Free The Duke's Secret Desire (Regency Romance) (Regency Lords Book 4) by Regina Darcy Page A

it is a boy, he must follow the family tradition: Eton, then Oxford, then a commission. God knows if the Empire will still be here when he reaches manhood; all these rebellions and rival potentates only harm India. But duty comes before all. You will make sure that my son knows this?” the Baron asked urgently.
    “Yes.”
    “He must do his duty. As I have done mine. As Arya has done hers. You will impress that upon him as he grows to manhood. He must do his duty as a British subject.”
    “Yes.”
    The Baron sighed. “I am counting on you,” he whispered, his voice fading as his eyelids closed.
    Bartholomew remained standing until his friend had fallen asleep. He stood in silent salute to a fallen brother at arms, tears streaming down his cheeks.
    After the Battle of Delhi during the Second Anglo-Maratha War the crown had seen a need to ensure its interest were being represented accurately. It had sent the Bartholomew Granger and Jason Danver to create political alliances and relationships in India. Alliances beyond that of the East India Company. It had been four long years. During that time Bartholomew had inherited the Duchy of Middleton, when his father died. The Duke had been dreaming of England for the last six months. His duty and estate calling to him. Both men’s commissions were coming to the end and they had been in serious talk about leaving the colonies together. That dream was now dead, Jason Danver would not live to see his homeland again. The Duke took a deep breath, clicked his heels together, bowed, turned around and walked out of the room.
    It did not have occurred to him to deny his friend’s dying request to look after his wife and unborn child, but he had no idea of just how he was to do that.
    Surely the Maharajah would want his daughter under his wing so that he would control the inheritance that she would receive on behalf of her child, who would be the heir to the impressive Danver estate and title. The Maharajah was by all accounts a fond father, but he was a ruler first and his children were the armoury with which he built up his power. British intelligence was not certain whether the Maharajah was playing both sides or whether he was unaware of the subversive activities of his eldest son Param. But it was only a matter of time before Param’s political activism on behalf of independence and his father’s strong ties to the British Empire were destined to collide.
    When Bartholomew left the room, the hallway outside the sickroom was thronged with people; friends, fellow officers, members of Lady Arya’s family. But not her brother; Bartholomew’s observant eye noted that Param Singh was not among the waiting crowd. Nor was the Maharajah, but that was not surprising; Indian royalty did not wait in hallways. The Maharajah would come when he decided it was time to say good-bye to his British son-in-law and he would do so with pomp and ceremony, a visit from a potentate to a representative of the British government. The marriage between his half-English daughter and Baron Danver had been arranged for political reasons. The Maharajah, mindful of the unrest in his province, and convinced that the only way to forge peace was to strengthen the bonds between the British Raj and his dynasty, had offered his beautiful daughter as a prize. Arya Singh, the obedient daughter of the Maharajah and his second wife, dutifully married the Baron a year ago as she had been told to do.
    What she thought of the match, Bartholomew didn’t know. He only knew that he had fallen in love with Arya Henrietta Singh, on the day that she became Baroness Danver, his best friend’s wife.
     

TWO
     
    Lady Arya Danver was royalty; her husband had been in the habit of forgetting that she had been raised not only as a British aristocrat, but also as an Indian princess. She was expected to conduct herself regally and in a manner which paid tribute to the long and impressive history of the Singh dynasty. She was now a