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reminder of his command—a command Daphne would see to completion, if only to stop her brother’s harping.
    “Your Grace,” Daphne rushed, hoping to hold his attention before her courage failed. “I…I want to thank you for your invitation. I am…” I am lying though my teeth and doing it badly. “I am…most flattered, Your Grace.”
    He placed his empty champagne glass on a table, his direct gaze making her cheeks warm. “I wonder if you might be interested in a tour of the gardens, Miss Farrington? With your aunt’s permission, of course.” He gave a hopeful glance to Aunt Susan.
    Before her aunt could open her mouth to reply, the earl edged in front of the duke.
    “What an excellent notion, Waverly. I was just about to ask Miss Farrington that myself. No doubt you have guests that require your attention.” He held out his arm to her.
    “Not so much as your great-aunt requires yours,” the duke countered. He stepped to the side and motioned toward an elderly woman pounding her cane on the stone walk.
    “Westbrook, is that you?” she called. “Stop dawdling, and give me your hand.”
    The earl gave a tight smile. “My apologies, ladies, but I’m afraid I’m needed elsewhere.” He bowed and gazed up at Daphne. “Perhaps another time, Miss Farrington.”
    When pigs wear corsets. “Yes, perhaps.”
    The earl nodded and turned toward the duke. “Waverly.”
    “Westbrook.” The duke watched the earl stalk toward his relation before returning his attention to where Daphne stood with her aunt and cousin. “Miss Farrington? Our walk?”
    Here was the opportunity for which she had most anxiously hoped. Yet now that it was hers to grasp, she hesitated. While she had no wish to go anywhere with the presumptuous earl, neither did she want to take a turn with the handsome, smiling, and charming duke. He was unsettling at best, his very presence evoking an internal discord of unfamiliar sensations, likely spurned on by the awkwardness of her plight.
    Before Daphne could frame a polite demurral, her aunt nudged her forward. “She would be delighted, Your Grace.”
    Daphne would be anything but delighted at the opportunity to walk about the lawn with the man; his ease in manipulating the earl warned her she’d have to be very careful in how she sought the duke’s financial support. But then, she could hear Thomas’s voice in her ears. Gain the man’s favor. Tell him about the financial advantages of Farrington Shipping. Then you can leave this damnable country and pack your bags…or spend the entire year in London.
    It was, after all, just a walk, and likely a short one. While the advantages of her family’s business were many, it wouldn’t take long to list them. She placed her hand on his extended arm. “Yes, yes of course. I would be most delighted, Your Grace.”
    The duke led her toward a small maze of waist-high hedgerows, the voices of the guests quieting into a faint murmur as he whisked her farther from the crowd. They walked in silence, with Daphne doing her best to appear calm.
    Perhaps if she commented on the roses or the fine state of the greenery, she could unwind her nerves and broach the topic of asking for his assistance with greater ease. Or at least fill the awkward and uneasy quiet that settled around them.
    She drew in a deep breath. One. Two. Three. Three beings in the Holy Trinity. Surely that was a good sign, convincing as any—
    “These roses are quite lovely. The best I’ve seen since my arrival in England.”
    Which was the absolute truth. That these were the only roses she had viewed since stepping upon English soil was of little importance.
    The duke gave her a small smile as his eyes traveled over the fragrant blossoms. “They were a gift, given to the very first Duchess of Waverly for her stalwart loyalty to the crown by Queen Anne herself. This particular line of roses heralds from those created by the House of Stuart, dating back at least two hundred years.”
    Which