Thwarting the Duke Read online

  Thwarting the Duke

  When the Duke Comes to Town

  Ava Stone

  Sue London

  Julie Johnstone

  Night Shift Publishing

  Contents

  Copyright

  Lady Hope’s Dashing Devil

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  About Ava Stone

  Also by Ava Stone

  Her Reluctant Lord

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Epilogue

  About Sue London

  Also by Sue London

  It’s In the Duke’s Kiss

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  About Julie Johnstone

  Also by Julie Johnstone

  Evading the Duke

  Outwitting the Duke

  Dismissing the Duke

  Copyright © 2016 by Ava Stone, Julie Johnstone and Sue London

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  ISBN: 978-1-310-32083-5

  Created with Vellum

  Lady Hope’s Dashing Devil

  Ava Stone

  DEDICATION

  For Leiza McArter, Christina Fashant, Kelly Snyder, Margaret Gannon, Janet Barrett, Diane Spigonardo, Michele Gardner, Jennifer Coleman, Lisa Bridges, Martina Arguijo, Sheree Doran, Mary Dieterich, Jessica Clements, Tina Hairston and Cass Dixon ~ thank you so much for the awesome suggestions and brainstorming help on this book. I am so lucky to have such amazing street team members! I don’t know what I would do without you. ~ Ava

  Chapter 1

  Hyde Park, Mayfair ~ May 1817

  “Oh, for heaven’s sakes, Jamie!” Lady Hope Post complained as she snatched the reins away from her cousin. “You drive like an old man.”

  James, Lord Elston, blew out an irritated breath and folded his arms across his chest as Hope navigated his matched greys around a landau and gig that had stopped for their passengers to speak to each other. “I thought you were supposed to be docile these days.”

  “Docile?” Hope cast her cousin a sidelong glance, keeping one eye on the barouche she was trying to catch. Docile wasn’t such an awful word, but the way Jamie had uttered it, made it sound like the vilest of curses. It was true she wasn’t quite herself these days, and she might not ever be again; but she was trying to help her cousin, for pity’s sake. It wasn’t her fault he wasn’t as skillful with his phaeton as she was. “Who said I was docile these days?”

  “Grace,” he muttered.

  Yes, that did sound like something her sister would say. And Grace had been in a rotten mood ever since the season and her husband hunt had begun. “Well, I suppose you could have asked Grace to go riding with you, if you don’t like the way I drive.”

  “I was supposed to be the one driving.” Jamie sat forward and motioned for Hope to turn the ribbons back over to him.

  The devil’s chance they’d catch Miss Alice Humphreys with Jamie driving. Hope gestured to the girl’s barouche, which was quickly approaching the Park Lane exit. “Do you want to catch up to her? Or do you want me to let you drive?”

  “I’m a perfectly fine driver,” her cousin grumbled. “And do watch out for that couple walking right there.”

  Hope saw them. She wasn’t blind. “I am a Post, James Woodward. I was raised with reins in my hands.”

  “Yes, well, since Uncle Thomas fell to his death driving one of these things, forgive me for not being comforted by that.” He sucked in a breath. “There’s another couple, Hope. Do have a care.”

  She saw that couple too. James should have more faith in her. She was, after all, a better driver than her cousin, no matter what he said. Besides, they were finally gaining on Miss Humphreys’ conveyance, and if they missed her then this little jaunt into Hyde Park would have been for naught.

  Just a little further. They’d catch her for sure on Park Lane. Hope gave the greys more lead to gather speed. “You’re the one who wanted to bump into Alice Humphreys.”

  “Casually bump into her,” he grumbled. “I didn’t want to careen into her.”

  Careen into her! What a completely ridiculous—

  “For the love of God!” A man bellowed at the exact same moment Jamie’s greys pulled onto Park Lane and the back left wheel of her cousin’s phaeton collided with…something.

  Blast it all!

  Hope pulled back on the reins, her heart pounding like a drum in her chest. What in the world had she hit? She jerked her gaze back over her shoulder to find another phaeton toppled onto its side. How in the world had she hit that? And how had she knocked it over?

  “Are you all right?” Jamie asked, snatching the reins back from her.

  “I-I think so,” she began and would have said more if the sudden appearance of an angry gentleman, glaring up at them hadn’t stopped the words on her tongue.

  “Are you mad?” the man demanded, his dark gaze flicking from Jamie to land quite firmly on Hope. A moment later, his eyes rounded in apparent recognition. But she didn’t recognize him in the least. “If the shaft hadn’t splintered, you’d have killed my mare. Do you realize that?”

  Oh, heavens! Hope’s hand fluttered to her lips.

  “Terribly sorry,” Jamie muttered. “Completely my fault.”

  “Indeed it was,” the man agreed, though his eyes were still quite leveled on Hope. “This isn’t the Bath Road. I can’t imagine what would have possessed you to race at breakneck speed. And—”

  “Honestly, Baxter, it was unintentional. An accident,” Jamie continued. “Send the bills for whatever repairs are required to Weston House and I’ll see that they’re taken care of promptly. Is your mare all right?”

