The Lost Duke of Wyndham (8 page)

“You don't know what it means to excel at something.” The dowager pursed her lips and stretched her neck slightly from side to side. “You couldn't know.”

Which had to be as cutting an insult as any, except
that the dowager seemed completely unaware she'd done it.

There was irony in there somewhere. There had to be.

“We live in interesting times, Miss Eversleigh,” the dowager commented.

Grace nodded silently, turning her head to the side so that the dowager, should she ever choose to turn her head in her direction, would not see the tears in her eyes. Her parents had lacked the funds to travel, but theirs had been wandering hearts, and the Eversleigh home had been filled with maps and books about faraway places. Like it was yesterday, Grace remembered the time they had all been sitting in front of the fire, engrossed in their own reading, and her father looked up from his book and exclaimed, “Isn't this marvelous? In China, if you wish to insult someone, you say, ‘May you live in interesting times.'”

Grace suddenly did not know if the tears in her eyes were of sorrow or mirth.

“That is enough, Miss Eversleigh,” the dowager said suddenly. “I am quite cooled.”

Grace shut the fan, then decided to set it down on the table by the window so she would have a reason to cross the room. Dusk hung only lightly in the air, so it was not difficult to see down the drive. She was not certain why she was so eager to have the two men back—possibly just as proof that they had not killed each other on the trip. Despite defending Thomas's sense of honor, she had not liked the look in his eyes. And she had certainly never known him to attack someone. He'd looked positively feral when he lunged
for Mr. Audley. If Mr. Audley had been less of a fighting man himself, she was quite certain Thomas would have done him permanent harm.

“Do you think it will rain, Miss Eversleigh?”

Grace turned. “No.”

“The wind is picking up.”

“Yes.” Grace waited until the dowager turned her attention to a trinket on the table next to her, and then she turned back to the window. Of course the moment she did, she heard—

“I hope it rains.”

She held still. And then she turned. “I beg your pardon?”

“I hope it rains.” The dowager said it again, so very matter-of-fact, as if anyone would wish for precipitation while two gentlemen were out on horseback.

“They will be drenched,” Grace pointed out.

“They will be forced to take each other's measure. Which they will have to do sooner or later. Besides, my John never minded riding in the rain. In fact, he rather enjoyed it.”

“That does not mean that Mr.—“

“Cavendish,” the dowager inserted.

Grace swallowed. It helped her catch her patience. “Whatever he wishes to be called, I don't think we may assume that he enjoys riding in the rain just because his father did. Most people do not.”

The dowager did not seem to wish to consider this. But she acknowledged the statement with, “I know nothing of the mother, that is true. She could be responsible for any number of adulterations.”

“Would you care for tea, ma'am?” Grace asked. “I could ring for it.”

“What do we know of her, after all? Almost certainly Irish, which could mean any number of things, all of them dreadful.”

“The wind is picking up,” Grace said. “I shouldn't want you to get chilled.”

“Did he even tell us her name?”

“I don't believe so.” Grace sighed, because direct questions made it difficult to pretend she wasn't a part of this conversation.

“Dear Lord.” The dowager shuddered, and her eyes took on an expression of utter horror. “She could be
Catholic
.”

“I have met several Catholics,” Grace said, now that it was clear that her attempts to divert the subject had failed. “It was strange,” she murmured. “None had horns.”

“
What
did you say?”

“Just that I know very little about the Catholic faith,” Grace said lightly. There was a reason she often directed her comments to a window or wall.

The dowager made a noise that Grace could not quite identify. It sounded like a sigh, but it was probably more of a snort, because the next words from her mouth were: “We shall have to get that taken care of.” She leaned forward, pinching the bridge of her nose with her fingers and looking extremely put out. “I suppose I shall have to contact the archbishop.”

“Is that a problem?” Grace asked.

The dowager's head shook with distaste. “He is a
beady little man who will be lording this over me for years.”

Grace leaned forward. Was that movement she saw in the distance?

“Heaven knows what sorts of favors he shall demand,” the dowager muttered. “I suppose I shall have to let him sleep in the State Bedroom, just so he can say he slept on Queen Elizabeth's sheets.”

