The Rogue's Wager (Sinful Brides #1)(45)

“Is Diana . . . in love with the duke?” If she were, Helena would swiftly end her plan, cut the marquess free, and deal with the suitors hunting her dowry in some other way.

“Love.” The woman all but spat that word. “You plebeian.” She scraped her gaze over Helena’s too-tall form. “We do not deal in matters of love. We deal in the practical. Wealth. Power. Prestige.” Those callous words turned Helena’s blood cold. Many times, she’d lamented her brothers’ inability to show feeling, but there had never been the emotional deadness that marred this woman’s black soul. “Furthermore,” the duchess went on, “it matters not whether—”

“What are you two ladies so passionately discussing?” A voice sounded at the front of the room, filled with amusement. They looked to the doorway where the portly duke stood, smiling his ever-present smile. “Hmm?” he asked, coming forward. “Could it be a certain marquess?” He waggled his bushy eyebrows. “Paying you court is he, Helena?”

When she’d concocted her scheme and enlisted Robert’s support, she’d seen only the deterrent he’d pose for interested fortune hunters. Not being part of this world, she’d failed to properly consider the enemies she’d earn herself by gaining the attention of a future duke . . . Always think a plan fully through . . . Her skin burning under the force of the other woman’s glare, Helena gave a slight nod.

How many times had that rule been hammered home by Ryker? She’d made the misstep in forgetting those rules applied to all, but the perils in being trapped by a fortune hunter were far greater than a duchess’s displeasure.

The duke settled his hands on his pea-green jacket, smoothing his paunch. “Westfield has always been a good boy.” Despite the thick undercurrent of tension blanketing the parlor, Helena smiled. With the marquess’s powerful physique and command of a room, there was nothing boy-like about him. “He’d make an excellent match, wouldn’t he, Nerissa?”

The duchess flushed.

“And I always thought to see my family tied to Dennington’s.”

A strangled choking sound escaped the duchess, and without a word, she spun on her heel and stormed from the room.

My family.

This man who’d chosen another over Helena’s mother, and failed to acknowledge his by-blow’s existence, saw her as . . . family? Helena stared bewildered at the man whose blood she shared.

The duke patted her on the arm. “Never mind her. She’s merely overcome with joy at the prospect of you marrying Westfield.”

And if her situation hadn’t become incredibly muddied by the connections shared by these two powerful ducal families, Helena would have laughed.

As it was, she’d seen the hatred glinting in the duchess’s eyes and knew she’d found an even greater enemy in the woman.

Three months.

She’d but three months, and then she’d be free of it all.





Chapter 11


Rule 11


Never be lured by a pretty face.

Arriving at his father’s townhouse a short while after his first meeting with the spitfire Helena Banbury, Robert dismounted his horse. As he dismounted, and turned the reins of his mount over to a waiting servant, a shiver of apprehension brought his shoulders back. With a frown, he looked about his father’s fashionable Mayfair Street home. Brushing back the irrational response, he strode up the steps.

The butler pulled the door open and Robert shrugged out of his cloak.

A footman rushed over to collect the garment.

With murmured thanks, Robert looked to Davidson. “Davidson, my father . . . ?” he asked, tossing over his hat.

“Is in his office, my lord,” the man said, easily catching the article in his fingers.

Inclining his head, Robert started down the hall. The sting of visiting that loathsome office to see his fiancée rutting with his grandfather still burned. This dreaded march reconjured the evil of that day. It had driven him to seek out a bachelor’s residence, and set himself up away from the pain of it. With time, the pain of Lucy’s treachery had faded from these walls. Instead it lived deep inside, in a place borne of caution. As the late duke had correctly proclaimed, Robert hated the bastard still, but he was grateful for the lesson imparted.

It was why he didn’t know what to make of Helena Banbury with her palpable hatred for his title, and, if his ego would allow—for him.

Then given the state she now found herself in, hating polite Society and missing the previous life she’d lived before his interference, it certainly explained away her sentiments. A smile pulled at his lips. Nevertheless, her faint, breathless words had hinted at a woman not wholly unaffected by him.

Robert reached his father’s door, and not bothering to knock, pressed the handle and stepped inside. “Father.”

The duke glanced up from his ledgers, heavy surprise coating the older man’s features. “Robert,” he greeted, his pen frozen over his books.

Following their exchange a month ago, after his discovery that his father had tried to manipulate him into marriage, they’d settled into an uneasy existence. Assured his father was, in fact, very much alive and well, Robert had sought out his bachelor’s residence once more.

“I am surprised to see you,” he said quietly when his son still said nothing.