Secrets of an Accidental Duchess Read online

  Secrets of an Accidental Duchess

  Donovan [2]

  Jennifer Haymore

  Grand Central Publishing (2012)

  Rating: ****

  Tags: FIC027050

  * * *

  Product Description

  With her pale hair and slim figure, Olivia Donovan looks as fragile as fine china, and has been treated as such by her sisters ever since a childhood bout with malaria. But beneath her delicate facade, Olivia guards a bold, independent spirit and the kind of passionate desires proper young ladies must never confess...

  It was a reckless wager, and one Max couldn't resist: seduce the alluring Olivia or forfeit part of his fortune. Yet the wild, soon-to-be Duke never imagined he'd fall in love with this innocent beauty. Nor could he have guessed that a dangerously unpredictable rival would set out to destroy them both. Now, Max must beat a Madman at his own twisted game-or forever lose the only woman to have ever won his heart.

  Begin Reading

  Table of Contents

  A Preview of Confessions of an Improper Bride

  A Preview of Pleasures of a Tempted Lady

  Copyright Page

  For L, who hasn’t yet gotten his wish that I’d add more epic battles and characters with superhero powers into my books, but who apparently still loves me anyway.

  Acknowledgments

  Many thanks to my editor, Selina McLemore, who always helps me find the way through the cobwebs of plots in my head. And to my agent, Barbara Poelle, who’s stuck by my side since Day One. Thanks also to my good friends and readers Kate McKinley and Anya Richards, who offer me endless support. I’m lucky to have all of you!

  Prologue

  She was an angel.

  Maxwell Buchanan, the Marquis of Hasley, had observed many beautiful women in his thirty years. He’d conversed with them, danced with them, bedded them. But no woman had ever frozen him in place before tonight.

  He stood entranced, ignoring people who brushed past him, and stared at her, unable to tear his gaze away. With her slender, slight figure, delicate features, and crown of thick blond hair, she was beautiful, but not uncommonly so, at least to the other men populating the ballroom. As far as Max knew, the only head that had turned when she’d entered the room was his own.

  The difference, he supposed, the singular element that clearly set her apart from the rest of the women here, was in the reserved way she held herself. There was nothing brazen about her, but nothing diffident or nervous, either. It was as though she held a confidence within herself that she didn’t feel any desire to share with the world. She didn’t need to display her beauty like all the other unattached ladies present. She simply was who she was, and she made no apologies for it.

  Her small, white-gloved fingers held her dance partner’s, and Max’s fingers twitched. He wanted to be the man clasping that hand in his own. He wanted to know her. He would learn her name as soon as possible. He would orchestrate an introduction to her and then he would ask her for a dance.

  “Lovely, isn’t she?”

  Max whipped around to face the intruder. The man standing beside him was Leonard Reece, the Marquis of Fenwicke, and not one of his favorite people.

  “Who is lovely?” he asked, feigning ignorance, curling the fingers of his right hand into a fist so as not to reach up to adjust his cravat over his suddenly warm neck.

  Fenwicke gave a low chuckle. “The young lady you’ve been staring at for the last ten minutes.”

  Damn. He’d been caught. And now he felt foolish. Allowing his gaze to trail after a young woman, even one as compelling as he found this one, was an imprudent enterprise, especially at Lord Hertford’s ball—the last ball of the London Season. If Max wasn’t careful, he’d find himself betrothed by Michaelmas.

  The dance ended, and the angel’s dance partner led her off the floor toward another lady. The three stood talking for a moment before the man bowed and took his leave.

  “Most people believe her sister is the great beauty of the family,” Fenwicke continued conversationally. “But I would beg to differ with them. As would you, apparently.”

  “Her sister?”

  “Indeed. The lady she’s speaking to, the one in the pale yellow, is the youngest of the Donovan sisters.”

  Max looked more closely at the woman in yellow. Indeed, she was what most people would consider a great beauty—taller than her sister, and slender but rounded in all the proper places, with golden hair that glinted where the chandelier light caught it.