Grace watched as the two men on horseback came into view. “They are back,” she said, and not for the first time that evening, wondered just what role she was meant to play in this drama. She was not family; the dowager was certainly correct in that. And despite Grace's relatively lofty position within the household, she was not included in matters pertaining to family or title. She did not expect it, and indeed she did not want it. The dowager was at her worst when matters of dynasty arose, and Thomas was at his worst when he had to deal with the dowager.

She should excuse herself. It did not matter that Mr. Audley had insisted upon her presence. Grace knew her position, and she knew her place, and it was not in the middle of a family affair.

But every time she told herself it was time to go, that she ought to turn from the window and inform the dowager that she would leave her to talk with her grandsons in private, she could not make herself move. She kept hearing—no,
feeling
—Mr. Audley's voice.

She stays.

Did he need her? He might. He knew nothing of the
Wyndhams, nothing of their history and the tensions that ran through the house like a vicious, intractable spiderweb. He could not be expected to navigate his new life on his own, at least not right away.

Grace shivered, hugging her arms to her chest as she watched the men dismount in the drive. How strange it was to feel needed. Thomas liked to say he needed her, but they both knew that was untrue. He could hire anyone to put up with his grandmother. Thomas needed no one. Nothing. He was marvelously self-contained. Confident and proud, all he really needed was the occasional pinprick to burst the bubble that surrounded him. He knew this, too, which was what saved him from being entirely insufferable. He'd never said as much, but Grace knew it was why they had become friends. She was possibly the only person in Lincolnshire who did not bow and scrape and say only what she thought he wished to hear.

But he didn't
need
her.

Grace heard footsteps in the hall and turned, stiffening nervously. She waited for the dowager to order her gone. She even looked at her, raising her brows ever so slightly as if in a dare, but the dowager was staring at the door, determinedly ignoring her.

When the men arrived, Thomas walked in first.

“Wyndham,” the dowager said briskly. She never called him anything but his title.

He nodded in response. “I had Mr. Audley's belongings sent up to the blue silk bedroom.”

Grace shot a careful look over at the dowager to gauge her reaction. The blue silk bedroom was one of
the nicer guest bedchambers, but it was not the largest or most prestigious. It was, however, just down the hall from the dowager.

“Excellent choice,” the dowager replied. “But I must repeat. Do not refer to him as Mr. Audley in my presence. I don't know these Audleys, and I don't care to know them.”

“I don't know that they would care to know you, either,” commented Mr. Audley, who had entered the room behind Thomas.

The dowager lifted a brow, as if to point out her own magnificence.

“Mary Audley is my late mother's sister,” Mr. Audley stated. “She and her husband, William Audley, took me in at my birth. They raised me as their own and,
at my request
, gave me their name. I don't care to relinquish it.” He looked coolly at the dowager, as if daring her to comment.

She did not, much to Grace's surprise.

And then he turned to her, offering her an elegant bow. “You may refer to me as Mr. Audley if you wish, Miss Eversleigh.”

Grace bobbed a curtsy. She was not certain if this was a requirement, since no one had any clue as to his rank, but it seemed only polite. He had bowed, after all.

She glanced at the dowager, who was glaring at her, and then at Thomas, who somehow managed to look amused and annoyed at the same time.

“She can't sack you for using his legal name,” Thomas said with his usual hint of impatience. “And if she does, I shall retire you with a lifelong bequest
and have her sent off to some far-flung property.”

Mr. Audley looked at Thomas with surprise and approval before turning to Grace and smiling. “It's tempting,” he murmured. “How far can she be flung?”

“I am considering adding to our holdings,” Thomas replied. “The Outer Hebrides are lovely this time of year.”

“You're despicable,” the dowager hissed.

“Why do I keep her on?” Thomas wondered aloud. He walked over to a cabinet and poured himself a drink.

“She is your grandmother,” Grace said, since someone had to be the voice of reason.

“Ah yes, blood.” Thomas sighed. “I'm told it's thicker than water. Pity.” He looked over at Mr. Audley. “You'll soon learn.”

Grace half expected Mr. Audley to bristle at Thomas's tone of condescension, but his face remained blandly unconcerned. Curious. It seemed the two men had forged some sort of truce.

