Chapter 11

A Not So Quiet Supper

Edwin placed the newspaper down on the dining table. He had much business to do, and there was important information to be gathered from the pages, but he was irritated. When he thought about it, he discovered he was irritated by his actions that morning.

He should not have brought Beatrice into that situation, and he should have commanded his family to cease asking her questions. He did not need to put on any pretense in his own home, but he had a duty to make Beatrice comfortable.

She suddenly appeared before him in the doorway of the dining room, as if she knew he was thinking about her.

“It is only us,” Beatrice noted.

Edwin took a second. There was nothing overly special or revealing about her dress, but it caught his eye. He thought back to their kiss only a day before. It had been hard not to do more with her, but he had too many business matters to attend to, though that would soon be rectified.

Even as he was admiring a beautiful woman before him, business struggles clouded his mind. However, the only thing that had been able to take his mind off business struggles as of late was Beatrice.

Perhaps I was too generous. I had my hands on her when she was in only her shift, and now I have given her a week to prepare. I don’t want to wait a week. I want her right now on this table, everything else be damned.

“Your Grace,” she said, looking down at her feet.

“Yes, come in,” he replied, annoyed at himself for not being in control.

As she rounded the table, it gave him ample opportunity to take in her form without her noticing. When she was side-on, he could see the way her dress hugged her figure, her bosom and rear practically begging to be touched.

He looked down at his empty plate as Beatrice sat. Then, he gestured for the maids to serve the soup.

“How was your day?” he asked politely.

“Oh, it was positively wonderful,” Beatrice sang.

The excitement in her voice took him by surprise, and he couldn’t help the smile that crossed his face.

“I can’t wait to hear about it,” he said.

“I spent a wonderful afternoon with your sister, and we talked about all manner of things. I am to help her debut this year, and I shall have to help my sister too, of course, but Mother will be there to support her, and I can help both of them. They might debut together, and that will be so much fun. I spoke with your mother too—she is very nice. It was kind of you to defend me at breakfast, by the way. Elizabeth told me she was sorry for asking so many questions, and we found we have a lot in common.” Beatrice sighed contentedly. “I feel welcome here.”

The Duke did not think he had ever smiled for as long as he currently had, but it was hard not to be caught up in the excited energy of the woman beside him. And when she looked at him coyly with a slight pout, he could only imagine how her lips would taste.

Edwin quickly cleared his throat. The supper table was no place for thinking about such things. He cleared his throat again and took a spoonful of the leek soup.

“You must tell me your secret,” he said. “Most people find my family completely tiring.”

He was mostly talking about Agnes, but she was not the best judge of character.

“I don’t believe they are. I think they are only excited for you to have finally gotten married, and they want to be a part of your life.”

“They said that?” the Duke asked, feeling some surprise at the mention of his family loving him.

“Not out loud, but I could tell from how they spoke of you and each other. You have a very loving family, and that reflects well on a man.”

Beatrice then blushed and looked down at her soup. Edwin understood why. He loved his family, but he did not love her, nor did she love him. That was what it was. But how did it reflect on a man?

“I must admit you have worked quickly,” Edwin said. “My sister can be equal parts inquisitive and suspicious. I am glad she has not irritated you or asked you so many questions. How did you manage that?”

“To be honest, I don’t know. We were talking, and I told her about how I used to sneak out at night and?—”

Her spoon clattered to her bowl, and she clapped her hand over her mouth before removing it just as quickly in an effort not to look guilty.

“Sneaking out at night?” Edwin raised an eyebrow.

“Your Grace, I made sure she would do no such thing if you were?—”

“I don’t believe my sister has the guts to do such a thing. I am much more interested in hearing what you had gotten up to when roaming the streets of London at night. Was it after midnight?”

The Duke imagined the alluring woman before him prancing through the dark streets, bathed in the moonlight, and the trouble she might get herself into. If he had met her on such a night, he was sure he could have convinced her to get up to no good.

“No, it was not like that,” Beatrice claimed, picking up her spoon again. “I would dress as a man and sneak out to talk with people. There are very interesting people on the streets at night.”

Edwin winked. “I am sure there are.”

