of the valley, and Celia felt tense muscles relax
with relief.
Mrs. Eloise Fairfax—simply Eloise to Celia—had come to her rescue. Eloise was both Celia’s
cousin and bosom friend, as their ages were only five years apart.
“My apologies, Lord Derwin,” said Eloise smoothly, “but I must steal my cousin away, and I
make no promise to return her.”
The last was spoken with a charming wink meant to assuage Derwin’s feelings. Petite with
luminous dark eyes that exuded warmth, Eloise had the gift of making men feel large and generous and
like everything was their idea.
Celia could learn something from her cousin—if only she just would.
Out of earshot from Derwin, Celia couldn’t help venting her irritation. “I thought widowhood
afforded a lady the luxury of avoiding droning men.”
“I’ve found widowhood affords no lady any such luxury,” said Eloise, her voice even as ever.
“But, oh, how on earth did you find yourself stuck in conversation with that lout?”
“Attracting louts is my special gift,” returned Celia. “Haven’t you heard?”
Going by Celia’s disastrous marriage, everyone had.
Eloise squeezed Celia’s arm with affection.
Celia loved Eloise. It had always been so, with Eloise assuming the role of older sister who
knew best. Never once had Celia felt stifled by her cousin, but rather loved. And some years—an
entire decade of them, in fact—love had been in short supply.
Together, Celia and Eloise moved through the intensifying crowd. With her natural friendliness
and curiosity, Eloise greeted friends and acquaintances—she ever collected more and more of them—
while Celia nodded distantly. She was known to be a cool duchess, one who held herself at a remove.
She’d never minded all that much.
“Is Rakesley about?” Leave it to Eloise to cut directly to the subject occupying half the space in
Celia’s mind.
“He followed Lady Artemis to London yesterday.”
Eloise nodded approvingly. “Like a good brother should.”
“Indeed.”
Of course, Rakesley wouldn’t have been able to allow his sister to grieve alone. So, he’d cut
short his own celebration for his colt Hannibal having won the Two Thousand Guineas. Like the
caring, responsible brother he was.
Celia liked him the better for it.
“Still,” began Eloise.
Though a single word spoken, Celia detected the note of worry within. She knew what Eloise was
about to say—and she wished her cousin wouldn’t.
“It would be a relief,” continued Eloise, “if he would ask the question and have it done.”
An objective truth.
All they had to do was be in the same room together, and nature would take its course. Rakesley
would ask, and Celia would say yes. Wasn’t it only natural for a duke to marry a duchess? The laws
of the universe all but decreed it so.
“Oh, these delays,” fretted her cousin. Eloise was a worrier.
Celia allowed that worry no entry. After Light Skirt won today’s race, she would follow Rakesley
to London, and send her condolences to Lady Artemis. In a separate note, she would invite the duke to
join her for tea at her late husband’s St. James’s Square mansion. Then she would arrange herself
appealingly on the chaise longue opposite his and agree to make him the happiest man on earth.
She would be saved.
More accurately, her stables would be saved.
Rakesley—arrogant duke that he was—thought his stables the best in the land, but Celia knew
hers to be. And her deceased, wastrel of a husband had nearly squandered them away.
No.
She wouldn’t think of her deceased, wastrel of a husband.
Not today.
Not when she had two very good reasons to smile.
Celia and Eloise settled into their box seats, front row, nothing impeding the view of the turf.
Though Celia had found few pleasures in her life as a duchess, a front-row box at Newmarket was
one.
The weigh-in now completed, horses and riders began taking their places at the start, all arrayed
in a rainbow of colorful silks. Celia leaned forward and held her fan to her forehead as a shield
against the sun, searching the scrum for her colors. Pink and white livery shouldn’t be too difficult to
locate, particularly when the shirt was bright pink with large and small white polka dots. She’d
designed the pattern herself.
Her heart lifted in her chest. There. A flash of pink and white as Light Skirt and her jockey Ames
jostled to the front of the starting line. A filly of even temperament, Light Skirt took no issue with
being at the center of two dozen high-spirited Thoroughbreds. And, oh, was she a beauty with her
shiny chestnut coat, white socks showing her elegant fetlocks to advantage, and braided black mane.
Further, the filly’s name suited her. When she ran, she possessed a lightness of step Celia had never
encountered in another horse.
Anticipation had Celia’s palms slicked with perspiration.
“By the by, Celia,” began Eloise, angling in her chair so they could’ve been mistaken for
conspirators.
Celia knew that tone. Whatever Eloise was about to say, it wouldn’t touch her smile.
She was determined.
“I’ve heard a rumor about the title.”
Celia didn’t need to ask which title. Her late husband’s title, of course. Duke of Acaster. The title
that would go extinct if an heir wasn’t found. She flicked a dismissive wrist. “There have been
rumors about the title since Edwin exhaled his final breath.”
Eloise gave a firm shake of the head. “This rumor isn’t precisely a rumor, Celia. A line of inquiry
appears to be bearing out.”
“And let me guess.” Celia couldn’t resist a tease in her voice. “You have this on the good
authority of Mr. Lancaster?”
A light blush pinked Eloise’s cheeks. “As it happens, I do.”
A widow these last seven years, Eloise had developed a special, erm, friendship with Mr.
Lancaster during the last three, a discreet arrangement that suited both. Further, Mr. Lancaster was a
barrister in Lincoln’s Inn, and as such, he was privy to solid information and wild rumor both. This
latest would prove to be the latter, of course.
“I appreciate your help, my dear.” She squeezed Eloise’s hand. Her cousin was only trying to
help. “But it’s been a year. If there were an Acaster heir, one would’ve been discovered by now.”
The courts had given it nine months before they’d been satisfied she wasn’t carrying Acaster’s
heir. Then they’d discreetly expanded the search, which looked doubtful as no family had been
located.
It mattered not to Celia one whit. She cared about two things in this world—the woman sitting
beside her and her horses. For the ten years of her marriage, she’d poured all her affection into her
horses. They’d saved her at her lowest point, and now it was her turn to save them.
She would do anything.
Even marry again.
Eloise’s seriousness didn’t relent. “I think you should be prepared for the possibility, Celia.”
Celia was saved from having to further engage on the subject, when she noticed the man with the
starting gun taking his place. “Oh, look,” she said, pointing. “The race is almost underway.”
“We’ll see,” said Eloise, with a doubtful lift of an eyebrow.
False starts were a known strategy of the Ring’s blacklegs to rattle horses at the starting line.
In the two decades since the blacklegs had secured near total control of betting in horse racing—
laying odds and making the books—their brazen corruption knew no bounds, from false starts to
bribing jockeys to poisoning rival horses to secure their favored horse a win. In 1818, the Jockey
Club attempted to rein in the power of the blacklegs by opening the Subscription Room at Tattersall’s,
where bets were to be struck. But it was a mostly ineffectual attempt, for the scale of betting had
ballooned well beyond the power of the Jockey Club.
On any given racing weekend, the hundreds of thousands of pounds just waiting to be plucked as if
from thin air by the wiliest opportunists was too great a temptation for many to resist. When the
spooking of a favored horse at the starting line could make a fortune for a blackleg overnight, the
stakes couldn’t be higher for the desperate chancer.
