Much Ado About You Read online

  ELOISA JAMES

  Much Ado About You

  Contents

  ONE

  “I am happy to announce that the rocking horses have been delivered…

  TWO

  The first thing Teresa Essex noticed was that the Englishmen…

  THREE

  A few hours later, Tess lay under the damp cloth that…

  FOUR

  Imogen’s hands weren’t shaking. She was quite proud of that…

  FIVE

  Tess found herself to the left of the duke, with…

  SIX

  Lucius Felton was, like most men, enamored of habit. When…

  SEVEN

  “I’ve quite made up my mind to marry him,” Annabel…

  EIGHT

  “The man who marries your eldest ward gets Something Wanton?…

  NINE

  Tess had never been stupid about men, only surprised by…

  TEN

  “A modiste will arrive just after nuncheon tomorrow,” Rafe said…

  ELEVEN

  Rafe woke with a bitter taste in his mouth, the…

  TWELVE

  The next afternoon an extremely interesting event occurred: Mrs. Chace, the…

  THIRTEEN

  Being an only child, and that of parents who saw…

  FOURTEEN

  Tess wasn’t quite certain how she found herself wandering down…

  FIFTEEN

  They were all curled on Tess’s bed, each with her…

  SIXTEEN

  Tess walked down the stairs, her fingers trailing on the…

  SEVENTEEN

  A moment later, the room was crowded. Lady Clarice and…

  EIGHTEEN

  If there was one thing in the world that Imogen…

  NINETEEN

  Draven carried her in the front door, past a gaggle of…

  TWENTY

  Imogen knew nothing of Lady Clarice’s ignominious fall, nor of…

  TWENTY-ONE

  Faced by a woman whose very flounces were dancing with fury…

  TWENTY-TWO

  “If you don’t find the notion too distressing,” Mayne said, raising…

  TWENTY-THREE

  “I’ll tell you what pleasure is,” the Bishop of Rochester…

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Not having slept the previous night, Lucius took a bath…

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The next morning came all too soon. Tess woke up…

  TWENTY-SIX

  The rest of the morning passed in something of a…

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  It turned out that Lucius owned the most elegant carriage…

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  In his adult life, Lucius had never given a second’s…

  TWENTY-NINE

  Lucius’s house was a Tudor collection of herringbone brick and…

  THIRTY

  Dearest Annabel and Josie, I am writing this in my…

  THIRTY-ONE

  A half hour or so before their evening meal would…

  THIRTY-TWO

  Horse races are noisy affairs. The Cup itself wouldn’t be…

  THIRTY-THREE

  The footmen saw them coming, and this time Lucius didn’t…

  THIRTY-FOUR

  When they reached Lady Clarice’s house, Rafe was there with…

  THIRTY-FIVE

  I am so sorry to tell you that Imogen is not…

  THIRTY-SIX

  Tess did not crane her head down St. James’s Street when…

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Mr. and Mrs. Felton awaited them in the drawing room. Whether…

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  They didn’t say a word on the way to their…

  EPILOGUE

  They were sitting for a family portrait. They had been…

  A LOVE LETTER TO LOUISA MAY ALCOTT

  WHY EVERY HEROINE NEEDS A SISTER JUST AS MUCH AS SHE NEEDS…

  PRAISE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  BOOKS BY ELOISA JAMES

  COPYRIGHT

  ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

  Chapter

  1

  September 1816

  Holbrook Court, seat of the Duke of Holbrook

  On the outskirts of Silchester

  In the afternoon

  “I am happy to announce that the rocking horses have been delivered, Your Grace. I have placed them in the nursery for your inspection. As yet, there is no sign of the children.”

  Raphael Jourdain, Duke of Holbrook, turned. He had been poking a fire smoldering in the cavernous fireplace of his study. There was a reserved tone in his butler’s voice that signaled displeasure. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Brinkley’s tone signaled the disgruntlement of the entire household of elderly servants, not one of whom was enchanted by the idea of accommodating themselves to the presence of four small, female children. Well, the hell with that, Rafe thought. It wasn’t as if he’d asked to have a passel of youngsters on the premises.

  “Rocking horses?” came a drawling voice from a deep chair to the right of the fireplace. “Charming, Rafe. Charming. One can’t start too early making the little darlings interested in horseflesh.” Garret Langham, the Earl of Mayne, raised his glass toward his host. His black curls were in exquisite disarray, his comments arrogant to a fault, and his manners barely hid a seething fury. Not that he was furious at Rafe; Mayne had been in a slow burn for the past few months. “To Papa and his brood of infant equestriennes,” he added, tossing back his drink.

  “Stubble it!” Rafe said, but without much real animosity. Mayne was a damned uncomfortable companion at the moment, what with his poisonous comments and black humor. Still, one had to assume that the foul temper caused by the shock of being rejected by a woman would wear off in a matter of time.

  “Why the plural, as in rocking horses?” Mayne asked. “As I recall, most nurseries contain only one rocking horse.”

  Rafe took a gulp of his brandy. “I don’t know much about children,” he said, “but I distinctly remember my brother and me fighting over our toys. So I bought four of them.”