“And now,” Thomas announced, looking squarely at his grandmother, “my work here is done. I have returned the prodigal son to your loving bosom, and all is right with the world. Not
my
world,” he added, “but someone's world, I'm sure.”

“Not mine,” Mr. Audley said, when no one else seemed inclined to comment. And then he unleashed a smile—slow, lazy, and meant to paint himself as the careless rogue he was. “In case you were interested.”

Thomas looked at him, his nose crinkling in an expression of vague indifference. “I wasn't.”

Grace's head bobbed back to Mr. Audley. He was
still smiling. She looked to Thomas, waiting for him to say something more.

He dipped his head toward her in wry salute, then tossed back his liquor in one shockingly large swallow. “I am going out.”

“Where?” demanded the dowager.

Thomas paused in the doorway. “I have not yet decided.”

Which meant, Grace was sure,
anywhere but here
.

A
nd that, Jack decided, was his cue to leave as well.

Not that he had any great love for the duke. Indeed, he'd had quite enough of his marvelous lordliness for one day and was perfectly happy to see his back as he left the room. But the thought of remaining here with the dowager…

Even Miss Eversleigh's delightful company was not enough of a temptation to endure more of
that
.

“I believe I shall retire as well,” he announced.

“Wyndham did not retire,” the dowager said peevishly. “He went out.”

“Then
I
shall retire,” Jack said. He smiled blandly. “End of sentence.”

“It's barely dark,” the dowager pointed out.

“I'm tired.” It was true. He was.

“My John used to stay up until the wee hours,” she said softly.

Jack sighed. He did not want to feel sorry for this woman. She was hard, ruthless, and thoroughly unlikable. But she had, apparently, loved her son. His father. And she'd lost him.

A mother shouldn't outlive her children. He knew this as well as he knew how to breathe. It was unnatural.

And so instead of pointing out that her John had most likely never been kidnapped, strangled, blackmailed, and stripped of his (albeit paltry) livelihood, all in one day, he walked forward and set her ring—the very one he had all but snatched from her finger—on the table next to her. His own was in his pocket. He was not quite prepared to share its existence with her. “Your ring, madam,” he said.

She nodded, then took it into her hands.

“What is the D for?” he asked. His whole life, he'd wondered. He might as well gain something from this debacle.

“Debenham. My birth surname.”

Ah. It made sense. She'd have given her own heirlooms to her favorite son.

“My father was the Duke of Runthorpe.”

“I am not surprised,” he murmured. She could decide for herself if that was a compliment. He bowed. “Good evening, your grace.”

The dowager's mouth tightened with disappointment. But she seemed to recognize that if there had been a battle that day, she was the only one who had
emerged victorious, and she was surprisingly gracious as she said, “I shall have supper sent up.”

Jack nodded and murmured his thanks, then turned to exit.

“Miss Eversleigh will show you to your room.”

At that Jack snapped to attention, and when he looked Miss Eversleigh's way, he saw that she had, too.

He had been expecting a footman. Possibly the butler. This was a delightful surprise.

“Is that a problem, Miss Eversleigh?” the dowager asked. Her voice sounded sly, a little bit taunting.

“Of course not,” Miss Eversleigh replied. Her eyes were clouded but not entirely unreadable. She was surprised. He could see it by the way her lashes seemed to reach a little higher toward her brows. She was not used to being ordered to tend to anyone except the dowager. Her employer, he decided, did not like to share her. And as his eyes fell again to her lips, he decided that he was in complete accord. If she were his, if he had any right to her…he would not wish to share her, either.

He wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to touch her, just a soft brush of hand against skin, so fleeting that it could only be deemed accidental.

But more than any of that, he wanted use of her name.

Grace
.

He liked it. He found it soothing.

“See to his comfort, Miss Eversleigh.”

Jack turned to the dowager with widening eyes. She sat like a statue, her hands folded primly in her lap, but
the corners of her mouth were tilted ever so slightly up, and her eyes looked cunning and amused.

She was giving Grace to him. As clear as day, she was telling him to make use of her companion, if that was his desire.

Good Lord. What sort of family had he fallen into?

