The Duke's Suspicion

Book 2: Rogues and Rebels

by Susanna Craig

Genres: Action & Adventure Romance; Regency Romance; International Crime & Mystery

Synopsis

An English war hero must unlock the secrets of an Irish beauty’s heart in this “remarkable must-read” from the author of The Companion’s Secret (Kathy Altman, USA Today).

Named for the heather in her native Ireland, botanist Erica Burke dreams of travel—somewhere she won’t be scorned for her scientific interests. Instead, a storm strands her with cool and commanding Major Tristan Laurens, the Duke of Raynham.

An unexpected heir, Tristan is torn between his duties as an intelligence officer and his responsibilities as a duke. A brief return to England to set his affairs in order is extended by bad weather and worse news—someone is after the military secrets he keeps. Could the culprit be his unconventional Irish guest? He needs to see her journal to be sure, and he’ll do what he must to get his hands on it . . . even indulge in a dangerous intimacy with a woman he has no business wanting.

Erica guards her journal as fiercely as she guards her heart, fearing to reveal a side of herself a man like Tristan could never understand. But though she makes Tristan’s task infernally difficult, falling in love may be all too easy . . .

“A new Susanna Craig novel is always cause for excitement with this romance-loving reader. Her historical detail, wonderful characters, created with depth and complexity, and the journeys upon which she guides them never fail to engage both my mind and my heart.” —The Romance Dish

Release date: December 18, 2018

Publisher: Lyrical Press

Print pages: 384

Sample

Chapter 1

As dark clouds rolled over the Cumbrian sky and thunder rumbled in the distance, Erica Burke discovered she had made a serious error in judgment. Several errors, in fact.

The most serious error, obviously, had been leaving her journal inside the inn where they had stopped to rest the horses. She was often forgetful. Careless, other people called it. But in truth she cared a great deal. Losing her journal would have meant losing months of work, losing the record of every botanical observation she had made since coming to England.

It would have meant losing a piece of herself.

To be fair, though, she would never have left her journal at a posting inn if she hadn’t been traveling. So hadn’t the real error in judgment been agreeing to accompany her sister? True, a lady often took a female companion on her wedding trip, a custom grounded in the assumption that the activities and interests of men and women, even newly married ones, were entirely separate. But Cami’s insistence on Erica’s joining her had had very little to do with convention. And as far as Erica could see, her brother-in-law, Lord Ashborough, had only one interest: his new bride. The only activity in which he wanted to indulge was… Well.

With a wary eye toward the sky, Erica hopped from the coach without explanation and hurried back across the filthy inn yard, blaming the sudden wave of heat that washed over her on the exertion. She had been promised the chance to explore the plants and flowers of the Lake District, and she was determined not to be put off by the occasional moment of embarrassment, or by the knowledge that her presence was entirely extraneous. Her only concession had been to ride in the baggage coach on occasion, with Mr. Remington, Lord Ashborough’s manservant, and Adele. Try as she might, Erica could not bring herself to think of the French girl as “Lady Ashborough’s maid.” It would have required her to concede that Cami was now a lady, and not simply her overbearing elder sister.

On the threshold of the inn’s dining parlor, she was forced to reevaluate her assessment once more. A group of rowdy young men now filled the table at which she and her party had been seated only moments ago. Avoiding as best she could the men’s eyes, hands, and voices, Erica pressed forward to retrieve what was hers. Perhaps the most serious error had been leaving Lord Ashborough’s mastiff, Elf, in Shropshire with the new vicar and his wife. Elf was neither fierce nor especially brave, but even half-grown she was enormous, and Erica had no doubt that her mere presence would have sufficed to forge a path through the room.

On the bench closest to the window sat a man with greasy dark hair. If the sight of him thumbing idly through the pages of her journal had not blanketed her vision in a red haze of anger, she might also have noticed his red coat. His militia uniform.

“Kindly unhand my journal.” Though she spoke quietly, she thrust out her hand, palm upward, so forcefully that the muscles of her arm quivered.

He did not rise, and a lazy smile revealed rather mossy teeth. “What have we here? An Irish rebel—?”

