Dukes By the Dozen

“I’m no hero.” He looked at her from under his brows. “But it was the Battle of Pirano, in the Adriatic Sea. Glorious, sunny day with a good wind. And I was the first lieutenant on Victorious, in charge of sailing the ship while the captain ordered the battle.” Beech ran his good hand through his hair as if he needed to settle his brain before speaking of what she knew must have been an unspeakable trauma. “We engaged in close battle with the French seventy-four, Rivoli, raking her to bloody splinters until we truly were victorious. But as battles go, we both inflicted casualties and took them. And as you see, I was one of those casualties.” He closed his eyes for a moment, then took a deep drink of his brandy before he added, “Lucky for me, I was not one of the fatalities. And thankfully the loss has been no real impediment to my career—I can give orders as effectively with one arm as with two.”

“Very sensible of the navy.” And so like Beech to make so little out of so great an injury. “Indeed, we should be the poorer as a nation—and perhaps not even be a sovereign nation—if we had not had Admiral Nelson, damaged as he was, to lead us.”

“Aye.” The scowl came back to mar Marcus’s sun-swept handsomeness. “But I am no longer a commander, and I fear my appearance in the ballroom shall prove a great impediment to my new career now.”

She did not follow his logic. “I should think you could give orders as efficiently as a duke with one arm as with two.”

“True.” He acknowledged her point. “But the business of being a duke is not only giving orders. It is, according to my mother, getting a wife.”

Wife. The word slid under her skin like a wayward thorn—a piercing, misplaced hurt.

She would never marry now, but Beech would have to.

Penelope swallowed the realization like bitter medicine and set herself to being cheerful. For his sake, if not for hers. “Come now, Beech. You are a hero, no matter what you say. You could arrange for some girl to fall in love with you in an evening, if you wanted.” Though she prayed God he did not. “You have but to smile.”

For the longest moment he stared at her over the rim of his glass, before the hint of that wry smile brewed at the corner of his mouth, “Why, Pease Porridge, do you mean to tell me you think I’m handsome?”

“Do have a look at yourself in a mirror, Beech.” She hid her embarrassment behind sarcasm, though it made a wretched fan—her face had gone hot. “Though you could do with a good barbering if you hope to please the bright young things in the ballroom.” She waved her hand in the general direction of the unsullied girls with spotless gowns and unstained reputations who made themselves available to be married, damn them. “On second thought, damn the bright young things. Keep the beard—it gives you a dashing, piratical air.”

“Must be the terrifying combination of the arm—or what’s left of it—and the beard for piratical. Perhaps I should employ a parrot, so I might amuse as well as frighten.”

“Oh, I should like that.” Beech had always been able to make her laugh. “But you are as you always were, Beech—witty and fun and as handsome as the day is long. You’re the same man at four and twenty that you were at four and ten—kind to your core.”

“Hardly,” he demurred. “If the last ten years have taught me anything, it is that I was certainly not a man at ten and four. But I thank you for the compliment.”

“Most welcome.” She ought to have left it at that, but some prideful last vestige of vanity prompted her to ask, “And how do you find me?”

He closed his eyes, as if he could not conceive of an answer. But then he said, “I should never have thought such a gangly girl should outgrow her spindly legs and pigtails to become such a ravishing, rosy beauty.”

Blissful, blessed warmth rose in her cheeks. “Now, Beech, I shall be forced to give you up, even as a secret friend, if you take to such extravagant lying.”

“I am not lying.” He was not to be talked out of his opinion. “Surely you have a mirror yourself?”

She did, though she had stopped looking into it, afraid that she might see what others saw—a woman tarnished and diminished by her own foolishness. And eaten up with her barely concealed rage.

But why should she rage at Beech? “Thank you, my friend.”

“You’re damned welcome.”

How remarkable. Penelope had not felt so comfortable, so blessedly accepted by another person—man or woman—in quite some time. And that he was a man—and a handsome, desperately attractive one at that—made it all the more remarkable. “Thank you for the brandy as well as your company, Beech.” She raised her glass. “It is beyond lovely to have you back.”

“I thank you.” He raised his glass as well. “Do you know, if this is what being a duke shall be like, I might like it more than I anticipated.”

“How should you not like it? To have your own money, and do as you please, and be the person to whom everyone but the king must show deference? Oh, yes, what an intolerable burden.”