The Duke's Tattoo: A Regency Romance of Love and Revenge, Though Not in That Order by Miranda Davis Page B

ripple effect Ainsworth had as he passed other pedestrians, like a tall ship creating a wake. Beaver hats swiveled. Ladies’ bonnets pivoted and bobbed. On each face writ plain was surprise then delight as eyes widened in recognition.
    With a quick glance to the right, Ainsworth strode into the street and dodged through traffic with athletic grace. She trailed after him across the street, never letting him disappear entirely into the miasma.
    After reaching Hatchard’s, His Grace hesitated, rolled his shoulder as if to test it and only then disappeared into the bookshop. So very much a man, unfussy yet refined, she sighed. She regretted inadvertently marring such perfection.
    Prudence approached Hatchard’s tall, many-paned bow window cautiously. The front window extended from floor to ceiling inside and gave an unobstructed view of readers within. She peeked in, not daring to enter.
    She watched with fascination as Ainsworth scanned a shelf on the other side of the glass. The way his long fingers slid over the leather bindings of the books made her shiver. He made a selection. With his head bent over the text, she had the leisure to admire him. His wind-blown hair needed a quick sweep of her hand. His profile proclaimed his pedigree: the aquiline nose, firm, sculpted chin and a prominent brow over deep-set, intense eyes. The boyish look of his unconscious countenance was nowhere in evidence.
    What had she been thinking! This was no man to trifle with, abduct or, God help her, tattoo. His wakeful expression was that of a predator, a raptor. She prayed never to find herself his prey.
    A gust of wind snatched at her bonnet’s brim. She jerked to catch hold of it and knocked on one of the small glass panes. The duke looked up and through the window. She flung herself out of sight with a squeak, her heart pounding. Had he seen her? Would he come storming out after her? She stood frozen in place, hoping and dreading he would fly out the door to find her.
    • • •
    Funny how revenge whets one’s appetite.
    The morning after he solved the puzzle of ‘mizzach,’ Ainsworth had a hearty appetite for the first time in too long to remember. He took breakfast in his mother’s morning room, where he usually picked at whatever he put on his plate. His shoulder and his dreams interfered with sleep and left him too exhausted to eat much most mornings.
    On this day, however, he smelled bacon and coffee with keen interest. He looked in awe at the ridiculous lengths to which Cook went to tempt him to eat. (So much fuss over his poor appetite.) Ainsworth had lost a stone or so since returning from the continent but hadn’t thought it all that obvious.
    From the overstocked sideboard, he piled his plate with potted beef, cold fowl, ham, potatoes, and eggs as well as a number of dainty pastries that Cook took special pains to make. He ate till his stomach ached, but pleasantly so.
    As he leaned back to enjoy the last of his coffee and yet another tiny pastry, he caught the two footmen exchanging grins.
    Gesturing at the sideboard with the pastry, Ainsworth said, “Please thank Cook for another delicious breakfast. I enjoyed these strawberry tart things especially. Is this my fourth or fifth?”
    “Fifth, Your Grace,” came the echoed response from both men.
    “Delicious,” he concluded and popped it whole into his mouth with a smile.
    Next he sent for Sterling. Within the hour, the two men were ensconced in leather chairs in the duke’s study. Sterling sat poised on the edge of his seat waiting for the duke to speak. His man of affairs was a small, neat, bird-like man with bright, intelligent eyes, a house sparrow to the duke’s golden eagle.
    “I have two requirements, Sterling. The first is straightforward. I shall need you to hire a place for me in Bath this spring. A few months will suffice but longer is acceptable if need be.”
    “To start when, Your Grace?”
    “May or June I should think. I shall remain in London or