Falling for a Duke (Timeless Regency Collection Book 8) Read online

  Timeless Regency Collection:

  Rebecca Connolly

  Nichole Van

  Janelle Daniels

  Copyright © 2017 Mirror Press

  E-book edition

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  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form whatsoever without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief passages embodied in critical reviews and articles. These novels are works of fiction. The characters, names, incidents, places, and dialog are products of the authors’ imaginations and are not to be construed as real.

  Interior Design by Heather Justesen

  Edited by Jennie Stevens and Lisa Shepherd

  Cover design by Rachael Anderson

  Cover Photo Credit: Richard Jenkins Photography

  Published by Mirror Press, LLC

  eISBN-10: 1-947152-08-4

  eISBN-13: 978-1-947152-08-3

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  The Timeless Romance Authors

  Autumn Masquerade

  A Midwinter Ball

  Spring in Hyde Park

  Summer House Party

  A Country Christmas

  A Season in London

  A Holiday in Bath

  A Night in Grosvenor Square

  Road to Gretna Green

  On the Duke’s Errand by Rebecca Connolly

  Other Works by Rebecca Connolly

  About Rebecca Connolly

  Vingt-et-Un/Twenty-One by Nichole Van

  Other Works by Nichole Van

  About Nichole Van

  I Kissed a Duke by Janelle Daniels

  Other Works by Janelle Daniels

  About Janelle Daniels

  Inverness Shire, Scotland 1817

  Scotland, for all its glories, was not exactly the place that the average member of Society would have imagined Lord David Chambers to go. After all, he was a fashionable, charming, and rather popular fixture at their events. Why should he, of all people, forsake such a life, in the middle of the Season no less, to venture in the relative wild of such a place?

  The idea that he should be deep in the Highlands of Scotland, far from anything remotely resembling a city, would have been even more farfetched.

  And yet here he was, riding a borrowed horse across the glorious expanse of countryside, loving every moment of it.

  Freedom from tyranny would do that to a man.

  He wasn’t prone to aiding his father, he of the aforementioned tyranny; it rarely went noticed and even more rarely went well. However, when the opportunity arose to investigate some problems at the only, and frequently ignored, Scottish estate belonging to the Duke of Ashcombe, David jumped at the chance.

  Anything to keep his father from harping on about David’s need to marry, or even worse, arranging a match for him.

  Arranged marriages were hardly de rigueur in this day and age, but that had never stopped the Duke of Ashcombe, as evidenced by his disastrous arrangement of the marriage for his heir, Derek, Marquess of Whitlock. Katherine, Lady Whitlock, was a cold, heartless, impenetrable fortress of a woman, who probably spewed hot tar from her ears when vexed. The marriage was doomed from the beginning, but at least her pedigree was impeccable.

  And that was all that mattered to Ashcombe.

  Although, to be fair, Katherine seemed to be softening in many ways, and his brother no longer developed a twitch when near her, so perhaps there was hope for them. That was not something they needed to congratulate Ashcombe for, as he would probably expect, but it was an interesting notation to make.

  Their sister, however, had not been forced into an arranged marriage. David suspected that was more likely due to Diana’s independent nature and indomitable willpower. That, and the fact that she’d run away from home so often they’d hired Bow Street Runners to tend her.

  And then the Runner married her himself.

  Ashcombe was likely taking no chances after that.

  Still, if he thought David would be inclined to follow orders from him on the matter of whom he would marry and have children and spend the rest of his life with, he was sadly mistaken.

  He would marry for love and nothing less, no matter her position and fortune.

  David pushed the horse harder, grinning to himself as it complied. The air was fresh and clear here, and it filled his lungs and his being with relief. He was suddenly one with the hills and mountains surrounding him as the horse took him across brooks and brush, the vast landscape endless and continually opening up more wonders to his sight. He’d only seen as much of the countryside as his father allowed him, which meant he had seen as far as he could in Derbyshire and little else.

  There was nothing wrong with Derbyshire, but the family estate was there, the seat of the dukedom, and it always would remind him of that. Derbyshire was a lovely county.

  Avondale was not a lovely estate.

  Sentimentally speaking.

  But this . . . This was something entirely different.

  He’d decided, upon his leaving the inn at Kingussie, that he’d had enough of riding in a coach. It sufficed on the long journey from London, but as he was within riding distance of the estate, he saw no need to submit his body to the same jostling he’d endured for days. He’d borrowed the horse from the local mews, but he was rather feeling now that he would request to purchase the magnificent creature.

  There was no telling how long he would be in Scotland, after all, and he was destined to tour the other estates back in England after he finished. He would do well to have a strong horse at his disposal. He’d never enjoyed travelling by carriage.

  He was not very good at it.

  Physically speaking.

