Page 39 of Matters of a Duke's Heart
“Then let us depart.” He nodded to Lady Helena, who still floundered. “Enjoy your afternoon, Lady Helena.”
Spencer said nothing else, and Lady Helena offered no further words. Those eyes he had once thought were pretty, that hadheld his own in a way he had once needed after Sophia’s death, only blinked in affront.
He walked away and tried to calm his anger down. How dare she speak of his wife in such ways.
“It seems Lady Helena is attempting to sink claws into the duchess,” Rupert noted as they headed to the end of the path where their horses were tethered and they’d part ways. “You ought to tell her. If your duchess has an enemy, she deserves to know.”
Spencer shook his head, embarrassed. “No. No, I do not wish to discuss Lady Helena with her. She does not need to know. Our courtship was barely anything, at least not what Lady Helena is attempting to make it sound like.”
Rupert only shot him an incredulous look. “While I agree it was brief, and that you did not make her any promises, Lady Helena could become a threat.”
But Spencer was already shaking his head again. “No. Besides, it is not as though my wife and I love one another. She will not have a need to feel threatened. The duchy is hers legally; I would not take it from her. We have a marriage of convenience only, but she is benefiting greatly from it.”
He didn’t like his friend’s silence, and he chewed his lip, fighting the urge to rush Rupert’s words. No doubt they brewed.
But when Rupert next spoke, it surprised Spencer. He had expected resistance to his decision not to speak of Lady Helena, but instead his friend surprised him. “Are you quite certain it is only convenience?”
Spencer drew up short. “Excuse me?”
“All I am saying is that you are dancing with her voluntarily, pulling her from other gentlemen, buying her treats, recalling her favorite things …” Rupert glanced at him. “At the last ball you could not keep your eyes off her for very long.”
“Nonsense,” Spencer snapped, untethering his horse, eager to leave this conversation and the village itself. “It is only a marriage—”
“Of convenience, yes, but what if—”
“Do not be ridiculous. There is no what if.” Spencer glared at his friend. “Do have a safe journey back to Wexley, Rupert.”
Annoyed, he mounted Arion, and tore off down the country road, suddenly nervous at seeing Felicity. Could Rupert be right? Was he starting to truly take more notice of Felicity in a way that insinuated he cared? Was he…
Was he truly warming to her?
He had wished to tell her she was not merely an ornament as she had angrily protested, but he had not given himself a chance to correct her on what she was in his life. On how the one time, after a bad argument, she had not dined with him, and he had not stopped watching the door.
He had begun to peer into the library when he passed, wondering if she would be in there. And how he waited for her to return safely from the walks she had begun to take around the grounds, with or without Alexander.
Spencer clenched his jaw as he rode.
When had he started to truly care for Felicity?
Chapter 13
“Je n'aime pas la pluie,” Felicity said, already giving Alexander a knowing smile as the small boy gazed out of the window of the school room. He sighed at the wet ground outside.
“What does that mean?” With no hesitation, he climbed off the chair he had been perched on, coming to her side. Over the last three weeks of her being at the manor, Alexander had started losing much of his hesitation in her company, and the two of them were growing closer. It pleased her so much.
“It means, I do not like rain,” she told him. “Would you like to try?”
Alexander pouted and then nodded. He tried to sound out the phrase but forgot it several times. After a few prompts, he finally got it—haltingly so, but Felicity applauded his attempt regardless.
“I think I learn more from you than Mr. Hemming,” Alexander mumbled grumpily, glaring at the tutor that was watching the two of them, confused, and slightly worried. Likely because Felicity kept coming to sit in on the French lessons.
At first it had been a precaution in case Alexander lashed out again, but then it had become a comfort. She had missed herown days of learning the smooth language, and now she found herself enjoying the young boy’s adapting to it.
“It looks as though it has tapered off greatly,” Felicity noted, nodding at the sky beyond. “How about you and I go riding? We have been cooped up in the manor for several days with the rain not letting up. Mr. Hemming, I hear you are quite fond of visiting the tavern on your leisure time. Would you care to take such a trip?”
He blinked at her overfriendliness, not expecting such a manner from a duchess, no doubt. He looked at her though he tried to figure out if she was trying to catch him out or get him into trouble, but after Felicity drew closer to Alexander, she gave him a hopeful nod.
“I insist,” she added.
