Page 3 of Dukes Do It Better
Even now, months later, knowing she’d never see him again, Emma couldn’t fully regret that brief flight into merry widowhood. It was one time, and only one time. At least now, when she lay in bed and it was just her hands and the darkness, her mind had clear pictures to fantasize about. Those memories were more than enough to keep her warm through the winter.
People would say a mere sailor wasn’t a suitable match for the daughter of a marquess—even the notorious Marquess of Eastly, famous for his countless affairs and scandals. A twisted version of a smile tilted her lips. There was quite a bit of her father in her, in addition to her faithless, long-dead mother. Not many would miss him.
She rolled the quill pen between her fingers, then returned to her journal.
C— is the marquess. How odd to think of him with Father’s title. And P— shall have to adjust to being a marchioness, instead of a countess. Lord knows how much she twitched and moaned about being a countess to begin with. If nothing else, hearing her complain about changing titles will be grand entertainment. I can hear her voice cursing in my head already, and it makes me smile.
“Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama…” Alton’s voice carried down the hall.
“In the kitchen, little love,” she called back. He repeated her name until he found her, and by the tenth mama her nerves had frayed.
Alton’s curls peeked over the back of the wooden chair beside her. Goodness, he was getting tall. The chair scraped against the plank floor as he pulled it away from the table, then clambered up onto the seat. “Is there pie?”
Emma moved the inkpot out of reach before his little hands could make their inevitable grab for it. “Pie is in the oven.” His pout made her chuckle. “Baking takes time. These things don’t happen by magic, you know.” At his age, she’d thought the kitchens produced delights like a djinn from a lamp.
Wish. Poof. Pie.
She’d had no concept of the labor and time each pastry and loaf represented, and hadn’t wrapped her mind around the reality until nearly six years earlier. Even in the womb, Alton had craved pie, and thus Emma’s love of baking had been born a few months before her son.
Alton sagged in the chair like his bones were turning to jelly. He lolled his head in her direction with beseeching eyes. “Can’t it go faster? It smells so good, and I’m hungry.” As if on cue, a gurgle sounded from his tummy.
“Some things are worth waiting for. Have a glass of milk and some bread with cheese to tide you over.”
He blinked his big, dark eyes at her. Dark eyes, gold hair. No one could deny Alton was her son. When she met his impression of a starving orphan waif with an unblinking stare, he sighed and climbed off the chair.
“Fine,” Alton grumbled, then moved toward the cupboard for a glass.
The milk jug was too heavy for him, so Emma rose to slice the cheese and bread, then pour his milk. The plate trembled slightly and tipped at a precarious angle as he carried it back toward the table. Her fists clenched with the need to step in, but instead of taking the plate away, she hovered, ready to make a grab for the stoneware before it hit the floor and they lost another place setting. Alton’s independent streak had been making an appearance during the last few months, which meant more chips, cracks, and crashes than were good for their dishes.
He was growing up right before her eyes. So many changes since the weather turned cold.
Maybe she had been too busy and distracted to grieve Father. When she was back in London, wrapped in the easy life of her brother’s house with its army of servants ready to see to her comfort, the reality of Father’s death might crash into her.
Or she might find that London changed nothing, and the part of her that should mourn her last parent remained cold. Exactly like Father had been when Mother died. After a lifetime of drama and heightened passion over every damn thing in their relationship, Father’s reaction to his wife’s death had been unexpected. As if she’d taken all the emotions with her when she died. Father hadn’t cried, and he hadn’t mourned in any discernable way. The next week he’d found a new mistress and was back to his old habits.
Alton scurried over to the open window and yelled, “Leonard! Don’t eat that!”
A muted bleat from the goat was probably Leonard’s way of telling the tiny tyrant to go to hell, and the sound made Emma smile.
She’d miss their home, but the need to see Calvin and Phee was stronger. Alton would love seeing his cousin again, and the merriment of celebrating Freddie’s day of birth as a family would be worth the travel. It was only a few weeks, after all. It wasn’t as if she planned to stay for the Season.
She knew her place now, and it wasn’t in glittering ballrooms. Although this life, as sweet as it was, could feel solitary. Especially late at night, when loneliness settled over Emma heavier than blankets, the memory of a pair of hazel eyes and a wicked smile reminded her that no matter how hard she tried to suppress it, her desire was alive and well.
Maybe she needed to take a lover. To enter into the relationship thoughtfully and methodically, and not on impulse. Choose someone decent and kind who would be around for longer than one night, but wouldn’t expect marriage or access to her secrets.
Yes, perhaps a lover was worth considering. If Leonard the goat could manage it, surely she could too.
Chapter Two
I sometimes wonder what life would be like if I’d received everything I thought I wanted. I’d have missed so much. Not a bit of my day-to-day existence would resemble my current reality, beyond the presence of A—. No cottage. No crashing sea. No midnight baking sessions, or overly familiar household servants. Worst of all, I would have married HIM.
—Journal entry, May 12, 1824
London, England
Early April 1825
For the love of everything holy, if Roxbury didn’t release her arm, she was going to do the man some serious harm. Here, in Hyde Park, where anyone might happen by, Lady Emma Hardwick would raise a fuss the likes of which London hadn’t seen since King George barred his queen from attending his coronation.
