Page 36 of Her Duke By Accident
Matthew groaned.
“You are quite popular this Season, Your Grace.”
“That’s what happens when you get a wife,” he snapped.
“Would you like me to fetch the duchess for you?” Mr. Livingston asked. “It is still early in the day. I’m sure the ladies still sit at breakfast.”
“No, that won’t be necessary,” Matthew grumbled. “The messages will just have to wait. Not that I have any urgency to attend another one of Lady Tollock’s frivolous balls or spend my money in a decrepit saloon.”
“And why must the House of Lords wait, Your Grace?” the butler asked, thoroughly amused.
Matthew stood from his desk, unaware of Mr. Livingston’s teasing. “Well, they’re foolish enough to think I agree with anything they’d say. Now, to get in my pockets they’d… ” his words trailed off as he looked at the butler’s expression. “You were just mocking me, weren’t you?”
Mr. Livingston cleared his throat. “I meant no disrespect, Your Grace.”
“I know,” Matthew scoffed. “Poke all you want. Won’t change the fact you’ve been at my side since before I was even born.”
A hearty laugh came from the older man. “Haven’t heard that humor of yours in quite some time.”
Matthew frowned, collecting his papers. “Lucy’s home?”
“Yes, Your Grace,” Mr. Livingston said with a sigh.
“And now I have a wife,” Matthew continued.
“Nothing has to change until you are ready for it to,” Mr. Livingston interjected. “You are the duke, the lord of this house. Not only that, but there are tenants and villages to look after. Lucy’s return gives the duchess someone to teach and guide.” The butler smiled at Matthew. “Do not force yourself to do anything if you do not want to.”
Matthew raised an eyebrow at the butler. “What on earth does that mean?”
Mr. Livingston chuckled to himself, shaking his head. “Never mind that, Your Grace.” He gestured towards the study door. “Mr. Dixon will be arriving within the hour for tax collection.”
Startled, Matthew looked up at the clock sitting on the mantel below the stern portrait of his father. In the gaze of the old duke, he suddenly felt ridiculed and small, as though everything he did business-wise at that desk was wrong. He sighed.
“Prepare my carriage, Mr. Livingston.”
The butler bowed his head. “Yes, Your Grace.”
As Mr. Livingston left the study, Matthew grabbed his coat and followed, papers held beneath his arm. Though his stomach grumbled for a larger breakfast, he walked by the smallest dining room in the manor, where voices and laughter were carried down the hall. Matthew kept his pace as he marched by, only catching a glimpse of a trio of women sitting alongside each other and eating.
Matthew paused in the foyer to button his coat when he heard light footsteps approach from behind him.
“Your Grace.”
He turned, bowing his head at his wife, Alicia. “Your Grace,” he stiffly said.
“Might I have your attention for a moment?”
Matthew sighed, looking over his shoulder toward the front doors. “It is rent collection day, and I cannot be late.”
“Don’t you leave with your advisor?” Alicia asked. “I haven’t seen him arrive yet.”
He looked back over to her. “How could you possibly know that?”
“I pay attention, Your Grace,” she said, a glint in her eyes that showed she took offense to his attitude. “As he is not yet here, might I have a word?”
“Yes, of course,” Matthew replied through clenched teeth.
“Ever since you told me to learn about my duties as the Duchess of Garvey,” she began, talking with a practiced confidence, “I have spent time every day with Ms. Crawford, learning the functions of the household.”