“As you wish, ma'am,” Miss Eversleigh replied, and in that moment Jack felt soiled, almost dirty, because he was quite certain she had no idea that her employer was attempting to whore her off on him.

It was the most appalling sort of bribe.
Stay the night, and you can have the girl
.

It sickened him. Doubly so, because he wanted the girl. He just didn't want her given to him.

“It is most kind of you, Miss Eversleigh,” he said, feeling as if he had to be extra polite to make up for the dowager. They reached the door, and then, before he forgot, he turned back. He and the duke had spoken only tersely on their outing, but on one matter they had been in accord. “Oh, by the by, should anyone ask, I am a friend of Wyndham's. From years gone by.”

“From university?” Miss Eversleigh suggested.

Jack fought back a grim chuckle. “No. I did not attend.”

“You did not attend!” the dowager gasped. “I was led to believe you'd had a gentleman's education.”

“By whom?” Jack inquired, ever so politely.

She sputtered at that for a moment, and then finally she scowled and said, “It is in your speech.”

“Felled by my accent.” He looked at Miss Eversleigh and shrugged. “Pommy R's and proper H's. What's a man to do?”

But the dowager was not prepared to let the subject drop. “You
are
educated, are you not?”

It was tempting to claim he'd been schooled with the local lads, if only to witness her reaction. But he owed his aunt and uncle better than that, and so he turned to the dowager and said, “Portora Royal, followed by two months at Trinity College—Dublin, that is, not Cambridge—and then six years serving in His Majesty's army and protecting
you
from invasion.” He cocked his head to the side. “I'll take those thanks now, if you will.”

The dowager's lips parted with outrage.

“No?” He lifted his brows. “Funny how no one seems to care that they still speak English and curtsy to good King George.”

“I do,” Miss Eversleigh said. And when he looked at her, she blinked and added, “Er, thank you.”

“You're welcome,” he said, and it occurred to him that this was the first time he'd had cause to say it. Sadly, the dowager was not unique in her sense of entitlement. Soldiers were occasionally feted, and it was true that the uniforms were quite effective when attracting the ladies, but no one ever thought to say thank you. Not to him, and especially not to the men who'd suffered permanent injury or disfigurement.

“Tell everyone we shared fencing lessons,” Jack said to Miss Eversleigh, ignoring the dowager as best he could. “It's as good a ruse as any. Wyndham says he's passable with a sword?”

“I do not know,” she said.

Of course she wouldn't. But no matter. If Wyndham had said he was passable, then he was almost cer
tainly a master. They would be well-matched if ever they had to offer proof of their lie. Fencing had been his best subject in school. It was probably the only reason they had kept him to age eighteen.

“Shall we?” he murmured, tilting his head toward the door.

“The blue silk bedroom,” the dowager called out sourly.

“She does not like to be left out of a conversation, does she?” Jack murmured, so that only Miss Eversleigh could hear.

He'd known she could not answer, not with her employer so close, but he saw her eyes dart away, as if trying to hide her amusement.

“You may retire for the night as well, Miss Eversleigh,” the dowager directed.

Grace turned in surprise. “You don't wish for me to attend to you? It's early yet.”

“Nancy can do it,” she replied with a pinch of her lips. “She's an acceptable hand with buttons, and what's more, she doesn't say a word. I find that to be an exceptionally good trait in a servant.”

As Grace held her tongue more often than not, she decided to take that as a compliment, rather than the rear-door insult it was meant to be. “Of course, ma'am,” she said, bobbing a demure curtsy. “I shall see you in the morning, then, with your chocolate and the newspaper.”

Mr. Audley was already at the door and was holding out his hand to motion for her to precede him, so she walked out into the hall. She had no idea what the
dowager was up to, giving her the rest of the evening off, but she was not going to argue further.

“Nancy is her maid,” she explained to Mr. Audley once he reached her side.

“I'd guessed.”

“It's most odd.” She shook her head. “She—“

Mr. Audley waited rather patiently for her to finish her sentence, but Grace decided the better of it. She had been going to say that the dowager hated Nancy. In fact, the dowager complained most bitterly and at painful length each time she had a day out and Nancy served as a substitute.

“You were saying, Miss Eversleigh?” he murmured.

