Page 86 of The Forger and the Duke
“I do believe it’s time for tea,” Amaranthe said as the cook peeked around the open door. “Excellent timing, Mrs. Blackthorn.”
“Is the she-devil gone, then?” Mrs. Blackthorn brought the tray into the room and deposited it on the small table beside Amaranthe while Mrs. Wheatley, the cook in training, and Eyde trooped in behind her.
“For now, and I hope for good,” Amaranthe confirmed. “Come here, children, and I will show you how to enjoy a cream tea. Theproperway,” she stressed, “no matter what anyone else, including anyone from Devonshire, tries to tell you.”
Camilla came forward first but instead of taking a seat, she wrapped her arms around Amaranthe’s waist and pressed her face into her stomach. “I missed you,” she said, her voice muffled.
Amaranthe slid her arms about the girl and kissed the golden ringlets atop her head. It felt natural now to touch, to embrace, to give and receive affection. The wall she’d put up between herself and other people after her parents died, after the world betrayed her, could finally come down.
“I missed you as well,” she said. “It was very silly of me not to visit you as soon as I returned to town.”
“Can you still visit us?” Ned looked worried. “Even if we are bastards?”
“Lord—” She stopped. She’d been in the habit of using his title, another way to try to keep her distance from the children. She no longer had a wish to keep her distance. “My dear Ned,” she said firmly, “I hope to see even more of you now. You see, I stayed away because of a very foolish fear that I—well, that I would not be a very good influence for you. But your brother, I am glad to say, persuaded me to mend my ways.”
“There was some concern in the court today that Amaranthe is a forger,” Mal said. He took his dish of tea from Eyde, who had commencing pouring since Amaranthe’s arms were full of little girl. The maid froze and stared, teapot aloft, until Mal assured her, “I was happy to lay those suspicions to rest and prove that she is not.”
“By a very persuasive argumentation,” Amaranthe said. “Your brother would have made a rather fine barrister, had the Benchers ever called him.”
She thrilled at how easily he used her given name. She’d used his as well. She’d already stopped thinking of him as Grey, the angry stranger who’d burst into her house making wild accusations. He was Mal. Direct, unpretentious, still prone to temper, but also steadfast, loyal, and dear.
“And you are the duke,” Hugh said quietly. “Our father’s only legitimate child.” He winced, but his hands were steady as he accepted his dish of tea.
“Amaranthe found the documents that proved my mother’s marriage to our father was properly done,” Mal said. “My mother hid her copy of the lines in the back of a book that our father gave her as a wedding gift. By some providential course the book made its way to Amaranthe in Cornwall and stayed hidden above the stables in her cousin’s house for years.”
Eyde stopped with the sugar tongs hovering over Ned’s tea. “Your book, mum?” she whispered in awe.
“Thaker retrieved it and held it for me,” Amaranthe explained. “It’s been safe all this time.”
Mal continued, passing Millie her dish. “The old duke, our grandfather, tried to pretend the marriage had never happened. He pressed our father into wedding your mother without annulling his marriage to mine, most likely because it would have been expensive and possibly damaging, or possibly because he thought my mother was dead already. But she was still alive, which, I’m afraid, made our father’s marriage to your mother?—”
“Bigamy,” Hugh said grimly.
“And us bastards.” Ned stared into his cup.
“How I hate that word.” Mal winced. “It is my hope you will allow me to adopt you, so you may wear the Delaval name with honest pride. I swear to you, on my honor—no, on my life—that you shall never want for anything I can provide you. You all shall have incomes from the estate and my support in whatever vocation you choose. And Millie, you needn’t fear you won’tmarry well. I will see that your dowry makes up for any perceived lack.”
Camilla made a face, but Ned rushed in before she could speak. “Speaking of marriage! When are you finally going to marry Miss Illingworth, Gr—” He broke off, looking baffled. A nervous look at his elder brother said he wasn’t ready to address Mal as Hunsdon. Hugh wasn’t ready for it, either.
“We shall all have some doing to get our tags and titles sorted,” Mal said gravely. “And I will wed Amaranthe as soon as she will have me.”
Amaranthe raised her cup to her lips, giving herself time to find her voice as her heart leapt wildly within her chest. “Are you asking me at last?”
“At last!” He looked confounded. “As if I haven’t asked you a dozen times already.”
“Commanded.” She sipped her tea. “Presumed. But neverasked.”
He lowered his own cup, staring. “I didn’t?”
“You did not,” she confirmed.
“Well.” Mal cleared his throat as the children looked at him with a puzzled eagerness. “We can settle that directly. Amaranthe, won’t you?—”
“Whist!” Eyde hissed, bumping the back of his chair with her elbow. “’Er’ll want it done correctly, with the knee and the rest.”
“I’m to go on one knee?” Mal looked perplexed.
“Well, of course!” Camilla said in exasperation. “Honestly, have you never done this before?”