The words sharpened her senses, brought the moment into vivid relief.

As if observing her own actions from a great distance, she watched her hand sweep the journal from his grasp and then swing back. The sturdy leather binding—no delicate lady’s commonplace book, this—struck along his jaw, effectively wiping the grin from his face.

One of his fellow soldiers guffawed, and suddenly the noises and odors of the room rushed back to full force, threatening to overwhelm her. Her narrow pinpoint of focus expanded from his uniform, grimy from travel and frayed around the collar and cuffs, into a swath of chaos. Clutching her journal in one hand and her skirts in the other, she ran from the room.

Hitting him had been yet another mistake. She could not even say what had prompted her to do it. Her distrust of soldiers? His disdain for Ireland? Perhaps a bit of both. Oh, why could she never seem to control her temper, her impulses? Was he following?

Outside once more, she paused only to scan the inn yard for Lord Ashborough’s coaches. But the yard was empty. Perhaps around the corner? No? Well, surely that was his carriage, standing by the church…

Oh, no. Now she understood her most serious error. When she’d discovered her journal missing, she’d hopped from the baggage coach without telling Mr. Remington to wait. He must have assumed she had decided to ride the rest of the way with her sister. Erica’s absence would likely not be noticed for hours.

She was stranded.

She could almost hear Cami’s voice telling her to wait right where she was. But Erica’s hasty reaction to the soldier’s sneer had rendered this village’s only lodging less than hospitable.

Regrettably, she had a great deal of experience with crises. Most, like this, of her own making. And sitting still had never been her preferred method of coping with any of them.

She furrowed her brow, trying to recall the map in the guidebook. People came from all over Britain to visit the Lake District. There would be signposts to Windermere. Surely even she, with her notoriously poor sense of direction, could find it. With another glance at the threatening sky, she began to walk.

What was a little rain?

For the first mile or so, she watched the clouds tumble toward her, listened to the peals of thunder as they swelled and grew, seemingly born of the earth as much as the air. Mud from an earlier rain dragged at her hems and sucked at the soles of her walking boots. At the second mile, she gave up the roadway in favor of the grassy verge. Cold, thick drops began to fall, speckling her dress and face. Hardly had she managed to stuff her journal into her pelisse when the sky opened and water poured down in sheets, whipped by the wind like clothing on the line, blinding her.

Something sharp snagged at her skirts, jabbed at the chilled flesh of her thigh beneath. The hedgerow. A flash of lightning showed her a gap in its tangled branches, barely wide enough for her to pass through. And a little way beyond it, an abandoned-looking stone cottage. Would its roof provide shelter? She could not tell until she reached it.

Head down, she pushed onward. The wind snatched at her sodden bonnet. Nearly strangled by its ties at her throat, she scrabbled with numb fingers to loosen them. Once free, the bonnet whirled into the storm and was gone.

The twenty yards standing between her and her goal seemed to take almost as long to travel as the two miles she had already come. At last, its stout slab door stood before her. Here, in the shadow of the low building, the wind still lashed, but it no longer threatened to carry her away. As she leaned her head against the door to fumble with the latch, she felt a movement. Not of her own making. Not the rumble of the storm, either. The door swung inward and she collapsed onto the dirt floor at the booted feet of a stranger.

The cottage was not abandoned, after all.

Even a cursory glance told her these were not the sort of boots generally worn by cottagers, however. The supple leather was not muddy or scuffed as it would have been if the man were a laborer or had recently trudged across the open field. Perhaps he had been traveling on horseback. Or perhaps he simply had been wise enough to take shelter before the rain began.

Without speaking, he stepped around her to shut the door, muffling the storm’s noise and closing out its murky light, casting the single room into near darkness.

Oh, God. This was it—her most serious error in judgment. Ever. Erica scrambled to her feet and whirled about to face him, her rain-sodden skirts slapping against her legs. But he was already moving past her again.

“Wait there.” His voice was pitched low, audible beneath the storm.

Gradually, her eyes were able to pick out his shape, now on the far side of the small room. A narrow seam of light formed a square on the wall behind him—a window, blocked by wooden shutters. She heard a rattle, a scrape, a hiss. Flame sparked to life in his hands then became the warm, flickering glow of a candle.

