Spellbound (2 page)

“And what about his grace’s
family? I have not yet met them, you know, and I’d like to know a
little bit about them before I do.”

Meg scrunched up her face
for a moment, a look of what one might call distaste crossing her
features. “There’s his grace’s sister, Lady Freya. She’s a bit of a
wild one and always out and about on her horse. They do say she is
touched in the upper works and prone to fits. But she’s very
beautiful and all the gentlemen admire her, they do.

“Then there’s his grace’s
maiden aunts. Lady Hetty is kind and gentle but a wee bit
scatter-witted most times. She was his grace’s mama’s sister and
was every bit as pretty as her grace at one time but did never
“take.” The other aunt is Lady Trudy. She is the dowager duchess’s
half-sister and a good bit younger than her grace. Dr. Campbell
says she is a professional invalid,” the young girl confided in a
whisper.

“His grace’s other aunt is
the Marchioness of Montgomery and a tartar for sure. They do say
she harped her own sons until they decided to have naught to do
with her so now she harps at his grace and his lordship to marry.”
Meg gave a little squeak at this point, as she was talking to his
grace’s fiancée, and apologized for her impertinence.

“It is nothing, Meg. Pray
forget it. Tell me about Lord Windhaven’s grandmother.”

Meg smiled and obliged her
new mistress. “Lady Windhaven is…well, she is…” The maid’s eyes
grew bigger. “I don’t know, milady. Lady Windhaven is a
duchess.”

Raven knew what this meant.
Lady Windhaven would prove to be high-in-the-instep, autocratic,
possibly even vindictive. Her word would be law, her preferences
everyone’s, her annoyances shared. She would make sure Raven was
indeed Lady Rachael Elizabeth Eliot, the long-lost daughter of the
Marquess of Dunston.

For the first time, Raven
realized what a truly monumental task she’d set for
herself.

Raven’s heart misgave her
when she first encountered the Dowager Duchess of Windhaven. The
woman was tall, gray-haired, and as haughty as she could have ever
imagined. And Raven very much feared the woman knew she was an
impostor.

After a brief few minutes
in which to refresh herself, a helpful footman—who gave her a
sympathetic smile—led Raven to the drawing room. She beheld rich
furnishings, expensive paintings and tapestries, and the haughty
stares of her new employer’s family. The duke was conspicuously
absent. Raven filed this fact away for later.

“Lady Rachael, how
delightful to meet you,” the oldest lady said regally from her
throne-like chair at the far end of the immense drawing room,
sounding anything but delighted.

Raven curtsied low, but not
too low. A younger woman sat on her right, her face pinched as if
she were in pain. On the left of the dowager was a woman of
indeterminate years who affected the style of a débutante and had a
vacant expression on her face. A pug sat in her lap with the same
vacant expression on his little smushed face. Raven marveled at how
alike they were in appearance.

The woman with the pinched
look deigned to acknowledge the newcomer with a regal nod of her
head. Raven supposed she must be the dowager’s daughter, Lady
Montgomery; there was an unmistakable resemblance.

As the vacant lady greeted
her absently, a redheaded termagant burst into the room. She
stopped when she caught sight of Raven, turned to look at the
dowager, and then gave Raven a look filled with such loathing that
the former actress was quite taken aback. The girl curtsied
mockingly and smiled.

Raven thought the young
woman’s smile was far more threatening than her earlier look. But
she forced herself to smile back. “You must be Lady Freya. I am
pleased to meet you.” She curtsied slightly and held out a
hand.

Lady Freya looked down at
Raven’s hand as if it were a particularly loathsome insect. The
duke walked in then and approached Raven. He glared at his sister
long enough to cause that young lady to flush and accept Raven’s
handshake. Then she flounced away to sit by her Aunt Hetty, Lady
Mehetabel Hatridge, the late duchess’s sister.

Lord Windhaven bowed
formally over Raven’s hand, apologized for not having appeared
sooner, and placed her hand on his arm. He led her over to his
grandmother and aunts, performing the introductions gracefully and
with the utmost formality. Raven stood stoically throughout,
curtsying and nodding as was proper, smiling at all despite the
obvious suspicion and unfriendliness with which she was regarded by
all.

Dinner seemed to crawl by
although the duke kept up a seemingly endless debate with his
grandmother about the current bills presented in Parliament. Raven
wondered how he managed to be so up-to-date when everyone knew he
rarely left his estate. Newspapers were notoriously
inaccurate.

She spoke only when spoken
to, using this opportunity to read her companions. She found
Windhaven’s sister to be rude and quite often offensively so but
she sensed in her an unhappiness that she found truly perplexing.
His grandmother was firmly set in her beliefs and opinions, rarely
allowing even the duke to override her. The flighty aunt rarely
spoke, unless to her pug, Horatio, and then it was to comment on
the various persons present at the table as if they were not even
there. The other aunt glared at Raven from time to time but
otherwise kept her thoughts to herself.

One aunt was missing from
their family gathering and Raven had been told she was very ill.
When she asked the duke about this and offered to help nurse her,
he had gravely informed her that his dear aunt was a hypochondriac
and needed nothing more than to have her bottles and powders taken
away for a time to prove it. Apparently, Meg had been right in her
confidential assessment.

The duke himself was such a
grave, solemn man that Raven wondered why. He had not had a very
difficult life that she could tell but he seemed to exude a certain
disapproval of everyone and everything around him.

Raven looked over at him
curiously, careful not to let any of her interest show. He was
regarding her with an expression almost of anger and she wondered
why. She did a mental check of her appearance. She wore her hair up
as fashion said she must, unusual for her, as she preferred to
leave the heavy tresses down. Her gown of pale blue complemented
her dark locks and made her dark skin seem golden in the
candlelight. She wore long gloves, wrinkled just so, and a tasteful
necklace of sapphires set in gold. Her brow furrowed slightly at
his look.

