Page 4 of A Diamond for a Duke

Jules’s brusque sound of annoyance echoed in the corridor.

Miss Phryne Milbourne, the only other woman he’d considered marrying—for all of a few brief hours—had espied him. Given the determined look on her lovely face, she again intended to broach his crying off.

London’s perpetually foggy and sooty skies would rain jewels and flowers before he ever took up with the likes of that vixen again, no matter how beautiful, blue-blooded, or perfectly suited to the position of duchess others—namely, Mother and The Uncles—believed she might be.

Within mere hours of his uncles and his mother taking it upon themselves to broach a possible match between Miss Milbourne and him, which she’d bandied about with the recklessness of a farmwife tossing chickens table scraps—Jules had observed her true character, quite by chance.

And thank God, he had, or she might well be his duchess by now.

The notion curdled the two servings of crème brûlée he’d indulged in at luncheon.

Truth to tell, he would’ve been hard put to decide which rankled more: Miss Milbourne’s callousness or her promiscuousness. Or perhaps, her ceaseless, nigh on to obsessive, pursuit of him was what abraded worse than boots three sizes too small. In any event, he had neither the time nor the inclination to discuss the issue with her tonight.

Or ever, for that matter.

Familiar with the manor’s architecture, he ducked into the nearest doorway and sidled into an elegant, unlit parlor situated between dual sets of ornate double doors. Doors which provided him with another, less obvious, route from the house through an adjacent passageway.

Unaccustomed to the room’s darkness, he blindly groped until he found what he searched for. With the merest scrape of metal, he turned the key, and chuckled softly, if perhaps a mite wickedly, to himself.

He truly was a social misfit, and that he rather liked the peculiarity made him more so.

Staid, abrupt, off-putting, somber, reticent, taciturn, reserved...

He knew full well what others thought of him and, for the most part, their descriptions were accurate. What they didn’t know was why.

Jemmah Dament knew.

As timid, overlooked children, they’d sought refuge in each other’s company and whispered their secret fears to one another, too.

Peculiar that twice in a matter of minutes Jemmah had popped to mind. Must’ve been encountering her bothersome family that caused the dual intrusions.

Feminine footsteps accompanied by a heavier, uneven tread echoed on the corridor’s Arenberg parquet floor as Miss Milbourne neared.

“I’m positive I saw Dandridge a moment ago, Papa.” A hint of petulance flavored her words. “He’s still avoiding me, though I’ve repeatedly explained that he misunderstood what he thought he saw and heard.”

The devil I did.

Keaton’s arm had been elbow deep inside her bodice, and his tongue halfway that distance down her throat too.

Far worse, in Jules estimation, was Miss Milbourne’s treatment of sweet, crippled Sabrina. Whorish behavior was repugnant, but cruelty to an unfortunate, doubly so.

Intolerable and unforgivable in his view.

There and then, he’d told Miss Milbourne as much and that she’d best cease entertaining notions of a match between them. His ire raised, he may have suggested he’d welcome starved chartreuse tigers at the dining table with more enthusiasm than continuing their acquaintance.

“Why, the stubborn man dared return the perfumed note I sent him last week, Papa. Unopened too, the obstinate wretch,” she fumed, her footsteps taking on a distinct stomping rhythm. “How many times must I apologize before Dandridge forgives me?”

“Tut, m’dear. I wish you’d let me sue the knave for breaking the betrothal,” Milbourne wheezed, great gasping rattles that threatened to dislodge the artwork displayed above the passage’s mahogany raised panel wainscoting.

If wishes were food, beggars would eat cake, old chap.

There’d have to have been an actual proposal and a formal agreement, including a signed contract.

Not a mere wishful suggestion in passing, which Miss Milbourne latched onto like a barnacle to rock.

She’d led her father on a deuced merry chase the past two years, setting her cap for, and then tossing aside, one peer after another, each ranking higher and with fuller coffers than the last. Served him and the late Mrs. Milbourne right for naming her Phryne after a Greek courtesan.

Dotty business, that.