“That blast of wind blew it out,” he explained with a glance past her at the door. Was it her imagination, or was there an accusatory note in his voice?

The candle lit his features from below, giving them a sardonic cast. Impossible to tell whether he was handsome or plain, dark or fair, young or…well, his voice, his ease of movement, certainly did not suggest an old man. And he was tall—taller than Papa. Than either of her brothers or her brother-in-law. Taller even than Henry…

Oh, why, in this moment, had she thought of Henry? But so it always went, her mind flitting from one idea to the next, fixing on precisely the things she ought to forget, and forgetting the things she ought to—

Her journal!

With a shudder of alarm, she slithered a hand between the wet, clinging layers of her pelisse and her somewhat drier dress and pulled the book from its hiding place. As she hurried toward the light, the man drew back a step. With the candle between her and her journal, so the stranger could see nothing but its binding, she turned the book over in her hands, then thumbed through its pages to assess the damage. The leather cover was damp; rain had wetted the edges of the paper here and there. It would look worn and wrinkled when it was dry, but so far as she could tell, the journal’s contents were miraculously unharmed. A sigh of relief eased from her.

When she laid her journal on the tabletop, the candlelight once more threw itself freely around the room. The stranger was looking her up and down, his expression both incredulous and stern. A familiar expression. Cami wore it often in Erica’s presence.

Of course she looked a mess. Who wouldn’t, under these circumstances? Icy rivulets ran from her hair down her face, and beneath the howl of the wind, she could hear the steady patter of water dripping from her skirts onto the floor. If this were a scene in one of those novels her sister denied reading, the hero would probably invite her to strip off her drenched clothing and dry herself before the fire. Something shocking would likely follow.

But there was no fire. And this man showed no intention of acting the part of a hero.

As if to confirm her thoughts, he shook his head and folded his arms across his chest. “What in God’s name are you doing out in a storm like this?”

* * * *

When Major Lord Tristan Laurens asked a question, he expected an answer. He certainly did not expect the subject of his interrogation to bristle, fling a lock of wet hair over her shoulder—spraying him with rainwater, almost dousing the candle—and reply, “I might ask you the same.”

Unblinking, she faced him across the table, communicating quite clearly that if he was waiting for her to bend first, he might wait forever. He had some experience coaxing information from unwilling sources, and he knew better than to begin by barking at them. But her arrival had caught him off guard. He had never liked surprises.

The silence that stretched between them was eventually broken by her fingers drumming against the cover of the book she’d unearthed from her bodice. She radiated a nervous kind of energy that refused to be contained. When another moment had passed, she plucked up the book, tucked it against her breast, and began to move around the room. Its narrow compass, crowded with ramshackle furniture, prevented her from pacing.

Or perhaps the predictable, orderly, back and forth motion of pacing was anathema to this woman.

She put him in mind of a bedraggled spaniel, with her slight build, rapid movements, and curling hair hanging limply on either side of her face. Though, admittedly, far more attractive than any spaniel he had ever seen. The precise shade of her red hair was difficult to determine under such dim and damp conditions. He tried to imagine what she might look like bathed in the warmth of a shaft of sunlight but gave it up as a bad job. Sunlight was unlikely to be granted them anytime soon.

When her wandering feet brought her within arm’s length of him, he held up one hand in hopes she might cease. Her jerk of surprise made him wonder if she had forgotten his presence entirely.

“The storm doesn’t show any signs of abating. Perhaps we ought to begin again.” He made a crisp bow. “Tristan Laurens.”

Her gaze raked over him, and for a moment he thought she meant not to respond. “Mr. Laurens,” she said after a moment and curtsied.

Ought he to correct her? At the very least, he might have introduced himself as “Major Laurens,” as he’d not yet resigned his commission. “Lord Tristan” was entirely incorrect now, of course. Both Father and Percy were gone, had been gone for some time. Still, it felt strange to think of himself as a duke, stranger still to call himself “Raynham.” Men of seven and twenty did not usually acquire new identities in quite so abrupt a fashion.