  There was a second’s silence during which the earl considered whether to acknowledge the fact that Rafe obviously still missed his brother (dead these five years, now). He dismissed the impulse. Manlike, he observed no benefit to maudlin conversation.

  “You’re doing those orphans proud,” he said instead. “Most guardians would stow the children out of sight. It’s not as if they’re your blood.”

  “There’s no amount of dolls in the world that will make up for their situation,” Rafe said, shrugging. “Their father should have thought of his responsibilities before he climbed on a stallion.”

  The conversation was getting dangerously close to the sort of emotion to be avoided at all costs, so Mayne sprang from his chair. “Let’s have a look at the rocking horses, then. I haven’t seen one in years.”

  “Right,” Rafe said, putting his glass onto the table with a sharp clink. “Brinkley, if the children arrive, bring them upstairs, and I’ll receive them in the nursery.”

  A few minutes later the two men stood in the middle of a large room on the third floor, dizzily painted with murals. Little Bo Peep chased after Red Riding Hood, who was surely in danger of being crushed by the giant striding across the wall, his raised foot lowering over a feather bed sporting a huge green pea under the coverlet. The room resembled nothing so much as a Bond Street toy shop. Four dolls with spun gold hair sat primly on a bench. Four doll beds were propped atop each other, next to four doll tables, on which sat four jack-in-the-boxes. In the midst of it all was a group of rocking horses graced with real horsehair and coming almost to a man’s waist.

  “Jesus,” Mayne said.r />
  Rafe strode into the room and stamped on the rocker of one of the horses, making it clatter back and forth on the wooden floor. A door on the side of the room swung open, and a plump woman in a white apron poked her head out.

  “There you are, Your Grace,” she said, beaming. “We’re just waiting for the children. Would you like to meet the new maids now?”

  “Send them on in, Mrs. Beeswick.”

  Four young nursemaids crowded into the room after her. “Daisy, Gussie, Elsie, and Mary,” said the nanny. “They’re from the village, Your Grace, and pleased to have a position at Holbrook Court. We’re all eager for the little cherubs to arrive.” The nursemaids lined up to either side of Mrs. Beeswick, smiling and curtsying.

  “Jesus,” Mayne repeated. “They won’t even share a maid, Rafe?”

  “Why should they? My brother and I had three nurses between us.”

  “Three?”

  “Two for my brother, ever since he turned duke at age seven, and one for me.”

  Mayne snorted. “That’s absurd. When’s the last time you met your wards’ father, Lord Brydone?”

  “Not for years,” Rafe said, picking up a jack-in-the-box and pressing the lever so that it hopped from its box with a loud squeak. “The arrangement was just a matter of a note from him and my reply.”

  “You have never met your own wards?”

  “Never. I haven’t been over the border in years, and Brydone only came down for the Ascot, the Silchester, and, sometimes, Newmarket. To be honest, I don’t think he really gave a damn for anything other than his stables. He didn’t even bother to list his children in Debrett’s. Of course, since he had four girls, there was no question of inheritance. The estate went to some distant cousin.”

  “Why on earth—” Mayne glanced at the five women standing to the side of the room and checked himself.

  “He asked me,” Rafe said, shrugging. “I didn’t think twice of it. Apparently Monkton had been in line, but he cocked up his toes last year. And Brydone asked me to step in. Who would have thought that ill could come to Brydone? It was a freak accident, that horse throwing him. Although he was fool enough to ride a half-broken stallion.”

  “Damned if I thought I’d ever see you a father,” Mayne said.

  “I had no excuse to say no. I have the substance to raise any number of children. Besides, Brydone gave me Starling in return for acting as a guardian. I told him I’d do the job, as soon as he wrote me, and no bribe was necessary. But he sent Starling down from Scotland, and no one would say nay to adding that horse to their stables.”

  “Starling is out of Standout, isn’t he?”

  Rafe nodded. “Patchem’s brother. The core of Brydone’s stable is out of Patchem, and those are now the only horses in England in Patchem’s direct line. I’m hopeful that Starling will win the Derby next year, even if he is descended from Standout rather than Patchem himself.”

  “What will happen to Patchem’s offspring?” Mayne asked, with the particular intensity he reserved for talk of horses. “Something Wanton, for example?”

  “I don’t know yet. Obviously, the stables aren’t entailed. My secretary has been up there working on the estate. Should Brydone’s stable come to the children, I’ll put the horses up for auction and the money in trust. The girls will need dowries someday, and I’d be surprised if Brydone bothered to set them up himself.”

  “If Wanton is for sale, I’m the one to buy him. I’d pay thousands for him. There could be no better addition to my stables.”

  “He would do wonders for mine as well,” Rafe agreed.

  Mayne had found a little heap of cast-iron horses and was sorting them out so that each carriage was pulled by a matched pair. “You know, these are quite good.” He had all the cast-iron horses and their carriages lined up on the mantelpiece now. “Wait till your wards see these horses. They won’t think twice about the move from Scotland. Pity there’s no boy among them.”

