Free Between the Duke and the Deep Blue Sea by Sophia Nash

display by your darling husband. But really, is it too much to ask you to meet the hordes who seek my hand in marriage? I mean, if I can do it, surely you can, too.” His brown eyes sparkled with wit.
    She tried not to notice it. “Did you bring back my dog?”
    “What? You didn’t stay for the grand finale?”
    “I dared not.”
    “Well, you owe me a new coat.”
    She raised an inquiring brow.
    “Edward is partial to buttons.”
    “Really?”
    “Yes. And Weston’s finest worsted wool. He at least had the propriety to stop at the buttons of my pantaloons, but it was a near thing.”
    “My dog prefers to be addressed as Eddie.”
    “That was made clear in your husband’s presence.”
    “Did he bite him?”
    “No. But it was obvious each wanted to tear the other’s throat out.”
    “Good. Well, I thank you for bringing him back to me.”
    “I know how to play my part. It’s just too bad you refuse to play yours.”
    “And that would be?”
    “That of my mysterious step great-grandmother’s great-grandchild. My cousin many times removed. That hanger-on relation who will help me keep the more impertinent misses at bay.”
    “So that you have enough time to make your own choice.”
    “Precisely. Before one of them takes things into her own devices and makes it for me.”
    “All right. I can do that for you.”
    “Thank you.” He extended his forearm toward her, and she had no choice but to place her arm along the top of it. The fabric of his fine coat was warm to her bare cold arm.
    Without another word, they descended the two long staircases toward the salon.
    She could do this. No one would know her here. She could pretend to be the impoverished noble relation instead of the rich tin miner’s dead daughter. She could fawn.
    Well, perhaps not the last part.
    She could do this for the man who had most probably scared her husband out of at least one good night’s sleep.
    Just before they rounded the last corner toward the two French doors guarded by the hulking Cossack, he pulled her to a stop.
    “Be careful of Candover,” he murmured.
    “The duke?”
    “Yes.”
    “Why do I need to be careful of him?”
    “And also of Vere Sturbridge, the Duke of Barry.”
    “He’s the Lord Lieutenant in Wellington’s army, correct?”
    “You’ve studied the list I see,” he said. “And, stay away completely from Edward Godwin, the Duke of Sussex.”
    “And why is that?”
    “I don’t know. I just don’t think it would be a good idea to spend any amount of time with him. He has a reputation for wearing ladies’ jewelry.”
    “I beg your pardon?!”
    “And he has a certain look about him.” He paused.
    “And what look is that?”
    “That wolfish, I-like-all-females look.”
    “Ah, I see. You mean kind of like the same look you sport?”
    “Precisely.”

Chapter 5
     
    “C andover,” Alex said with the slightest of bows, carefully conducted to show neither deference nor offense. The other duke’s icy expression, just short of glacial, suggested that forgiveness for instigating the debacle in London was not in Alex’s near future.
    Candover glanced about the opulent salon, which had been quickly turned out for the august gathering. The upper echelon of London aristocracy graced the room in studied poses. Alex nudged Roxanne Vanderhaven toward Candover. “I should like to present to you my third cousin four times removed, Tatiana Harriet Barclay. Taty, James Fitzroy, the Duke of Candover.”
    Roxanne curtseyed very prettily in a made-over pale blue walking gown, Alex noticed. She appeared far more slender in the fine silk. And the delicate bones of her face accentuated her natural elegance.
    “Your Grace,” she said in a cultured, well-modulated voice, “I am honored to meet you.”
    Candover fondled his gold looking glass and raised it to his eye to peer down at her from his great height. “Delighted,” he said, without an ounce of delight in his tone.
    “I didn’t know your eyesight