As the horses jostled into position, Celia’s mind wandered in an unwelcome direction.
It was all this talk of Acaster.
A debauched lecher for most of his life, it only occurred to him at the young age of five-and-
seventy that he could expire without a legitimate heir. He’d needed a wife.
One wasn’t difficult to find. He was a duke, after all, and Celia’s father was a wealthy merchant
with a beautiful, obedient daughter and on the hunt for a title in the family.
Everyone got what they wanted.
Everyone, except Celia.
The duke had been serious in his intention to father an heir.
A clammy shudder traced through her at the remembered feel of the duke’s hands on her skin…
clamped around her wrists… clamped around her throat…
She swallowed the memory down. She couldn’t think of the particulars of that life and maintain
the smile on her face.
“My dear, are you alright?” asked Eloise, her gaze searching. “Do you need the ladies’ retiring
room?”
Celia shook her head. “It’s only nerves.”
Her smile had slipped.
She returned it to its place.
Her lech of a husband had, at least, done one thing right: He’d left her the horses in his will. They
belonged to her outright—as long as she was able to keep them, for one rather sizeable problem
remained.
Acaster had left her with no money for their upkeep—only debts. A new bill arrived every day.
Even a year after his death.
How like Edwin not to think or care about the practicalities. If—when—Light Skirt won today,
the thousand pounds in prize money wouldn’t take Celia very far. Every last farthing of it needed to go
toward the buy-in for the Race of the Century in September, as tempting as it was to keep it and
forego that race. But the Race of the Century carried a £10,000 purse, which would be enough to keep
her afloat while she established the Thoroughbred stud she’d put in motion.
She simply had to keep her head above water for the next few months.
Perhaps Rakesley would agree to a quick wedding—a special license or a trip up to Scotland.
Then all her troubles would be over.
Another concerned crease formed on Eloise’s brow.
Celia’s smile had slipped—again.
She couldn’t think about marriage and not think about the marriage bed she’d been subjected to
with Acaster—not if she was to proceed with her plan and marry again.
While Rakesley was all arrogant duke, he wasn’t a bad sort—as men went. He knew his duties
and responsibilities and took them seriously. He would make her the only sort of husband she would
be able to tolerate: One whose life wouldn’t much intersect with hers. For here was the most
important consideration for marriage with him.
He didn’t gaze upon her possessively or with hot lust.
He viewed her in a dispassionate, respectful way that suited her perfectly. She intuited he wanted
the same sort of marriage as she—one not tangled up in emotion.
She would do her duty and give him an heir and two spares.
And he would save her stable.
Her ears picked up a snippet of whispered conversation from a passing couple. “…and soon to be
the Duchess of Rakesley, by all accounts.”
Good.
Gossip was spreading about her and Rakesley, and the feeling of safety, the feeling she’d been
holding at arm’s length until he’d officially asked the question—Will you marry me?—began to take
on a tangible feel within her.
The life she wanted—security… freedom—was within reach.
Eloise tapped her hand and jutted her chin. The man with the starting gun had lifted the weapon
into the air.
Even as Celia’s heart thumped into an all-out gallop, her gaze caught on one horse and rider, the
colors of purple and black unmistakable. Little Wicked. From the moment of her birth, she’d been
proclaimed the most promising filly of her year. High expectations had followed. Lord Clifford,
however, lost her in a card game to a chancer named Deverill, a man known in society for his
mountains of blunt.
Celia didn’t give a toss about the gossip. But she did care what happened to Little Wicked.
“Why is Little Wicked running today?” she hissed. The filly had run in yesterday’s race, placing
third and showing herself to be a contender for the rest of the racing season. “It isn’t right that she’s
here. It shouldn’t be allowed.”
Eloise placed a calming hand on Celia’s knee. “The Jockey Club has trouble enough enforcing
their existing rules without adding one more.”
Celia glanced around. It didn’t take a second to find Deverill, surrounded as he was by a scrum of
married ladies and their husbands.
“He has a few admirers, it appears,” said Eloise.
“Oh, those lords want his mountains of blunt.” Celia was feeling ungenerous.
Eloise gave a dry laugh. “And the ladies want in his bed.”
Celia ignored that last bit.
Lord Devil was the moniker society had bestowed upon the man. With blue eyes that could pierce
a soul and hair the black of a raven’s wing, he possessed a male beauty severe in its intensity.
And he had not the slightest effect on her.
What did have an effect on her was that he was running Little Wicked on two consecutive days.
“Deverill has no business owning a Thoroughbred like Little Wicked.”
“How unexpectedly snobbish of you, cousin.”
Celia shook her head, impatient. “Thoroughbreds are a touchy breed. They need to be run and
worked, but they also require coddling. Just because someone has the money to keep a stable and
train a Thoroughbred doesn’t mean they should. Little Wicked deserves more than to be treated like a
rich man’s toy,” Celia finished with more passion than was strictly necessary.
Eloise watched her calmly. “But her future isn’t yours to decide, Celia. Besides, she certainly
appears to be full of vim and vigor.”
As if to illustrate Eloise’s observation, Little Wicked gave a restless stamp of her hoof and toss of
her head. A note of portent crept through Celia. Little Wicked was about to give Light Skirt a run for
the money. She could feel it.
Starting line and stands alike went still and eerily quiet. The next sound would be the firing of the
gun.
A sudden plume of gray smoke puffed into the air, followed the next instant by the crack of the
shot.
The horses were off.
Light Skirt jumped to her usual fast start and would’ve been in the lead if it weren’t for Little
Wicked beside her, living up to her promise and acclaim. Both fillies possessed blistering speed on
the flat that ran alongside Devil’s Ditch, making it apparent in the first furlong that this would be a
two-horse race.
Heart pounding in her throat, Celia shifted forward, her hands gripping the railing, knuckles gone
white. Little Wicked showed no signs of exhaustion from yesterday’s race. In fact, she was running
today like yesterday had been a warm-up amble.
By the third furlong, the horses stretched out, and Celia waited for Light Skirt to transition into her
signature cadence. The filly had the rare ability to hold the length of her stride while increasing her
turnover. It was this quality that made her so light on her feet.
But, today, Light Skirt was running tight in the shoulders.
Without a thought, Celia was on her feet, hands clenched into fists, her mouth silently repeating,
“Come on… come on… come on…”
A possibility occurred to her. A possibility she couldn’t face—not if she was to keep her breath
and hold her nerve. But this possibility pushed through, anyway.
Light Skirt could lose.
Which meant…
Celia could lose.
All her plans gone up like a cloud of dust in the horses’ wake.
A vision flashed in her mind—of herself in London, begging the Duke of Rakesley for his hand in
marriage.
No.
It couldn’t happen.
Didn’t life owe her better than that?
Hadn’t she earned it?
Then, in the fifth furlong, a shift occurred.
Light Skirt’s shoulders relaxed, and her cadence increased. The breath caught in Celia’s throat.
Here it was—the filly’s special magic revealing itself.
