August felt every muscle in his body stiffen, but he forcibly reminded himself what was really at stake here. He bit back his instant acerbic accusations and fought the urge to stuff his impetuous, wayward sister in a burlap sack, fling her over the back of a horse, and take her back to the safety of their London home. Instead he arranged his features into what he hoped was a mask of cool detachment.
He gazed at Anne, taking in her flushed face and snapping eyes. She hadn’t a leg to stand on when it came to righteous indignation, but he had to admire the fact that she had gone on the offensive. Gutsy, that. Instead of looking chastised, she looked as though she wished to run him through.
“You’re looking well, Anne. I’m pleased to see you survived the journey from London no worse for wear.” He kept his voice pleasant. “Imagine my surprise when I discovered that you were no longer residing in our house.”
She had the grace to redden. “I left a note.”
“You did.”
“With instructions. Instructions that you were not to follow me.”
“Indeed. Though had you thought to share your plans with me, I might have given you a ride here. As you may recall, I have interests in Dover that require my attention from time to time. The present being one of those times.”
Anne was staring at him as if he had sprouted a second head. “You’re not angry with me?”
“Oh, I didn’t say that, dear sister.” August avoided looking at Miss Hayward. God only knew what she was thinking.
Anne now looked positively mutinous. “Well, I’m not going back to London with you.” Her mouth was set in a hard line. “I’m…sorry for whatever inconvenience I might have caused, but I intend to stay. I do not require your supervision. I am perfectly fine on my own without you interfering.”
“You’ll be relieved to know that Miss Hayward has also conveyed the same,” August replied, frustration at her resentment rising despite his best efforts. “It is not my intention to interfere with anything. Though I might suggest that your manners are slipping. I am not the only one I think you owe an apology to.”
Anne colored again, and August met Miss Hayward’s dark, measuring gaze. He stared stonily back.
“Miss Hayward,” Anne said quietly, “I apologize for not being truthful with you. And I apologize for my behavior just now. I was just…surprised to see my brother here.”
“That would make two of us,” Miss Hayward replied easily, turning to address her student. “Apology accepted. And you should know that I am also well familiar with older brothers who do things that defy reasonable explanation.”
A reluctant smile pulled at the corner of Anne’s mouth, and August felt the muscles in his jaw tighten.
“I trust that you enjoyed your first day?” Miss Hayward inquired.
“I did. It was…incredible.” There was an instant, blinding animation on Anne’s face that August hadn’t seen in…well, forever. It made her eyes sparkle and her cheeks flush and a dimple appear on the side of her wide smile. He stared at his sister, unable to look away, but she didn’t elaborate on what it was that she had found so incredible. Nothing he had ever given her—no gown or slippers or jewels—had ever come close to eliciting such a reaction.
“I’m glad.” Miss Hayward inclined her head, a small smile playing around her lips. She didn’t offer an explanation either.
“I should go in,” Anne said into the silence that had fallen. “I do not want to be late for dinner, and I still have today’s reading assignment to complete.” She looked at August then, a clear challenge in her soft blue eyes, as if defying him to stop her.
“A good idea,” he said.
Anne bit her lip, suspicion shadowing her features, as if his answer had come too easily. And maybe it had, but for now he needed to be at Avondale, and it was better that Anne was here with him than left to her own devices in London, regardless of how that had come about. Here he could keep an eye on her and make sure she was safe while pursuing his own ambitions.
He supposed that he should be grateful that his sister hadn’t taken it into her head to see Italy. Or Siberia.
“Thank you, August, for being reasonable.” She was still looking at him as if she half expected him to implode.
“When am I not reasonable?” he replied, scowling.
Anne started to speak and then seemingly reconsidered. “Thank you, Miss Hayward,” she offered in lieu of whatever she had been going to say. “I’m very much looking forward to tomorrow. And good night, August,” she added in a courteous tone. “I hope your business goes well and doesn’t take long.” She headed toward the house, and August watched her walk away from him, her posture ramrod stiff.