Beatrice smiled as she ate a spoonful of soup. “You are awful, Your Grace. If you were to see my adventures out there, you would find them mundane. I spoke to people, walked alone in the dark, and found food. I was dressed as a common man, and no one pays common men any attention. There was one time when I almost got into a fight, but I managed to sneak away into the dark.”

“You are full of surprises, aren’t you?” Edwin said.

“Perhaps I am,” Beatrice quipped, smiling again.

When she smiled, her entire face lit up. There was something more there, too. As soon as she had entered, Edwin had thought about more than just supper, and he could see the same lust in her eyes, though she hid it well.

His eyes lingered on her lips for a moment more before he went back to his soup.

“I wonder if our paths ever crossed at night, in London,” Edwin mused.

“I don’t remember you, and I am sure I would have remembered you if I had run into you,” Beatrice said.

Edwin looked at her again. This time, she blushed as she looked down at her soup. When she had entered the breakfast room that morning, she had a hint of pink on her cheeks, and he had wondered where the color had come from. Perhaps she had been thinking things she was not supposed to.

“I believe I would have remembered you, too,” Edwin stated. “Even if you were in disguise.”

“I met a great many interesting characters,” Beatrice said.

“I don’t doubt it.” Edwin felt some parts of his life collide. “I wonder if that would present any additional business opportunities for me.”

“Business opportunities?” Beatrice echoed.

“I’m only thinking out loud.” Edwin laughed. “The world is changing, and business is conducted in many ways now. I don’t doubt the way we do business will change completely over the next few decades. If I stay ahead, I could… I’m boring you now.” He chuckled again. “You don’t need to hear a lot of talk about different business methods.”

“No, probably not, but I enjoy hearing you talk, Your Grace. You could try to explain business methods to me, but I am sure I would understand very little. You went to Eton to study business, didn’t you?”

“I did,” Edwin replied. “I studied there with my good friend Robert.”

That made Beatrice blush again.

Edwin enjoyed teasing her. He enjoyed a lot of things about her, including conversing with her. He had arranged to have a late supper so they would not have to dine with Modesty and Elizabeth, but that was only to stop them from pestering her. Now that they were alone, he found he enjoyed her company. He had organized the dinner for her benefit, but he benefitted from it too.

“I didn’t expect your family to be living in the main house with you, Your Grace,” Beatrice admitted, changing the topic of conversation after the mention of Robert.

The soup bowls were cleared away and replaced with plates of mutton, parsnips, and beetroot.

The Duke was a little irked by the question. “Yes, my family lives with me. It is not unheard of, but they sleep in a separate wing of the manor, and we lead completely separate lives.”

“Do you often have breakfast together?” Beatrice asked.

Edwin was sure she did not mean it as a slight. “I only wanted them to get to know you,” he lied. “You sound like my younger sister now.”

“I don’t mean to, you must believe me,” Beatrice assured him. “I’m not saying anything by it. It’s just…”

“Well, spit it out,” Edwin prompted. “What are you saying by it?”

“Only that our marriage is not conventional by any means. And before you say anything, I know this is a marriage of convenience for both of us, but I expected things to be different.”

“Different?” the Duke asked. “Please go on.”

“I feel I am making you angry, and that is not my intention. I will keep my mouth shut.” Beatrice looked up from her plate and smiled playfully. “Except to eat, of course. I can’t very well keep my mouth shut for that.”

“No,” Edwin muttered.

He shouldn’t have been annoyed by her questions, but it was not Beatrice with whom he was annoyed. He was annoyed at himself, at life, at Society. He considered her words, and he knew what she meant.

“Yes, my family lives here with me and not in separate lodgings,” the Duke said.

Beatrice opened her mouth to speak, but he held up a finger, silencing her.

“And I can see you are disappointed by our wedding. We did not have a grand wedding, and there was no breakfast celebration after and no honeymoon. Your first morning after we wed, and you come downstairs for breakfast only to find my entire immediate family waiting for you.”

“I enjoy their company,” Beatrice reassured him. “You shouldn’t worry about any of this.”

“I do worry about it, and I have worried about it for years—that’s the problem,” Edwin said. “It is because my estate is not in good shape.”