  Rafe just looked at him. The earl was one of his dearest friends, and always would be. But Mayne’s sleek, protected life had not put him in the way of grief. Rafe knew only too well what it felt like to find oneself lonely in the midst of a cozy nursery, and cast-iron horses wouldn’t help, for all he found himself buying more and more of them. As if toys would make up for a dead father. “I hardly think you—”

  The door behind him swung open. He stopped and turned.

  Brinkley moved to the side more nimbly than was his practice. It wasn’t every day that one got to knock the master speechless with surprise. “I’m happy to announce Miss Essex. Miss Imogen. Miss Annabel. Miss Josephine.”

  Then he added, unable to resist, if the truth be known, “The children have arrived, Your Grace.”

  Chapter

  2

  The first thing Teresa Essex noticed was that the Englishmen were playing with toys. Toys! That fit with everything they’d heard about Englishmen: thin, puny types they were, who never grew up and shivered with cold during a stiff breeze.

  Still, they were only men, if English versions of them.

  Tess hadn’t been much over sixteen years old when she realized that men’s notions of toys were flexible. With a glance at Josie and a touch on Imogen’s shoulder she brought her sisters into a straight line. Annabel had already fallen into place, her head tilted just so, the better to allow the beholders to appreciate the sheen of her honey-golden hair.

  These Englishmen looked even more shocked at the sight of the four of them than was usual. They were practically gaping. Quite rude, really. They weren’t exactly the spindly-legged, sickly creatures she would have expected, from what was said about Englishmen. The one of them looked like a fashion plate and had a wild mop of black curls that she supposed must be fashionable. Not that he was a dandy. Dandies didn’t have that faintly dangerous air. The other was tall, with a bit of a gut and a messy shock of brown hair falling over his brow. A lone wolf, perhaps.

  “Well,” she said finally, when no one spoke, “we are, naturally, sorry to interrupt you both, especially when you were so gainfully occupied.” She gave it just the faintest stress. Just enough to let them know that they were not merely pretty Scottish lasses, to be shunted off to the back room and ignored. They were ladies, after all, whether they wore unfashionable clothing or not.

  The elegant one bowed and came forward, saying, “What a delightful surprise to meet you, Miss Essex. All of you.”

  There was something odd about his voice, as if he were having trouble not laughing. But he kissed her hand with all the adroitness of a courtier.

  Then finally the big one, the lone wolf, shook himself, for all the world like a dog coming out of a puddle, and came to her side as well. “I apologize for my impoliteness,” he said. “I am Rafe Jourdain, the Duke of Holbrook. I’m afraid that I mistook your ages.”

  “Our ages?” Tess let her eyebrows ask a delicate question. Then, slowly, the implications of the gaudily painted room and the clusters of toys sank in. “You thought we were still children?”

  He nodded, standing before her now, bowing again, the easy sweep of a man who has spent his lifetime in the highest echelons of society, even though he (apparently) didn’t bother to brush his hair. “I offer you all my heartiest apologies. I was under the erroneous belief that you and your sisters were quite young.”

  “Young!” Tess said. “You must have thought we were mere babes in arms!” Because now she had taken in the presence of a nanny and four gaping young nursemaids in white aprons, the rocking horses, the dolls. “Didn’t Papa tell you—”

  But she broke off. Of course Papa hadn’t told him. Papa had likely informed him of Starling’s age, and Wanton’s stride, and what Lady of Pleasure liked to eat before a race, but not the ages of his daughters.

  Their guardian had taken her hand and was smiling down at her now, and her heart warmed despite her resentment. “I’m such a fool that I forgot to ask your father. And, of course, I hadn’t the faintest notion that my guardianship
would be needed. Will you accept my deepest sympathies for your loss, Miss Essex?”

  Tess blinked. His eyes were a curious color, sort of a gray-blue. And kind, for all he looked like a wild man of Borneo. A dash of hope mixed with the bleak feeling of defensiveness in her chest.

  “Of course,” she said. “May I introduce my sisters? This is Imogen,” she said, turning to her sister. “Imogen is just turned twenty.” There were moments when she thought that Imogen was more beautiful than Annabel (and that was really saying something). She had their mother’s sleek black hair and her laughing eyes, but that mouth—only Imogen had a mouth that took such an exquisite curve. Sometimes it struck men like a blow in the stomach; it was rather interesting to watch the duke blink and recover.

  Imogen, of course, never paid any mind to the effect she had on men because she was in love. She did smile at the duke, though, and gave a pretty curtsy. When their father had a bit of money, he usually remembered to hire a governess for a time, at least, and so they all could put on dandified manners when required.

  “This is Annabel,” Tess said, putting a hand on Annabel’s arm. “Annabel is the eldest after me; she is twenty-two.” If Imogen paid no heed to men, Annabel must have toddled out of her nurse’s arms knowing how to flirt. Now she gave the duke a rosy-lipped smile that spoke of innocence and something else; she pitched her voice to the tune of an unheavenly appreciation. Her simple greeting sounded like honey with an edge of lemon.

  The duke showed no sign of turning weak at the knees. “Miss Annabel,” he said, bringing her hand to his lips. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”