Read Online The Duke's Wager by Edith Layton - Free Book Online

steps to insure your future. At the moment, my sole heir is my nephew, your cousin, Harry. But that is not right. I’ve made an appointment with my solicitor. I’ll change a few things in your favor. No,” he said, seeing her about to protest, “there is nothing wrong with a little foresight, my dear. In the meantime, I have some other business…yes, eternally business, to clear up in the west. I’ll be gone for about a week, and then, after I see my solicitor, perhaps you and I can take ourselves off to some resort spa. I can enjoy the waters, and you can try to bewitch some young men.” He eyed her with worry, for in truth, he did not have any idea of what sort of young men she could consort with. Her birth placed her below the correct people he felt she would be temperamentally suited to, her education placed her above the earnest young men he associated with. But perhaps, he thought hopefully, we might make a match for her with some impoverished younger son, or some young man just out of the military, or even, he dared to think, someone of exceptional family whose empty pockets might make such a match acceptable.
    As if she could read his thoughts, she smiled softly at him, and kissed his cheek.
    “Dear Uncle,” she said, “confess it, isn’t business easier to manage than a stray young niece?”
    “At any rate,” he smiled back, “while I am gone, stay within the house. That matter out there will soon be cleared up. And Regina…if, should anything untoward occur to me…for I am not a young man…that is to say, if I should ever be in a position where I cannot help you should the need arise…do not tell any other soul, but you may make application to St. John Basil St. Charles, the Marquis of Bessacar. Simply seek him out and tell him who you are. No, I cannot answer any questions. Just remember that.”
    “It is graven on my heart,” she said, and made a child’s sign of crossing her heart and sealing her lips. “I promise you, Uncle.” She smiled, kissing her fingertip. “Honor bound.”

V
    Regina sat huddled in a large chair in the comer of the room as her aunt swept up to Mrs. Teas. It seemed that her vision was blurry, her ears were fogged, her head ached dully. Things had happened too quickly for her naturally resilient personality to have time to assert itself.
    One moment she had been sitting in her room, helping Belinda pin up a dress, a dress she was planning to wear to celebrate her uncle’s return the next day. And the next moment, this small fierce little woman had entered the house to announce that she had already had word from her solicitors, although how she could have discovered the news so shortly after the terrified servant had delivered it to Regina herself, she would never know.
    Aunt Harriet had introduced herself to Regina, and then taken stock of the house that was now hers, or rather her son’s. But one look had shown Regina that whatever Cousin Harry had, his mother would control.
    Uncle George had fallen as he had entered the inn where he was staying, and by the time the landlord had gotten him decently into bed, he had not had much time left. The only message he managed to whisper to the physician before his ravaged heart had given way as surely as his late brother’s had, was one for Regina. “Tell her,” he had gasped, “that I’m terribly sorry.”
    Regina had not gotten to know her uncle very well, so she could not in all honesty be said to be pining for him. Still, the tears she had shed at his graveside were genuine enough. He had looked so very much like her father. His death had so nearly duplicated his brother’s. And, selfishly, she knew that the safe harbor to which he had spirited her was now vanished.
    Her aunt did not grieve at all. She was a small fury of a woman, and as adept at business as her brother had been. Though, even standing erect with indignation, as she so often did, she only reached to Regina’s shoulder, the small wiry body contained