Page 40 of The Captive Duke
“Are you asking if I have a mistress in Town, languishing for lack of my company? That would have been fast work, my dear. Should I be flattered or insulted that you suspect such a thing of me?”
My dear?Was he teasing? She recalled him shaking his finger at his daughter in mock sternness. “You should be quiet. I would never ask such a thing.”
Though she might suspect it.
“Helene did.” He disentangled their arms and took her by the wrist instead, leading her to a shaded bench. “At great, vociferous, and tiresome length, she accused me of being quite the blade on the town.”
Good heavens. It was one thing to complain to a cousin, quite another to rip up at one’s husband. “You cut a dash. Greendale remarked it.”
“Greendale was still wearing powder and patches. He’d criticize the angel Gabriel for flying. I was faithful to my vows, Countess. My parents were a love match, and I married Helene hoping to esteem her greatly.”
He fell silent while Gilly cast about for a change in topic—Helene had hopedto be esteemedgreatly, and apparently she had been. The duke went on, his tone thoughtful.
“I often suspected Helene had a wandering eye and couldn’t quite admit it to herself, so she must see the fault in me.”
To his list of attributes, Gilly added astuteness, which was not a great blessing under some circumstances.
“She very much enjoyed being Duchess of Mercia,” Gilly said, relieved that it was the truth.
“She did. I take consolation from that.”
“Will you observe mourning for her and Evan?”
“That depends in part on the guidance I receive from Vicar, but I am inclined to take up second mourning, as Helene will soon have been gone for a year.”
“And Evan, too.”
The duke’s lips twisted in an expression Gilly recognized not as distaste so much as impatience.
“What?”
“I feel as much guilt as grief where the child is concerned,” he said. “For various reasons, but in part because the little fellow needed me more than my duchess did—the best person to show the next duke how to go on is the present version. And yet, my presence in the nursery was barely tolerated, and the army seemed like a good use of an extraneous duke.”
He was confiding in her, and Gilly was equally dismayed and touched. Damn Helene for her selfishnessanyway, and English dukes numbered only several dozen in a good year. How could even one be extraneous?
“You are not extraneous, Your Grace. Not to Lucy, not to your tenants and staff.”
“What about to you, Countess?” Despite the gravity of the question, his blue eyes held humor, and maybe something else—curiosity?
“You are not extraneous to me, either. I am the one imposing on your household.”
“You will disabuse yourself of that notion.” He rose and drew Gilly to her feet. “When Vicar comes to call, you will pour. When Lucy needs her first habit, you will supervise the creation of it. When the tweeny steals the under- butler’s attentions from the first parlor maid, you will intervene, or civilization throughout the shire will cease.”
“While you do what?”
“Wait for my daughter to speak and try to address what needs addressing regarding my past.”
He gave her a little bow, touched his finger to the flower Gilly still held, and took himself back up toward the house.
Leaving Gilly to wonder, if in his questions and confidences the duke might—without any conscious intent to do so—have been flirting with her, just a little.
To Christian’s great pleasure, in response to inquiries regarding Girard and Anduvoir, a letter arrived fromDevlin St. Just. Out of the pile of otherwise trivial social correspondence, that one was saved back, to be read in the solitude of the library at the end of the day.
The volume of good wishes from Christian’s peers and neighbors quite honestly surprised him. Each day brought more letters, some from people he’d never met, congratulating him on his safe journey home, thanking him for his service to the realm “above and beyond the call of duty,” wishing him well in light of his “noble sacrifices.”
Platitudes, all of them, and they made Christian at once furious and humble—though nobody had any word regarding Girard.
“Will I disturb you?” The countess in her dark bedclothes stood in the doorway, her hair a golden rope braided over one shoulder.
