Desperate Duchesses (Desperate Duchesses #1)

Desperate Duchesses (Desperate Duchesses #1) Page 71

On his bottom.

Behind him he heard a grunt of distress from his footman, who lurched forward to rescue the poor forsaken duke who had slipped in the muck. But Villiers was already up.

The fall made the rage brewing in his stomach burst into flame. He made his way home, stripped off the coat smeared with green moss and black mud, bathed and dressed again for the evening.

It occurred to him as he pulled on tight breeches of a glorious canary that without noticing it and certainly without approving it, he had fallen into the way of thinking of himself as a man about to be married. For all of forty-eight hours, he scoffed to himself.

His valet eased a coat of saturated rose over his shoulders; he rejected it as clashing with the breeches. The man brought a waistcoat of mustard yellow, and Villiers actually swore at him. Finally he settled on a full-cut frock coat with his trademark exuberant embroidery: a tracing of leaves and yellow roses. It was, perhaps, just a trifle too exuberant, but it had an aggressiveness that pleased.

The valet cleared his throat rather nervously. “Boots, Your Grace? Or the shoes with silver buckles?”

“Red heels,” Villiers snapped. “I’m to Parsloe’s and then to dinner with Lord Devonshire. I can hardly tramp about in boots.” Rather than his cane, he chose a proper little rapier, designed to swing at his hip. Finally he placed a patch high, just below his eye where it would emphasize his lashes.

He swept a cold look around his chamber, a muddle of rejected coats, cravats, shoes, ribbons spilling from his drawer. “Do make yourself useful and neaten this up,” he said softly. “I have a mind to bring someone home later.”

“A bloody animal he is tonight,” his valet said later, in the kitchen with a soothing cup of tea. “As if I didn’t always neaten up. I’m sure I don’t know what’s got into him.”

“The lady’s rejected ’im,” Cook said, wiping her hands on her apron. “I’ll bet you an apple tart next Tuesday that she’s turned him down flat.”

“You think that because he’s bringing home a dollymop?”

She had a sound of disgust. “Nothing to do with it. He’s in a foul mood, he is. And he’s not over at Beaumont House, is he? He’s been there for three days running. Mark my words: he’s back on the market again.”

“I don’t think he ever was on the market,” the valet said dubiously.

“Could be he’s not a marrying man,” Cook concluded. “I’d best make up some bits and pieces for entertaining a ladyfriend tonight.”

“Got rid of his mistress and all last week,” the valet said mournfully. “And now the wife drops him. That’s cruel, that is.”

“Not his wife yet, and that’s a blessing in itself,” Cook said. She had firm views about matrimony, and one could not describe them as positive. “Out of the way, will you? I can’t put a hand on my sugar.”

Parsloe’s, like any organization of its ilk, was ruled by the unspoken hierarchy structuring the members of the London Chess Club. Brilliance ruled. Chess is an odd and unlikely sport: it taxes the brains and the heart at the same time. Even a poor player might sometimes make a beautiful play, or stump a master, and thus the hierarchy is never set in stone. Only at the very top is it unassailable.

Villiers’s carriage pulled up at precisely eight o’clock. It was a delicious little carriage, as sleek and beautiful as its master: painted a dark crimson, and picked out in brazen orange accents.

The door was snatched open by the duke’s footman; three others joined in, standing before the door, backs straight, liveries immaculate.

One red heel emerged from the carriage, followed by a powerful, muscled thigh clad in canary colored breeches. The duke wore, as usual, not a touch of powder. He walked to the door of the large townhouse that served as the chess club’s headquarters without looking to the left or the right.

As he climbed the stairs, a footman swept open the front door. Inside, he handed his hat to one, and his cape to another.

“I shall keep my sword,” he said to Parsloe, who was bowing. “I am not in the mood for killing tonight.”

The rules of the chess club insisted on no weapons, but what could Parsloe say? The duke ruled. And not because of his title, either.

Villiers strolled into the main room, knowing that anger was burning within him like a slow coal, and rather relishing the pure stupidity of it. He didn’t want the girl, never really wanted the girl, and now he was angry because he no longer had her? Such is the foolishness of men.

Lord Woodword Jourdain looked up when he came in. “Villiers!” he cried. “You’re just in time to try my new chess game.”

Villiers strolled to his side and looked down at the cacophony of pieces. “How many pieces in this version, Jourdain?”

“Twenty-eight,” Jourdain said eagerly. “Ten rows and fourteen columns. I had to make up a special board.”

“This piece?” Villiers put a beautifully manicured forefinger on a piece.

“The concubine,” Jourdain said.

“An errant piece, no doubt.”

“Only held in check by two additional bishops.”

“And these?”

“Crowned rooks.”

“I think not,” Villiers said, turning away. “I’ve had enough of females, concubines or otherwise…they are all so tiresome, are they not?”

Jourdain huffed in annoyance, but Viscount St. Albans looked up. “Do tell,” he said with his usual lisp. “Has true love tarnished so quickly?”

“Ah, what is love?” Villiers said. The only person sitting before an unattended chessboard was Lord Gordon. “A game, my lord?”

“My pleasure, Your Grace.”

“I’ll give you a rook advantage,” Villiers said gently.

Lord Gordon’s face showed no response at all to this insult, merely a bovine gratitude, and Villiers felt his temper slip a notch higher.

“What is love, ’tis not hereafter,” St. Albans said. “I believe that’s Shakespeare, but even so, Your Grace, your experience of love must have been remarkably brief. It’s been no more than a day since I heard you were engaged.”

“I give you the joy, St. Albans, of being the first to know that I am no longer engaged,” Villiers said.

“At least try a few of the pieces,” Jourdain said, suddenly appearing at his shoulder. “You’ve no idea how interesting it makes the game, Villiers. Take the concubine.” He plumped the piece down in the middle of the board. “Here’s another for you, Gordon. She moves all directions, of course, just like the queen. Her special touch is that she can take two men in a row, but she never takes the king or the queen.” He giggled madly. “She’s not that sort of concubine.”

“What?” Gordon’s pink lips flapped like a fish on the dock, Villiers decided. “We can’t play with a piece like that.”

“You play with pieces like that all the time,” Villiers said sweetly. “That was you I glimpsed with Mrs. Rutland the other night?”

Gordon was rearranging his pieces and didn’t look up. Villiers could only hope that he remembered where they all went.

“The concubine goes in front of the king’s rook,” Jourdain instructed. “She’s on her knees already, you understand.”