In the end, he let her assumption stand. After the weather cleared, they would go their separate ways, and his rank would be irrelevant.

Her fingertips danced over the book she was holding. “Miss Erica Burke.”

“Erica?”

It was not a given name he had heard before, and her inclusion of it hinted at the existence of an elder sister who generally took precedence as “Miss Burke.” Her Irish accent was distinct but not unpleasant. From Dublin, if he had to guess. And his guesses were usually correct.

“Erica is the Latin word denoting the genus to which several common species of flowering shrubs belong.”

She must have given a variation of that explanation many times; it had the air of a rehearsed speech. So she knew at least a bit of Latin and a little botany: the marks of what passed for an educated gentlewoman. Then again, she might be a bluestocking.

Or something more unusual, and more interesting, than either.

His surprise at the explanation must have been evident on his face, for she continued, with a little grimace of resignation, “Heather. It means ‘heather.’ My father named his children using Linnaeus’s Species Plantarum as his guide.”

Though mildly curious about the names with which her siblings had been saddled, he focused his immediate concern on the fact that her family had let one of their number out of their sight. A young woman wandering about alone faced dangers far greater than a little rain, especially in a time of war, when so many were desperate.

Having learned his lesson about speaking sternly, however, he dipped his head in a nod of greeting. “It is a pleasure, Miss Burke, to meet someone else who has known the travails of having been named by an eccentric father. Mine was a student of the Arthurian legends.”

That confession brought the twitch of a smile to her lips, quickly wiped away by a crack of thunder that shook the tiny cottage. “Oh, will this storm never end?” She began once more to move about the room, like a caged bird flitting from perch to perch.

“It will, of course.” He tried to speak in a soothing tone, though it was not something he’d often had occasion to use in the army. “But I think we must resign ourselves to the fact that darkness may fall before it does.”

“You mean, we must spend the night? Here?” A panicky sigh whooshed from her lungs as she sank onto a wooden chair. “Oh, when my sister discovers I’m missing, she’ll be furious.”

Furious? Not worried?

Seizing the opportunity, he righted her chair’s partner—though they matched only in being equally rickety—and seated himself near her. “You are traveling with your sister? How did you come to be separated?”

“We—my sister, her husband, and I—are bound for Windermere. Their wedding trip. There are two coaches in our party, and I believe the occupants of each must have thought me safely aboard the other. But I had—” She leaped up again, fingering the leather-bound book.

Dutifully, he got to his feet, as good manners dictated. He had not been away from polite society long enough to forget everything he’d learned. “I’m sure she will be too relieved at discovering you are safe to upbraid you.”

The candle’s flickering light painted her face with shadow. Was she amused? Skeptical? “It’s quite clear, sir, that you do not know my sister.”

“No. I do not believe I have that pleasure.”

She laughed, a rather wry sound, and sat down again. So did he. A moment later, she was up, trying to peer through the narrow crack around the shutters. “How long will it take for them to reach Windermere?”

“They were driving into the storm,” he answered as he rose. “Several hours, perhaps, for although it’s not a great distance, fifteen miles or so, the roads in that direction are prone to flooding.” She turned from the window and a wrinkle of concern darted across her brow. “I expect they stopped somewhere along the way to wait out the rain,” he added, trying to reassure her.

“Oh.” Once more, she sank onto a chair. This time, he remained on his feet—wisely, it turned out, for she soon resumed her erratic wandering. “But then, mightn’t they have returned to that village a few miles back, expecting to find me? I have to go.”

“Absolutely not.”

The commanding note brought her to an abrupt halt. Her mouth popped open, preparing to issue an argument.

“I will personally see you safely reunited with your sister as soon as possible, Miss Burke.” Already he feared he would regret making such a promise. “In turn, you will not put yourself at unnecessary risk.”

She pressed her parted lips into a thin line and sat, nearly toppling the chair with the force of her frustration.

This time, she stayed seated long enough that he began to think of returning to his own chair. Hardly had his knees bent, however, when she uncrossed her arms and laid one hand on the edge of her seat to rise. His awkward position—somewhere between sitting and standing—must have caught her attention, for she waved him down with her free hand, the one not clutching her book.