By the sixth furlong, she’d nosed half a length ahead of Little Wicked. Only two furlongs to
hold…
Celia’s nails dug red crescents into her palms.
Into the seventh furlong, Light Skirt extended her lead another half a length, the finish line in sight.
In an instant, Celia’s despair inverted into utter, effervescent joy. Hands clapping, she began
shouting and hopping up and down as her brilliant filly crossed the finish line ahead of her adversary,
who had regained some ground, but too late. If the race had been a furlong longer, it was possible
Little Wicked would’ve taken the prize. That filly would be one to watch in the remaining races of the
season, since she was a latecomer and those courses were longer.
But that didn’t matter now, as pure, unadulterated joy streaked through Celia. She threw her arms
around Eloise, tears streaming down her face in equal parts exhilaration and relief, as she received
congratulations from all around. She was certainly making a common spectacle of herself.
But it mattered not.
Light Skirt had just won the One Thousand Guineas and its £1,000 purse. She’d secured her place
in the Race of the Century—and a chance at its £10,000 purse.
Her stable was safe.
For now.
Long enough for her to obtain a discreet line of credit to float her through the short term—until her
wedding to Rakesley.
While it was true she would have to smile at another man for the rest of her days—another
husband… another duke, no less—she wouldn’t mind smiling at the man who had saved her stables
and secured her future.
This last decade had put her through the mangle, but—at last—she’d come out the other side.
How very close she was to the past never mattering again.
C H A P T E R T WO
LONDON, A WEEK LATER
P ale pink bedroom curtains swept open, allowing sunlight to stream through the bow window
that overlooked the rose garden, and Celia dragged a pillow across her face.
“Must you, Mrs. Davies?” she mumbled into dense goose down.
“A gent has arrived,” said Ashcote Hall’s redoubtable housekeeper.
Celia peeked from beneath the pillow. “A gent?”
Mrs. Davies sniffed. “From London by the sound of him.”
Celia’s brow creased. “Has Mr. Murdoch arrived already? What is the time?”
“Eight of the clock, Your Grace.”
That didn’t sound right. Why would the horse painter she’d sent for arrive at such an early hour?
Unless… “Have I slept through the day?”
In anticipation of this meeting, she’d gone through an entire bottle of plonk last night in a fruitless
attempt to drown her sorrows.
In other words, it was possible she’d slept through the day.
Mrs. Davies dropped a lump of sugar into Celia’s morning tea and stirred, the spoon an efficient,
ear-piercing ting-ting-ting against porcelain. “Eight in the morning.”
Celia groaned, and last night’s sorrows were upon her—still floating on the surface, ever buoyant
and unsinkable. Today, she would have to face what she’d set into motion by necessity—the selling of
her beloved stable.
Honestly, it defied belief how her life had all gone so horribly wrong, so incredibly fast.
One moment, Light Skirt was winning the One Thousand Guineas and Celia was on the verge of
receiving a proposal of marriage from the Duke of Rakesley…
The next moment—well, a week later—Rakesley was asking Celia if she would mind very much
not marrying him. The enthusiastic yes perched on the tip of her tongue turned to dust as the import of
the question sank in.
She wasn’t to marry him.
Her life was in shambles—yet again.
A day later, as if the universe was keen to add insult to injury, a letter had arrived. An official
one. The one Eloise had warned her to expect.
A new Duke of Acaster had been located.
From its place on her bedside table, the letter pulled at her gaze like a magnet. Since its arrival,
she’d read it three or four times a day, though it was no longer necessary. She’d memorized its
contents word for word. She’d even dashed off a note to Eloise’s Mr. Lancaster to verify it wasn’t
some sort of jape.
Impossibly, it wasn’t.
There was a new Duke of Acaster.
He would be a wastrel, of course.
It was in the Acaster blood.
But that didn’t concern her. What did concern her was that she was in trouble. It was only a matter
of time before this new duke turfed her out into a dower house at the Acaster family seat in Kent.
Which wouldn’t be the worst of it.
Her horses would be turfed out, too.
She was about to lose the one thing she cared about.
So, she’d made a necessary decision—sell off two of her beloved Thoroughbreds. Not at a
Tattersall’s dispersal sale, but rather by putting a discreet word about that two mares from the
Godolphin line were on offer. That would drum up some excitement in turf circles and perhaps see
her through the next few months of operating costs.
Horses were no inexpensive love.
Yet one silver lining lay within all this. Her dead husband’s mountain of debt? It would
—blessedly—transfer to this new duke.
She snorted, drawing a chastising lift of the brow from Mrs. Davies as she pulled the coverlet
back for Celia. Mrs. Davies had been her one concession from the late duke, who had allowed her to
set up her former governess as Ashcote’s housekeeper. But Celia hadn’t been many weeks married
before she understood it wasn’t concession so much as necessity. Acaster hadn’t been able to retain
female staff for longer than a handful of months.
For the obvious reasons.
The man had been an unapologetic lech.
“Has any correspondence arrived this morning?” Celia shrugged on her dressing gown.
“Nothing yet,” said Mrs. Davies, her attention divided as she signaled for the scullery maid to
stoke the wood in the fireplace.
Celia tried not to wallow in her troubles—truly, she tried—but a full week had passed since
she’d received news of the new duke, and there was still no sign of the man. So, she’d kept herself
busy. The day after receiving Mr. Lancaster’s confirmation, she’d dashed off a letter to the renowned
horse painter, Mr. Silas Murdoch. A faithful rendering of her two mares was the necessary first step
toward their sale.
Three days ago, she received a reply from the painter that he would arrive at Ashcote three days
hence.
Today.
Hence, last night’s bottle of plonk—and today’s aching head.
“Mrs. Davies,” she groused. “Is all that sunlight strictly necessary?”
The housekeeper cast an assessing eye over Celia. “Yes,” she said, firm. “Now, drink this.” She
wasn’t referring to the tea, but rather a concoction that held a shade of green, a sheen of slime, and a
scent of egg.
“Are you trying to murder me?” Celia squeezed her eyes shut against an errant shaft of sunlight.
She wasn’t sure she would mind being put out of her misery all that much.
“You’ll come to no harm from anything my mam swore by.”
And that was that.
Mrs. Davies’ mam was the final word on any subject.
Like a good soldier, Celia took the glass, held her breath, and drank the surprisingly bland
contents in three large gulps. Mrs. Davies gave a nod of approval, which was her highest praise.
Half an hour later, Celia was dressed in a drab woolen dress fit for a morning in the stables and
braced for the day—whatever it would bring. She ran through the meeting ahead of her. As duchess,
she would have the upper hand over Mr. Murdoch—in the beginning. During this time, she would lay
out her requirements for the painter. That was the simple part. The complex—and delicate—part of
discussion would be when it turned to money. Namely, his price. There, she could lose the upper hand
and be reduced to begging, for she had no intention of paying a farthing more than she had to.
As she descended the loose coil of Ashcote’s grand curved staircase into the receiving hall, she
caught a glimpse of a man’s back, his gold-streaked brown hair touching the top of his collar. Her
gaze followed the width of square shoulders, down the length of his coat of charcoal gray. The fabric
was fine—too fine for a horse painter.
