Ducal Encounters 01 - At the Duke's Discretion

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any method, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of The Author – Wendy Soliman.

  At the Dukes Discretion - Copyright Wendy Soliman 2014

  This e-Book is a work of fiction. While references may be made to actual places or events, the names, characters, incidents, and locations within are from the author’s imagination and are not a resemblance to actual living or dead persons, businesses or events.

  ISBN: 9781483517780

  Chapter One

  Winchester, England 1818

  Amos Sheridan’s efforts to distract Nate’s attention away from Martha’s ample bosom proved woefully ineffective. With an impatient roll of his eyes, he slammed his empty tankard down and dealt his brother a sharp nudge in the ribs.

  “Ouch!” Finally, Nate turned towards Amos, albeit with a scowl. “What the devil was that for?”

  “Time to go, little brother. We are expected at home.”

  “Damnation, just when things were getting interesting.”

  Amos suppressed a smile. Nate’s fascination with Martha, the comely barmaid at the Crown and Anchor tavern in Shawford village was as predictable as it was diverting. Martha’s eyes lit up, an hour previously, when Nate and Amos walked into the taproom. True to form, she had flirted outrageously with Nate ever since. She sent him saucy smiles, laughed a little too loudly at anything he had to say, and frequently leaned her elbows on the bar, pushing her breasts together to better display her décolletage.

  Nate had not long returned to Winchester since finishing his tenure at Oxford and was thirsty for the pleasures of life. Martha would not disappoint, which was why Amos had suggested visiting the Crown and Anchor.

  “Drink up, Nate,” Amos urged.

  “We will not be missed.” Nate waved a negligent hand in Amos’s direction, his attention firmly focused on Martha’s bosom once again. “There’s time for another tankard of this excellent ale.”

  “Mother will skin us alive if we’re late. She has guests, and since she has gone to considerable trouble to arrange this dinner to welcome you home, it would be the height of bad manners to keep her waiting.”

  “Perdition, so it would be.” Nate removed his elbows from the bar and blew Martha an exaggerated kiss. “Until later, Martha my love.”

  “Good evening, your lordships.”

  “And good evening to you, Jeggins,” Amos replied to the landlord, picking up his hatd and ushering his reluctant brother towards the door.

  Jeggins inclined his head in the direction of his departing customers. That was about as deferential as it got in this establishment, which was one of the reasons why the Sheridan males frequented it. The residents of Shawford and Compton had come to an unwritten agreement to let them be themselves and didn’t badger the life out of them for favours or with obsequious behaviour when they showed themselves in the villages. There had been a duke at Winchester Park since Norman times, and that title was currently held by Amos’s older brother, Zachary. One of the few characteristics the feuding residents of the two villages shared was a fierce pride in their duke. They claimed the Sheridans as their own and were aggressively protective of the family’s privacy, as well as their right to behave as well or as badly as anyone else.

  All four of the boys had done their level best not to disappoint on the bad behaviour front, driving their poor mother demented with their antics.

  “Don’t worry,” Amos said, slapping Nate’s shoulder as they took their horses from the ostler in the inn’s mews and mounted up. “Martha will still be there tomorrow.”

  “Not sure I can wait that long,” Nate replied morosely. “She’s wet my appetite.”

  “It’s what she does,” Amos replied, pushing his new stallion into a canter as they cleared the village streets and headed across three miles of common land to reach Winchester Park.

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  Amos’s laugh echoed above the soft breeze that assaulted his face as he continued to give his lively mount its head. “Don’t tell me you didn’t find distractions in Oxford. If you spent all your time studying, the family name will be sullied beyond redemption.”

  “Never fear, I lived down to the standard you three set for me.” Nate drew level with Amos and grinned. “Oxford seems a devilish long time ago already.”

  Their horses had decided to race one another. Fiercely competitive, neither brother saw reason to stop them and leaned forward instead, laughing as they urged them on. Conversation between them was temporarily suspended while they gave their full attention to the speeding animals. They were still neck and neck when they were forced to slow in order not to excite the young horses grazing in Winchester Park’s paddocks.

  “An honourable draw,” Nate said, patting his sweating mount’s neck.

  “Nothing honourable about drawing,” Amos replied, grinning. “Sheridans play to win.”

  “Even against one another?”

  “Especially then. Anyway, we’ll set up a proper race sometime soon, with all four of us taking part. It will be like old times.”

  “Best not let Annalise hear about it,” Nate said, referring to the older of their two sisters, “or she will insist upon being a part of it.”

  “And most likely beat the lot of us.”

  Amos failed to suppress a prideful grin. Annalise, when still very young, had badgered him to allow her to ride astride. Amos had seen little harm in her doing so while on the privacy of the estate. It had not occurred to him that at nineteen, having taken the ton by storm during her first season, she would not have put aside her tomboy pursuits in favour of more feminine occupations. With the benefit of hindsight, he ought not to be surprised. Annalise had inherited the same hellfire tendencies as her brothers, but had learned to disguise them a little better.

