Chapter Six

May 15, 1812

"You are a complete idiot."

William scowled. He was usually the one saying that, and it was most disconcerting to have it thrown at him across his own smoking room.

"I am not," he began.

"Yes, you are," said Lindow firmly. "What on earth were you thinking?"

"He wasn't thinking at all, of course he wasn't!" Aylesbury said before William could get a word in edgeways. "For the first time in his life, the man wasn't thinking. We should be celebrating!"

The two men fell about in laughter, and William tried to smile. Tried.

It was his own fault. He had invited all three—despite Lindow's opinion—of his brothers to Cothrom House to tell them about the engagement. The trouble was, the gossip of London moved far more swiftly than he had expected. They already knew.

Which meant they had already been preparing their roasting comments.

"Oh, have another drink, Cothrom. It's not the end of the world," said Aylesbury easily.

"I don't know, I would describe marriage as just that," teased Lindow.

"All the more reason for a drink!"

William sighed, ignoring their laughter but not their pointed requests for another drink. It was a little early for such things—just after luncheon—but he supposed he should have expected it. Any excuse.

As he stepped across the oak paneled room toward the drinks cabinet, William glanced once again at the door. He had hoped... well, the invitation had been most welcoming. As welcoming as he could make it. And yet still Pernrith had not come.

"He won't come," said Lindow quietly from behind him.

William did not turn around as he opened the drinks cabinet and started pulling glasses toward him. "He might. You don't know that—"

"He won't," Lindow said flatly. "He's not a part of this family."

"And whose fault is that?" William shot over his shoulder. "If you could just make him feel welcome—"

"I won't ever do that, and you know that, so please drop it," the younger of the Chance brothers said through what sounded like gritted teeth. "He's not our full brother. Our father betrayed our mother, sired a—"

"That word is not to be bandied about in my house," William said, as calmly as he could manage as he turned back to his brothers with three glasses and a bottle of brandy. "Thank you."

Lindow glowered but had the self-restraint not to continue.

William sighed as he stepped over and handed glasses to him and Aylesbury, pouring a healthy portion of brandy into each. "Come now, I did not invite you all over to argue."

"No," said Aylesbury abruptly, evidently just as eager as he was to move the conversation on. "We're here to commiserate!"

"Celebrate," said William stiffly.

"We're here discussing your imminent imprisonment," said Lindow darkly. "I'd call that commiseration!"

Damn it all, but they were infuriating. "To Miss Fox-Edwards," said William tightly, lifting his glass.

Both of his brothers did so, as well. For a moment, he allowed himself a sense of relief that they were finally behaving like civilized human beings.

"Yes, to Miss Fox-Edwards," said Aylesbury with mock seriousness before throwing back the entire glass of brandy.

"To Miss Fox-Edwards," Lindow said with a grin. "And all who sail in her—"

"Lindow!" William censured.

There was nothing he could do. Lindow and Aylesbury were chuckling like schoolboys, and William's headache was only growing with the sip of brandy he'd taken.

"Don't take on so like a mother hen," Aylesbury said with a placating lift of his hand.

Lindow dropped into an armchair. "Yes, after all, you're the one who has decided to do the irresponsible thing and offer marriage to the first woman you spoke to after our little conversation."

Ah. Yes, well. They had a point.

William dropped onto the sofa and beheld his brothers, wondering if he could explain it to them. Perhaps if he understood it better himself, he'd have a better chance of doing so.

But that was the trouble. Something strange had come over him when he'd been dancing with Alice—with Miss Fox-Edwards, he must remember to call her that in public. Something had overcome him, some desire he had not known before.

Oh, he'd known desire. Hot lust, easily sparked, easily solved.

But this? This had been different. His tea in the garden with her the following day had proven his instincts, though slightly confused, had been right. Miss Alice Fox-Edwards was a perfectly respectable woman with no relatives likely to cause a scene, and one distant cousin who was thoughtless and thankfully out of the picture.

She was therefore perfect.

"—never thought you would be so... so reckless," Aylesbury was saying.

William blinked. Both his brothers were staring. He shrugged. "It did not feel reckless at the time."

Although it had felt similar, he imagined. There had been a rush of something new, a delight in leaving behind the expectations of Society, just barreling forward with the first idea that had come into his head. Was that what recklessness felt like? If so, no wonder his brothers were so reckless.