It meant he was paid well for his work.
Which Celia couldn’t do.
And tall, was her next thought.
Of a sudden, his head cocked. He must’ve heard her. He pivoted, his gaze immediately landing on
her. Celia’s step faltered, and the breath caught in her throat. Handsome. Cheekbones defined and
chin dimpled. A mouth with lips not full or thin, either.
Men shouldn’t be this handsome, especially not horse painters.
It upset the balance of the universe.
Men never affected Celia in this way. Perhaps it was like when she’d viewed the Parthenon
Marbles at the British Museum or the first time she’d heard Herr Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. A
thing of beauty ever had such an effect on her.
It so happened the thing of beauty twenty feet away from her was a man.
A young man.
It was his eyes, however, that drew her in and held her in place. Not a striking blue, but a hue the
clarity and changeable quality of the sea on a sunny day. They held more within, too. Intelligence—
and a hint of irony.
This man might be young and a thing of beauty, but brainless he wasn’t.
Irritation streaked through her. This handsome, intelligent, young man wasn’t Mr. Murdoch.
He couldn’t be.
The illustrious horse painter had sent an apprentice.
“Duchess,” he said with a shallow bow.
His voice wasn’t particularly deep, but it brushed across her with the consistency of crushed
velvet. Further, she detected that ironic quality, again. This man wasn’t all that impressed by her title.
Or her, for that matter.
Celia wasn’t accustomed to that.
She might not have been dressed in the first stare of fashion for a morning in the stables, but men
stopped and took notice of her—to a one.
It was simply her effect on men.
But within this man’s clear, ironic eyes, she detected none of that appreciation.
She gave a regal nod of acknowledgement and continued down the stairs. Several feet away, she
stopped and held out her hand. The expectation was clear: He was to give it a courtly kiss.
Instead, he offered a slight—ironic—bow.
Celia’s hand fell to her side. The cheek of the man and his irony. How dare he gaze upon her with
that look in his eye?
As if he knew something she didn’t.
“And your name?” she asked—demanded, really.
“Gabriel Siren.” A flicker of uncertainty flashed behind his eyes. “At least, that was—”
“I appreciate your promptness in calling, Mr. Siren,” she said, intentionally cutting him off. She
didn’t need to know anything more.
Yet… she experienced a ping of recognition. Gabriel Siren. She’d heard the name somewhere,
but couldn’t quite place it…
Gabriel.
He certainly looked like an artist’s rendering of an angel—until one met his eyes.
One didn’t find sweetness and light in those cerulean depths.
Unusual for a man who couldn’t be all that many years removed from university.
Bewildered dark eyebrows drew together. “You were expecting me?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
A lopsided smile tipped at one corner of his mouth. “I, erm, honestly don’t know.”
What a strange young man.
Well, he was an artist, and artists were known to be entities unto themselves.
Celia gestured toward the door. Best to get on with it. “Shall I take you to them?”
Mr. Siren made no move to follow. “Them?”
“Cleopatra and Lady Fanny.”
“Your… daughters?” He looked genuinely perplexed.
Was the man altogether daft?
“The mares.”
His brow released. “Ah.” He shrugged. “Why not?”
Annoyance bristled up Celia’s spine. He acted as if he were granting her an allowance rather than
the other way around. Not only did this young man have no business being as handsome as he was, but
he had no business being as confident, either.
“Follow me,” she said with no small amount of imperiousness. She was the duchess here, and the
perplexing Mr. Siren would know it.
In silence, she led him through the house. She’d thought to put him in his place by making him trail
three steps behind her like a servant. But she found she didn’t like him at her back. It made her feel
strangely exposed.
Deemed a beauty from the moment of her birth, Celia had always accepted her place as the object
of an enraptured gaze.
But with this man it felt… different.
He wasn’t enraptured.
Then she heard it—the absence of footsteps behind her.
She threw a glance over her shoulder and found the confounding man wasn’t gazing upon her at
all, but rather standing in fascination before a musty old portrait. She supposed a painter would be
interested in paintings. “Mr. Siren?”
He spared her a quick glance. “Who is this?”
Celia ruffled at the demand. “My husband’s father.”
“The Fifth Duke of Acaster?”
“That’s right.”
He stared for another solid minute. Then turned to her. “We may go now.”
Celia’s eyebrows lifted. “May we, now?” No small amount of sarcasm laced the question.
He nodded his assent.
The cheek of this man!
And Celia found herself leading the way—again.
Upon their entrance into the stables, her first genuine smile of the day dawned. Here was where
she came to return to her real life and real self. In truth, she didn’t allow interlopers easily. She had a
trusted head groom, multiple stable lads, and a trainer for the season. All knew their places and ran
the stables accordingly. As the clock was near to striking nine, they’d arrived in time to find Light
Skirt being led into the stable yard on her way to the paddock. Celia reached out to run her hand
across the filly’s velvety nose. She squinted up at the stable lad on her back. “How is our girl this
morning?”
“Right as rain, she is,” said the lad.
Celia nodded, and the lad was on his way. They didn’t stand on formality in the stables.
She glanced over to find Mr. Siren quietly observing her. Unsettling.
She turned on her heel and marched straight down the center aisle of the stable, tossing over her
shoulder, “Cleopatra and Lady Fanny are this way.”
“An impressive operation you have here,” came Mr. Siren’s voice at her back.
Celia supposed she should slow her pace and allow the man to walk by her side. “Not as
impressive as some.”
Mr. Siren glanced around. “No?”
“Ashcote houses twenty Thoroughbreds,” she said. “The Duke of Rakesley has fifty or so at
Somerton.”
The serious, lopsided smile curved about Mr. Siren’s mouth. “Only twenty?”
“However,” continued Celia. She couldn’t help herself. “What we lack in quantity at Ashcote, we
more than make up for in quality.”
“I believe it.”
Celia blinked.
I believe it.
Strangely, she believed him.
Mr. Siren didn’t deal in flattery.
Which was why she continued talking to this man who unsettled her no small bit. “At Ashcote, we
don’t only breed from winners, unlike Rakesley. We pay attention to other qualities, as well. Take
temperament, for example. A foul-tempered stallion is likely to sire foul-tempered offspring, though
they may never live in the same stable. Thoroughbreds are a tricky breed and have to be managed
with thought and care.”
She stopped before a box, and a docile chestnut mare with a black mane poked her head over the
gate. “Take Lady Fanny here. On the small side, but she’s a real goer on the turf and has been known
to bite other horses. But to humans she’s as sweet as can be.” The mare nosed Celia’s arm, demanding
the attention she rightly deserved. “Alright, girl,” she said, stroking the mare’s nose. “And there—”
She pointed across the aisle. “There is Cleopatra. A little more high of spirits, but containable, and
able to focus on the turf.”
As Celia spoke, she realized something unusual. Mr. Siren let her talk, uninterrupted.
It was that quality which unsettled her.
Most men interrupted—often.
Most men only waited for her to finish talking, so they could start talking.
Not this man.
He listened.
And took in every word.
She wasn’t sure she liked that better.
“Was your late husband involved in the running of the stables?”
