Billy paced the length of the terrace before jerking off his mask and running a hand through his hair. When he swung around, his face was an agonized mirror of her own. “I knew I could make you want me, honey. But I wasn’t sure I could make you love me. You might have wanted to spend the night with a Darling, but spending your life with one was another proposition altogether.” He spread his arms, his rumpled hair and desperate expression only making his immaculate clothes look more striking. “I can dress up in fancy clothes and talk like a gentleman, but that still doesn’t make me one.”

He moved toward her, shaking his head in helpless wonder. “And look at you, Duchess—a lady to the bone— so fine and sweet it takes my breath away.” He reached down and gently cupped her belly in his palm, his expression both fierce and tender. “Nothing would make me prouder than to watch that beautiful body of yours swell with my child.”

Billy’s frank confession and intimate touch thawed the icy lump in Esmerelda’s throat. A single tear went tumbling from her lashes, then another.

Without bothering to brush them away, she stroked his jaw with her fingertips. “You forgot to take one thing into account, Mr. Darling.” At his questioning glance, she whispered,“! already loved you.”

Her mouth melted against his in a seeking caress. He wrapped his arms around her and lifted her clear off her feet, squeezing her as if he would never let her go.

“I never wanted a gentleman,” she murmured, kissing his throat, his cheek, his lips. “I wanted a man. I wanted you.”

This time when Billy took her by the hand and led her deeper into the garden, Esmerelda followed without protest. They ducked into the first gazebo they found.

“Oh, excuse me,” Billy muttered, rapidly backing up.

Esmerelda peeped around his shoulder only to find another couple locked in a torrid kiss. Moonlight spilled through the latticed walls, frosting their hair with silver.

“Aunt Anne!” she breathed, both scandalized and delighted.

Her aunt immediately gave Andrew McGuire’s broad shoulders a halfhearted shove. “Unhand me, you knave! How dare you take such liberties!”

Billy chuckled. “Don’t let us disturb you, Drew. I believe the lady’s about to give you a tongue-lashing you’ll never forget.”

He beat a hasty retreat with Esmerelda trotting along behind him, still gaping over her shoulder. He didn’t pause again until a dead branch cracked behind them.

A troubled expression crossed his face.

“What is it?” Esmerelda whispered, edging nearer to him. “Is someone following us?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t think so. It’s just a feeling I’ve had more than once lately.”

Shaking it off, he cupped her waist in his hands and set her atop a low stone wall opposite a towering evergreen hedge. The hedge provided privacy, while the wall provided the perfect excuse for Esmerelda to wrap both her arms and her legs around him.

He began to bunch up her skirt, determination glinting in his eyes.

“Why, Mr. Darling, whatever are you doing?”

“I’m going to get you with child. Then I’ll demand that your grandfather make you do right by me.”

Biting back a delighted grin, she said, “Surely even a scoundrel like you wouldn’t sink so low!”

“I’m a Darling, Miss Fine. I’ll sink as low as I have to.” With that wicked promise, he slid his hands beneath her skirt, cupped her rump through her thin silk drawers, and dragged her against him for a hot, delicious mingling of tongues.

They were still locked in that rather compromising embrace when her grandfather came charging through the hedge, clutching Samuel Darling by his one good ear.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Esmerelda sprang off the wall, but Billy kept his arms curved protectively around her as they turned to face her grandfather together.

The duke’s cane was nowhere in sight. Two winded footmen came stumbling through the hedge after him. Their eyes bulged as they saw their master’s beloved granddaughter in a stranger’s arms. “Turn around,” the duke barked.

Sam tried to oblige him, but only succeeded in nearly twisting off his ear.

“Not you! Them!”

The footmen did an abrupt about-face, the old-fashioned periwigs the duke insisted they wear quivering in alarm.

“You’re dismissed,” he commanded.

As they ducked back through the hedge, exchanging a relieved glance, Anne came racing down the path. Her chignon was hanging half over her eyes, and the hooks of her bodice looked curiously off-kilter.

She skidded to an abrupt halt on the gravel path. “For heaven’s sake, Reginald, what was all that commotion about?”

The duke gave Sam a spiteful shake before freeing his ear. “I saw this ruffian sneaking out the dining room window, so I lit out in pursuit. I caught him with this? He wrested the grubby sack from Sam’s hand and turned it upside down.

