The Duke's Undoing (Three Rogues and Their Ladies) by G.G. Vandagriff Page B

your manners seem to have mended nicely, and I’m terribly sorry about your leg, but aren’t you being the tiniest bit selfish? It does seem a shame that the lovely Elise shouldn’t dance. She does enjoy it so.”
    “Somerset will be along in a bit if he’s not already here. He’s the only one I will trust her with.” Their hostess laughed. “George barely speaks. You have chosen wisely. Try the card room. I’m quite certain you will find him at whist or loo.”
    Elise made a delightful moue. “I don’t want to come between a man and his cards, dearest. It’s quite warm in here, don’t you think? Perhaps a stroll on the terrace? Lady Sumner has the most divine peacocks.”
    “Not to mention a maze,” he raised an eyebrow.
    Whacking him on the wrist with her fan, she said, “You’ve had your kiss already today, darling.”
    Lady Sumner watched this exchange, her eyes sparkling with the intelligence she could quite probably not wait to impart to the dowager set. “Looks like you’ve traded one commanding officer for another,” she teased him.
    Clasping the back of Elise’s milk-white neck with one hand, he assured his hostess as he guided his fiancée away, “I haven’t given up all my tricks, My Lady.”
    Once they had entered the ballroom, Elise said, “You seem to be very fond of Lady Sumner, and she of you. Confess! You are not nearly as depraved as they say.”
    He compressed his lips into a thin, hard line. “It’s been ten years since she’s set eyes on me,” he said.
    For some reason, this grim pronouncement caused her to stroke his weathered face with the back of her glove. “Your leg must be paining you. Come, there’s a seat in that alcove. There is something I must discuss with you.”
    His leg was paining him, beside which he was curious, so he led his affianced to the alcove she indicated. Lady Sumner’s ballroom was one of the largest in London. It boasted chandeliers made by the same glazier as those in Versailles. The windows were so tall, they nearly reached the ceiling, which rose three floors and was domed, sporting the requisite cupid frescos. The room was hung with silver silk. Their alcove was fitted with a cozy love seat, upholstered in anthracite velvet.
    Ruisdell feared he was in for a scold, so he preempted it by asking, “How are you adjusting to your role as a future duchess of this isle?”
    “That would be nothing were you not the duke in question! I tend to be less practical than the ordinary woman and temperamental with it. I also like to go my own way. I’m afraid we wouldn’t suit at all.”
    Throwing his head back, he laughed his first genuine from-the-diaphragm laugh since crossing the channel for Portugal. He was thinking of all the pranks, masquerades, and mischief Sunshine and his adjutant had played at during their growing-up years. Oh, he had enough blackmail ammunition to keep her tamed well into the twentieth century! But, of course, he wouldn’t tell her that. The disembodied voice added, Yet . Ignoring it, he looked at her with amusement.
    “Now what is it you wish to discuss?”
    Rapping him again with her closed fan, she said, “I absolutely forbid you to meet Robert tomorrow. I know you said you wouldn’t; however, that’s what duelists always tell their ladies before sneaking out at dawn.”
    He took one of the curls that lay on her shoulder and used it to tickle her ear. Batting him away with her fan (he must find a way to divest her of that article), she went on. “He might not kill you, but he could shoot your other knee. Then where would you be? I can’t imagine how impossible your temper would become were you confined to a sofa for the rest of your life!”
    “I could still ride a horse. And how is it that you think I’m such a poor shot? I just returned from a war, where sadly, I shot many unfortunate men. I don’t like to dwell on it, but there it is.”
    “Robert, being obviously touched in his upper works, as they say, has no