“I apologize on behalf of my sister, Miss Hayward,” he said as Anne disappeared into the house without a backward glance.
“Do not make me accuse you of being redundant twice in as many minutes, Your Grace. Lady Anne already apologized.” Her words were light and held no judgment.
“Still, she should never have deceived you.” Or me.
Miss Hayward shrugged. “She’s still young. I suspect she acted as she did because she felt you didn’t trust her.”
“Trust her?”
“To conduct herself in a manner that meets your approval.”
August stared at Miss Hayward, aghast. “Is that what you think? Is that what she thinks?”
“I can’t answer for Lady Anne. But I do think she is fortunate to have a brother who cares as much as you do.”
She had done that neatly—softened her refusal to answer his question with a compliment meant to distract and flatter. It was a ploy he used regularly to get what he wanted—usually information—and it was a curious sensation to be on the receiving end.
“That’s not it at all.” He shook his head. “It’s Anne who doesn’t trust me.”
“Trust you to do what?”
“To take care of her.” Why did he need to state the obvious?
“Be more specific.”
“What?” The question threw him.
“What, specifically, is it that you believe you can do for your sister that she cannot do for herself?” Again, there was no judgment, only curiosity, and her words held shades of the question he had asked her at the very beginning.
“I can protect her from every manipulative, greedy bastard who will wish to use her for his own gain. To get to me, or maybe just my money. I can make sure that the spiteful gossip that is the currency of the ton never touches her.” He stopped abruptly, aware his voice had risen.
“Mmm.” Miss Hayward’s noncommittal sound was almost as discomfiting as his outburst.
“What’s mmm supposed to mean?” He had no idea how he’d managed to be drawn into this conversation, but he seemed powerless to retreat from it now.
“Keeping in mind that I too have a brother who cares very much about both my sister and myself—”
“Just say whatever it is that you’re going to say.” It was rude, but frustration had eroded his patience.
“Very well.” She didn’t look offended. Or even surprised. “You can’t control your sister, even though I understand that your motives are honorable.”
“I don’t want to control her,” he snapped. “I want to make sure she makes the right choices that will ensure her happiness. This role she’s found herself in, one of the sister to a duke, does not come naturally to her.”
“How so?”
August threw up his hand. This was absolutely none of Miss Hayward’s business, but he had been the one to bring it up, and there had been something strangely cathartic about the torrent of words that had escaped. Whether he liked it or not, Clara Hayward was going to be Anne’s teacher for the foreseeable future. Perhaps she would be able to talk some sense into Anne.
“She holds herself aloof from the other young ladies of the ton. Makes no effort to blend in socially. Takes no interest in her future.” He shook his head. “She refuses to believe that if she doesn’t make the right choices, her happiness cannot be guaranteed.”
“I see. And what, exactly, are the right choices required for happiness?”
“The same as anyone’s. A place in society. A good, sensible marriage—” August stopped suddenly.
Miss Hayward’s expression hadn’t changed, nor had she uttered a word, but something in her dark eyes had shifted. There was unmistakable disappointment there now. “Ah. You don’t want her to end up like me.”
“That’s not what I meant. That’s not at all—”
“I understand, Your Grace. You don’t wish your sister to be the oddity at the ball, tolerated because of a title or perhaps because of her wealth, or both. You do not wish Lady Anne to be the girl who gets asked to dance only on a dare.” She said it with not a trace of self-pity.
August took another step toward Miss Hayward, needing to say something that would erase the disappointment he’d seen in her eyes. Needing to say something that would ease the regret that had settled heavily in his chest. That feeling that he was losing something—that something was once again slipping through his fingers—returned. God, he was making an epic mess out of this.
“Do not put words in my mouth, Miss Hayward. Because that’s not who I see when I look at you.” The force of his words made her eyes widen. “I see an intelligent woman, the same one who once put an ignorant buck in his place and taught him that things are rarely as they seem. I wish I had understood that then.”
