How to Catch a Duke

a female of common origins.
Women were easy to ruin, and a female inquiry agent with a tarnished reputation would be ruined indeed.
“Lord Stapleton,” he said. “He’s an idiot. Arrogant, wealthy, nearly ran off his own son, God rest the earl’s randy soul. Stapleton has made his widowed daughter-in-law’s life hell. You needn’t die. I’ll kill Stapleton for you and the world will be a better place all around. Shall I ring for another tray? You’re still looking a bit peaky.”
Lord Stephen Wentworth displayed a strange blend of chilling dispassion and surprising graciousness. Abigail hadn’t spent much time with him, but her observations suggested his intellect worked like the mechanism of an automaton—ruthless logic turned mental gears unimpeded by sentiment. If a marquess was attempting to murder somebody who hadn’t committed any particular crime, then murdering the marquess was both just and advisable.
That taking a life was illegal, immoral, and contrary to Abigail’s values did not seem to occur to his lordship, or trouble him if it did. Then too, Stapleton hadn’t precisely attempted murder—yet.
“You cannot kill a peer of the realm, my lord, though I am touched by the offer.” Abigail was also unnerved that Lord Stephen would so easily guess the identity of her nemesis.
“You are appalled at the very notion, even as you tell me this man has twice attempted to do you harm. His bloodthirsty behavior is merely vexing while my gallantry appalls you. Female logic at its unfathomable finest. I need details, Miss Abbott, and I suspect you need another tea tray.”
And there was the odd flash of consideration, at which Lord Stephen also excelled. “You attempt to confuse me. Spouting offers of murder one instant and proffering more sandwiches the next.” Abigail could eat more than most farmhands and still be hungry. Trust Lord Stephen to sense that unladylike trait and remark upon it.
“Can you be confused by sandwiches? Good to know. The bell pull, Miss Abbott. Thrice.”
She rose to comply, because with Lord Stephen one chose one’s battles—and she was hungry. The inn fare on the Great North Road had been unfit for feral dogs, and stagecoach passengers seldom had time to finish a meal, in any case.
“Do you promise you won’t kill Lord Stapleton?” Abigail remained on her feet to ask that question, which was petty of her. Lord Stephen was cursed with an unreliable leg. To stand for any length of time pained him, according to his sister, and walking a distance took a heavy toll. With this man, though, Abigail would use every means available to gain and keep the upper hand.
Bad enough she needed his help. Worse yet if she could be befuddled by a plate of warm, toasted cheese sandwiches that had cheddar dripping over the crusts and smelled of butter with a hint of oregano and chives.
“If I did finish the old boy off,” Lord Stephen asked, “would you spank me for it?” He batted his eyelashes at Abigail, such an absurdity she nearly burst out laughing.
“I suspect Bow Street would see you punished were you to murder the marquess, and I don’t want their inconvenience on my conscience. I simply need to be left in peace and allowed to go safely on my way.”
The discussion paused again as two footmen wheeled in an entire trolley of comestibles. One fellow lifted the lid of a tureen, and the scent of a hearty beef barley soup wafted to Abigail’s nose. The other footman set a second tea tray on the low table, except that the offerings also included a pot of chocolate, a carafe of claret, and a mug of cider.
“Would miss care for anything else?” the footman asked.
“What else could I possibly…?” She left off speaking as the footman ladled a steaming serving of soup into a delftware bowl.
“Lemonade?” Lord Stephen suggested. “A syllabub, a posset, orgeat? Three tugs on the bell pull means the kitchen is put on full alert. Battle stations, present arms, forced marches to the pantries and wine cellars. Tell Thomas your inmost culinary desire and he’ll convey it directly to Cook.”
Only a very wealthy man had the resources to put a kitchen on full alert at a moment’s notice. Abigail had made discreet queries into the extent and sources of Lord Stephen’s fortune, and the sums he was said to possess were nearly as staggering as those attributed to his ducal brother.
“The available offerings are more than sufficient,” Abigail said, as the footman set out cutlery on a tray and added the bowl of soup, thick slices of buttered toast, and a spicy mug of hot mulled cider.
“That will be all, gentlemen,” Lord Stephen said. “Though please have the fires lit in the blue suite.”
Abigail noted his lordship’s presumption, but she wasn’t about to take issue with his high-handedness until she’d done justice to the soup, a baked potato stuffed with bacon and brie, and an apple tart drizzled with some sort of raspberry-flavored cream.
As she finally, finally ate her fill for the first time in days, Lord Stephen arranged his booted foot on a hassock and leaned his head back against the sofa cushions as if—harmless old thing that he was—he’d doze off in the presence of a lady.
“I am being rude,” Abigail said. “I know I ought not to eat so much, and that I’m supposed to make polite conversation while I clean my plate—my plates—but I don’t take you for a high stickler.”
“I can be a high stickler,” his lordship replied, slouching lower against the cushions without opening his eyes. “I take very firm exception to marquesses who threaten my favorite inquiry agent, for example. Such fellows could end up facing me over pistols on the field of honor, whereupon their odds of survival are abysmal. Have another tart.”
She should decline, but the tarts were magnificent. Warm, sweet, rich, and spiced with cinnamon in addition to the raspberry drizzle.
“Will you share one with me?”
He opened his eyes. “You are trying to cozen me. Pretending we’re friendly enough to share a