Never Deceive a Duke Read Online Free PDF

exile from Selsdon Court, he had never once wished to return. Oh, at first he had wished for many things which were not to have been. Things children, in their naïveté, longed for. A kind touch. A warm hearth. A home . But he had found instead the very opposite. He had been pitched headlong into the bowels of hell. His childhood longing had boiled down to a man’s pure, unadulterated hatred. And now that he might go back to Selsdon Court—now that he might be master of them all—he wished to return even less. What a trick fate had played him this time.
    Rothewell cleared his throat, returning Gareth to the present. “Luke never said much about your past,” he admitted. “Simply that you were an orphan from a good family who had fallen on hard times.”
    Hard times. Luke Neville had always been a master of understatement. “It was pure luck which brought me to Barbados,” Gareth admitted. “And by God’s grace, I met your brother.”
    Rothewell actually smiled. “I recall he caught you bolting from the dockyard with a gang of scurvy sailors on your heels.”
    Gareth glanced away. “He snatched me up by the coat collar, thinking me some sort of pickpocket,” he answered. “Luke was a brave man.”
    Rothewell hesitated. “Yes. Very brave indeed.”
    “And I…good Lord, I must have looked like a drowned rat.”
    “You were skin and bone when he brought you home,” Rothewell agreed. “It was hard to believe you were what—thirteen years old?”
    “Barely that,” said Gareth. “I owed Luke my life for saving me from those bastards.”
    Again, Rothewell smiled, but it was tight and humorless. “Well, their loss was our gain,” he said. “But when Luke said ‘of good family’ he rather understated the matter.”
    “I never precisely told him,” Gareth admitted. “About Warneham, I mean. I said only that my father was a gentleman—an army major who fell at Roliça—and that my mother was dead.”
    Rothewell sat down on the corner of his massive desk and pensively regarded Gareth. “Luke knew what it was to be orphaned young,” he said simply. “We have been pleased to account you as—well, as almost a member of our family, Gareth. But now a higher duty calls.”
    “Oh, I doubt it,” Gareth sneered, then tossed off the last of his brandy.
    “Go down for a fortnight,” Rothewell suggested. “Just to make sure there is a competent estate agent in place. Have a good look at the account books to ensure you are not being cheated. Put the fear of God into the staff—and make sure they know for whom they work now. Then you can return to London, and quit that shabby little house of yours in Stepney.”
    Gareth looked at him incredulously. “And do what?”
    Rothewell made a circle in the air with his glass. “One of these grand Mayfair mansions hereabout must belong to the Duke of Warneham,” he suggested. “If not, buy one. You need not rusticate the rest of your days—and you certainly do not need to continue slaving in the service of Neville’s.”
    “Impossible,” said Gareth. “It cannot be let go, even for a fortnight.”
    “Zee is not leaving for a few days yet,” Rothewell said. “And if worse comes to worst, I daresay old Bakely and I can hobble along well enough to hire—”
    “You?” Gareth interjected. “Rothewell, do you even know how to find Neville’s offices?”
    “No, but my coachman has gone there almost every day for the last nine months,” he answered. “Look, Gareth, who is Neville’s nearest competitor?”
    Gareth hesitated. “Carwell’s over in Greenwich, I suppose. They are a little larger, but we have been giving them a run for their money.”
    Rothewell set his glass on the sideboard. “Then I shall simply hire away their business agent,” he replied. “Every man has his price.”
    “Hire him to replace me ?”
    Rothewell plucked the empty glass from Gareth’s hand and returned with it to the sideboard. “My friend, you are just kidding yourself