“I know it’s the custom for a gentleman to stand when a lady does, but you’ll do yourself an injury if you try to keep up with me.” Three of her quick steps put the breadth of the deal table between them. The candle lit her face, revealing a scattering of freckles. “I’ve never been noted for my ladylike behavior, if you hadn’t already guessed. So why should you worry about acting the gentleman? Not that I doubt you are a gentleman, Mr. Laurens,” she added hastily, looking him up and down where he stood. Color infused her cheeks. “And I certainly hope you will not take my thoughtless remark as a license to—to—”

“Miss Burke.” He stepped into the river of words, hoping to divert their course. “You may rest assured, I am a gentleman. You’re far safer in here than you would be on the other side of that door.”

Her nod of acknowledgment was quick, a trifle jerky, and he realized she was trembling. Now that the heat of the blush had left her face, he could see more clearly the bluish cast of her lips. “Come,” he said, moving both chairs closer to the table, closer to the meager warmth offered by the candle. “Take off that soaked pelisse.”

That order sent another flare of uncertainty through her eyes. But after a moment, she laid her book on the table and attempted to comply, though her fingers shook. The dress beneath was nearly as wet in patches and clung provocatively to her curves. He took the sodden pelisse from her hands and quickly turned away. On a rusty hook near the door hung his greatcoat. After making a simple exchange of wet garment for dry, he returned to her side.

Once enveloped by his greatcoat’s length and breadth, she allowed herself to be guided to a chair. “I’m afraid I dare not build a fire,” he explained as he took the place across from her. “The chimney looks on the verge of collapse.” Indeed, some of its uppermost stones had tumbled down through the flue into the firebox. They lay glistening in the candlelight as rain trickled over them and damp air seeped into the room.

The candle gave at least the illusion of heat, though he knew, and she must too, that it would not last until dawn. It was only September. They were in no danger of freezing to death. But it promised to be a miserable night.

“You should try to get some rest,” he urged.

For once, she did not argue. Laying one arm on the tabletop, she used it to pillow her head. With one finger of the other hand, she traced the tooled leather binding of her book. “Thank y-y-you,” she stuttered through another shiver masked as a yawn. “It has been a tiring day.”

“Yes,” he agreed automatically.

Except he wasn’t tired. He’d ridden a good distance since morning, it was true, but today’s exertion was nothing to what he had known in recent years. If it wasn’t fatigue that had prompted him to take shelter when the storm clouds rose, then what was it? Major Lord Tristan Laurens would have spurred his horse to a gallop, outrun those clouds, and made it home before nightfall, no matter how tired.

Raynham, on the other hand, was not so eager to reach Hawesdale Chase.

Crossing his legs at the ankle, he leaned back in his chair and prepared to pass an uncomfortable few hours. Rain continued to fall steadily, though the thunder now rolled farther off. Erica’s restive hand at last fell still, but even in her sleep, she still guarded her book. It made him wonder what was inside. Already the candle’s heat had begun to dry her hair, transforming its tangled waves from rusty brown to polished copper. He had no notion of what had become of her bonnet, or even if she had been wearing one at all. She had no gloves, either, and her nails were short and ragged. I’ve never been noted for my ladylike behavior, she had told him, with only the merest hint of chagrin. He did not envy the sister who had been charged with her keeping.

Yet he could not truthfully say he was sorry for an excuse to stay put a few hours more.

Chapter 2

Half awake, Erica bolted upright. Pain stabbed through her neck and down her back, driving away her drowsiness. Where—? Why—? Her eyes fell on the sleeping form of Mr. Laurens, slumped in his chair, chin resting against his chest.

Oh.

Sunlight poured in through the cracks around the shutter, illuminating the dingy room, with its cracked plaster walls and broken furnishings. It was a wonder the cottage hadn’t collapsed around them while they slept. The light picked out the features of Mr. Laurens’s face, too, considerably less timeworn than their surroundings. Why, he wasn’t much older than she, certainly not thirty. His tawny hair caught the sun, while a day’s growth of darker beard shadowed his square jaw. Not a bad-looking face, but she refused to think of him as handsome. No one who took such obvious delig. . .