An un-duchess-like snort that wouldn’t be suppressed sounded from her nose. “Of course not.”
Mr. Siren lifted his eyebrows and said nothing.
She’d revealed too much.
“This stable is your life’s work.” He made the observation with genuine interest.
Celia had to swallow against the sudden surge of tears that constricted her throat. She’d told
herself she wouldn’t cry, and she wouldn’t.
However, with a single, simple sentence, this young and too-handsome horse painter had spoken
her pride and her shame.
This stable was her life’s work.
She’d built it—and now she was stripping it for parts.
And this man saw because he listened to her as if she were an equal.
Not a social equal, but a human equal.
Celia had never encountered that in a man.
She might be powerless against such treatment.
She might be powerless against this man she’d known for less than half an hour.
C H A P T E R FO U R
C loak hood lifted to conceal her identity, Celia stood on one side of Bennet Street, glowering at
the townhouse opposite.
The building she’d been attempting to muster the nerve to enter for the last hour.
The Archangel.
In the row of Mayfair townhouses, it was one of many. With its unassuming brown brick and black
trim, it wouldn’t draw the eye if one didn’t know where to look. One wouldn’t know it for a gaming
hell. And seeing how it was around the corner from the popular gentlemen’s clubs, it was smartly
placed for those only getting started with their nights after dining at their respective clubs.
This new Duke of Acaster was an intelligent man.
An intelligent young man.
The shock at meeting him a week ago still hadn’t subsided. She’d never considered the possibility
that a Duke of Acaster could be under the age of seventy years—much less four-and-twenty.
The fact of the matter was this—she was well and truly in the suds.
This new Duke of Acaster was young, but he was no young man who could be wrapped around
her finger. He possessed a sharp edge in his eye that could slice through blancmange. How else did
one establish the most exclusive gaming hell in London?
She needed to take a step.
Then she needed to put another step in front of that one, and another and another, until she’d
crossed the street and the threshold of the unassuming building that saw two or three gentlemen enter
every quarter hour or so. It was early enough in the evening that more patrons were arriving than
exiting.
A quiver of anxiety shot through her. She’d never been inside a gaming hell, but that wasn’t what
had arrows of nerves flying through her veins. She’d come to London, to this gaming hell for one
reason.
To beg.
If necessary, she was fully prepared to sink to her knees and plead with this new duke to hold off
on the sale of Ashcote Hall and let her keep her horses there through the Race of the Century. He
didn’t give two figs about Ashcote or her horses.
It would cost him nothing.
She would do anything.
Anything?
She could use her body. A tactic that had been done before by women the world over—and
herself specifically.
No.
Those instances had been others using her body for their wants and ends.
Which was a whole other matter entirely.
And something that would never happen to her again.
But her problem remained. In fact, it had tripled in size. This new duke was determined to sell the
roof from over her beloved horses’ heads.
She didn’t yet know how, but she couldn’t let it happen.
Right.
She squared her shoulders and began putting one foot in front of the other.
Then it was up the five steps to the door and a few taps of the knocker, her exterior composed, her
palms damp, and her heart a racehorse in her chest.
She was at The Archangel.
She was doing this.
The door swung open on silent hinges and a large form filled the doorway. Massive was a more
accurate descriptor for the form as the doorman’s shoulders threatened to touch either side of the
doorframe. “Is madame lost?” he asked, his French accent light.
“This is The Archangel, correct?” Celia set her tone at mildly imperious. She would only go full
duchess if absolutely necessary.
“It is.”
“Then I am not lost.”
He remained, unmoved. “This is a gentlemen’s club.”
“I’m aware.”
In locked silence, they stood, neither willing to cede an inch of ground. Celia understood it
couldn’t hold and any moment the door would slam in her face.
“Ricard?” came a feminine voice from behind him. “Is something amiss?”
Celia lifted an eyebrow. “One of your gentlemen?”
Ricard didn’t look inclined to answer, as a woman swept around him unlike any Celia had ever
seen. Tall and striking, she wasn’t dressed exactly like a man—she was wearing a skirt— but not like
a woman, either. Women simply didn’t wear white silk cravats and teal watered silk waistcoats.
Further, this unusual woman possessed authority at The Archangel.
Sharp blue eyes that meant business fixed on Celia and assessed her from tip to toe, drawing
conclusions and holding them to herself. “Ricard,” said the woman, at last, her conclusion drawn.
“Allow the lady inside.”
Ricard gave a nod and stood aside.
Celia had only taken a few steps before she felt a hand at her shoulder. “Your cloak,” said the
woman.
Celia shrugged off the garment and allowed it to be taken.
Then it was through a black velvet curtain and into The Archangel. Celia hadn’t known what to
expect of a gaming hell, but it wasn’t this. Tasteful. That was the first word that sprang to mind. Male.
All rich woods and subdued brown and burgundy, The Archangel was a tasteful, masculine
establishment. And while the gentlemen at various gaming tables were obviously enjoying their
evening, it wasn’t the raucous atmosphere she’d assumed it would be.
The woman turned toward Celia. “I take it you’re here to see Mr.—” The woman bit off the next
word.
And Celia knew why.
The owner of this establishment was no longer Mr. Siren.
He was the Duke of Acaster.
“I am here to have a word with the duke, yes.”
Something unreadable and complex passed behind the woman’s eyes. “I trust you can keep
yourself entertained while I see if the duke is in?”
Celia glanced around. A few lordly eyes had already landed on her and taken note. “Of course.”
She hardly recognized her own voice for how tight it had gone.
All she wanted to do was reclaim the last few minutes and turn her feet in the opposite direction
and be far, far away from this place.
Which would get her nowhere.
Actually, that wasn’t true.
It would see her and her stable turfed out of Ashcote.
She squared her shoulders. Here, she would remain.
The other woman nodded and set off.
Celia spotted a chaise longue against the nearest wall and settled onto it, alone.
Nay, not entirely alone.
A buzz was building through The Archangel. It had to do with a woman’s presence.
And not any woman’s presence in this decidedly masculine domain.
The Duchess of Acaster’s presence.
From various groupings of gentlemen scattered through the club, she sensed a gathering—of
intention.
Soon, one lord, then another, broke free and ambled in her direction to bid her a good evening, a
question in their eyes. What in the blazes was the Duchess of Acaster doing in The Archangel,
anyway?
Celia’s mouth curved into its practiced smile—the one meant to dazzle—and she batted the
couched inquiries away.
These lords weren’t gathering around her as they would a young unmarried lady, with honorable
intentions. The glint in these men’s eyes told of an altogether different motive regarding the widowed
Duchess of Acaster.
In the domain of The Archangel, she wasn’t wife material.
She was a potential conquest.
She was mistress material.
“Duchess?” came a voice to her right.
She directed her smile toward a lord with the eager look of an excitable puppy, his bland
handsomeness holding no threat. A safe, young lord. “And you are?”
“Lord Wrexford at your service,” he said on a deep bow, gratification pinking his cheeks.
“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Lord Wrexford.” Her smile tipped into the genuine.
Wrexford had a bit of sweetness about him. “And are you a habitué of The Archangel?” she asked as
if they were in the most proper drawing room in London rather than a risqué gaming den.
