The Duke I'm Going to Marry(53)

But Dillie would. Every damn day of her life.





CHAPTER 9


SEVERAL WEEKS HAD PASSED since Lady Withnall had practically stopped Dillie’s heart in the Farthingale kitchen by revealing she knew Ian had spent a week in her bed. In truth, Dillie had been on edge ever since, dreading the day the axe would fall, though Ian had assured her that it wouldn’t.

She knew it was inevitable, for the gossip was too juicy to remain a secret. Yet Dillie was stunned when her so-called loss of innocence finally did happen. After all these weeks, she had almost been lulled into believing Ian’s assessment had been right.

She couldn’t have been more wrong.

The evening had started out harmlessly enough. She’d just descended from the Farthingale carriage with several members of her family on a beautiful April evening, preparing to attend Lord and Lady Cummerfield’s ball. She was rather proud of the way she looked. Her gown was a simple, white silk concoction, the sort appropriate for an unmarried young woman attending a fashionable ball.

Madame de Bressard had outdone herself. London’s most popular modiste had fit the gown to her perfectly, the smooth fabric draping over her curves so that each fold and sway fell in a way that flattered her body. The feisty Frenchwoman had designed gowns for her and her sisters as each had made their entrance into society. The gowns were exquisite, but her prices were exorbitant.

Dillie wore the Farthingale pearl necklace around her throat, and more pearls had been wound into her stylish chignon, enhancing the dark sheen of her hair. Again simple, yet elegant.

Her mother commented favorably on Lord and Lady Cummerfield’s exquisite Belgravia home, and Dillie quite agreed. The residence was charming, a large townhouse painted in cheerful yellow with white trim around the windows and doors.

Then the heavens came crashing down atop her.

While standing in line, waiting to be introduced, the gaudily gowned and indiscreet Lady Bascom leaned over to her companion, Lady Aldritch, and whispered rather loudly, “Edgeware came to her each night!”

At first, Dillie thought she was commenting on one of Ian’s new conquests, which would explain why she hadn’t seen him in weeks. The kiss they’d shared in Daisy’s music room must not have been as satisfying for him as it had been for her, though he’d politely agreed it had been at the time.

She stifled her disappointment. Ian wasn’t going to change his rakehell ways. He was a confirmed ne’er-do-well. Perhaps it was for the best that he’d moved on to someone else, for she had grown to like him more than was safe. Good Ian, that is.

She’d seen a lot of Good Ian lately.

But he also had a wicked side, the rakish part of him that used women and discarded them without a second thought. She’d momentarily forgotten that side of his nature, the dissolute, confirmed bachelor who wasn’t going to change his ways for any woman.

“For an entire week!” Lady Aldritch confirmed. “Right under our very noses.”

“Right under her family’s very noses,” Lady Bascom corrected with a cold laugh. “Not one of them realized he was sneaking onto Chipping Way each night.”

What?

Dillie heard a startled buzz behind her. Oh, crumpets! Her family must have heard every word, for Lady Bascom was never one for discretion. She could not have whispered louder had she shouted the news from the ramparts.

Dillie turned toward the buzz and groaned. Every blessed Farthingale in existence happened to be standing behind her. Well, perhaps not all five thousand of them, but certainly a good twenty or thirty.

She prayed for Lady Bascom to be struck mute.

Apparently, not hard enough, for Lady Bascom continued, her voice resounding as clearly as a church bell. “Who would have guessed? The Duke of Edgeware and Dillie Farthingale.”

Lady Aldritch expressed shock and embellished the rumor by adding a trellis outside her window that had never existed. “I must say, I was surprised. She didn’t strike me as the sort the duke would notice. She’s a quiet girl.”

“Isn’t it always the quiet ones?” Lady Bascom replied. “She was doomed to scandal the day her parents named her Daffodil. It’s an impertinent flower, if you ask me. Not easily controlled. And it wasn’t a trellis. I heard the duke climbed a tree to reach her bedchamber. That’s why her father had the thing cut down. Too late, of course. He ought to have thought of it sooner.”

Dillie stepped forward to glower at both ladies. “What utter rubbish! Nothing of the sort happened. Who told you this malicious drivel?”

Both women paled.

“Who?” she demanded when they seemed to have lost their tongues. Her hands curled into fists, and she must have appeared ready to do them bodily harm, for they both gasped and scurried off as though she’d just drawn a pistol and threatened to shoot them.