  His valet stayed in the carriage, no doubt fretting about what the state of his master’s clothes would be when he arrived at Dovenbard Park. As he was no longer wearing his cravat or his hat, those fears were probably founded. However, he was still wearing his coat, waistcoat, and even his gloves, so he was still moderately respectable in dress.

  And who precisely was going to see him today that would care about his attire? He was only just arrived, the staff at Dovenbard was minimal, and he had no guests with him to impress. He did not meet with the estate agent until tomorrow and, given the reports of stolen sheep or destroyed farms or whatever the issues truly were, he doubted the man would care.

  David was the younger son of a duke who could not be bothered to put forth any particular effort with estates outside his realm of comfort—which begged the question of why the outer estates existed, but that was a matter of logical concern, in which His Grace had never excelled. The point was that nobody would care if Lord David Chambers looked disheveled and untidy upon his arrival from London.

  And he could terminate their position if they did care.

  Officially speaking.

  Really, it was astounding that his father had agreed to let him manage these affairs in his behalf. He barely trusted David to cut his own meals, but out here he was to use his brain, intellect, and limited experience to make important decisions?

  Perhaps the duke was aging faster than he would like to admit.

  That terrified Derek, but David did not particularly mind.

  For a man with more than enough fortune and some influence, David suddenly felt as though he had never quite breathed a full breath in his life, n
or had he ever truly been his own man. He was the most willful of his siblings, but that had been pure rebellion and hardly indicative of his own nature. His childhood had been all rules and proper behavior, strict punishment for disobedience, and no obvious signs of amusement at any time.

  Amusement had been for private moments between siblings when their parents could not be bothered with them. Without his siblings, life would have been bleak indeed.

  But there was nothing bleak here. Nothing but beauty and wildness, raw and untamed.

  “Come on, boy,” he urged the horse as he leaned closer. “Come on. Show me what a true Highland lad is made of.”

  The horse needed no other encouragement. As if determined to prove the mettle of his nationality, he thundered over the uneven terrain faster, every stride powerful and sleek, the motions fluid and the pace seeming easy.

  Yes, indeed, he would be purchasing this horse straightaway, and he would have such a ride daily, if only to feel this complete exhilaration again and again.

  The sound of the hooves pummeling the ground resounded within him, his heart finding cadence with the rhythm, the combination drowning out all other sounds around him.

  Which was undoubtedly how he missed hearing any sort of gasp or scream in the moments before his horse reared wildly, nearly throwing him. David managed to settle the horse enough to climb from his back with ease and grabbed the reins.

  “Easy, lad,” he murmured, stroking his mane and scratching at his ears. “What startled you so?”

  “That would be me.”

  David turned in surprise to see a young woman on the ground, glaring at him furiously, her long, fair hair loosening from its plait. Her pale green eyes fixed on him with distaste, and it occurred to him that, had her expression been less contorted in derision, she might have been quite pretty. She clambered to her feet, brushing off her thick woolen skirts and muttering to herself.

  She appeared well and whole, so David turned back to the horse, which was still somewhat agitated.

  “There, now,” he soothed as the horse snuffed and stomped. “It’s all right. You’re not hurt, are you?”

  “No, I’m quite well, thank you,” snapped the woman behind him, her thick Scottish brogue rolling out like the hills around them.

  David sighed and turned to her, still gripping the reins of the horse. “I surmised as much from your abuse of me.”

  Her high brow knitted as she frowned. “In what way have I abused you?”

  “I saw your eyes.” David made a pained face. “You’ve pummeled me in your mind at least seventy-two times with your fists alone, and that’s not counting the stabs from the knife in your boot, which are probably somewhere around a tally of twenty-seven. And you’ve trampled me with my own horse, drowned me in one of the lakes, had me drawn and quartered, and strung me up by my own boots in the town square.”

  By the look of her bewildered expression, she did not find his speech at all amusing.

  He prayed the Scots had some sense of humor, or this excursion, though divinely situated in location, would be as interminable as the rest of his life had been.

  “Never mind,” he sighed, rubbing the horse’s side.

  “It was seventy-six times,” she broke in, folding her arms over the pale spencer she wore. “Not seventy-two. And I only stabbed you five times because that would be sufficient to do enough damage. I trampled you with my own horse as well as yours, didn’t bother drowning you because I doubt you could swim. I don’t believe in drawing and quartering, and if I strung you up in town square, it would not be by those fancy boots, but by your thumbs.”

  David stared at her for a long moment, impressed in spite of himself at her sharp wit and a little amused. Perhaps she was a pretty girl after all.

  “You could have called out to warn me of your presence,” he pointed out as he watched her.

  “I did.” She quirked a brow at him.

  He frowned. “And I didn’t hear you?”

  Her mouth tightened into a thin line.

  There was no way to tell if she was being truthful or not, and he was too much a gentleman to accuse her.

  But apparently not too much a gentleman to nearly trample her without apology.

