The Duke’s Desire by Margaret Moore

noticed, his favorite dogs at his feet, Sir Myron Thorpe nodded off over a brandy. It had been a long, boring day, and hewould be a happy man once he had some company for the hunting season.
    Yawning prodigiously, he moved to pick up another piece of pineapple from the plate at his elbow when he happened to look out his study window.
    He abruptly straightened, as alert as a hound—something he rather resembled—catching the scent of a hare. His awakened dogs lifted their heads and sniffed the air.
    “Charles, my telescope,” he cried to an elderly servant who was making a halfhearted attempt to clean the hearth.
    While Charles got up as quickly as his creaking knees would let him and tottered toward the tall secretary desk to find the instrument, Myron commanded his now alert dogs to sit, tossed the piece of pineapple into his mouth and went to the window.
    He didn’t wait to swallow before addressing Charles again. “Maybe it isn’t him, after all. I’ve invited him here every year since we left Harrow. I’ve just about given up hope.”
    Charles found the telescope and brought it to Sir Myron, who held it to his eye. Then he nearly dropped it. “Good God, it is the Duke of Deighton, as I live and breathe. And just look at that horse. Where the devil does he find ’em? I’d give six of mine for that one.”
    “Might the gentleman be staying to tea?”
    Charles asked, quite used to his master’s mode of communication, which was inevitably loud and enthusiastic.
    “Tea? Galen Bromney coming to tea? Are you mad? No, he’s finally taken up my invitation to hunt with me. Why else would he come?”
    “Ah. Then I had best inform Mrs. Minnigan.”
    “Of course you should inform the housekeeper! At once! She should prepare the best rooms for him.”
    “Very good, sir,” Charles intoned as he made a little bow and left the room.
    Myron tossed his telescope onto the nearest chair, grabbed his tweed jacket and hurried outside to the wide steps fronting his house, trailed by his excited dogs who no doubt anticipated another foray after rabbits or deer.
    “Gad, I haven’t seen Deighton in, what, fifteen years?” he muttered in an excited soliloquy. “Bit of a ladies’ man after Harrow according to Justbury Minor, but none the worse for it! My God, look at his seat. Perfect! I suppose his man is coming with his things later. Ho there!”
    Galen could not have missed Myron if he wanted to. It was ever thus, from the first day they were at school. Myron’s voice was, by some quirk of nature, loud even when he whispered, which meant he could never be included in the plans of the more daring schoolboys. Nor was he at all capable of deceit; indeed, Galen could well believe dishonesty simply did not exist within Myron’s trusting and honest nature. Unfortunately, that also meant Myron was often treated like the village idiot until Galen had befriended him, something for which Myron had been rather pathetically grateful. At first, his gratitude had been a nuisance. Then it became enjoyable having such a thankful lackey who could always be counted on to say something admiring.
    After he had left school, Galen had almost instantly forgotten all about Myron, until he had learned where Verity lived from the unsuspecting Eloise, and he recalled that his former friend also lived in Jefford. Better yet, Myron invited him to hunt every year, even though Galen had yet to accept the invitation.
    As keen as he had been to rush to Jefford the day after Verity had departed Potterton Abbey, he had not. He had learned to govern his impulses better, with the glaring exception of the kiss he had shared with Verity in her bedchamber at Eloise’s.
    When their lips touched, passion and desire had immediately surged into vibrant life within him, as if he had suddenly been awakened from a long sleep, or as if no time had elapsed since they had last shared a passionate embrace.
    It had taken every ounce of his self-control to leave that