The Accidental Duke (The Mad Matchmaking Men of Waterloo Book 1) by Devlin, Barbara (love letters to the dead .TXT) 📕

Leashing his temper, he navigated the side hall and halted before the door to his father’s study. As he rested his hand on the knob, the metal cooled his heated palm, and the tension investing his frame abated.

In the blink of an eye, the cavalry bugle blared, the infantry drummer beat the familiar pa rum pum pum pum, and he jolted to the past. To another involuntary, violent recollection. The mordant miasma of gunpowder burned his throat and eyes, and he gasped for air and wiped a stray tear, as he sank further into hell. A morose cri de cœur rose above the din of war, filling his ears with a sorrowful collection of pleas, none of which he could discharge, given his injury, and it was the helplessness amid so much agony that battered his conscience.

Somehow, through the fog, Arabella beckoned in a hushed voice, Anthony.

An alluring vision formed, and his lady reached for him with outstretched arms. The terrifying urgency yielded to the slow, intoxicating smolder of passion, as he recalled, in startling detail, their tryst in Lord Ainsworth’s study. How she yanked his hair and bit his lip. How she pressed her feminine curves to him and uttered his name in a whispered plea, unmistakable in its meaning.

Shaking himself alert, Anthony opened the door and strolled into the study, whereupon he found four equally damaged Waterloo veterans. While they bore no blood relation, they were nonetheless his brothers in arms.

“Gentlemen, this is a surprise and a much-appreciated reunion.” Anthony walked straight to his childhood chum, Lord Rawden Durrant, the Earl of Beaulieu, and shook his hand. “Beaulieu, it is always good to see you.”

“Wish I could say the same of you, and I doubt it is much appreciated, given you avoided us like the plague at the dinner party.” Ever the mischievous scamp, Beaulieu possessed a biting cleverness, which he honed at Anthony’s expense, during their years at Eton. Although Beaulieu lost his left eye at Waterloo, he remained as sharp as ever. “You look like something that rolled in with the tide, after a shark’s nasty mangling. What have you done to yourself?”

“Perhaps, impending marriage does that to a man, although I claim no direct knowledge, because I remain blissfully unattached.” Lord Michael Donithorn, second son of the marquess of Landsdowne, snickered, as he hobbled on crutches, because Wellington’s penultimate battle cost Lord Michael the lower half of his right leg. “But I would not protest, given the lady in question, because she is quite handsome, and you could do far worse.”

“He has done worse.” Lord Hunter Lee, the earl of Greyson, chuckled. As with the other military men, Greyson also suffered invisible wounds. After a year in solitary confinement as a prisoner of war, he struggled with a deep-seated fear of crowds, thus his appearance was a rarity. “Remember that bare-arsed jaunt through the library, at the Howard’s, after Lord Beddington caught Anthony docking in Lady Beddington’s honey harbor, amid Lord Howard’s collection of atlases?”

“Perhaps he wanted to chart some new territory.” Lord Arthur James, earl of Warrington, waggled his brows. Partially blinded by gunpowder burns, the once bold and bawdy nobleman had all but retreated from society, and his presence was not lost on Anthony. “And that is a ball I will never forget, especially when Rockingham escaped via the terrace, where I indulged in a little inappropriate behavior, with the widow Harrison, beneath the canopy of an oak. But I was not the only one he sent running for shelter in the shadows.”

“That is why I always dally in the shrubbery.” Beaulieu smirked. “Although I recommend avoiding the rose bushes, because I once tangled with a thorn where no one should get a thorn, such that I required the services, above and beyond the call of duty, of my valet to extricate it, given I was too embarrassed to summon a doctor.”

“Did you have to go there?” Lord Michael winced. “I give thanks, every day, that I survived the savagery of battle with that part of my anatomy intact.”

“Oh, I say.” Greyson grimaced. “Take anything but that.”

“Ah, how this reminds me of those nights spent gathered around the campfire, in La Haye Sainte.” Anthony perched on the edge of his father’s desk and reflected on the quiet, dark hours of the conflict, which contrasted with the hell of daylight. “Gentlemen, while I am grateful for your estimable company, I would know what brings you to my door?”

“Our leader announces his betrothal, and we are supposed to ignore the felicitous occasion?” Beaulieu eased to a high back chair near the hearth. “At the very least, this calls for a celebratory brandy, although I would also include a final wild night of wenching, if you are so inclined.”

“Where are my manners?” Anthony slapped his thigh and stood. At a side table, he lifted a crystal decanter and filled five glasses with the amber liquid. “As to the wenching, I have no interest in such games, but I appreciate the thought.”

“What did I tell you?” Lord Michael glanced at Beaulieu, as Anthony played host and made the rounds. “Something is most definitely wrong in the world when a soldier declines a night of wenching.”

“I hoped you were mistaken.” Beaulieu rubbed his chin, which denoted intense scrutiny and was always dangerous where he was concerned. “But I noticed he appeared on the verge of vomiting when His Grace announced the impending nuptials, at Ainsworth’s dinner.”

“Please, don’t talk about me as though I am not here.” While Anthony chafed at Beaulieu’s observation, he could not argue his friend’s assertion. “I get enough of that from my father.”

“But you are not here.” Warrington averted his gaze and sighed. “We have not seen you since we departed the Continent. What returned to London is a puzzle I cannot solve.”

“I rescind my previous statement, because I would prefer you ignore me.” Anthony plopped into the leather chair behind his father’s desk.

“Not a chance.” Standing near the windows overlooking Berkley