Lady Ward was crying.

Eleanor was shouting.

The hedgehog was chirping.

Ignoring all three of them, Derek went to the door and locked it, then angled a chair beneath the doorknob for good measure. No one was leaving the parlor until they had their bloody story straight. Desperately wishing he had a bottle of brandy at his disposal, he settled for draining the two flutes of champagne before he turned to face his reluctant (to put it mildly) fiancée and elated mother-in-law.

“Quiet.” He snapped the word out with the same sharp tone he used for his hounds, and it had a similar effect. At least on Lady Ward and the hedgehog. Eleanor was far more difficult to subdue. Not that he was surprised. ‘Willful nature’ indeed. The chit was what nightmares were born of. And he was going to marry her.

Here’s to you, Grandfather, he toasted silently as he tipped one of the empty flutes up towards the ceiling. Wherever you are, and we both know it isn’t heaven, I know you’re no doubt laughing your arse off, you old bastard.

After twenty-three years of constantly being told he wasn’t good enough, he wasn’t man enough, he wasn’t deserving enough to inherit a dukedom, Derek would be lying if he said he’d shed a tear over his grandfather’s coffin. His grandfather may have raised him – his own mother and father had perished in a boating accident when he was eleven years old – but there’d been no love lost between the two men. His grandmother, a sweet woman who had always snuck him hard candies, said it was because they were too much alike. Whatever the reason, Derek had been relieved when the tyrannical goat had finally met his maker. Until his grandfather’s solicitor had sat him down and explained the unusual terms of the late duke’s will.

It was really quite simple, which made it all the more infuriating. Derek would immediately inherit the title and all of the land and properties that went along with it. But he would only keep the title and the land and properties if he married before his twenty-ninth birthday and (here was the crux of the bloody matter) managed to avoid any major scandals.

The will was a way for his grandfather to control him even in death, and despite seeking the counsel of no less than two dozen different solicitors, he’d yet to discover a way to overturn the damned thing. Yes, it was unusual and even possibly illegal, all of the solicitors had told him. But in order to fight it he would have to go to the courts which were notoriously slow and cumbersome. It could take years before they ruled in his favor, and in the meantime everything – from his townhouse in London to Hawkridge Castle in Surrey – would be placed under the temporary care of the Crown.

Given that he had no intention of pandering to King George every time he wanted use of his own bloody money, Derek had grudgingly accepted the terms of the will. All things considered, it actually hadn’t been that bad. Mr. Evans, the solicitor in charge of making sure the terms of the will were met, was an annoying little fellow, but he’d stayed out of Derek’s way for the most part. He still had an entire year left to find a bride, and by some small miracle he’d even managed to keep his nose clean of any scandals – until a certain redhead with an affinity for odd pets asked him to help free her from underneath a table.

“I still don’t see why I have to marry him.” Hands on her narrow hips, Eleanor shot Derek a look of such utter revulsion that he blinked. “Who cares what other people say? I know the truth, which is that nothing happened!”

Her brown eyes shining, Lady Ward wrapped her arms around her daughter and squeezed her tight. “My darling,” she sniffled happily. “My sweet, darling girl. Do you know how proud of you I am?”

“For getting stuck under a table?” Eleanor said incredulously.

“Don’t be absurd,” Derek drawled. And because some perverse side of him liked it when her eyes flashed and her cheeks flushed with angry heat, he added, “Anyone can get stuck under a table. But it’s a rare lady who gets to marry a duke.”

There went her eyes and her cheeks, and he couldn’t help but grin at how easy she was to antagonize. He felt like a young lad again tugging on Mindy Caterwaul’s braids. Except that teasing had led to a kiss, whereas this was leading straight down the aisle.

“We’re not married yet,” Eleanor gritted out, glaring at him over her mother’s shoulder. “Nor will we ever be! I could never marry you.”

“Why not?” he asked, genuinely curious to hear her reasoning. Knowing he was the most eligible bachelor in all of England wasn’t arrogance; it was simple fact. For years debutantes and their overbearing mothers had been trying to catch him, as if he were a prized trout to be hauled out of the water and displayed on their mantle. He’d managed to keep up the pretense of looking for a wife while simultaneously avoiding all of their advances. No small task, given the doggedness with which he’d been pursued. The Bow Street Runners were known far and wide as the best thief takers in all of London, but they were nothing compared to a desperate debutante.

Once he’d come home to find a young woman hiding behind one of his potted ferns. A potted fern, for the love of Christ! Thankfully his butler, a man accustomed to dealing with hysterical females, had managed to subdue the girl and send her on her way. Then there was the time he’d been accosted at the theatre. All he’d wanted to do was watch a bloody play in peace and quiet, but as soon as word got out that he was in one of the box seats absolute bedlam had ensued. He still had a mark on his arm where one lady’s nails had dug a little too deep in her frantic attempt to cling to him as he’d made his exit.

Dangerous creatures, debutantes. Yet here was one – although to be fair, she was several years past her debut – that had managed, with the help of a runaway hedgehog and a sharp nail, to finally do what no other woman could: catch the Duke of Hawkridge. She should have been crying tears of joy along with her mother. Instead he was fairly certain that if she’d been in possession of a dagger she would have already tried to stab him with it.

Repeatedly.

“Why not?” Managing to slip free of her mother’s embrace, Eleanor regarded him with wide eyes, her pink lips slightly parted and a faint wrinkle in the middle of her nose, as if she’d smelled something particularly distasteful. “For one thing, you’re a pompous, self-entitled rake who has no regard for a woman’s intelligence or her self-worth. You’ve spent your entire life being handed whatever you want, and it’s turned you into a conceited, bullying–”

“All right,” Derek growled, holding up his hand. “I get the bloody point. You don’t want to marry me.” Now it was his eyes that flashed. “Unfortunately, you don’t have a choice in the matter.”

“Of course I have a choice!” She lifted her chin defiantly. “And I choose not to marry you.”

“Is that so?” he said in a very quiet, very gentle voice. Those who knew him understood that when he used such a tone it would be in their best interests to immediately flee in the opposite direction. Eleanor stepped closer.

“Yes,” she said, meeting his hard gaze without flinching. “It is.”

“In that case, I suppose you don’t mind that if word of this gets out your reputation will be completely ruined and no man will ever have you?”

“First, word of this is never going to get out. Second–”

Derek harsh laugh cut her off. “Word always finds a way to get out, my lady. Even now I’ve no doubt there are busy bodies standing outside this room with their ears pressed to the door. Make no mistake, people have noted our absence. And it will not take very long for them to draw whatever dark conclusion they wish.”

“Let them think what they want. Henny and I know the truth, and it doesn’t matter a whit to me if my reputation is ruined.”

“And your parents?” he challenged softly. “What of their reputation? For you can rest assured that they will be given the same cut direct as you. Your mother strikes me as a lovely, sociable woman. What a pity it will be when she’s no longer received by any of her friends.” 

For the first time, Eleanor’s courage faltered. “I…Mama?” she said uncertainly, looking back at Lady Ward. “That’s not true, is it?”

“A scandal of this magnitude would indeed affect the entire family,” Lady Ward said gravely. Then her expression softened. “But if you truly do not wish to marry His Grace, your father and I will not force you.”

Eleanor’s face was so easy to read Derek could decipher every emotion that flitted across her freckled countenance, from doubt to anger to disbelief, and finally, at long last, grim acceptance.

“Fine,” she said shortly. “I’ll marry you. But I’m not going to like it.”

Derek smiled humorlessly. “That’s fine, Red. Neither am I.”