Page 4 of Look at Her Duke
Stop being silly. If Alistair and Olivia are going, you would just attend with them.
Well, yes. ButKiplingwould be there. And he clearly wanted to see her.
“Would—would it be permissible to dance?”
Good Lord, when had she grown so bold?
When you met him holding a chicken, likely.
His Grin was blinding. “I wouldnae have it any other way, milady. Save a dance for me?”
When he placed a hand on her knuckles, she made an embarrassing little sound likemeep.
And then, still grinning, with one glance over his shoulder at her…Kipling Mancheste sauntered out of her life once again.
“Darling,ye could at leastpretendto smile.”
Kipling stifled his sigh and forced his lips to curl as he patted his mother’s hand on his arm and watched the dancers floating about in circles. It wasn’t that he didn’t normally enjoy balls and social events like this one…it was what tonight represented.
His first appearance in Society as the Duke of Bestingbum.
A title he’d never expected would be his.
“Mother, are ye certain I cannae escort ye to the gambling tables?” Since he’d gained the title, she’d proven that she had no qualms helping to spend the Bestingbum fortune. “Or to visit with some of yer friends?”
“And miss yer official debut?” She scoffed, swatting at his arm. “I am right where I want to be, darling.”
Debut. As if he were some kind of young miss, being presented to the vultures. Kip stifled another sigh.
Mother meant well, he knew. She’d married a younger son of a duke, and Kip remembered his parents being very much in love before Father’s unexpected death. Then her first son—Kip’s older brother—had passed on as well, a few years later. Mother had turned her undaunted affections to him, and he did his best to fill what he assumed were several holes in her heart.
It was just the two of them now, against the world, and of course he did what he could to keep her happy. She’d even spent some time with him on the Continent during the last two years, since he’d fled in desperation.
“Could I at least convince ye to go make polite conversation with Lady Stallings?” Kip murmured.
“I plan on it. If I am standing here with ye, pretending I amno’getting dizzy, watching these people spin in circles, then she will have to come to me. And once she does…”
She’d bring her daughter, aye.
Mother’s light brogue was layered atop a crisp finishing school tone, one she shared with her oldest and dearest friend, Lady Stallings, tonight’s hostess. Kip couldn’t be sure, but he suspected the ball itself was a scheme concocted by the two women, not just to introduce the new Duke of Bestingbum, but to link his name to Lady Emma, youngest daughter of the Earl and his wife.
And Kip’s almost-fiancée.
Hisengaged-to-be-engagedwife.
His mother and Lady Stallings had already arranged it, deciding Emma would be the first partner to help usher him through Society in his new role…and were just waiting on him to make it official.
And up until today, Kip would’ve gone along with their scheming. What difference would it make? They were all the same.
Up until today, he’d assumed his lust for his best friend’s sister had finally dissipated. Then he’d discovered she was still unmarried, still living under Alistair’s roof, still a beautiful lass of—what? Almost twenty, she had to be. Still just as lovely, just as impassioned, just as hoydenish as he’d remembered.
Standing there, staring down at a lass with a chicken, he’d fallen right back in love with Lady Amelia Kincaid.
“Oh look, darling, here they come! Och, try to look like ye are enjoying yerself.”
He didn’t want to marry Lady Emma Iverson.
But Kip also didn’t want to hurt his mother, so he attempted a credible smile, and when Lady Stallings and her daughter swanned over, he made a show of fawning over them as Mother expected.