“I’m afraid not.” His blush spread to his scalp. “This is my first time, actually.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
“I’m not much for gaming, in truth.”
“That only speaks well for you, my lord.” She had to say it.
His blush intensified, offering a radish red contrast to his coppery hair. “But I had to see.”
“Had to see what?”
“The gaming hell run by the Duke of Acaster.”
Celia’s brow lifted. So focused had she been on her goals, she hadn’t considered that a duke who
owned a gaming hell would be a matter of some curiosity for the ton.
“The duke and I have known each other since school,” continued Wrexford.
“Is that so?”
“Of course, he wasn’t a duke then.”
“No, he wouldn’t have been.”
“What a come up, eh?”
“Certainly is.”
Was she the only person in London for whom this story held little fascination? A question
occurred to her as she took in Wrexford. Oh, how she didn’t want to ask it… “So, you and the duke
are the same year?”
“Actually, I’m a year below him.”
Celia only just didn’t gasp. “You’re… younger?” Which meant…
This lord who was flirting and blushing madly at her couldn’t have more than three and twenty
years on him, not if Acaster had four and twenty.
A feeling whispered across Celia’s skin—of being watched.
Unerringly, her gaze lifted toward the source. There, on the gallery above, stood the duke, his
intense gaze upon her. The whispery feeling penetrated skin and shivered through to dark interior
places within her.
Her smile slipped.
Wrexford’s puppy eyes went wide with concern. “Is all right with you, Your Grace?”
Celia gave a vague nod and reminded her mouth of its one job—to smile.
Then it happened.
The crowd parted like the Red Sea, making way for the Duke of Acaster, a man now one of them.
Nay, not merely one of them, but a cut above them in the social hierarchy—a duke.
Across the closing distance, their eyes locked. He was a mystery, this new Duke of Acaster.
But more of a mystery was her response to him.
She’d dismissed it a week ago as an anomaly brought on by shock.
It was more than he was handsome.
It was something else.
Sitting here, her gaze left with no choice but to meet his, the mysterious it revealed itself.
Simply put, the man lit a little thrill through her veins.
And she liked it not one bit.
But trivialities such as like or dislike held no power here.
It felt like an inevitability.
C HAPTER SIX
A s Gabriel’s gaze held the duchess’s captive, a few quick reactions flicked through him.
Surprise.
He hadn’t thought her so bold as to venture into The Archangel.
Curiosity.
What was she doing here, anyway? Their business with one another had reached its natural
conclusion.
And yet another reaction coursed through him, one not easily identifiable. A novel reaction.
A need.
The need to pull her away from the besotted group of men gathered around her and claim her as…
What?
Ridiculous thought for two very solid reasons.
He wasn’t the sort of man who claimed a woman.
And she was his great uncle’s title-chasing widow.
That fact alone was enough to dampen any needs he might have in relation to this woman.
Still, it couldn’t be denied that his memory of her a week ago was a dull shadow of the woman
before him tonight. Gone was the woolen dress of practical drab brown, and in its place was blush
silk nearly the shade of her skin, cut low over a generous décolletage that possessed a gravitational
force all its own, pulling the eye, demanding a full accounting of every supple curve.
He resisted the pull—unlike the men around him. How reductive to simplify a woman into parts.
He made it a rule never to succumb to thoughts that reduced one to the animal side of humanity—and
he wasn’t about to start now.
“You aren’t going to steal her away, are you?” came a voice accompanied by a few light-hearted
grumbles.
“Family business,” said Gabriel, his gaze refusing to release the duchess.
That got a laugh from the crowd of lords who still couldn’t quite believe their favorite gaming
hell was now owned and run by the newly-minted Seventh Duke of Acaster. Word had spread like
wildfire.
For Gabriel, nothing had palpably changed. A few more responsibilities, that was all.
The duchess came to her feet and stood, unmoving. She was waiting—for him. As a gentleman, he
should extend his arm for her to take while he escorted her to his office. Propriety demanded it.
But The Archangel wasn’t proper society.
It was a gaming hell.
Different rules applied.
Except that was only the excuse.
The fact was he didn’t want to touch her—couldn’t touch her. For he sensed something inside him.
The flicker of a small flame.
To touch her would be putting tinder to fire.
A risk best avoided.
He pivoted and trusted the duchess to follow. At the office door, he stood aside and allowed her
to enter first, the scent of jasmine and bergamot trailing in her wake. He supposed he should offer her
a seat.
He didn’t.
He didn’t want her to sit.
He wanted her to leave.
He cocked a hip against his desk, crossed his arms over his chest, and waited. His first rule of
conversation was never to speak first—and then only as little as possible. Given room, people
generally talked themselves out and into a better state of mind. He could only hope that would be the
case with the duchess.
An armchair between them, she rested elegant fingers on the leather back. Her tongue swiped
across her pouty bottom lip. A nervous habit of hers. He’d noticed it on their first meeting. He found it
irritatingly difficult to remove his gaze from that pouty bottom lip and sheen of moisture.
At last, she opened the conversation. “I’m shocked Edwin wasn’t a member of your little club.”
“Oh, he was.” Gabriel saw no reason to withhold that information from her.
Luminous amber eyes blinked. “Of course, he was.” A cynical little laugh followed. “And racked
up a mountain of debt, too, no doubt.”
“He did.” Gabriel kept his tone carefully neutral.
“Debt accrual was Edwin’s one skill in this world.” She gave a shrug. “At least, there’s one debt
you won’t have to repay.”
“Every debt requires payment, Duchess.”
The words emerged hard and low. He didn’t want this woman thinking she had free rein over him,
like she held over the men downstairs.
The remainder of her smile fell away.
Only now that they floated in the air did Gabriel hear another possible meaning embedded within
his words. They hinted at a gray area—an area where payment could take other forms beyond blunt.
Perhaps he hadn’t meant to speak them in such a way, but now that he had, he didn’t want to take them
back, for they were having such an effect on the duchess. Her skin had gone flush, and her amber eyes,
bright. Her cherry-red lips parted, as if she were in desperate need of a deep breath.
He might like having that effect on this woman.
Which he didn’t like—at all.
“Why are you here?” The question teetered on the offensive.
Her fingers drummed the seatback, nails a light click-click against leather. “I was curious.”
“Curiosity brought you into The Archangel?”
He didn’t believe it for an instant. The place would’ve inspired intrigue, to be sure, but mere
inquisitiveness wouldn’t have pushed her this far beyond the bounds of propriety.
She offered no answer with her mouth, but her eyes held a different story. She’d come here with
purpose.
“I’ll ask again—”
“Don’t sell Ashcote,” she said in a sudden rush, words tumbling over themselves in a hasty
jumble.
Now, he understood what he saw in her eyes—desperation.
“It’s my home.”
Gabriel uncrossed his arms and planted them on the desk to either side of his hips. “Other homes
can be attained. As dowager duchess, you’re entitled to the dower house at Acaster Castle in Kent.”
Her brow gathered in distress. “Acaster Castle? That drafty old pile of rocks?”
“Then use a portion of your dowry to find a place to your liking.”
