Heartless Read Free Page A

back. She’d never heard of the Duke of Derringer.
    He straightened, his fingers tightening around his black gloves. “My mother’s cousin is a bishop. I’ll see him tonight about a special license. We’ll marry tomorrow.”
    He was a wee bit irked that she didn’t seem to know who he was. Everyone knew of the Duke of Derringer. He was infamous and feared throughout the kingdom. Where had she been that she’d not even made the connection that he was Lord Heartless?
    “Tonight? Tomorrow?” she sputtered. “How is that possible?”
    “I have to marry by the twenty-ninth, my dear. We will marry tomorrow just to make sure everything is legal and legitimate. And cousin Horace has been after me to marry this age so getting the license will not be difficult to obtain. I am a duke with connections, after all.”
    “Oh,” she said in a small voice. She stiffened her spine. “Very well, your grace. We shall marry tomorrow.”
    “Good. I’ll arrange a room for you tonight. We’ll marry from here and I will escort you to the Crescent after the wedding.” He walked to the door and turned the knob. Then he paused and turned back to the young woman at the table.
    “By the way, what is your name?”

 

    2
     
    Leandra Merrily Harcourt married the third Duke of Derringer one early morning in late October. Shivers threatened to send her to the floor, the enormity of what she’d just done closing in on her. She knew so little about this man she now called husband.
    The local vicar ended the ceremony. Leandra barely managed a full breath when the duke suddenly pulled her against his tall form and pressed his lips to hers. Shocked gasps came from the vicar and his curate.
    For Leandra, time slowed. The embrace shocked her as much as their audience but for a very different reason. This man she’d known for mere hours manhandled her and she felt...excitement. She gasped and he released her with a mocking grin.
    “Thank you, vicar,” the duke said as he escorted Leandra from the room. He tossed a few gold coins at the man as payment for services rendered and then handed the curate several pound notes as a donation to the church. “I have money to spare now,” he said carelessly to Leandra’s questioning look. “Thanks to you, wife.”
    His voice held a note of something that made Leandra shiver uneasily. Oh, Lord, what had she done?
    She knew exactly what she’d intended.  She had leapt at the chance to become somebody’s—anybody’s—wife. Seduced by his manner, all ease and power, she’d craved the same feeling. She wanted to be able to act in any way she pleased without fear or threat. The penniless bastard daughter of a deceased earl had very little actual freedom.

     
    Derringer settled his wife into his repaired curricle. He pondered the conversation he’d had with the blacksmith just moments ago.
    “Been cut, yer grace,” the large man said confidently.
    “What the devil do you mean it’s ‘been cut?’”
    The blacksmith didn’t even blink at the duke’s anger. “That there wheel’s been cut, yer grace, sawed near through. I would say as ‘ow someone ain’t wishful of yer safe return.”
    “Of all the…” the duke muttered. First, he had to marry to get a fortune that rightfully belonged to him and now that certain someone who was trying to kill him had struck yet again. “The devil!”
    “Are you quite well?” his wife asked suddenly, ripping him back to the present.
    He glowered at her bespectacled face. “Yes,” he growled as he swung himself up onto the seat next to her.
    The girl nodded in apparent satisfaction. “Why have you no valet, your grace?” she asked, eyebrows raised in avid curiosity.
    “What the devil do I need one of those whiny, sniveling creatures for? Bleeding milksops, all,” he muttered as he urged his perfectly matched blacks into motion. Personal servants knew a man’s every secret, he reminded himself.
    “Perhaps you should try for a little calm, Lord