  The man breathed out a breath and refocused his attention on Jamie. “James Woodward?”

  A ghost of a smile tipped Jamie’s lips. “Thaddeus Baxter, it’s been an age.”

  Thaddeus Baxter? Hope knew that name. At least she thought she did. She certainly knew the surname. If things had happened differently, it would have been hers by this point.

  “It’s Kilworth now,” the man said as his eyes flicked back to Hope.

  Kilworth. Just the sound of that name made Hope’s heart twist so painfully she thought she might burst into tears right there. He was Henry’s cousin. The new Earl of Kilworth. He didn’t look like Henry. His hair was lighter, almost golden and his blue eyes were so dark they were almost black. Of course, that could all have bee
n the anger that was still rolling off him in waves.

  “Yes, yes,” Jamie agreed good-naturedly. “I did know that. Sorry, old man.”

  The new Lord Kilworth nodded once and gestured back to his fallen phaeton. “I’ll send the bills to Weston House once the repairs are made.”

  “Oh!” Jamie handed the reins back to Hope. “Let me help you right that,” he said, hopping down from the bench. “Terribly sorry again.”

  Hope watched as Jamie and another fellow helped Lord Kilworth push his phaeton back onto its wheels. The shattered shaft aside, it didn’t look all that broken, really. His lordship cast her a censorious glare, and Hope dropped her eyes back to her lap. He might be Henry’s blood relation, but the man didn’t possess one ounce of the charm that her late love did. Not one ounce.

  “Have you lost your mind letting her drive your cattle?” Thad shifted his glare from Lady Hope Post to her inept companion. And why had she focused her attentions on Elston of all people? He hardly seemed her sort, not if her usual sort was the late-Henry Baxter

  Elston shrugged. “She’s been driving since she was in leading strings. She’s a Post.”

  Whatever the devil that was supposed to mean. “The last thing she should be doing is driving a phaeton through the park or…splashing through the Serpentine, for that matter,” he grumbled as that particular memory darted into his head. Hope Post and Henry chasing each other through the waters in the park like a pair of escaped Bedlamites.

  Elston’s face turned slightly red. “My cousin is more docile this year than she was last season.”

  She was his cousin. That explained why she was in Elston’s company. Thad hadn’t realized they were relations, not that he’d given a lot of thought to the pretty blonde, not since last season anyway. “Tell that to my phaeton,” he returned.

  Elston breathed out a breath.

  “Thad,” his friend Robert Cole began, “it’s a clean break. Davies won’t have a difficult time fixing it at all.”

  Whether it was a clean break or not wasn’t the point. Beautiful as she was, Lady Hope was a reckless chit who could have killed his horse or someone else that afternoon. And Elston was an idiot to let her drive his phaeton. During their years at Harrow he’d never thought Elston was an idiot, but apparently he’d been mistaken about that. Thad glanced again at his old classmate. “Keep your eye on her if you don’t want more trouble.”

  Elston shook his head. “She has her own brothers for that.”

  Brothers who failed miserably at keeping her out of trouble most of the time, but Thad bit his tongue from saying as much. After all, Lady Hope was none of his concern one way or the other, not so long as Elston paid for his phaeton repairs. He waved the man on and returned to inspecting his broken conveyance.

  He sank down to his haunches to look the shaft over. Damned lucky the break was clean and that Sulis was unharmed. The damage in property and lives could have been much worse.

  Robert clapped a hand to Thad’s back and said, “So much for a jaunt into Hampstead today.”

  Thad hadn’t been dying to make that trip anyway. Visiting his aunt tended to put him in a mood. And while he had a valid excuse for cancelling those plans now, he was still shaken by the whole event. He pushed back to his feet. “Did you see how fast she was going? Damned chit could have killed herself.”

  Robert grinned. “I think that’s what Henry liked about her. Spirited girl.”

  His late-cousin had the trained eye of an unrepentant rake. “I’m certain he liked something else about her all together,” Thad muttered under his breath.

  “Possibly,” his friend agreed, obviously having heard the comment. “Pretty girl, isn’t she?”

  Spirited and pretty? Fairly apt descriptions of the lady, not that Thad was about to admit that to Robert. “I didn’t notice,” he lied. Because he had noticed. He’d noticed her beauty last year when he’d first seen her, laughing and splashing her way through the Serpentine after his degenerate cousin.

  But, honestly, any man with eyes would have noticed how her wet walking dress had clung to her body, and the memory of her shape was still burned into Thad’s memory. Bloody inconvenient, that.

  Robert laughed. “If you say so.”