  “The Donovan sisters?” he mused. “I don’t know them.”

  “The lady in yellow is Jessica Donovan.” Fenwicke murmured so as not to be heard by anyone in the crowd milling about the enormous punch bowl. “The lady in blue is her older sister, Olivia.”

  The angel’s name was Olivia.

  Due to his position as the heir of a duke, Max was acquainted with most of the English aristocracy perforce. Yet from the moment he’d caught his first glimpse of the angel tonight, he’d known he’d never been introduced to her, never seen her before. He’d never heard Olivia and Jessica Donovan’s names, either, though their surname did sound vaguely familiar.

  “They must be new to Town.”

  “They are. They arrived in London last month. This is only the third or fourth event they’ve attended.” Fenwicke gave a significant pause. “However, I am quite certain you are acquainted with the eldest Donovan sister.”

  Max frowned. “I don’t think so.”

  Fenwicke chuckled. “You are. You just haven’t yet made the connection. The eldest sister is Margaret Dane, Countess of Stratford.”

  That name he did know—how could he not? “Ah. Of course.”

  A year ago, Lady Stratford had arrived from Antigua engaged to one well-connected gentleman, but she’d ended up marrying the earl instead. Like a great stone thrown into the semi-placid waters of London, the ripples caused by the splash she’d made had only just begun to subside. Even Max, who studiously avoided all forms of gossip, had heard all about it.

  “So the countess’s sisters have recently arrived from the West Indies?”

  “That’s right.”

  Max’s gaze lingered on Olivia, the angel in blue. Fenwicke had said she was older than the lady standing beside her, but she appeared younger. It was in her bearing, in her expression. While Jessica didn’t quite strut, she moved like a woman attuned to the power she wielded over all who beheld her. Olivia was directly the opposite. She wore her reserved nature like a cloak. She stood a few inches shorter and was slighter than her sister. Her cheeks were paler, and her hair held more of the copper and less of the gold, though certainly no one would complain that it was too red. It was just enough to lend an intriguing simmer rather than a full-blown fire.

  Olivia’s powder-blue dress was of an entirely fashionable style and fabric—though Max didn’t concern himself with fashion enough to be able to distinguish either by name. The gown was conservatively cut but fit her perfectly, and her jewelry was simple. She wore only a pair of pearl-drop earrings and an austere strand of pearls around her neck.

  Her posture was softer than her sister’s, whose stance was sharp and alert. However, their familial connection was obvious in their faces—both perfect ovals with full but small mouths and large eyes. From this distance, Max couldn’t discern the color of her eyes, but when Olivia had been dancing earlier, she’d glanced in his direction, and he’d thought they must be a light shade.

  God. He nearly groaned. She captivated him. She had from the first moment he’d seen her. She was simply lovely.

  “… leaving London soon.”

  Fenwicke stopped talking, and Max’s attention snapped
back to him.

  Fenwicke sighed. “Did you hear me, Hasley?”

  “Sorry,” Max said, then gestured randomly about. “Noisy in here.”

  It was true, after all. The orchestra had begun the opening strands of the next dance, and laughing couples were brushing past them, hurrying to join in at the last possible moment.

  Fenwicke gazed at him appraisingly for a long moment, then motioned toward the ballroom’s exit. “Come, man. Let’s go have a drink.”

  If it had been an ordinary evening, he would have declined. He and Fenwicke had a long acquaintance, and Max had always found the man oily and unlikable. They’d been rivals since their school days at Eton, but they’d never been friends.

  He glanced quickly back to the lady. Olivia. At that moment, she looked up. Her gaze caught his and held.

  Blue eyes. Surely they were blue.

  Those eyes held him in her thrall, sweet and lovely, and sensual too, despite her obvious innocence. Max felt suspended in midair, like a water droplet caught in a spider’s web.

  She glanced at Fenwicke and then quickly to the floor, and Max plopped back to earth with a splat. But satisfaction rushed through him in a warm wave, because just before she’d broken their eye contact, he’d seen the first vestiges of color flooding her cheeks.

