The Devil's Match (The Devil DeVere #4)(12)

Hew nodded. “Of course, Sir Edward.”

“Then it seems only one item remains.” Ned rose and cracked his knuckles with a malevolent glare.

Hew paled, yet stood his ground. “And what is that?”

Ned flexed his right hand. “I am still much in need of satisfaction.” Hew shut his eyes as if in anticipation, but Ned spun around to ram a solid English peg into DeVere instead.

“Oof!” The blow stuck Ludovic’s midsection, knocking him clean onto his arse, bursting the wind from his lungs in an agonizing gush. The world went black for an interminable moment as he lay gasping in a struggle just to breathe. “What the devil was that about?” he finally managed to choke out.

Ned tented his tawny brows. “Need you ask? Regardless of your professed innocence, this entire imbroglio positively reeks of you. That was for your damnable conniving and complicity that shall now result in a merging of our families... May God help me...”





Chapter Six





Upper Grosvenor Street





“Your father is right, you know.” Diana’s gaze tracked Vesta, who paced her bedchamber, like a dervish in a rustling, silk petticoat. “Haven’t you heard the adage—marry in haste, repent at leisure?”

Vesta spun around to counter, “Or marry by arrangement and be miserable all the same?”

Touché. The point struck home. “That was unkind, Vesta.”

“I’m sorry, but I know you were not happy with Lord Reggie, Aunt Di. We all knew it. Did you never love one another?” Vesta threw herself down on the bed and began plucking at the counterpane.

“No. We did not.” Diana joined her goddaughter on the bed. She absently toyed with Vesta’s curls as she spoke. “In the beginning, I had hoped that affection would grow between us...but it never did. As the years progressed, we came to live independent lives, and I would have carried on that way, had not Reggie ruined us. Yes, Vesta, I was unhappy in my marriage, but I was still a dutiful wife.”

Diana was careful to avoid the word “faithful.” While she certainly had regrets about the past, she refused to harbor any guilt about what had transpired between her and DeVere. Time had only increased her resentment over his abrupt and unexplained end to their affair, yet she was galled and dismayed to discover her attraction for him had failed to diminish. If anything, it had magnified. He was right, though she would slit her own throat before ever confessing it; she did still desire him and utterly despised herself for it.

“What really happened to Lord Reggie, Aunt Di?” Vesta paused her nervous fidgeting to ask. “You’ve never spoken of it.”

“Because it is vastly unpleasant to do so,” Diana said. “He was a compulsive gambler, and when it appeared he had lost nearly everything, he was found dead. That entire chapter of my life is over now and best forgotten.”

Still, Vesta pressed her. “It happened at my godfather’s country house in Epsom, did it not? I was not too young to remember. You and Mama and Papa went for a visit and came back early, but I never saw Lord Reggie again. No one ever said he was dead. No one told me anything at all. I didn’t understand for the longest while.” A moment of silence ensued. “How long did my parents know one another before they wed?”

Diana was thankful the topic had finally diverted away from herself. “I don’t know,” she answered. “A few months maybe? They met at my engagement party as I recall.”

“How old were they?”

“Annalee had just passed her eighteenth summer.”

“And my father was only a few months older than she was,” Vesta said. “And you, Aunt Di, how old were you when you wed?”

“I was seventeen.”

Vesta bolted upright. “A full year younger than me!” she declared. “See how unfair you are all being!”

“But, Vesta, the circumstances were completely different in my situation. My parents arranged the match—”

“To a man you just admitted you did not even love,” Vesta accused.

Diana realized with a sigh that she had been outmaneuvered again. “But, dearest, we don’t wish you to rush into something you may later regret. Sometimes our emotions lead us astray, and what we think we desire most at one moment becomes something that haunts us later. You must know we only care for your happiness.”

“The only one who seems to truly care for my happiness is my godfather!” Vesta sniffed, tears beginning to mist her eyes. “Are you in love with him? Is that it?”

Diana paled. “How can you even ask such a thing? He is a vile man, nothing more than a licentious libertine!”

“How can you dare say such things, when you know Hew is all that is honorable and decent! You did want him, didn’t you?” Vesta accused and tore herself away from Diana. “And now you hate him for choosing me instead! Well, you shan’t have him, Aunt Di!”

“Hew?” Diana shook her head in bewilderment. “I thought we were talking of Lord DeVere.”

“Lord DeVere?” Vesta froze, her hazel eyes turning into saucers. “You are in love with Uncle Vic? I surely cannot imagine a more unlikely pair!” She clutched her stomach and broke into a paroxysm of giggles.

“I am not in love with anyone,” Diana protested, “least of all that...that...reprobate!”