A shimmering stream of silverware, jewelry, and candlesticks came spilling out on the grass.

“Why, Samuel Darling,” Esmerelda exclaimed, “what would your ma say?”

Sam hung his head in shame.

“The other young scamp got away,” her grandfather informed them.

“Enos,” she whispered. Billy nodded, rolling his eyes.

He stood tall and straight in the moonlight, unmasked and exposed to her grandfather’s chilly regard.

“So we meet again, Mr. Darling. I suppose it wasn’t enough for you to rob my granddaughter of her precious virtue. You had to bring your kinfolk all the way to England to rob my home as well.”

“It was never my intention to rob your granddaughter of anything. I loved her then and I love her now.”

The duke snorted. “You loved her so well that you used her, then cast her aside like some worn-out pair of boots.”

“I let her go because I thought it would be best for her, but I won’t make the same mistake again. I may not be the sort of man you would have chosen for your granddaughter, but I can promise you that no man will ever love her like I do. I intend to have her, sir. With or without your blessing.“

Esmerelda’s heart swelled with pride. The duke went purple and began to sputter.

Billy took her by the shoulders, gazing tenderly down into her face. “I’m going to go now, sweetheart, because I don’t want your grandfather to have a stroke. Tomorrow is my last night in London. If you still want to be my wife, you know where to find me.”

He kissed her then, a kiss that was brief and hard and sweet. As he strode away down the path, Sam trailed after him, massaging his ear.

Although her grandfather hadn’t even been out of breath when he’d come charging through that hedge, he sagged against the stone wall as if barely able to stand.

Esmerelda reached for his shoulder. “Grandpapa, please…”

He shrugged off her touch, refusing to look at her. “Leave me, you faithless child. You’re no different from your mother.”

Esmerelda stood there for a long time until Anne gently put her arm around her shoulders and led her away.

Esmerelda walked the long, lonely corridors of Wyndham Manor for the last time. She’d left her lavish carriage dresses and traveling gowns hanging in her armoire, choosing instead the simple walking suit she’d been wearing on the day she climbed down from that stagecoach in Calamity.

She carried only her old battered trunk and her mother’s violin case. She regretted leaving the Stradivarius behind, not because of its worth, but because of the look on her grandfather’s face when he had toasted her for bringing music back into his home and heart. She hated the thought of it sitting silent and forlorn in the abandoned music room.

The soles of her kid boots whispered across the marble-tiled foyer. Although the hall should have been bustling with maids and footmen this late in the afternoon, there wasn’t a servant in sight.

As Esmerelda faced the towering teak doors that guarded her grandfather’s smoking room, she almost envied her mother for creeping away to join the man she loved in the dark of night.

Taking a deep breath, she eased open one of the doors. The thick velvet drapes were drawn, and it took her eyes a moment to adjust to the palm-shrouded gloom. Her aunt sat stiffly in a straight-backed chair, poking an embroidery needle through a linen handkerchief with exacting precision. As Esmerelda rested her trunk and violin case on the floor, Anne gave her a wan but heartening smile.

Her grandfather was huddled in front of the fire in an iron wheelchair. Despite the suffocating warmth, a woolen lap robe was draped across his knees. Although Esmerelda had never known him to smoke, he wore a Persian smoking cap and brown velvet smoking jacket. His shoulders were hunched and his hands curled loosely on his knees. He looked small and shrunken and older than she could have ever imagined him looking.

An open rosewood coffer rested on his lap. Tucked within its velvet lining was a bundle of yellowing letters, painstakingly bound in a frayed ribbon she suspected had once belonged to her mother. It took little effort for Esmerelda to recognize her own precise handwriting.

Tears stung her eyes as she felt the pity he must have wanted her to feel, but she struggled to blink them back.

Pity could not make her stay. Not when Billy was waiting for her at that theater in Drury Lane.

She moved to stand in front of her grandfather, but he continued to stare into the dancing flames, his bitter gaze unfocused.

“Last night you accused me of being no different from my mother,” she said. “And I suppose you were right. She was willing to sacrifice everything she held dear to be with the man she loved, including the approval of the father she adored.”

She drew Lisbeth’s locket over her head and pressed it into his hand. As she gently folded his liver-spotted fingers around it, she leaned down and whispered, “Mama loved you until the day she died. So will I.”