  “Very well,” he told Fenwicke. Tonight he didn’t politely excuse himself from Fenwicke’s company, because tonight Fenwicke appeared to have information Max suddenly craved—information about Olivia Donovan.

  He turned away from her, but not before he saw another gentleman offering her his arm for the dance and a bolt of envy struck him in the gut. Thrusting away that irrational emotion, Max followed Fenwicke down the corridor to the parlor that had been set aside as the gentlemen’s retiring room. A foursome played cards in the corner, and an elderly man sat in a large but elegant brown cloth armchair in the corner, blatantly antisocial, a newspaper raised to obscure half his face. Other men lounged by the sideboard, chatting and drinking from the never-ending supply of spirits.

  Fenwicke collected two glasses of brandy and then gestured with his chin at a pair of empty leather chairs separated by a low, glass-topped table but close enough together for them to have a private conversation. Max sat in the nearest chair, taking the glass Fenwicke offered him as he passed. He took a drink of the brandy while Fenwicke lowered himself into the opposite chair.

  Holding his glass in both hands, Fenwicke stared at him. “I gather you haven’t had the pleasure of observing the Miss Donovans prior to tonight.”

  “No,” Max admitted. “Do they plan to reside in London?”

  “No.” Fenwicke’s lip twisted sardonically. “As I was saying in the ballroom, I believe they’re leaving before the end of the month. They’re off to Stratford’s estate in Sussex.”

  “Too bad,” Max murmured.

  But then a memory jolted him. At White’s last week, Lord Stratford had invited a few men, including Max, to Sussex this autumn to hunt fowl. He’d turned down the offer—he’d never been much interested in hunting—but now…

  Fenwicke gazed at him. The man had always reminded Max of a reptilian predator with his cold, assessing silver-gray eyes. “You,” he announced, “have a tendre for Miss Donovan.”

  It was impossible to determine whether that was a question or a statement. Either way, it didn’t matter. “Don’t be absurd. I don’t even know Jessica Donovan.”

  “I’m speaking of Olivia,” Fenwicke said icily. It sounded like Fenwicke was jealous, but that was ridiculous. As the man had said, the lady had been in Town for less than a month.

  “I don’t know either of them,” Max responded, keeping his tone mild.

  “Regardless, you want her,” Fenwicke said in an annoyed voice. “I’m well acquainted with that look you were throwing in her direction.”

  Max shrugged.

  “You are besotted with her.”

  Max leaned back in his chair, studying Fenwicke closely beyond the rim of his glass, wondering what gave Fenwicke the right to have proprietary feelings for Olivia Donovan.

  “Are you a relation of hers?” he asked.

  “I am not.”

  “Well, I was watching her,” Max said slowly. “And, yes, I admit to wondering who she was and whether she was attached. I was considering asking her to dance later this evening.”

  The muscles in Fenwicke’s jaw bulged as he ground his teeth. “She has no dances available.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I asked her myself.”

  Max stared at the man opposite him, feeling the muscles across his shoulders tense as the fingers of his loose hand curled into a tight fist. He didn’t like the thought of his angel touching Fenwicke. Of Fenwicke touching her. The thought rather made him want to throw Fenwicke through the glass window overlooking the terrace across from them.

  He took a slow breath, willing himself to calmness. He wasn’t even acquainted with the woman. Didn’t even know the sound of her voice, the color of her eyes, her likes and dislikes. Yet he was already willing to protect her from scum like Fenwicke.

  He wouldn’t want Fenwicke touching any young innocent, he reasoned. He’d protect any woman from the marquis’s slick, slithering paws.

  “How is your wife?” he asked quite deliberately, aware of the challenge in his voice.

  Fenwicke’s expression went flat. He took a long drink of brandy before responding. “She’s well,” he said coldly. “She’s back at home. In Sussex. Thank you for asking.” His lips curled in a snarl that Max guessed was supposed to appear to be a smile.