"I never would have thought it of you," said Lindow, wagging a finger.

William gritted his teeth to prevent himself from listing the innumerable occasions when Lindow had been far more reckless. "I know."

"If anything, I'd say you were thoughtless," Aylesbury said expansively, placing his brandy glass on a console table. "I mean, you met the woman that very night! Spent what, an hour with her, in total?"

William hesitated. It was tempting to mention he had met Alice beforehand. It would make the sudden engagement sound far more reasonable. Rational. Explainable.

The circumstances of that meeting were so unusual, however, that it may not actually help. Besides, he had not recognized her at the ball, not with the mask and the turban.

No. Perhaps not worth mentioning.

"You were thoughtless," came Aylesbury's words.

William nodded curtly. "I know."

"You could be making a huge mistake," Lindow pointed out.

"I know."

"You might not even like her after a few months," Aylesbury said, shivering.

"I know."

"And you could bring ruin on the whole family if it turns out she's a wrong'un," said Lindow, with barely concealed glee.

A nerve throbbed in William's temple. "I know."

Lindow and Aylesbury exchanged a look. Then they fell about laughing again.

William tried to contain his temper, he truly did. It was just his brothers' way, he knew. After so many years, he should really be accustomed to their ribbing.

But somehow, when it came to Alice, it crossed a line. A line William had not even known he had. But the act of mocking her, teasing him about her, lit a fire in him that decades of dedicated self-control could no longer hold back.

"It is not a laughing matter!" William exploded, rising suddenly from his seat.

If he had hoped his outburst would quieten his brothers, he was sorely disappointed.

Aylesbury grinned. "Well, at least it's not me making a huge mistake this time. It's rather pleasant for it to happen to someone else."

"Yes, is this how you feel every time you see us being little disasters?" piped up Lindow. "It is most enjoyable."

William did everything he could to slow his breathing, but he did permit himself a slight eye roll.

Brothers!

All three of them were nightmares, in their own way. Aylesbury was constantly needing money, money William could ill-afford now he was to be wed. Lindow was the black sheep, if it were possible to pick one, constantly getting himself in trouble with the ladies. And Pernrith...

Well. Having a half-brother from your father's notorious affair was difficult to manage at the best of times, but Pernrith didn't help himself. He was a viscount! He needed to be here, part of the family, working out what was best for the family.

William gritted his teeth. Though he wasn't entirely sure he wanted another opinion on his hastily arranged marriage.

"Look," he said quietly. "Admittedly, I did not imagine I would step into the Earl of Chester's ball a free man, and leave it—"

"With a ball and chain newly forged," interrupted Lindow.

William glared. His brother sipped his brandy with an apologetic expression. "Fine. I was caught... unawares."

"You were caught," said Aylesbury, far more quietly than William had expected. "There is no crime in that. Simply break it off."

Break it off.

William sighed. It was a course of action he had considered, naturally. Waking in the early hours of the day after the ball, he had run through a number of different routes out of his hastily offered engagement.

Leave town. No, that would bring ruin on the lady.

Break it off quietly, secretly. No, there were people at that ball who had seen her.

Marry her, then divorce her. Definitely not.

And that only left . . .

"I will marry her," said William quietly.

Lindow's smile faded. "Dear God, I thought you were joking all this while. You are truly going to marry her?"

"I knew he wasn't jesting," said Aylesbury shrewdly. "This is Cothrom we're talking about. He doesn't joke."

"I most certainly do joke, just not with you two," William said curtly, tightening his fingers around his brandy glass as though that would tether him to the ground. "But I believe in following the rules, in sticking to what Society expects."

"So... so you'll marry her, just because you ought?" The way Lindow said it, it was as though William had been given a sentence of transportation. His brother's face surely could not have been more horrified if he had been.

"I made her an offer, in public," said William quietly. "I will honor it."

And not only because it was the right thing to do, though he would not share that particular detail with his brothers.

Because there was something about Miss Alice Fox-Edwards. She had given a perfectly reasonable explanation for her strange behavior in the woodland of Hyde Park. A respectable woman would feel startled to be suddenly in the arms of a man she didn't know, William reasoned. Her cry of matrimony was what Society expected.