“Ashcote is to my liking.”
“Would you like to make an offer?”
“I can’t.”
That math didn’t add up. In going through his great uncle’s papers, he’d come across the marriage
contract. Generous didn’t begin to describe the terms. How desperate this woman and her family must
have been for a title within their ranks. “Wasn’t half your dowry returned to you upon Acaster’s
death?” Such a financial arrangement in the event of widowhood was only standard practice.
She gave her head a tight shake. “It would have been.”
Gabriel almost didn’t want to ask… “Would have been?”
“If any of my dowry was left.”
Of course. “Acaster gambled it away.” It wasn’t a question.
Another tight shake of her head. “I spent it.”
Gabriel felt his brow lift with disbelief. And he’d thought this woman possessed of a modicum of
good sense… “You spent it?”
She nodded. “On my stable.”
“You spent your widow’s portion on horses?”
“I don’t expect you to understand.” Her chin lifted to a stubborn angle. “Horses are expensive.”
The duchess presented a problem. He saw that now. However, Gabriel liked to solve problems,
and fortunately a solution to this duchess arrived readily.
“As a widow, you can return to your family.”
The luminous amber of her eyes went flat and hard. “That isn’t an option.”
“Why not?”
“That’s my business, and none of yours.”
The duchess may have thought that was him put in his place, but she didn’t know him. There was
no problem Gabriel couldn’t solve.
And when the solution arrived to him, he almost laughed aloud at its elegance.
Of course.
Though, judging by the narrowing of her eyes, the duchess would require some convincing.
“What do you want most in the world?” He knew the answer, but he wanted her to speak it aloud.
“Why would I tell you?”
“We might be able to help each other.”
Interest sparked in her eyes, but she remained cautious. “How so?”
“Should I tell you what I want most in the world?”
“I’m not sure.”
And Gabriel understood what she expected him to say—your body.
How many times had she heard that line?
Well, he hated to disappoint… “To see my sisters accepted into society and assume their rightful
place.”
The duchess’s brow gathered. “Sisters?”
“I have three sisters.” He spread his hands wide before him. “Two of them need to make their
debut in society.” A strange rule that still baffled him. “Saskia and Viveca are impressionable and
young.”
The duchess blinked, and a flummoxed line formed between her eyebrows. “You are young.”
“Would you like me to prove exactly how young I’m not?” he said as coolly as if they were
discussing the weather.
The duchess’s mouth snapped shut.
In one sense, Gabriel regretted the words. He’d allowed his irritation to get the better of him.
But in another sense, one more visceral, he didn’t.
He spent so much of his time inside his own mind, but somehow, this duchess pulled him out of
his head and into his body.
And he didn’t like that—not at all.
No.
He should definitely regret speaking such words to her—if only he could.
“And the third sister?” asked the duchess “Is she—”
“Deceased?” He shook his head. “You’ve already met her.”
“I have?”
He jutted his chin, indicating The Archangel beyond his office. “Out there.”
Sudden realization dawned across the duchess’s face. “That was your sister?”
“Tessa.”
“Lady Tessa.”
“Pardon?”
“As the sister of a duke, she’s Lady Tessa.”
Gabriel snorted. “Don’t remind her.”
The duchess canted her head. “She doesn’t wish to be a lady?”
“You needn’t concern yourself with Tessa.” They were veering off course. “Only Saskia and
Viveca.”
“Ladies Saskia and Viveca.”
“They are, as yet, unmarried and will need a place in society.”
The duchess remained unmoved. “What has that to do with me?”
Gabriel could smile. He had her. She simply didn’t know it yet. “It has to do with what you want
most in the world.”
“It most assuredly doesn’t,” she scoffed, so sure of herself.
“Oh, but it does,” Gabriel assured her. “How would you feel about a little gamble?”
“You seem to have mistaken me for my deceased husband.” Even as she refused to relent, her
curiosity was piqued. He saw it in her eyes.
“I can assure you no one would mistake you for an octogenarian wastrel, but…” Gabriel let a few
meaningful beats of time elapse. “You are a dowager duchess.”
Sudden umbrage glittered about her. “Are you saying I’m aged?”
He kept his even keel. “I’m saying you could be useful.”
“How so?” Dread snaked through the question.
“You could be their chaperone into society.”
Her mouth fell slightly agape with shock. “You are definitely calling me old.”
“I can offer you what you want most in the world.”
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*2. Out of me, as out of a living fountain, the little and the great,
the poor and the rich, draw the water of life: and they that willingly
and freely serve me, shall receive grace for grace.
But he that will glory out of me, or be delighted in any good that
tends not to me, shall not be grounded in true joy, nor enlarged in his
heart, but shall be many ways incumbered and straitned.
I have bestowed all, and will that all be returned unto me again:
and with great strictness, I require thanks.
C H A P T E R IX.
That it is a sweet thing to despise the world, and serve God.
Is it much that I should serve thee, whom all creatures are bound
to serve?
*It ought not to seem much unto me to serve thee: but this rather
seemeth much and marvellous unto me, that thou vouchsafest to
receive into thy service one so poor and unworthy, and to join him
with thy beloved servants.
*3. Behold, all is thine which I have, and whereby I serve thee.
*Behold heaven and earth, which thou hast created for the
service of man, are ready at hand, and all daily perform whatsoever
thou dost command.
*And this is little: thou hast also appointed the angels to the
service of man.
*But that which excelleth all this is, that thou thyself hast
vouchsafed to serve man, and hast promised to give thyself unto
him.
Would I were able at least for one day, to do thee worthy service!
Verily, thou art worthy of all service, of all honour, and everlasting
praise.
*Verily, thou art my Lord, and I thy poor servant, that am bound to
serve thee with all my might; neither ought I ever to be weary of
praising thee.
C H A P T E R X.
That the desires of our hearts are to be examined.
ON, thou must still learn many things, which thou hast not
S
Christ. yet well learned.
2. Beware therefore thou lean not too much upon any desire
conceived without asking my counsel; lest afterward it repent thee,
and thou dislikest what before pleased thee, and which thou
zealously desiredst as the best.
But thou oughtest to use violence, and resist manfully thy sensual
appetites, and respect not, what the flesh would or would not; but
rather to labour, that even perforce it be subject to the spirit.
Learn to break thine own will, and to yield thyself to all subjection.
*Vile sinner, what canst thou answer to them who reproach thee,
who hast so often offended God, and so many times deserved hell?
But mine eye hath spared thee, because thy soul was precious in
my sight:
That thou mightest know my love and always remain thankful for
my benefits.
C H A P T E R XI.
Of the considering the secret judgments of God, lest we be
exalted on account of our good deeds.
I stand astonished, when I consider that the heavens are not pure
in thy sight.
For if we be left, we sink and perish: but if thou visitest us, we are
raised up and live.
All the world cannot lift him up whom the truth hath subjected
unto itself; neither shall he be moved with the tongues of all his
praisers, that hath set his whole hope upon God.
For as for them that speak, behold they are all nothing; they shall
pass away, as doth the sound of their words: but the truth of the Lord
remaineth for ever.
C H A P T E R XII.