  Max remembered that Fenwicke’s country home was in Sussex, just like the Earl of Stratford’s. He wondered if the houses were situated close to each other.

  “I’m glad to hear she’s well.”

  “You can’t have her,” Fenwicke said quietly.

  Max raised a brow. “Your wife?”

  “Olivia Donovan.”

  Max took a long moment to allow that to sink in. To think about how he should respond.

  “She’s not married?” he finally asked. He knew the answer.

  Fenwicke’s tone was frosty. “She is not.”

  “Engaged?”

  “No.”

  “Then why, pray, can’t I have her?”

  “She’d never accept you. You would never meet her standards. You, Hasley, are a well-known rake.”

  “So?” That had never stopped any woman from accepting his advances before.

  “So, you’re not good enough for her.” Fenwicke’s smile widened, but it was laced with bitterness. “No man in London is.”

  “How can you possibly know this?”

  “She told me.”

  Max nearly choked on his brandy. “What?”

  “I propositioned her,” Fenwicke said simply. “In the correct way, of course, which was quite delicate, considering her innocence. I dug deeply—quite deeply indeed—into my cache of charm.”

  Max’s stomach churned. He could never understand what women saw in Fenwicke—but obviously they saw something, because the man never needed to be too aggressive in his pursuit before capturing his prey, despite his marital status.

  Yet it seemed Miss Olivia Donovan didn’t see whatever it was in Fenwicke that all the other women saw. Intriguing. Without ever having met her, Max’s respect for her grew.

  The thought of how many times Fenwicke had abandoned his young wife in the country left Max feeling vaguely nauseous. How many times had he seen the man with a different woman on his arm?

  Perhaps what left the sourest taste in Max’s mouth was that everyone knew about Fenwicke’s proclivities but continued to invite him to their social events. No one spurned him. He was a peer, after all, a member of White’s, and an excellent dance partner or opponent at cards.

  Long ago, Fenwicke had decided that Max was an adversary and had pushed Max into a constant competition. They’d competed over sports, women, their studies, and politics. It had all started in Max’s t
hird year at Eton, when his cousins had died of influenza and Max became the heir to a dukedom just like Fenwicke was—Fenwicke’s father was the Duke of Southington and Max’s uncle was the Duke of Wakefield.

  Fenwicke even had the audacity to claim he’d be more of a duke, since he was an eldest son rather than a nephew. That statement had enraged Max—no one could vex him like Fenwicke could. Something about the man brought out the worst in Max, which was why he’d tried his damndest to stay away from the marquis. Avoidance hadn’t worked, however. Both he and Fenwicke had gone to Cambridge and now they belonged to the same gentleman’s club. Max couldn’t get rid of the man. And once they were both dukes and sitting in Parliament, they’d be required to see more of each other. Max had to come to terms with the fact that Fenwicke was a permanent fixture in his life, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

  Now, thinking of Fenwicke’s lascivious thoughts toward Miss Donovan in spite of his married state, Max’s dislike of the man threatened to grow into something stronger. Something more like hatred. He closed his eyes and images of his father passed behind his lids. His mother… alone. The tears she’d tried to hide from him. Even at a very young age, Max had known exactly what was happening. Exactly how his father had betrayed his mother, how he’d hurt her, ultimately destroyed her.

  Max would never do that to a wife—he’d never marry so there would simply never be a concern—and he’d never abide anyone who did.

  Fenwicke set his empty brandy glass on the table with a sigh. “I’m afraid Miss Olivia Donovan simply isn’t interested.”

  Max narrowed his eyes. “So because you failed to charm the lady, you assume that I’ll fail as well?”

  “Of course. She’s frigid, you see. The girl is composed of ice as solid as a glacier.”

  Another of the many reasons Max disliked Fenwicke: He never took responsibility. If a woman rejected him, he’d think it was due to some defect in her character as opposed to a natural—and wise—dislike or distrust of the man himself. If a woman professed no attraction to the marquis, naturally she wouldn’t feel any attraction to any man, because all other men were lesser beings.