She almost told him. It was strange, because she barely knew him, and furthermore, he could not possibly be interested in the trivialities of the Belgrave household. Even if he did become the duke—and the thought of it still made her somewhat sick to her stomach—well, it wasn't as if
Thomas
could have identified any of the housemaids. And if asked which ones his grandmother disliked, he'd surely have said,
All of them
.

Which, Grace thought with a wry smile, was probably true.

“You're smiling, Miss Eversleigh,” Mr. Audley remarked, looking very much as if he were the one with a secret. “Do tell why.”

“Oh, it's nothing,” she said. “Certainly nothing that would be of interest to you.” She motioned toward the staircase at the rear of the hall. “Here, the bedchambers are this way.”

“You
were
smiling,” he said again, falling in step beside her.

For some reason that made her smile anew. “I did not say that I wasn't.”

“A lady who doesn't dissemble,” he said approvingly. “I find myself liking you more with every passing minute.”

Grace pursed her lips, eyeing him over her shoulder. “That does not indicate a very high opinion of women.”

“My apologies. I should have said a
person
who does not dissemble.” He flashed her a smile that shook her to her toes. “I would never claim that men and women are interchangeable, and thank heavens for that, but in matters of truthiness, neither sex earns high marks.”

She looked at him in surprise. “I don't think truthiness is a word. In fact, I'm quite certain it is not.”

“No?” His eyes darted to the side. Just for a second—not even a second, but it was long enough for her to wonder if she'd embarrassed him. Which couldn't be possible. He was so amazingly glib and comfortable in his own skin. One did not need more than a day's acquaintance to realize that. And indeed, his smile grew jaunty and lopsided, and his eyes positively twinkled as he said, “Well, it should be.”

“Do you often make up words?”

He shrugged modestly. “I try to restrain myself.”

She looked at him with considerable disbelief.

“I do,” he protested. He clasped one hand over his heart, as if wounded, but his eyes were laughing. “Why is it no one ever believes me when I tell them I am a moral and upstanding gentleman, on this earth
with the
every
intention of following
every
rule.”

“Perhaps it is because most people make your acquaintance when you order them out of a carriage with a gun?”

“True,” he acknowledged. “It does color the relationship, doesn't it?”

She looked at him, at the humor lurking in his emerald eyes, and she felt her lips tickle. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to laugh the way she'd laughed when her parents were alive, when she'd had the freedom to seek out life's absurdities and the time to make merry over them.

It almost felt as if something were waking up within her. It felt lovely. It felt
good
. She wanted to thank him, but she'd sound the veriest fool. And so she did the next best thing.

She apologized.

“I'm sorry,” she said, pausing at the base of the stairs.

That seemed to surprise him. “You're sorry?”

“I am. For…today.”

“For kidnapping me.” He sounded amused, vaguely so. Perhaps even condescending.

“I didn't mean to,” she protested.

“You
were
in the carriage,” he pointed out. “I do believe that any court of law would brand you an accomplice.”

Oh,
that
was more than she could take. “This would, I assume, be the same court of law that sent you to the gallows earlier that same morning for pointing a loaded gun at a duchess.”

“Tsk tsk. I told you it wasn't a hanging offense.”

“No?” she murmured, echoing his earlier tone precisely. “It ought to be.”

“Oh, you think?”

“If truthiness gets to be a word, then accosting a duchess with a gun ought to be enough to get one hanged.”

“You're quick,” he said admiringly.

“Thank you,” she said, then admitted, “I'm out of practice.”

“Yes.” He glanced down the hall toward the drawing room, where the dowager was presumably still enthroned upon her sofa. “She does keep you rather silent, doesn't she?”

“Loquaciousness is not considered becoming in a servant.”

“Is that how you see yourself?” His eyes met hers, searching her so deeply she almost stepped away. “A servant?”

And then she did step away. Because whatever it was he was going to find in her, she wasn't so sure
she
wanted to see it. “We should not loiter,” she said, motioning for him to follow her up the stairs. “The blue silk bedroom is lovely. Very comfortable, and with excellent morning light. The artwork in particular is superb. I think you will like it.”

She was babbling, but he was kind enough not to remark upon it, instead saying, “I'm sure it will be an improvement over my current lodgings.”