  The brothers surrendered their mounts to the grooms who ran out to take them, and entered the imposing house by a side door. Faraday, the family’s faithful butler, materialised to take their outer garments.

  “We’re fearful late, Faraday,” Amos said. “Unavoidably detained.”

  If Faraday could smell the reason for their delay on their breath, he did not give the slightest indication. “Her grace is now yet down, my lord. I believe you have just enough time.”

  “Right then, we’d best look to it and get changed.”

  The brothers took the stairs two at a time and parted on the upper landing. A short time later, Amos, impeccably attired in beautifully tailored evening clothes, descended the stairs at a more moderate rate. He found all three of his brothers already in the drawing room, glasses of whisky in their hands. Zach acknowledged Amos’s arrival and poured a drink for him.

  “I hear you have been leading our youngest brother astray,” he said.

  Amos snorted. “He hardly needed any leading.”

  “I would imagine not,” Vince said. “Especially if Martha was involved.”

  “What do you devils know of the luscious Martha?” Nate demanded in a possessive tone.

  The three eldest Sheridans had a good laugh at Nate’s expense.

  “Martha is a family tradition,” Zach explained, clapping Nate’s shoulder. “Just place yourself in her capable hands, little brother. She will see you right.”

  Nate looked affronted. “I’m hardly a greenhorn, I’ll have you know. I don’t need tutoring.”

  This statement provided the brothers with another cause for amusement. “Trust us,” Vince said. “Until you have sampled Martha’s delights, you know next to nothing.�
��

  “It’s all part of the dispute between the villages,” Amos explained.

  “Martha is?” Nate’s eyebrows disappeared beneath his thick thatch of hair. “I fail to understand how.”

  “Shawford and Compton both claim credit for having us, the Sheridans, living in their environs,” Zach explained, even though Nate knew it perfectly well.

  “And as Winchester Hall is equal distance between the two,” Amos added, “the dispute will never be resolved through fair means.”

  “Ah, now I understand.” A slow smile of comprehension graced Nate’s disgustingly even features. “Martha is Shawford’s secret weapon.”

  “You see,” Vince said, grinning, “that expensive education wasn’t completely wasted.”

  “Perhaps not,” Zach replied. “But it won’t be complete until Martha has got her claws into our baby brother here.”

  “She looks upon it as a rite of passage to educate us all,” Amos said, topping up his glass.

  “And who are we to stand in the way of good honest competition between the villages?” Vince demanded to know.

  “What competition?”

  Annalise walked into the room in a rustle of pale yellow silk, curls dancing around her lovely face, her eyes alight with interest. Portia, at sixteen the baby of the family, was at her side, her much plainer face alive with excitement because she was to dine with the family when guests were present. Not due to be presented until the coming season, society was still new and interesting to Portia. Amos idly wondered if he had ever exhibited such enthusiasm himself and when he had become so jaded, so bored with the entire social rigmarole.

  He watched his siblings contemplatively, wondering about the unfairness of life. Being born into wealth and privilege ensured they would enjoy the very best of the amusements society had to offer. It ought to have been enough but, to top it all, they had all been blessed with good looks, elegance, and engaging charm. All of them except poor Portia, that is. In spite of their mother’s lack of stature, all the brothers topped six foot and Annalise, much to her annoyance, was taller than average. Portia on the other hand was short and, as she herself cheerfully put it, the runt of the litter with a face like a wrinkled prune. It wasn’t true, of course, especially when she wasn’t being compared to her sister. Portia had a lively wit, an enquiring mind and charming personality. Simply put, Amos adored her and felt fiercely protective of her, as did all of the Sheridan brood.

  “Nothing that needs to concern you,” Zach replied to Annalise’s question.

  “Which is precisely the response I would have expected.” Annalise wrinkled her pert little nose in disgust. “You boys find all sorts of diverse subjects to discuss, but the moment we get anywhere near you, you change the subject. How are Portia and I supposed to learn anything interesting about life if you insist upon being so secretive?”

  “How many offers of marriage was I asked to entertain for your hand during your first season?” Zach asked in a tone of mild amusement.

  “Oh, that. Bah.” Annalise flapped a hand. “I am far too young to think of matrimony.”

  “You’re nineteen,” Amos reminded her. “More than old enough.”

  “Most young ladies look upon it as a duty to marry in their first season,” Vince pointed out.

  “I am not most young ladies.”

  The brothers shared an exasperated glance. “That is certainly true,” Nate said, speaking for them all.

  “Well, I don’t intend ever to marry,” Portia said airily. “Unlike Annalise, no one would want me for anything other than my fortune.”

  “Darling, that simply isn’t true,” Annalise protested. “You are interesting, clever, and amusing, whereas my head is full of air, and I can barely string two intelligible sentences together.”

  “Gentlemen don’t like women to be clever. It makes them feel inferior. Besides, why should I have a man telling me how to behave and what to do, when I can stay here and do precisely as I please?”

  “Rather like our brothers do.” Annalise sent the brothers in question a teasing smile. “Well said, Portia. Zach, you have no business berating me for not accepting any of those stuffy proposals, when you are a duke and have a duty to marry and produce an heir to ensure the future of the duchy. Besides, you are thirty, which is positively ancient. If you leave it very much longer, you will probably lack the stamina to beget an heir.”