“Not in good shape? What do you mean? Does my father know? You should have told me.”

Edwin gave a wry smile. “This coming from the woman who tricked me into marriage and used to dress as a man to sneak out at night. There is nothing to worry about, and your father does not need to know anything. My estate is in the best shape it has been since I inherited the dukedom, and it will soon be in fine shape, then good shape, and then great shape. My father left us with a lot of debt.”

“Oh,” Beatrice murmured. “I didn’t know that.”

“Not many do, and you shall tell no one, not even your father. I have worked for years to right the wrongs of the past, and I won’t fail now.”

Beatrice held his gaze. “I know you won’t.”

He stared back at her, and her eyes were still clouded with lust, but there was compassion there, too. He hadn’t talked about this to many people, enough to count on one hand, but something about the woman before him made him want to open up.

“My father was a good man,” Edwin continued. “A very good man. Generous—perhaps too generous. Many people took advantage of his good nature, and I regret arguing with him about that so much. We were on good terms, but his downfall was hard to watch. I assumed that downfall—the debts, the reputational damage, the embarrassment.”

“I didn’t know any of this,” Beatrice murmured. “I never meant to anger you or stir up the past.”

“You haven’t done either,” Edwin stated. “Not many know my father was the one who put us in so much debt. After he passed and the dukedom passed on to me, I could start making the decisions he was never able to. I had to do things he would never have done, but I did it for my family and his reputation. That is why I have not spent money on our wedding or anything superfluous. We can’t spend on those things when there is still work to be done.”

“I understand,” Beatrice said, placing her fork down after finishing the last of the parsnips on her plate.

“My father had his flaws, but he was a good man, and I want people to remember him as such. I would rather be called names than have him called worse and turning in his grave.”

Beatrice placed her hand on his. “I could see the truth in what Elizabeth told me earlier. She told me you were not cruel but misunderstood. I don’t believe you have been the cruel man they say you are.”

“I am cruel when necessary,” the Duke replied.

The warmth of her hand seeped into his bones, and he tried to control his breathing. Beatrice was not looking at him. Rather, she was looking down at the table instead. Her chest rose and fell invitingly, and she didn’t remove her hand from his.

“You are a good man,” she said, still looking down. “You are honorable and decent for what you have done for your father. And you are hardworking and persistent for working so hard to regain what was once yours. Perhaps you are not unlike your father.”

Edwin withdrew his hand. “I am unlike him. He was weak and let people take advantage of him. My father’s love and generosity are what got my family into this mess. I have to be cruel because people are cruel. If people were like my father, everything would be fine. They are not, so I cannot be. I will not be. I will not be weak—too many people depend on my strength.”

“You are too hard on yourself,” Beatrice whispered.

Edwin looked at her, but she still did not return his gaze.

“I know you are not cruel,” she insisted in a low voice.

“You know a lot about me without spending much time with me,” Edwin said. “How do you know you have not gotten me all wrong? What if I am not the man you think I am?”

“That might be true, but I don’t believe it. I am a very good judge of character. I might not see entirely who you are, but I know who you are not. You are right, we have not spent much time together, but during that time, I have not seen cruelty. You have been gracious and well-intentioned. You’re giving me time and space before you take me into your bed. Those do not sound like the actions of a cruel man.”

“Is that all it takes not to be a cruel man?” Edwin asked, smiling. He stood up and loomed over her. “You believe I am a good man because I did not ravish you on our wedding night. I have thought about taking you in my bed ever since you arrived here, so what does that make me?”

“It makes you… it makes you…”

Beatrice faltered. She bit her bottom lip, and more color rushed to her cheeks—not embarrassment but warmth. She looked up at him like a doe caught in a clearing.

“Then what does it make me if I do this?”

Edwin did not give her time to react. He bent down and kissed her neck, nibbling on the skin just enough to coax a gasp from her lips. He cupped the back of her head in his hand to claim her as his own.

I had to be cruel to get where I am today, and I will have to do more. You don’t know me. No one knows me.

Beatrice did not fight back. She did not try to escape either. What she did surprised him. She grabbed onto his shirt with both hands and tugged his body toward her almost hard enough to send him crashing to the floor, with her beneath him.