And there was something else. Something he felt whenever he was in her presence. He had gone to see her that morning in the hope—nay, the expectation—that he had dreamt it.

But the moment she had descended those stairs, bright eyed and ready for the day... when they had drunk tea together... the feeling of her hand in his, that sudden yearning for her, a connection he could not have predicted...

William blinked. Both Aylesbury and Lindow were staring now, genuine concern on their faces.

"Dear God," faltered Aylesbury. "You... you're not in love, are you?"

"No," William said instinctively.

"Love? Of course he's not in love. He barely knows the woman," Lindow scoffed. "You're in lust, aren't you, Cothrom?"

"No," said William hurriedly. "No, it's not—"

"Then I don't see why you've got to marry her," said Aylesbury, leaning back in his chair and fixing his elder brother with a curious expression. "There's just no rhyme or reason to it."

No rhyme or reason to it.

Though William was loathe to admit it, his brother was right. In a way, there was no logic to what he was doing.

But perhaps... perhaps this was something that went beyond logic. Perhaps—

A chiming clock distracted him from the nascent thought, and William groaned to see the time. "I must depart."

"Depart? We've only just arrived," protested Aylesbury.

"Yes, I've only just started going through my list of hilarious quips about this ridiculous marriage," said Lindow, pulling—dear God, was that a list he was taking from his pocket?

William snorted, despite himself. His brothers were dependable. Dependable to be idiots, but dependable, nonetheless. "I invited you to be here at eleven and you arrived past one o'clock. You can hardly complain if I have another appoint—"

"I think you will find we will complain, and shall," declared Aylesbury with a wink. "Though if you leave us alone in the excellent company of that drinks cabinet you have over there, I think I can be mollified."

"I already am," Lindow said with a wink of his own in William's direction. "I've guessed where he's going."

William did not bother to favor that with a response. "I shall see you tomorrow for dinner?"

"Only if we can have it here," said Lindow, rising and approaching the drinks cabinet. "For some reason, I have discovered that if you don't pay your cook, they go off and leave you."

"How bizarre!"

William groaned, but he didn't have time to sort this out. He would have to fix it tomorrow. "Try to leave me something in the drinks cabinet for when I return."

"We shall try," said Aylesbury, placing a hand on his heart with a mischievous expression.

Lindow snorted. "I make no promises."

And it was with that comforting reminder that his brothers were complete reprobates that William pulled on his gloves and hat and left Cothrom House.

It did not take him long to reach Marian Gardens, where Miss—where Alice was lodging. His butler, Nicholls, had been able to discover the location remarkably quickly when William had returned from the Earl of Chester's ball, and though he had taken the carriage that morning, this afternoon, William preferred to walk.

The fresh air and gentle pace would give him the opportunity to reflect.

His brothers' teasing echoed in his ears, but though William knew most of what they said was true—he had been reckless, he had been thoughtless, and his decision certainly could bring disrepute to the family—he still felt no regret about what he had done.

Which was most odd.

Even more so because there was something odd about Alice Fox-Edwards, as well. Oh, William could readily believe her story about Hyde Park—that wasn't bothering him. But there was something else, something more. Something she wasn't telling him, he was certain.

And the only way to get it out of her would be to... well, force her sounded so uncivilized.

Before William knew it, he was standing outside her front door.

"You are late," said Alice as she opened the door.

This was rather surprising to William. Not the statement that he was late. He'd known he was going to be late the minute he'd left his own home, just as he also knew he wouldn't publicly blame his brothers for it.

No, it was the fact that Alice had opened her own door.

It appeared she could guess his confusion. "Oh, I... my footman has a toothache, and my... my housekeeper is assisting my cook."

William inclined his head. "How unfortunate for you."

He had intended the words as polite patter, nothing more, but Alice inexplicably raised an eyebrow. "Why? I'm not the one with a toothache. Ready for our walk?"

William swallowed, and then nodded instead of attempting to trust his tongue.

That was the thing about Alice. She was at the same time both forward and shy. She had appeared most appropriately reserved at the ball, and yet there was something forceful about her. Something William knew he should censure, but could not help but find... interesting.

The moment Alice stepped out of her lodgings, she slipped her hand into the crook of William's arm. "Where to?"

William opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

She'd done that with such a level of intimacy, he hardly knew what to do with himself. Did all young ladies know how to do such a thing? As though it were natural? As though they had been that way for weeks?

There was a knot in his throat that did not seem able to dissipate, no matter how many times he swallowed. It was most unaccountable.

"Cothrom?" Alice said gently as they reached the pavement.

William drew himself up.

He was a duke. He was a Chance, a family of brothers who did not shy away from anything. Except, it appeared, young ladies.

Oh, hell.

"How about Hyde Park?" he said. "It is close by, and it would be... pleasant to walk there."

With you on my arm. So we can make new memories there, memories that don't include you barreling into me, demanding that I marry you.

Not that he spoke these thoughts aloud.

By the look on Alice's face, cheeks pink and eyes averted, he did not have to.

"Yes. Yes, of course."

As they walked arm in arm down the street toward the nearest gate to the park, William attempted not to think about the weight on his arm. The sense of delight it gave him. The warmth spreading up his arm and across his torso. The pride he felt as others glanced at them, and saw a beautiful woman on his arm.

Perhaps this marriage nonsense wasn't such a bad idea after all.

Hyde Park was packed. Though the heat was pushing some to return to their cooler country estates, the beautiful weather was drawing out anyone who was anyone into the open air. Horse riders swept by, carriages trundled, and a great number of pedestrians mingled, forming and unforming groups as gossip and well wishes traveled faster than lightning.

For a time, they walked in silence. Then Alice said something which sparked a reaction within William he could not have predicted.

"Ah," she said, pointing over to a copse of trees, the sunlight glinted off his signet ring on her finger. "Where we first met."

And William did not know what made him do it. If asked, he would have spluttered some sort of incoherent babble or said nothing. It was like... hot fury, but he wasn't angry. Spurred on by something far too similar, and far too different.

"Cothrom!"

No one heard Alice gasp his name, she spoke too quietly for that—and William was not surprised. All the air must have been pulled from her lungs as he lunged, pulling her suddenly into the woodland.

Where no one could see them.

"Cothrom, what on earth—"

"This is where we first met, you're right," said William, breathing harshly as he pushed Alice up against a tree, glorying in the desire pooling through him. "You asked me—nay, ordered me—to marry you."

Alice stared through blonde lashes, soft pink lips parted. Invitingly. "Yes, but—"

"And there was nothing more in that?" William asked insistently, desperate to know before he gave into the temptation which had begun in this very place just days before. "You did not... I don't know, lie in wait for me, or—"

"William!" Alice gasped, using his first name without even asking. "The very idea—"

"What did you want from me?" William said, taking a step forward and pinning her to the tree trunk with his very presence. "What did you want?"

He was panting, his lungs tight, and something was building, an ache, a need, and he knew he shouldn't give into it, knew what was right, what was due her as a woman...

And Alice was looking with such... it was not fear. Nor was it surprise—that had faded. It took William a moment to recognize it.

Dear God. It was desire.

"William," Alice murmured. "William, I—"

He did not give her a chance to say another word. William finally touched her body with his own, moaned at the sensation of her breasts pressed up against his chest, and covered his lips with her own.

It was a crushing kiss, one far more passionate than he should have bestowed as their first kiss—but it did not seem to matter.

She could have shied away, pushed him back, declaimed him as a gentleman who presumed too much, all of which would have been perfectly respectable responses. But Alice did not do any of those things.

Her lips parted. Her head tilted, welcoming him in. Her hands were splayed against his chest, just as they had been the first time they had met here, in this woodland, in Hyde Park.

But this time they were pulling him closer, and he wanted to be closer. William's eyes closed as he lost himself in the kiss, tingles of sparking pleasure roaring through his body as his tongue deftly plunged into her welcoming mouth.

Sweet fire. Hot honey. A sort of giddy headiness he had only previously associated with mead.

When William stepped back, breaking the kiss much against his wishes, Alice's hair had become unpinned where he had pressed her into the tree.

They were both breathing heavily.

"Wh-What..." Alice swallowed, her eyes unfocused. "What were you saying?"

William gave a laugh, pulling a hand through his hair and wondering how he could have allowed himself to lose control like that. He could not lose control again. "I have no idea."