How we are to be affected, and what we are to say, in every
thing which we desire.
SON,let say
Christ.
thus, in every thing; Lord if it be pleasing to thee,
this be thus.
But if thou knowest it will be hurtful unto me, and not profitable to
the health of my soul, take away this desire from me:
For every desire proceedeth not from the Holy Ghost, though it
seemeth unto man right and good.
“Lord, thou knowest what is best, let this or that be done as thou
pleasest.”
Give what thou wilt, and how much thou wilt, and when thou wilt.
Set me where thou wilt, and deal with me in all things according
to thy will.
I am in thy hand; turn me, and turn me again, which way soever
thou pleasest.
Behold, I am thy servant, prepared for all things; for I desire not
to live unto myself, but unto thee: and O that I could do it worthily
and perfectly!
Let thy will be mine, and let my will ever follow thine, and agree
perfectly with it.
Let my will and nill be all one with thine, and let me not be able to
will or nill any thing else, but what thou willest or nillest.
4. Grant that I may die to all things that are in the world, and for
thy sake love to be contemned, and not be known in this world.
Grant that above all things that can be desired, I may rest in thee,
may quiet my heart in thee.
Thou art the true peace of the heart, thou art the only rest; out of
thee all things are troublesome and unquiet.
In this very peace, that is in thee, the one eternal good, may I
sleep and rest. Amen.”
C H A P T E R XIII.
That true comfort is to be sought in God alone.
Wait ♦awhile, O my soul, wait the divine promise, and thou shalt
have abundance of all good things.
Although thou hadst all created good, yet wouldst thou not be
happy or blessed; but in God, that hath created all things, thy whole
happiness consisteth.
And if thy comfort be wanting, let thy will, and just proving of me,
be unto me as the greatest comfort: for thou wilt not be angry
always, neither wilt thou threaten for ever.”
C H A P T E R XIV.
That all our care is to be cast on God.
*For he standeth very totteringly, that casteth not his whole care
upon thee.
Lord, so that my will may remain right and firm towards thee, do
with me whatsoever shall please thee.
Christ. Son, such must be thy disposition, if thou wilt walk with
me.
I will receive indifferently from thy hand good and evil, sweet and
bitter, delightful and sorrowful, and give thee thanks for all that
befalleth me.
*Keep me from all sin, and I will neither fear death nor hell.
So thou dost not for ever cast me from thee, nor blot me out of
the book of life, what tribulation soever befalleth me shall not hurt
me.
C H A P T E R XV.
Of suffering injuries; and who is proved to be truly patient.
*2. He is not truly patient, that will not suffer but as much as he
thinketh good, and by whom he listeth.
3. Be thou therefore prepared for the fight, if thou wilt have the
victory.
Have mercy on me, and deliver me out of the mire, that I stick not
fast therein, and that I may not be cast down altogether.
C H A P T E R XVI.
That we are to rest in God above all his gifts and benefits.
*Grant me, O most sweet and loving Jesus, to rest in thee above
all creatures:
Above all health and beauty, above all glory and honour, above
all power and dignity, above all knowledge and subtilty, above all
riches and arts, above all joy and gladness, above all hope and
promise, above all desert and desire!
Above all gifts and presents that thou canst impart unto us;
Above all joy and triumph, that the mind of man can receive and
feel:
Lastly, above the angels and arch-angels, and above all the host
of heaven, above all visible and invisible things, and above all that
thou art not, O my God.
*2. For, thou my Lord God, art best above all, thou alone art most
high, thou alone most powerful, thou alone most full and sufficient,
thou alone most sweet and overflowing with comfort, thou alone
most lovely and loving, thou alone most noble and glorious above all
things, in whom all good things are together, and most perfectly, and
ever have been and shall be:
For surely my heart cannot truly rest, unless it rests in thee, and
surmount all gifts and creatures whatsoever.
Let him come unto me, his poor servant, and make me glad.
Let him put forth his hand, and deliver me from all trouble.
*Come, O come! for without thee I shall have no joyful hour; for
thou art my joy, and without thee my table is empty.
5. Let others seek what they please instead of thee; but for me
nothing else doth, or shall delight me, but thou only, my God, my
hope, my everlasting salvation.
I will not hold my peace, nor cease to pray, until thy grace
returneth, and thou speakest inwardly unto me.
Thy tears and the desire of thy soul, thy humiliation and the
contrition of thy heart, have brought me unto thee.
Christian. Lord, I have called thee, and have desired to enjoy
thee, being ready to cast away all things for thee.
For thou first hast stirred me up, that I might seek thee.
*6. What hath thy servant more to say before thee, but greatly to
humble himself in thy sight, always mindful of his own iniquity and
vileness?
For there is none like unto thee in all that is wonderful in heaven
and earth.
Thy works are very good, thy judgments true, and by thy
providence all things are governed.
C H A P T E R XVII.
Of the remembrance of the manifold benefits of God.
But I know and confess that I am not able to give thee due thanks
for the least of thy favours.
I am less than the least of all thy benefits; and when I consider
thy bounty, the greatness thereof maketh my spirit to faint.
3. And he that hath received fewer, ought not to repine, nor envy
them that have greater store; but attend rather unto thee, and highly
praise thy goodness, who bestowest thy gifts so bountifully, so freely,
and so willingly, without respect of persons.
All things proceed from thee, and therefore in all things thou art to
be praised.
Thou knowest what is fit to be given to every man, and why one
hath less and another more.
It is not ours, but thine to judge, who dost exactly know what is
meet for every one.
For thy will, and the love of thy glory, ought to be preferred above
all things:
And to comfort him more, and please him better than all the
benefits which either he hath received or may receive.
C H A P T E R XVIII.
Of four things that bring much peace.
ON, now will I teach thee the way of peace, and true liberty.
Christ.S
*Endeavour to do rather the will of another than thy
own.
*Continually wish and pray, that the will of God may be wholly
fulfilled in thee.
Thou, who canst do all things, and ever lovest the profiting of my
soul, increase in me thy grace, that I may fulfil thy works, and work
out my own salvation.
My Lord God, be not far from me; my God, consider and help me;
for sundry thoughts have risen up against me, afflicting my soul.
How shall I pass through them without hurt? How shall I utterly
break them?
Christ. I will go before thee, and will humble the great ones of the
earth. I will open the doors of the prison, and reveal unto thee hidden
secrets.
Christian. Do Lord, as thou sayest, and let all evil thoughts fly
before thy face.
*3. Enlighten me, O good Jesus, with a clear shining inward light,
and drive away all darkness from the habitation of my heart.
Fight strongly for me, and vanquish those evil beasts, these
enticing lusts, that so peace may be obtained by thy power, and
abundance of thy praise found in the holy court of a pure
conscience.
*Command the winds, and the tempests; say unto the sea, Be
still, and to the north wind, Blow not, and there shall be a great calm.
*4. Send forth thy light and thy truth, that they may shine upon
the earth; for I am as the earth, without form, and void, until thou
enlighten me.
*Pour out thy grace from above, let thy heavenly dew distill upon
my heart.
C H A P T E R XIX.
Of avoiding curious enquiry into the life of others.