Too Wilde to Wed (The Wildes of Lindow Castle, #2)(9)

“I begged Diana to join me as my guest,” his aunt chimed in, “but she refused. Come along, North. The two of you must stop quarreling, because it’s only in melodramas that a duke falls in love with a governess.” She managed to appear amused, mischievous, and satisfied, all at once. “I shall expect you to join us for supper, Diana.”

Diana opened her mouth, clearly to protest, but his aunt held up her hand. “We need to make plans for your welfare. No important conversations should be conducted in a room as malodorous as this one. Moreover, when there is rough ground to be covered, a glass of wine does not go amiss.”

North bowed.

Diana might call herself a governess if she wished, but he had never bowed to a domestic before. He made his bow a trifle deeper than it might have been, to make a point.

“Well, this is a pretty business,” his aunt said, when they were out in the corridor. “I find you crossing swords in the nursery with my favorite member of the household. There are dark circles around your eyes. You’ve managed to become alarmingly muscled and gaunt at the same time.”

“Nonsense,” North said, pushing away an image of the maggoty rations his soldiers were allotted in America. “What does Prism make of Diana’s presence?”

“Prism’s great gift as a butler is to know what the family wants before they do,” his aunt said. “Diana refused to dine with me until Prism convinced her that I would take the children to Bath out of pure loneliness, leaving her behind. As if I would go anywhere with babes in tow!”

“I am surprised that my father agreed to employ Diana. Surely you didn’t believe the boy is mine.”

“Of course not, darling. I presented it to the duke as a fait accompli,” his aunt said, gripping his arm as they began descending the stairs. Lady Knowe was fond of heeled slippers that made steep wooden staircases like this one somewhat perilous.

North was torn between aggravation at the situation, and frustration at himself for feeling even the slightest attraction to Diana. “How on earth did you learn of her situation?”

“I know you. Something had happened just before you left the country, and Diana was the obvious answer.”

North’s mother had died when he was too young to remember, but Aunt Knowe had always been in the castle. “It took me months to find Diana, as Mrs. Belgrave refused to tell me her address. How did you manage it?”

“I barged straight into the woman’s sitting room and threatened to eviscerate her,” his aunt said cheerfully. “An utterly repellent creature, I might add. She had the audacity to inform me that her daughter had stolen a fortune in emeralds.”

“Prism returned Diana’s jewels and clothing to her mother,” North said, remembering his incredulity when Prism gave him back his betrothal ring.

“Diana is no thief. When I found the poor girl, she had scarcely a ha’penny to her name. I actually had someone investigate Mr. Belgrave’s will to make certain that her mother hadn’t stolen Diana’s inheritance.”

“Mrs. Belgrave disowned her?” An uneasy memory of the shabby little house in which he found Diana came back to him.

“Her foolish father left only a proviso directing his wife to dowry their daughters,” Lady Knowe said, nodding. “From what I hear, the woman is racketing around town, allowing herself to be courted by fortune hunters, no doubt draped in the very jewels she accused Diana of stealing.”

North assumed that Diana had chosen a poor man over him. But her lover had died before North had met her, in light of the fact that her child was three or four years old. “Bloody hell,” he said, his voice grating. “I rode away and left her there.”

“Understandably,” Aunt Knowe said, patting his arm. “I had to bully her dreadfully before she would agree to return to the castle. In the end, Diana came only on the condition that she be employed. Unfortunately, neither of us envisioned the outrage that would result.”

North shrugged. “It’s not as if the Wildes are unfamiliar with scandal.”

“I shall miss her,” his aunt said, pausing at the bottom of the nursery steps. “She was such a gloomy creature when you first brought her here that I wondered at your judgment, but now she can keep me laughing all evening. At least, on those occasions when I convince her to dine with me.”

His aunt sounded lonely, to North’s surprise. He always envisioned Aunt Knowe buzzing happily around a castle full of guests.

“Have my father and stepmother been spending most of their time in London?”

“The House of Lords, and the war,” she said with a sigh. “In addition, dear Ophelia has to find husbands for the girls. Betsy is in the process of taking London by storm and yet she turns her nose up at every offer. Ophelia misses Artie terribly.”

“Why doesn’t she simply take Artie to London?”

“I never took you to London as a boy, did I? Children don’t thrive in coal dust. Your father’s second duchess took Joan to London, and the poor babe developed a bronchial complaint within the week.”

“Why would she have taken Joan to London? I don’t remember ever seeing that particular duchess in the nursery.”

His father’s second duchess had been fertile—giving him four children in six years—and adulterous. She’d run away with a Prussian count shortly after Joan was born, and Parliament had granted the duke a divorce with unheard-of speed.