“And what would you have done differently if you had?” she asked quietly.
“I would have asked you to dance again.” August reached for her hand and caught it, bringing it up between them, his thumb sliding over her bare knuckles. “I wish I had asked you to dance again.”
She was silent for a long minute, a gut-wrenching, electrifying mix of desire and longing flitting across her usually unreadable features.
Her fingers tightened on his. “I wish you had too,” she said, and August felt the breath leave his lungs.
She had told him once that regrets were nothing but excuses, but he was having a hard time recalling what excuse had prevented him from kissing this woman witless. What excuse he might think up to prevent himself from doing it now. All he had to do was catch her face in his hands and dip his head. Capture her lips with his own and be done with wondering what might have been. Be done with regrets and excuses and take control the way he should have a very long time ago.
He gazed at her, the sinking sun kissing her skin a golden color and setting fire to the mass of thick tresses that had surrendered to the breeze and defeated their pins. A curl she had so valiantly tried to stuff behind her ear trailed down the side of her face, the end drifting to touch the skin near the lace-trimmed edge of her bodice. His found his eyes slipping over the gentle swell of her breasts concealed by her modest gown. The deep color of it was the perfect foil for her fair skin, and for a brief second he wondered how she might taste if he pressed his lips to the delicate shadow of her cleavage, her throat, and then her lips. Wondered again what would have happened if he had kissed her that night a decade ago. Wondered what would happen if he did so now. His gaze stalled on her mouth. Her lips were generous, the upper slightly more voluptuous, begging for attention and stirring all sorts of erotic thoughts far south of his brain.
She had never looked more touchable. More perfect.
The air between them had thickened, crackling with tension and anticipation. And then she stepped back, pulling her hand from his, and he almost cursed out loud as a mask of pleasant neutrality dropped over her features. “You speak of marriage being a requirement for happiness, Your Grace, yet you yourself remain unwed. So I might see where Lady Anne remains skeptical of your decrees.”
August felt his lip curl in distaste. “I am well aware of my duties to the duchy, Miss Hayward. When I choose a bride, it will be a sound financial and business decision, as all good marriages should be.”
“So you’re holding out for an heiress.” She sounded both cynical and amused.
“If that is what it takes. I’ve seen what happens when people marry because they believe themselves in love, and it isn’t pretty. Contrary to the opinions of poets, love does not conquer all.”
“Your sense of romance is overwhelming.”
“I do not have the luxury of believing romance and marriage to be the same.”
“And what about your sister?”
“Anne will have respect and admiration. Financial security and social standing. Those are the foundations necessary if love within a marriage is to be achieved. And I will make sure she has those things.”
And what does she have to say about that?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“I might suggest that your sister needs a brother, not a dictator,” Miss Hayward said evenly, in that damnably composed way of hers.
He took a deep breath. “I’m not her dictator. I’m her protector.”
“I fail to see the difference in this case.”
“Anne is not you. You are stronger than she is,” he said.
“Then you underestimate your sister, Your Grace.”
August looked away. How the hell would she know that? She didn’t truly know Anne, not the way he did. This was all so…impossible.
“What is she reading? The assignment she mentioned?” August asked abruptly, knowing that this change of topic was wholly transparent and not caring. He might not be able to control everything—the rise and fall of the tides was a bit beyond him—but there was no excuse for prolonging an ill-advised conversation he never should have started.
“I’m sure it’s of little interest to you.”
“Then you’d be wrong.”
“It’s titled Marriage,” Miss Hayward said with a measure of irony.
“I’ve not heard of it.”
“No, I don’t suppose you would have. I received my copies shipped from Edinburgh only last week.”
“A Scotsman wrote it?”
A small smile played around Miss Hayward’s lips. “No. A Scotsman most assuredly did not write it.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t need to, Your Grace. As you pointed out earlier, you are not a student of the Haverhall School for Young Ladies. Unless, of course, you feel the need to determine what Lady Anne is and isn’t allowed to read while she is under my tutelage.” She said it genially, but August could hear the steely challenge beneath.
