Scandal And The Duchess

“I’m sorry,” Rose said to Albert. “It’s clear you two had much friction, and I’m very sorry about that. You needn’t worry about seeing me anymore. I’ll take what he left me and go.”

Albert wasn’t listening. He took another step toward her. “My father was wrapped up in my mother. The sun and moon rose and set on her. I thought, I hoped, after she was gone, that he’d turn to me. Embrace me. At least talk to me. But no. You came along and put paid to that, didn’t you? He saw you, and again he forgot I existed. You played him, you little whore. You wrapped him around your finger, and he couldn’t see anything but you. Stupid bugger—at his age, what could he really poke? But you stroked his vanity and turned him from me, and I was cut out again.” Another step, the rage boiling from him. “Then you killed him. He tried to be young again for you, and it killed him. And so, I’m making sure you don’t get one penny of Southdown money. Not cash, not a trust, not a house, not a room in a house. You’ll get your two pieces of bloody furniture, but only if it’s scrap wood.”

He took two more strides inside, then started beating the pile of furniture with his walking stick. Pound, pound, pound!

Rose skipped well back, the dog hiding behind her, whining. Chairs broke, tables fell, the wood rotted, the cloth and rush seats exploding in dust.

Albert beat it all, his face red, arms straining. Rose saw with alarm that he’d started to smile—a gruesome smile—as though breaking up the furniture his father had put out here released something feral inside him.

Rose started to edge around him. Wind and rain notwithstanding, she wanted to be hurrying up the path after Steven, not shivering while Albert rained destruction inside the summerhouse.

Albert saw her. He snarled at her and rushed her, shaking his walking stick.

Rose yelped and scrambled back. The dog, cringing no more, braced himself in front of Rose and started to bark at Albert.

Albert seemed to come to himself a little. He lowered the stick but swung around and scuttled for the door.

“You can wait in here for you lover,” he snapped. “I never want to see you again.”

The idea sat well with Rose. Albert could be left alone with his bitterness and rage, and that would be fine with her.

Albert turned around and glared at her again, his face blotchy, eyes protruding. Then he stepped onto the summerhouse’s porch, wrestled a moment with the big door, and managed to shove it closed.

The summerhouse shook with the impact, raising dust. Rose started sneezing again, the dog echoing her.

She put her hand over her nose and mouth and headed for the door, stopping in dismay when she heard the key screech in the lock.

No matter, Rose thought in irritation. The hinges were flimsy enough. She’d wait until Albert was gone, then pry the door loose from the wall.

The next moment, she heard a scraping, heavy sound of the ebony settee being dragged along the porch and thumped in front of the door.

“Albert!” Rose yelled. She pounded on the door’s flaking panels. “Let me out at once!”

More pounding, as Albert presumably took his stick to the settee as he’d done to the other furniture. Then came more dragging—this time it sounded as though Albert piled large tree limbs, easy to find in this neglected woods, on top of the settee to block her in. Rose pushed at the door. The hinges gave a little, enough to let in light, but she couldn’t shove the door far enough to slip out.

“Albert!” she shouted.

She heard another drag, thump, and rattle of a heavy branch. The light between the slit in the door was muted.

“Damn and blast you, Albert!”

She heard his tread as he stomped away, then silence but for the wind and rain. Rose balled her fists and beat on the door again. The dog pawed at it, then looked up at her, worried.

“Oh, it doesn’t matter.” Rose pressed her hands flat on the door, then reached down and gave the dog a reassuring pat. “Steven will be back in a few minutes. Won’t he?”

The dog wagged his tail, but looked perplexed, as though wondering why on earth Rose wasn’t letting them out of there.

Rose gazed around at the wreck of the summerhouse and the ruined furniture in sadness. Charles must have sent the extra furniture out here to disguise the settee, but still, these things had been part of the house, part of its history. Albert apparently hated that history.

It was also sad that Charles and Albert had never had a chance to settle their differences. Albert blamed Rose, but Rose could feel no remorse or guilt for that. Either man could have tried to talk to the other, regardless of Rose’s presence. She’d certainly done nothing to keep Charles from Albert—she’d barely known Albert. Charles could have made overtures to his son, but it was also clear that Albert was a spoiled brat, even at his age.

These thoughts went through Rose’s head distractedly as she let out an irritated breath. She was cold, rain pounded down on the roof, and who knew how long it would be before Steven and Albert’s staff could trundle a wagon down here?

The dog left Rose’s side to circle the room, his head down. He might smell rats or birds—the dog would have been trained to fetch grouse or other game from fields after a shoot.

She watched him abstractedly until he started pawing at the wall opposite the door. More than pawing. He let out a bark and scrabbled at the paneling with his paws.

Rose went to him, curiosity spilling through her anger. “What have you found, lad?”