Love Letters From a Duke by Elizabeth Boyle Read Free Book Online

every intention of going over this morning and setting matters to right, as you say.”
    “Good,” Aunt Geneva announced. “’Tis best settled quickly. What Father was thinking when he encouraged that girl, I know not. The Langleys are hardly good ton .” This was punctuated with a very disapproving sniff.
    That his aunt looked askance at Miss Langley actually gained the chit some small favor in his mind. He’d always found the people Aunt Geneva disliked, well, interesting. And there was no arguing the point…Felicity Langley was interesting.
    “And once we have this distasteful matter finished,” she was saying, “we can get to the business of finding you a proper bride. I’ve gone to the liberty of drawing up a list of likely candidates, and I think you’ll discover—”
    “Aunt Geneva, I have no intention of getting married,” he told her. “These bumble-brained chits they pass off in London society hold no interest for me.” Empty conversations, worries about the latest fashions, or whether or not one possessed the latest on dit . He shuddered at the very idea of spending the rest of his life listening to such mindless prattle.
    She sniffed and waved a hand at him. “You’ll have your choice of brides, any woman you want. Why, they’ll be lined up around the square before the end of the week.”
    “Yes, because they want the title,” he shot back.
    “So? Whatever is wrong with that? In the end, the choice is yours.”
    Still, even that concession didn’t set well. Pick of the litter might seem a boon to some, but they were still all mewling kittens with sharp claws in his estimation.
    “Your Grace, you must marry,” Aunt Geneva persisted. “You are the last of the Sterlings.”
    “Nonsense. Isn’t there that second cousin, old Bertie’s boy, who’s next in line?”
    “Tristam?” Her regal brow furrowed.
    “Yes, that’s the fellow. He’ll produce an heir or so and leave me to my peace.”
    She threw up her hands. “That will never happen. The man is most unsuitable.”
    “More than me? I find that hard to believe.” Thatcher had been the family’s black sheep for so long, he hadn’t considered that there could be someone more inappropriate to inherit. “Go find him a likely bride—that ought to do the trick.”
    He dug back into his breakfast, which was steadily growing cold. Perhaps there was a reason beyond her ill-conceived marriage that had resulted in Aunt Geneva’s banishment to the end of the table.
    Like not letting the old duke finish his breakfast in peace.
    “We can gain him whatever bride you want, but she’ll never bear a child,” his aunt told him.
    “Whyever not?” he asked against his better judgment.
    “Suffice it to say he is incapable of providing the line with an heir.”
    “An accident of some sort? Or is he just too shy around the fairer sex?” Thatcher reached over and added several lumps of sugar to his coffee. “If he’s a bit of wallflower, I can fix that—I’ll send him out with my old friend Tremont, or perhaps Temple, they ought to be able to introduce him to the sort of—”
    “Your Grace,” she said through gritted teeth, “it is nothing that your old rabble can cure,” she said, heaving a sigh and then dropping her voice to a low whisper. “His inclinations tend elsewhere.”
    Thatcher shook his head and stared at her.
    “Oh, must I spell it out?”
    “Apparently so,” he told her. “Especially since it means the difference in me having to marry or not.”
    “Your heir apparent prefers men over women.”
    “Oh.”
    “Quite so,” she replied, wiping her lips with her napkin and setting it aside.
    “That puts an entirely new wrinkle on all this,” he admitted.
    “Yes, and it was most likely why Father agreed to your alliance with Miss Langley. But since you’ve decided against her—which is for the best, considering her entirely inappropriate lineage—”
    “Aunt Geneva, if she is so improper, whyever would the duke