She made her way silently, needing to be wariest of all now, for the kitchens of the wealthy were usually filled with busy workers, working diligently with flour on their aprons. Clair tilted her head to listen to the sounds of chanting coming from the closed kitchen door.
"Eureka!" She thought in triumph. Finally she would catch a culprit red-handed, or at least holding a book of spells.
Quietly, she pushed the kitchen door open, praying it wouldn't squeak. Once again, luck was with her; she noiselessly made her way through. Inching her way forward, she crouched behind a large green cupboard. Peeping around it, she saw that the kitchen had been modernized with all the newest in cookware, including a yellow brick Dutch oven set majestically in the center of the back wall. The heat from it warmed the room, making for a cozy nest.
To Clair's surprise, there was only one person in the kitchen. He was standing with his back to her, near a stove. Two fat black cats lounged lazily nearby, one at the man's feet and the other beside the oven. Clair instantly recognized him as the duke. The man's hair was silver, his clothing was elegant, and he wore well an air of command. He was dressed in soot-colored satin breeches with a smoking jacket of a deep ruby hue. A pair of dark ruby house slippers completed the ensemble.
Clair was disappointed in his dress. He wasn't wearing what Ian had called "warlock robes." She pondered a moment and then decided that the duke probably couldn't run around in his occult costume without rousing the suspicions of his servants.
The duke, stirring something in a large black kettle on the stove, remained unaware of her. Unfortunately he had stopped chanting.
Gathering her courage, Clair crept forward until she was leaning around the duke. The spellbook she'd been so determined to view was in reality a cookbook. "Where's the eye of newt?" she muttered to herself.
"Drat!" she added. A troubled frown crossed her features. "Out of the frying pan and into the fire."
Startled, the duke dropped the ladle he'd been holding. "Who in the blue blazes are you?" he asked.
Trying for a composed look, Clair politely answered, "I am Clair Frankenstein."
The name raised one of the duke's imperious eyebrows. Taking a quizzing glass out of his jacket pocket, he looked Clair up and down. Then, pointing to a small round table in the corner of the kitchen, he motioned her to sit. "Aren't you the Frankenstein who used that new-fangled recording device to capture pigs rooting around a cemetery?"
Bloody hell, Clair thought, borrowing one of Ian's favorite curses. It seemed her fifteen minutes of infamy were lasting a bit longer than fifteen minutes. "I was going to record ghosts, Your Grace."
"Intentions, intentions. It looks as if you ended up with a pig in a poke."
Clair raised her eyes to the ceiling. How she hated such humor at her expense. She would never live down those little oinkers. The initial flashbacks from the porcine incident had people pointing and giggling at her—or worse, oinking at her. One clever gent had even sent her a roast pig with a dozen violets. That had been the breaking point. Clair had quit eating pork—a feat not easily done, since the Frankenstein cook made the most delicious bacon and eggs.
The duke took in the bright flush on her face. He smiled. "What are you doing haunting my kitchen?"
"Would you believe I was hungry?"
Shaking his head, the man picked up his soup ladle and began dishing stewlike substance into two bowls. He placed one in front of Clair.
Suspiciously, she sniffed. It smelled delicious. "Is it poison or bat wings?"
"Heavens no, child. Chicken wings in red wine stew." He placed the second bowl to the right of Clair. "Would you care for a glass of chianti to go with it?"
Clair nodded warily, waiting for an explosion or a demand for further explanation as to why she had sneaked into his house. It wasn't long in coming.
"Now, tell me what all this balderdash is about." His voice was stern with centuries of breeding as he poured a rather generous amount of wine into a very tall glass. "And don't try to bamboozle me, my dear."
She knew a command when she heard it. Sensing honesty was the best policy, she replied with the truth. "I thought you were a practitioner of the black arts."
"Good grief, no!" he said, flabbergasted. "I am a practitioner of the culinary arts. To be honest, I haven't blackened anything in the kitchen since I was a wee lad."
Drat! Drat and double drat! She had done it again, made a fool of herself, always rushing in where even angels feared to tread and falling flat on her face. How could she have made such a mistake again? Wait a minute! This fiasco was courtesy of one sneaky, odious toad of a baron. The realization narrowed her eyes. It was her caring, helpful Ian who had started her on this primrose path, leaving her to face the folly. She was a lone rat on a fast-sinking ship. She would kill him with her bare hands, she envisioned. Or boil him in oil, then tie him to the mast and burn him for treachery.
"Won't you try my stew, my dear?" The duke asked. "It's one of my new recipes," he added as he motioned to the cookbook on the counter.
Politely, Clair took a bite. It was as good as it smelled. She was a bona fide idiot and this duke was a bona fide chef. "It's delicious. Amazing, Your Grace."
He took several sips of his wine, obviously pleased. "Some wine?" he asked again.
"Yes, thank you." Maybe she could get bosky and forget this whole misguided adventure. Or, Clair mused, maybe she would lop off Ian's nose with a carving knife. That would be a funny sight.
Mulling over her options, she recognized that if she had only had a brain and Ian only had a heart, she wouldn't have stumbled into this kitchen. Indignantly she brushed back a lock of her golden hair and tucked it behind her ear. "Your Grace, I am a bit confused."
"I can see that. I take it this is another of your pigs in a poke."
"Your Grace, I do beg pardon, but I am really getting tired of everyone bringing up that misadventure."
He chuckled. "I can well believe it. Now, let me introduce myself properly. I am Julian Maurice Oswalt. But my friends call me Ozzie," he remarked as he leaned over and patted the fatter of his two black cats. "You, I think, may call me Ozzie." The cat purred loudly, eliciting another chuckle from the duke, who pointed a finger at the contented puss.
"This is Aurora, mother to that one over there," he informed Clair, inclining his head toward the smaller of the two cats, who lay snoozing peacefully at the foot of the stove. "That is Samantha. Both are bewitching felines."
"They are pretty," Clair agreed. "And, in a way, they are partly responsible for why I'm here tonight."
Ozzie raised an eyebrow. "You're a cat burglar?" he asked. Then he winked.
She laughed. "Of course not. I'm here because I thought you were a warlock."
Ozzie chortled. "I see. I know people think it odd that I only keep black cats, but as a boy my dearly departed mother gave me one. These are her great granddaughters. The cat's, of course. Not my mother."
"I didn't know dukes could be so sentimental," Clair said.
"We do take our sentimental journeys—all in the dark, of course. Yes, sentiments and passions are frowned upon for a duke, as is cooking. What would the ton say if they knew I was my own chef?" he asked sadly.
"They'd want to stew you in your own sauce, I would imagine."
"Correct, Miss Frankenstein."
"Call me Clair," she offered. She quite liked this eccentric duke. "I must say you are a bit of a surprise. In all fairness, you should have called for your guards to cart me off to the fleet for this cursed business. But you didn't. Why is that?"