  Even he was slightly ashamed of that.

  “Apologies for not seeing you, miss,” he said with all the politeness he could muster while losing none of his cheek. “And for nearly trampling you.”

  She tilted her head at him, her eyes narrowing. “No concern for my well-being?”

  David straightened up and gave her a sardonic look. “Do you always demand niceties from strangers?”

  “Shouldn’t I expect them from everyone?”

  “Hmm.” He toyed with her a moment, looking her over. She looked very well. Too well. As though she had sprung from the grounds of the Highlands itself. She fit perfectly with the surroundings, her clothing earthy and worn, though not at all threadbare. Her own natural coloring was fresh and lively, and her eyes had a spark in them that he instantly liked.

  Her cheeks colored under his observation, and he let his mouth lift on one side in a hint of a smile. Then he mounted his horse smoothly, clicking his tongue.

  The girl scoffed loudly.

  “I know, pet,” David told her with a sympathetic look. “It is far too soon for me to be gone, just when we’ve formed such a perfect attachment. You must bear up your sorrows as best as you can. Your heart will be whole again soon.”

  Now her eyes went wide, and she looked positively infuriated. “You are outrageous.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know,” he remarked with a sniff. “Now, as you seem to be all-knowing, tell me how far to Dovenbard Park.”

  She went perfectly still. “The Ashcombe place? Is it yours?” she queried, her tone stiff and cold.

  David snorted. “Something like that. Now you know who you’re dealing with, so tell me true.”

  Her gaze became calculating, but she pointed in the direction he was facing. “Four miles, if that.”

  He nodded in acknowledgment. “I figured as much. It’s a pleasure to know you are as intelligent as fair, though time would only tell how true either was.”

  She glowered again, looking as though she might spit.

  “By the by,” he mused as he looked down at her again. “You’ve got a bit of something right there.” He gestured to his right cheekbone. “A smear of some sort. Lord knows what that could be.” He tilted an imaginary brim of a hat at her, then kicked his heels into his horse, which shot off rather perfectly, leaving the wretched girl in their grass-strewn wake.

  David chuckled to himself as they rode the last few miles to Dovenbard, feeling even more invigorated after that unexpected exchange.

  There was certainly life in Scotland; there was no question of that. But would any of it suit his needs for the time being?

  That, again, was something only time would tell.

  “Of all the impertinent, obstinate, insufferable men on this earth . . .” Ceana Shaw couldn’t even finish the thought, her emotions and temper were in such a state.

  And this was the day after the incident.

  She’d known many rude and insolent men in her life, being related to a great many and surrounded by a great many more at almost every moment she was home. But none of them, not even her cousin Ewan, had pressed her into this sort of rage, especially lasting through the night and into the next morning. She was perhaps even more inflamed now than before.

  She couldn’t stop thinking about it, seething at every recurrence of memory. What sort of man nearly runs over a woman with his horse and does not even have a care for her well-being?

  Ceana snorted as she fumbled at the buttons of her spencer and flung it onto her bed, not at all refreshed after the morning walk she’d taken to clear her mind. “That sort, that’s who,” she muttered.

  But what sort was he?

  He’d been dressed like any of the other gentlemen she knew, though of better quality, and yet he had
n’t worn a top hat or cravat. His hair had been wildly disheveled, and he’d been in need of a good shave, but none of that detracted from the raw vigor in his hazel eyes. Or the strong cut of his jaw. The broad set of his shoulders.

  Pity he had the manners of a troll; he could have been a rather attractive man.

  He hadn’t even asked her name, let alone begged her pardon.

  No bowing or politeness, and while he’d eventually offered an apology that she had not at all believed, she did not consider a mere recitation of the appropriate words to be an actual apology.

  And she would demand an apology.

  She hadn’t shown it, but she had injured herself in her fall yesterday. The walk back to Ravensmere had been torture for her throbbing right ankle, but she would have endured each of the punishments the stranger had accused her of imagining before ever letting that stop her.

  This morning’s excursion had reminded her quite profoundly of her injury, and her fury had raged anew. She’d avoided limping home again, desperate to keep her pain from being observed, and that had been as much of a challenge this morning as it had been the day before.

  Despite Ceana’s being an only child to her father, Ravensmere was inundated at all times with cousins, uncles, aunts, great uncles, cousins by marriage, half cousins, former intendeds of cousins, and various other extended relations. For being a well-respected member of the gentry, her father seemed more like the unlikely leader of a mob than anything else.

  It should not have been surprising, then, that Ceana would have gone out walking amongst the hills and valleys and brooks and rocks of the Highlands to escape the madness of home, to have a quiet moment to herself. She often went for long walks among their own lands. Everybody in the region knew her well, and seeing her walking, running, or riding was perfectly commonplace.

  Though, never in her entire life had she been nearly trampled by a horse on one of her walks.