  Chapter 2

  It was silly that a little thing like bumping into, or colliding really, with Henry’s cousin could frazzle Hope’s nerves. Honestly, it wasn’t Henry’s cousin. It was just the reminder of Henry. Of course, everything reminded her of Henry. Any emerald made her think about the earbobs he’d sent her. Any waltz made her remember what it felt like to be in his arms. And any ride through the park brought up so many different memories of him. But until today, she’d never heard anyone else use his title as their own. And that, hearing the new earl refer to himself as Kilworth, was like a dagger to Hope’s heart.

  A knock sounded at her door and Hope pushed up on her elbows, half-heartedly. “Yes?” she called.

  And then her door opened and her triplet Grace stepped into Hope’s chambers. A rare smile was splashed across her sister’s face. “Mr. Lacy has invited us to see Romeo and Juliet in his box this evening. Isn’t that grand?”

  Grand was a relative term. Young love and death would do nothing to lift Hope’s spirits. “I’d rather not attend, if you don’t mind.”

  And just that quickly, Grace’s smile was gone and her brow furrowed in worry. “You love Romeo and Juliet.”

  She had at one point. But not any longer. “It will only make me think of Henry,” she said on a sigh.

  “Oh, for pity’s sake,” Grace complained as she plopped onto to the edge of Hope’s four-poster. “You didn’t die with him, you know?”

  Part of her had. But there was no point in saying as much. Grace had not cared for Henry, and…Well, really no one had cared for Henry except for Hope and no one else seemed even remotely sorry that he was gone. “Besides, you’ll do better trying to get Mr. Lacy to come up to scratch, if I’m not there.” Which may or may not be true. While Grace, Hope and their sister Patience were identical in appearance, Mr. Lacy only had eyes for Grace. It truly wouldn’t matter who else was around.

  “I despise that play,” Grace complained.

  “Then why did you say yes?” Hope almost laughed.

  Her sister shrugged. “I thought you’d enjoy it. And now I have to go and sit through the miserable thing. True love and all that utter nonsense.”

  True love was not utter nonsense. Hope frowned at her sister. “Do you not love Mr. Lacy even a little?” Grace had, after all, decided the gentleman in question would make the perfect husband. But if she was going to spend her life with him, shouldn’t she feel something for him?

  “I like Mr. Lacy a great deal,” Grace said practically. “And if I am ever successful in getting him to propose, I am certain we will be quite happy together.”

  She liked him, but...“Don’t you want to love him?”

  At that Grace shook her head. “That is not an emotion I want to experience,” she said, and for the first time Hope noticed a sadness in her sister’s voice, almost like Grace had loved and lost before. But Grace had never loved anyone, not that Hope knew about anyway, and they had been together nearly every day of their lives. If there had been someone, Hope would have known, wouldn’t she?

  “Well, I do not want to watch Romeo and Juliet kill themselves tonight. So you shall have to go without me. I’ve had a very trying day.”

  “What happened today?” her sister asked.

  Hope blew out a breath and collapsed back against her pillows. “I went riding with Jamie in the park and we had a slight accident.”

  “Accident?” Grace echoed. “Are you all right? Is Jamie—”

  “No one was harmed.” Hope winced, remembering the awful experience all over again. “But I somehow toppled over Lord Kilworth’s phaeton and broke his shaft.”

  “Lord Kilworth!” Grace’s voice raised an octave.

  “Henry’s cousin.” Hope closed her eyes not wanting
to remember the earl’s chilly stare if she could help it.

  “How did you topple over his phaeton?”

  Hope still wasn’t sure how she’d done that. She hadn’t even seen him as they’d taken that turn onto Park Lane. “I have no idea. I was trying to help Jamie catch Alice Humphreys, when—”

  “What does Jaime want with Alice Humphreys?” Grace turned up her nose, matching Hope’s thoughts on the matter perfectly.

  “Same thing you want with Mr. Lacy. He’s terrified the Duke of Danby will have a bride for him at Christmas if he doesn’t find one of his own before then.”

  “But Alice Humphreys?” Grace snorted. “Jamie’ll be an earl someday. He can do better than some upstart merchant’s daughter with the personality of a rock.”

  Hope agreed with the nod of her head. “But for some reason he likes her. Anyway, they’ve quarreled about something and he was hoping if he and I went for a ride in the park that we could bump into her.”

  “But you bumped into Lord Kilworth instead?”

  “Unfortunately,” Hope agreed. “And you should have seen the way he looked at me, Grace.” She shivered. “He’s rather cruel, I think. He has the coolest stare of any man on Earth, and he quite definitely hated me on sight.”

  “No one could hate you on sight. You look like me,” her sister teased and normally such a sentiment would have brought a smile to Hope’s face. But not this time. Not with the memory of her encounter with the angry Lord Kilworth fresh in Hope’s mind.

  “Be that as it may, the man definitely despises me. I could feel it when he looked at me.”

  “Perhaps he was just angry you toppled his phaeton.” Grace sighed. “What did Mama say? You’re still alive, so—”

  “Jamie took the blame.” Hope shook her head. “He’s paying for the damages and told Mama it was his fault.”

  “That was good of him,” her sister said.