Charming the Duke by Holly Bush

this evening, Thornsby,” Morgan said as he beamed at his daughter. “A room full of beautiful ladies does a man’s heart good, I’d say.”
    Thornsby nodded and turned his attention to the daughter. Cicely Morgan was of a fine family. She probably knew where to place the silver and how to manage a household. One look at the forbidding mother confirmed this girl had learned her household lessons. She was passably attractive and staring at him. He’d best speak to the girl. He didn’t.
    “How’s the stable, Morgan?” Thornsby asked in a dry, affected tone.
    Lady Morgan frowned and dragged her daughter off in a huff. Morgan espoused at great length his stables, his home, his bloody antique coin collection until Thornsby was sure he’d gone asleep standing up. The man finally wandered away.
    “Thornsby,” Millicent Marsh cooed in his ear.
    “Millicent.”
    Miss Marsh was outfitted in a pale dress, nearly see-through. Although Thornsby had, as late as a year ago, seen all of Millicent’s charms up close and unencumbered by clothing.
    “Where have you been keeping yourself, Thornsby,” Millicent purred.
    “Been busy, my dear.”
    “Rumor is you’re wife hunting,” Millicent said.
    Thornsby’s brow shot up. “Where ever did you hear a story like that?”
    “Your sister. Ran into Athena and her husband in Italy.”
    Thornsby was shocked Athena had exposed this family secret. No secret now, with Millicent Marsh knowing it. She was exactly the kind of woman Athena loathed. Widowed at a young age and left a fortune. Beautiful and dangerous and she knew it.
    “Was Smithly actually that gave it away,” Millicent laughed. “The two of them married . I was quite shocked. They just don’t seem to . . . to suit.”
    Thornsby understood that she’d implied Athena was not attractive enough. Even with Smithly’s lack of title, the women of the ton had swooned when Andrew batted his blond lashes and rolled his shoulders.
    “Love doesn’t always suit what we expect it to, my dear,” Thornsby said.
    “Love! How clever! Do you imagine them in love?” Millicent sighed. “Athena possibly, but I doubt she’ll equal Smithly’s appetite for very long. Would hate to see poor Athena’s heartbroken, though. It pains me surely, Thornsby.”
    Thornsby could see Millicent’s brain working as if it were exposed. Her specialty was wooing married men. She’d told him that he was the exception only because he was so magnificently handsome. Not that he’d believed her.
    “Smithly and Athena will live a long and faithful life, I believe, Millicent.”
    “Oh, of course, darling,” she tittered. “And what about you? You were the only man to sway me even slightly from my commitment to never taking a man’s hand in marriage again.”
    Millicent Marsh would marry him in an instant. She would host elegant parties and purr naked in his bed. Her family background would serve suitably as a duchess. Thornsby harrumphed. Excepting he’d never be quite sure the children she presented him were, in actuality, his own.
    “I . . .” Thornsby began and stopped. Over Millicent’s blond curls he spotted new arrivals. The Sheldons. And who was the woman hanging on to the sisters’ arms? The graceful figure in gold with upswept hair put the other two to shame. She turned and Thornsby’s mouth dropped. The wren!
    His feet shuffled as if willed by his groin to take closer inspection. Thornsby could not take his eyes from her. But he would not give into the urge to demand boldly what she was doing here, looking like a siren. It was her impudence that resulted in two orphans making themselves comfortable in his home.
    “Thornsby!”
    He turned in a start to Millicent’s enraged face. He wondered briefly what she had been saying. He bowed curtly and angled past Millicent to get a better view of Matilda Sheldon.
     
    * * *
     
    “Step down, Matilda. That’s right,” Juliet said.
    “The Hollingberrys are on your left,” Alexandra