  All four brothers spluttered on their drinks.

  “What must Zach do precisely to beget an heir?” Portia asked with an air of such innocence as to make the brothers dissolve into fits of laughter.

  “I am glad to find you all in such good spirits,” the dowager duchess said, walking through the door that Faraday held open for her. “May I ask what you find so amusing?”

  “Our sisters are an endless source of entertainment,” Zach replied. “When they are not irritating the life out of us, that is.”

  “I am pleased you find them to be so entertaining,” the duchess replied, seating herself beside the fire and accepting a glass of champagne from Faraday’s tray. “I must say, it is very pleasant to have you all together like this. It has been too long.” She raised her glass. “Welcome home, Nate.”

  “Thanks, Mother, it’s good to be here and to be idle for a change. All that studying quite takes it out of a chap.”

  “Is that so?” Amos replied, biting back a smile.

  “Certainly, although I dare say Zach will find me an occupation soon enough.”

  “If he does not then I certainly shall,” their mother replied. “Your sisters and I need escorting on an excursion to Winchester over the coming week. We must set our minds to Portia’s wardrobe for her come-out.”

  Nate’s horrified expression caused more amusement amongst the brothers, but he was saved from finding a way to excuse himself from the engagement by the arrival of their guests.

  As Amos intermingled with their neighbours and friends he thought his mother was right about one thing. A close-knit family, it had been too long since they had all been at home at the same time. He watched his mother, elegant and charming still although she was now well into her fifties, and wondered how she could have produced four such strapping sons when she herself was so diminutive. But what she lacked in statue was more than compensated for by her style and steely determination to maintain the family honour. Anyone who mistook her easy going manner for weakness was not left in ignorance as to her true character for very long.

  Amos had been severely worried about her when their father died three years previously. The two of them had been so much in love, right until the very last. Even a boisterous family of six could not quell the affection between them. Amos and Zach had thought her heart might actually fracture beneath the weight of her grief, and nothing any of them said or did seemed to comfort her. She recovered from her loss in time, but a light in her eyes had been permanently extinguished. She devoted herself to her children, and turned her attention to Zach in particular. Never tiring of introducing him to young ladies whom she considered suitable duchess material, she allowed her annoyance at his tardiness in selecting one to become increasingly apparent.

  Unfortunately the brothers had seen for themselves just how harmonious their parent’s marriage had been, and that example now worked against the duchess. None of them were in any particular hurry to embrace matrimony as a consequence. For his part, Amos was absolutely determined not to become leg-shackled unless he found a lady who could inspire him to similar devotion. Despite being inundated with potential candidates whenever he showed himself in society, Amos had yet to find a female who moved him to the extent he would sacrifice his freedom for her sake.

  Zach, he knew, was similarly minded. Although, as Annalise had so artfully just reminded them all, expectations rested on his shoulders which, sooner or later, he would be obliged to fulfil. Hopefully, he would do so before Portia’s prophecy of physical incapability became a reality.

  During dinner, the conversation turned t
o the annual garden party their mother threw to celebrate her birthday. It had become quite a tradition over the years. Both sets of villagers attended and managed to behave with civility towards one another, at least until the ale supplied in strict rotation by the competing inns in the two villages loosened tongues and opinions. Their father had been a firm believer in supporting local businesses. His widow and Zach maintained that tradition, spreading their custom with conscious consideration for the ongoing competition. The duchess sought to fill Portia’s wardrobe, and doubtless replenish her own and Annalise’s in Winchester rather than London. It was a consideration that was noted and appreciated by local tradesmen.

  She would almost certainly look to smaller establishments in Shawford and Compton for additional items. Amos smothered a smile, reminding himself to tell Nate the taproom at the Crown and Anchor made a very convenient place to wait while the ladies selected their purchases−a chore, he had reason to know from painful past experience that took up a considerable amount of time. Once he was privy to that knowledge, Nate’s enthusiasm for escort duties would likely undergo a marked improvement.

  “As to the addition to your silverware, your grace,” Palmer, the local squire, remarked during dinner. “Have your thought to look anywhere other than Shawford this year?”

  Amos wondered what the devil Palmer was playing at. Their late father had always commissioned a new piece of silver to add to his wife’s growing collection to coincide with her birthday celebrations, where it would be set on display for all to admire. That duty now fell to Zach and, like his father before him, he only ever went to Mr. Chesney in Shawford for that purpose. Chesney’s work was quite exquisite and even Compton residents reluctantly conceded they had no one skilled enough to compete with him.

  “Whatever can you mean, Mr. Palmer?” the duchess asked, looking up from her roasted guinea fowl. “I would not insult Mr. Chesney by even thinking of going elsewhere.”

  “No insult was intended by the question, your grace. It is just that Chesney’s health is no longer robust.”

  He is unwell?” Amos asked. It was the first he had heard of it, and not much local gossip escaped him. He visited the Crown and Anchor’s taproom at regular intervals for precisely that reason.