Three faces froze. The girl named Mary actually gasped.
“Your Grace,” Jamie’s wife said. “I realize it is a bit of a protocol breech, but may I introduce you to three of our staff, who have only been with us for a month, and see how beautifully they are doing.”
“I do see,” he agreed. “They have great potential.”
She turned that blinding smile on him, leaving him a bit dizzy, and returned to her staff. “Pay your respects as I announce you. Our butler is Tom Nelson, our maids Maisy Tuesday and Mary Willard.” Each bobbed in turn and waited. “Now, off with you,” she ordered. “If there are any pastries left, share them with the others.”
The three fled as if Adam had growled. He couldn’t help but smile.
“Others?” he asked.
Her smile grew impish as she bent to prepare the tea. “We are the despair of the parish...well, I imagine I am. Jack and Olivia haven’t been here enough lately to be considered accomplices. But I decided that since I am mostly out of society it would be a safe place for them to train up. I admit they have been a delight.”
“Can I ask how Maisy came to be here? She doesn’t quite seem to be a local.”
Immediately the smile disappeared. “She found herself lost on foreign shores when her American master died of the ague in London. My sister-by-marriage, Olivia, found her and brought her to us. I am so glad, too. She is teaching me so much about America. I’m even learning a bit of the Creole language. She is from New Orleans, where we lost so many of our brave young men.”
“A stupid venture altogether, that war.”
She just nodded.
For a long few minutes the only sounds that could be heard in the room were the crackle of the fire and the soft chime of porcelain being moved about as Georgie Grace prepared tea. Adam soaked in the ritual of normalcy like sun on a cold body. This was what he had dreamed of back on the Peninsula, small homey moments spent in safe places. The gentle scents of women—hers seemed to be something flowery—and the comforting motions of daily ritual. Tea and cakes. A woman’s laughter. A warm fire on a cold day. He wanted to close his eyes and just drink it in.
“Your Grace?”
Good lord, he’d actually closed his eyes. “Adam,” he corrected, his eyes wide open as he accepted his teacup and cakes. “Please.”
She smiled, looking a bit bemused, not that he blamed her. “Then I am Georgie. And if I am any judge of things, you will soon meet Lully.”
“Lully? Do you mean your daughter? I thought her name was Charlotte.”
She grinned. “Lilly Charlotte, actually. Only her cousin couldn’t pronounce Lilly. It rather stuck.”
Adam watched her take a delicate bite of her cake. She left a bit of icing caught just on the upper corner of her mouth. Adam couldn’t take his eyes off of it. He couldn’t quash the urge to reach up and brush it away. Or kiss it away….
Napoleon’s knees, he’d been away too long. Ducking his head, he slurped at his tea, scalding the roof of his mouth as he did so until he could rein his less civilized urges back in again. It had been so long since he’d even thought about lust. The multiple surgeries on his leg had mostly seen to that.
Well, evidently he was past all that.
“Adam, are you all right? Is it your leg, or another injury? Would you like to lie down?”
He opened his eyes again, afraid that now he was the one blushing. “No, no. I was just enjoying the tea. I’ve been thinking how these are the small moments a soldier thinks of when he’s lying on the cold ground in Spain.”
Oh, sweet Christ, he was really going to be lost if she didn’t turn that sympathetic gaze somewhere else. It made him want to just lay himself at her feet.
If his leg were more dependable, he’d jump up and pace. He was afraid, though, that he’d end up with his face in her lap, and that wouldn’t promote his intentions here a bit.
“Lully,” he blurted out. “I’m really here for her.”
His words were met with a rather stark silence. “Pardon?”
He nodded, setting down his saucer. “I am actually here to bring her some news.”
Again Georgie tilted her head. “Lully is four, Your Grace. What news could you have to give her?”
This wasn’t going the way he’d planned. He should have believed Jamie from the start. Maybe his reaction to Georgie wouldn’t have knocked him so off-center.
“I need to take her to Scotland.”
Georgie froze. “I beg your pardon?”
He tried closing his eyes again. “She is needed there.”
She was staring at him as if he’d begun to bark like a dog. “In Scotland.”
He nodded, and surrendered to the inevitable. It wouldn’t get any easier with the waiting. “Life has just changed forever for her, Georgie. She is no longer simply a little girl.” A deep breath didn’t help, so he just dove in and opened his eyes again. “She’s a duchess.”
Georgie laughed. “She is no such thing.”
It was pointless to argue.
“Are you feeling perfectly well, Your Grace?” she asked, getting to her feet. “I can call for the local physician. He is old, but….”
He should have known this would be her reaction. “No,” he said, There was no avoiding it. He had to get to his feet as well. “No,” he said, grabbing his cane and hoisting himself up, his knee protesting like an unoiled hinge. “I am not ill. Please sit again so I might.”
She flushed, but she sat. Adam did the same, trying not to wince.
“And please,” he said. “My name is Adam.” He considered picking up his cup again and decided against it. He had a feeling he’d be on his feet again soon. “I was coming to see you anyway. I promise. Not only because I wanted to meet the woman who had stolen Jamie’s heart, but because I made a promise to him.”
“That is lovely.” Her voice didn’t sound like it. “But not to the point.”
He nodded and took another breath. “There is news,” he repeated. “Jamie’s mother has died.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
She neither sounded nor looked like she meant it. Having known Jamie’s mother well, he couldn’t really blame her.
“How can that concern us?” she asked. “Jamie’s family made certain we knew we were not welcome.”
“Well, since Jamie is…gone, it means that Lully has inherited. I need to take her with me to accept.”
Adam didn’t think you could see fire in the color green. He certainly could now.
“Inherited? Inherited what? Jamie was disowned.”
“You cannot disown a title, Mrs. Grace. Your daughter is now a duchess in her own right.”
She was shaking her head. “Don’t be ridiculous. Girls cannot inherit titles. They pass along the males. My father was quite specific about that when he was complaining about his oldest two daughters.”
“Scottish titles can. This one passed from Jamie’s great-uncle to his mother to...well, it would have been Jamie. But now it passes to Jamie’s child. Which is where I come in. It is my duty to take her to verify her title.”
She was up again, glaring down at him. “Try not to be absurd. My daughter is not going anywhere. Certainly not to Scotland. You do realize that it is January, Your Grace.”
“Not Scotland immediately,” he acknowledged, eying his cane and wondering how many times he could get her to sit back down. “I should have made that clear. To London to secure her title, but she will need to travel to the estate in Scotland as soon as it is possible.”
She sat back down with a bit of a thump. “Well, she isn’t going. She is a four year old girl.”
He drew a careful breath, wondering why she should be so adamant. “You do know I am her trustee.”
She stiffened and seemed to grow in stature. “I know this is the first time since Jamie died that you have mentioned it, either in person or letter. We have been dealing quite successfully with Mr. Carson at the bank.”