He looked away, gazing
pointedly at his grandmother. “I believe Lady Rachael is looking
decidedly peaked after her journey, grandmother, and I would like a
word with her before she retires.”

Raven sent him a
questioning look, which he resolutely ignored, while the dowager
rose to signal that dinner was over. The rest of the ladies rose as
one and left Raven alone with her “fiancé.”

Windhaven signaled the
dismissal of all the servants with an imperious wave of his hand.
The footmen filed out, followed closely by the butler. In moments,
they were alone.

“What the devil are you
about?” he demanded.

Raven was stunned but she
didn’t show it. Instead, she replied mildly, “What do you mean,
your grace?”

“I hired you—”

Raven interrupted before he
said too much. “Is it wise, your grace, to discuss this here? The
walls do have ears, you know.” she remarked blandly.

The duke stared at her in
disbelief.

Raven sighed. “Your grace,
I realize that what I am about to propose is against all rules of
propriety but I feel it may be best. If you would like to discuss
anything of a personal nature with me, I request that we do so in
the privacy of one of our rooms. Since you and I know the truth of
our situation…” she let the words trail off, knowing he would grasp
that she could not truly be compromised since she was nothing more
than an actress.

He seemed to mull this
over, his natural inclination to have his own way warring with the
wisdom of her request. “Very well,” he finally said. He rose to his
feet and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “I will
come to you in ten minutes.” He walked from the room with all the
confidence of his position in life and Raven felt an unaccustomed
pang of envy.

He must have been crazy.
Did he actually hire an actress to play the part of a missing
woman? Lord, what was he thinking to allow this to even
continue?

These and similar thoughts
ran through Lord Windhaven’s mind as he traversed the halls to the
apartment allotted to Raven. He paused outside her door, his hand
poised to knock. He took a deep breath and scratched at the hard
wood.

The door opened
soundlessly. Raven stared up at him, her seductively beautiful face
set in lines of expectation but nothing else. She stood silently
aside as he entered and closed the door.

Now that he was in her
presence, and enough time had passed to cool his anger, Windhaven
was unsure how to start. He had thought he had been reasonably
angry earlier, but now, he wondered.

“Please sit, Lord
Windhaven, and tell me what I did at dinner this evening that so
displeased you,” Raven said in her pleasant, throaty
voice.

He noticed she was still
dressed in her evening gown of blue silk, the fabric swirling
around her, showing glimpses of lush curves. He found himself
wondering what she looked like naked and was almost relieved at the
return of his earlier anger.

“I would like to know,
madam,” he began, declining the offer to sit, “exactly what you
think you are doing here?”

Her dark, perfectly shaped
brows quirked ever so slightly at his sharply spoken inquiry. “I
was under the impression that you hired me to play the part of Lady
Rachael, Lord Windhaven. Am I mistaken in this? If so, I will
return to London first thing.”

“That is not what I meant.
I realize I hired you to play the part of Lady Rachael. What I want
to know is, why are you acting like a damned saint?”

Any shred of animation or
emotion on Raven’s face disappeared. She stared up at the duke and
said, “If my acting does not meet your requirements, my lord, I beg
that you inform me how I am to act instead of leaving me so
completely in the dark. I have agreed to this without prior
knowledge of your real reason behind it. What is it you truly wish
to accomplish with this masquerade?”

Windhaven’s brow furrowed.
He began pacing about the room like a lion, his tawny locks winking
in the firelight.

Raven sighed, drawing his
attention. “Why did you hire me, Lord Windhaven?”

He stopped moving. He stood
as still as a statue, in fact. “I don’t know. I thought that if I
had a fiancée, grandmother would stop haranguing me about getting
married.”

“That is highly unlikely
until you actually do marry, my lord,” she replied logically. She
moved across the room with the fluid grace for which she was known
and sat in a handsome chair by the crackling fire. “After all,
engagements are broken all the time. It would be very easy for you
to retain your independence and your grandmother did not strike me
as a stupid woman. She would not be satisfied until you were safely
wed.”

The duke strode over and
sat down in the opposite chair. He looked at his companion, not
really caring for her unwavering calm. He supposed she was right.
The dowager had a way of not giving up until the very final moment.
She would hound him until he walked down the aisle with some pretty
young thing who would breed him strong sons.

As the duke stared at
Raven, an idea began forming in his mind. She had all the behaviors
and mannerisms of a lady, so why not? He supposed he could do much
worse and Raven was definitely easy on the eyes. In fact, she was a
treat to look upon with her glossy black hair, fathomless black
eyes, tall, lusciously curved figure, and seductive voice. He felt
himself react physically to her charms just thinking about
it.

So, the Duke of Windhaven
smiled charmingly and said, “That is easily solved. Marry
me.”

Raven’s famous calm finally
deserted her. She had only been in residence less than a day and
already the man was determined to toy with her. She felt
indignation rising but forced it down and managed to come across as
merely annoyed rather than furious.

“I will pretend you did not
say that and ask you politely to leave me, your grace,” she
replied. “If you would like me to continue this charade of being
your betrothed, I will oblige you. But please do not play games
with me.”

“What games?” he asked
crossly. “I am in earnest, madam, and in considerable shock that
you would not take me seriously.”

“Please, Lord Windhaven. If
you are in earnest, then you will, like the gentleman you are,
allow me time to consider your offer.”

The duke rose to his feet
and bowed stiffly. She watched him leave the room and wondered why
the thought of marriage to such a man—a man who would try to dupe
his entire family by hiring an actress to play the part of his
affianced bride—had the power to make her heart skip a beat with
longing.