Dictator indeed. “Of course not.”
“I’m glad to hear it. You are welcome to read it yourself, if you like. I can have a copy sent over to the dower house.” She hesitated. “Perhaps that would give you an alternative topic of conversation in which you may engage your sister.”
August frowned. He didn’t need any more of Miss Hayward’s advice when it came to Anne. He’d already disclosed far more than was wise, and he did not like to give anyone any kind of leverage. “No, thank you. I’m quite sure that I’ll have other things that will occupy my time.” Like focusing on the real reason he was here.
Because he didn’t accept failure. Failure was for weak people like his father.
“Would you join me for dinner?” he asked. He needed to get back on track. Start making some inroads with the Haywards that didn’t involve his own family tribulations.
“I beg your pardon?” Miss Hayward stared at him, those liquid brown eyes widening in startled uncertainty and a beautiful flush creeping into her cheeks. August tried not to be too pleased.
“The invitation, of course, extends to your brother. And your sister too, if she’s so inclined. I am, after all, trespassing somewhat, and it’s the least I can do.” And it was something that the Duke of Holloway did when courting an investment. Invite the stakeholder to his club or to his home and lavish him with good food and better liquor. An expensive strategy, but one that invariably paid off in spades. It was easy to disarm his next prospective opportunity when he was drunk on extravagance.
Though he suspected that none of the Haywards would be impressed with such extravagance. Especially since it had been part of the demise of their fortunes, an obsession that had cost their parents almost everything. No, the Haywards would require something a little different, yet no less memorable.
“I’m afraid I’m going to have to decline, Your Grace.”
“Wonderf— Wait, what?” He stared at Miss Hayward. Dammit, why was she making this so difficult? A dinner invitation from a duke seemed to be something the rest of society fell all over itself to accept. “Why? Is it a requirement that you eat with your students?”
She frowned. “Not at all. In fact, I try to give them space to socialize amongst themselves. They’ll see enough of me in the coming days, but I do make it a point to be available the first evening to ensure they’ve settled in and address any concerns and questions.”
“Tomorrow, then.”
“Your Grace—”
“You need to eat. Why not with me?” He was not taking no for an answer.
“Um.”
“There is a tavern on the north side of town that serves excellent lamb with mint and an even better selection of wines. The kind of wine that has had the privilege of being crafted in France.”
“The Silver Swan.”
“You know it?”
“Yes,” she said slowly.
“Good. We’ll take an equipage from Avondale. How does six o’clock sound?”
“It sounds delightful, but I don’t think—”
“I insist. It’s the least I can do in return for your gracious hospitality. And, of course, Lord Strathmore’s.” He smiled in his most disarming manner. “Even if he doesn’t know it yet.”
Miss Hayward gave him a weak smile, and he could see her teetering on indecision. No doubt weighing the consequences of refusing a duke a request. Though a request that was not asinine, but entirely proper and sincere. At least on the surface.
“I promise not to dare you to dance. Or do anything else that would give your brother leave to put a bullet hole in my coat.”
She laughed then, a low, musical sound, and it was as if the sun had broken through a cloud. Her eyes crinkled at the corners, and August thought that time might have stopped for the briefest of moments. He had never, in all his life, wanted to kiss a woman as badly as he did right now. He thought he might ask her to dinner every night just to hear her laugh again like that.
Until he remembered he was not asking her to dinner to woo her. He was asking her to dinner to extract whatever information he could from her and her family to use to his own advantage. Potentially.
He was disturbed at the guilt that instantly stabbed at his conscience. August reminded himself that he wasn’t deceiving her—not really. Further to his purchase of the school, he was simply…exploring a mutually beneficial opportunity, even if the Haywards didn’t know it yet. And there was no room in good business for guilt.
“In that case, I thank you,” she said, though she had moderated her smile, and now it was simply one of polite acceptance. “That would be lovely.”