Free His Secret Heroine by Delle Jacobs Page A

Greville ball this evening, did you not?"
    "I've slept an entire day?" No wonder his head hurt like he was muzzied. Reggie never slept so long.
    "Yes, My Lord. But considering you have not slept for several nights, it is hardly surprising. I have a bath prepared for you, and coffee. There's some fresh biscuits sent up by Mrs. Monroe, to tide you over a bit."
    Puckett took care of everything. Reggie thought he had never needed coffee, biscuits and bath more in his life. He let the comforts ease him back to reality as Puckett filled in the details.
    The first time around, Ludwick had liked the book, but thought it lacked something. Reggie, although disappointed, had known the man was right, and he'd had to accept the need to revise it. But at least the man had said he would see it again if the anonymous author should fix whatever it was that was missing. Reggie thought he'd found it. But would Ludwick agree?
    "I saw the look in his eyes while he was reading, sir. Couldn't wait to get to the next page. He'll see it our way, I'm sure."
    But Reggie had been through that before. Hard to get his hopes up.
    What if Ludwick bought it? He could be free of his father's domination, and marry Chloe. If it sold well, that was. Ludwick was just the first step, and the rest was not foregone. But Ludwick had just begun his printing business and was eagerly seeking new stories. He could set type fast, and print quickly. The book could be out in weeks. Well, a month or so, perhaps.
    Reggie couldn't wait that long. His father would have him shackled to Portia long before. In fact Reggie was already skating on thin ice. He hated to think to what subterfuge or force his father would resort if he discovered Reggie's plot before it was carried out, for the Duke of Marmount was capable of just about anything to get his way.
    Reggie shuddered, thinking of what happened to those who dared stand up to the duke. His mother had done it, and found herself banished to a small estate barely suitable for a knight's widow. In sixteen years, his father the duke had not seen his wife, nor had the duchess indicated the slightest desire to see her husband. Reggie, being the inconsequential second son, had been allowed to stay with his mother, but Robert had been taken from her.
    Reggie still remembered Robert's tearful pleading that had fallen on his father's stone-hard ears. That had been the beginning of a cold rage in Robert that had not extinguished to this day. Robert had abandoned the duke at the earliest opportunity. Even the letters sent from Spain flatly refused to recognize his father. Reggie still had no idea how his brother had managed to purchase his colours and slip away without the duke discovering it, but Robert's success had only increased the duke's vigilance over his remaining son.
    Reggie was the last and only member of the duke's family to still tolerate him. And now Reggie was about to step over the same precipice.
    He didn't want to lose his father. He loved the man desperately, and pitied the man equally as deeply. But he felt it coming. He had to be free to be a man, in his own way.
    The bath water had finally cooled, and Reggie stepped from the tub to be toweled off. He crammed a macaroon in his mouth and thought of what he was going to say to Chloe tonight. He had a proposal to make, and he had to be sure it was precisely right.

 
     
    Chapter Six
     
     
    Chloe peered around a pink marble column at the entrance to the Greville ballroom, where she had a good view of the top of the stairs. Perhaps he would not come. Perhaps she had allowed her imagination to dream up the words he had spoken to her. Or she had misinterpreted them.
    She had taken this position near the grand entrance just for the purpose of seeing everyone who entered, and she had been watching between sets, during sets. She had even sent four gentlemen away with some instruction or other so she could continue her vigil. But he still had not come.
    And now she saw Lord