Page 8 of Her Duke Next Door
The ladies hesitated until one of them laughed falsely. “Oh! Only that the Duke has certain…Storiesthat follow him around. Stories that he was not a kind man to the Duchess.”
Mary bit back a laugh. She had also thought the man arrogant. Perhaps he had treated his wife as his possession, owning her, controlling her. It only made her dislike him even more.But she had disgraced herself enough by speaking badly to the Duke’s face. Going behind his back now felt even more uncouth somehow.
“I will be sure to keep my distance, then,” she said dismissively. She did not care for rumors and stories. She had been the subject of stories due to her late husband. Who was she to gossip about others?
“Mama!” Eloise’s call graced her ears, cutting through the constant chatter around her. “You must come with me! I have a problem!”
“Whatever is it, darling?” she asked, laughing at Eloise tugging on her hand, pulling her toward the castle.
“It is—it is with… Um, Katie’s harp! Yes! That’s it. My problem is with Katie’s harp.”
Mary laughed, wondering what her daughter was up to, but not having a clue what was going on. Regardless, she let herself be pulled inside. However, Eloise did not simply pull her inside the main sun room that led out to the garden. No, she guided her deeper into the house.
“Eloise,” Mary whispered. “It is improper to wander around His Grace’s home like this!Eloise!”
“No, we are allowed to be here! Katie said so. Please, Mama, this is very important for her birthday.”
Mary was helpless to her own daughter’s pleas and did not protest as she was taken down a brightly lit hallway, with a plush, red runner down the center of the stone. Portraits lined the walls, and intermittently placed busts of previous Dukes watched her intrude.
Too many eyes were on her. Mary held her breath. She had not felt watched in a very long time.
Not since…
Not since her husband…
Her thoughts were cut short by Eloise stopping abruptly. “Here we are!”
They came to a door of dark mahogany.
“Katie is in there,” Eloise said.
Mary laughed. “All right, then. We shall not keep her waiting on her birthday. Shall we?” she exclaimed, going along with the excitement. She wondered if it had to do with this performance the guests had whispered about.
I hope her harp is not broken. This would make Katie terribly sad, Mary fretted.
Pushing open the door, Mary felt pressure on her back and realized she had been shoved through the doorway. She stumbled forward, only to hear the sound of the door closing behind her, and giggles erupting through the wood. She turned and banged on it, trying the handle, but the devious little girls on the other side closed it tight. Whatever could they be?—
“Lady Yore?” It was like that morning all over again, and Mary went rigid at the sound of that velvety voice. When she could not see his face–and it was just the two of them–he sounded much different. She was not sure which version of him was the one to trust. “Whatever are you doing in my study?”
Mary whirled, her eyes wide, as she came face-to-face with the Duke of Livingston once again.
“I… Eloise… She brought me here. She said Katie needed assistance.”
Dominique let out a bark of laughter. “How peculiar,” he said, framed by the low afternoon light through the large window behind his desk. He pushed his chair back and stood up behind the wooden furnishing. His hands braced on the surface as he looked at her. “I was told Katie needed assistance too. As her father, I, of course, wasted no time in coming to her needs.”
Mary could not hold back her scoff enough.
“Do you have something to say, my lady?” He cocked his head at her. “I should think we might attempt to be civil to one another, given that our daughters are friends, should we not?”
“Yes, Your Grace,” she agreed, thinking only of her daughter and trying to put aside her own pride.”
“Then, shall I call you my friend, my lady?” he teased her, smiling broadly as if it was some game.
She met his eyes. “You may not, Your Grace.”
“Of course.” Dominique nodded. “What was it you said? That I was intolerable and you were glad that we were strangers?”
“And you hoped to never meet me again,” Mary countered.
