“Four months.”
“I’m sorry.” He sounded like it. But then, Georgie had never doubted that Jamie’s cousin was a kind man. Jamie truly had worshiped him.
“I as well, Your Grace.”
He set down his cup and struggled to his feet. Georgie’s heart dropped. So. It was time to get down to business. She set down her own cup, but found she couldn’t quite make it to her feet as well. Instead she tucked the miniature into her pocket.
“Adam,” he corrected with a gentle smile as he retrieved his cane. “It would look ridiculous if you called your cousin ‘your grace.’”
“Yes, of course….Adam.”
Georgie was setting down her own cup when she was distracted by the sound of giggles. She turned to the windows to see Lully leaping about the back garden in her favorite bright red dress she insisted made her a robin. Murphy was seated by the herb corner, and Hattie just tying the ribbons on her bonnet by the arbor. Georgie didn’t realize she was smiling until the duke commented on it.
“I see the aforementioned walk is about to commence,” he said with his own smile.
She nodded, soaking in the sight of her baby like sunlight.
“That’s quite a dog,” he said.
“Murphy is actually quite a darling,” she said, dispatching her cup. “As long as you do not try to interfere with Lully or Jamie, anyway.”
Just then the dog in question, pressed his nose against the glass. Beside him Lully gave a dignified little wave, a gleaming smile, and then turned to run after Hattie, who was already through the garden gate.
Adam waved back. “Our little duchess is quite magnificent.”
Georgie came to abrupt attention and turned on him. “Please. Do not refer to her like that. Ever.”
“Why not?” he asked, setting the cup down. “It is who she is.”
Bile rose up in her throat. “As I said, Your….Adam. She is only a very little girl.”
“With people who depend on her.”
“And trustees to see to those people until she is old enough to be involved.”
“Only once she is invested. Then we may act for her.”
“You act for her now. Well, Mr. Carson does.”
“Not as duchess. This is an entirely different level of involvement, Mrs. Grace.”
“Not Mrs. Grace, please.”
His one eyebrow rose. “Well, I cannot call you Jamie’s wife, even though that is how I think of you.”
She sighed. “Georgie will do perfectly fine. My daughter is Lully. Or Lilly. Or Lilly Charlotte. I will set Murphy on you if you spread it around that she should be called Her Grace. It would destroy her life.”
She had been set to move on. He stopped her with two words.
“Her life?”
Briefly she closed her eyes. “Our lives, then. The locals see her as Gracechurch’s niece, no more, no less. You know perfectly well from your own experience that there is a change in how people deal with you when they find out you hold such a lofty title. A separation appears, a caution. A self-imposed artificiality from the people she has known as friends and neighbors her whole life. Think of what that would do to the little girl you just met. Please. Do not hurt my child.”
“Or you’ll sic Murphy on me.”
She considered him for a moment, hoping he believed her. “Do not think I won’t, if it comes to that. And do not be misled by his rather ungainly appearance. Murphy will follow my every command without hesitation. And he is quite an athletic animal.”
Adam all but reared back. “You are quite serious, aren’t you?”
“You’ve been to war, sir. I have as well, although of a much different type. My cousin did his best to murder young Jamie and destroy my family. I will no more let you do it than I did him.”
“Murder your nephew?”
“Destroy my family.”
For another long moment, he considered her. “I don’t mean to take her away from you.”
“But you mean to take her away from here, where she is safe.”
As if fate had simply been waiting for that boast, suddenly Georgie heard Murphy. He wasn’t barking as if he played. It was his attack bark. Then she heard a scream. Not even noticing that she knocked the tray over, spilling tea and china over the rug, she was on her feet running for the back of the house
“Stop!” the duke yelled, struggling to his feet. “Wait!”
She neither stopped nor waited.
CHAPTER 4
BY THE TIME Georgie made it through the kitchen, half her staff was on her heels, cook with a cleaver, the maids with brooms and Tom with a blunderbuss Georgie had no idea he had. She lifted her skirts and dragged out the knife she had sheathed to her thigh on the run, a skill she had needed before. Murphy was still barking, that hair-raising, deep-chested cacophony that terrified her. Hattie was still screaming at the top of her lungs, more as an alert to others, Georgie knew, then from fear.
Georgie saw Lully’s coat first, that bright splash of red laying on the ground. They had made it almost to the wall by the wood on their walk. Georgie’s heart climbed right up her throat until she saw her little girl climb back to her feet. Hattie was beating someone over the head with her umbrella, and Murphy was shaking that someone like a rag doll, someone trying his hardest to reach the wall.
“Shealbhú go tapa!” Georgie called.
Immediately Murphy sat back, the man’s leg firmly in his mouth. The intruder wasn’t going anywhere. He was too busy screaming himself and trying to ward off Hattie’s final blows, his arms over his head. From the direction of the stables Georgie could hear reinforcements trundling her way.
She could barely breathe by the time she reached the little group. Her first priority was to grab hold of Lully and make sure she was safe. She did it as soon as she re sheathed her knife.
“He tried to nab her!” Hattie cried, giving the man’s other leg a kick for good measure as Georgie clutched her little girl to her. “Right out of my hand!”
Murphy growled and shook that leg, setting up another whimper of pain from the man. Georgie could almost feel sorry for him. She saw that blood stained his leg.
“I kicked him too, mama!” Georgie announced, trying to pull from her mother’s arms to deliver another blow.
Georgie held on, just in case. “I believe Murphy has this well in hand, my heart. Stay here with Hattie, please. I must speak to the man.”
She had only taken two steps when the rest of her staff arrived, yelling and threatening and bristling with various weapons. Georgie held them all off.
“Thank you so much,” she said, handing Lully into Hattie’s care. “If you’ll wait a minute until I can find out what is going on.”
But when she turned the kidnapper over, it was to receive another unpleasant surprise.
“Jem? Jem Collins?!”
The young son of her parents’ head groom tried to move, but subsided quickly with Murphy’s renewed growl. “Miss,” the boy pleaded. “My leg. I fear it’s broke.”
“Éasca as,” she murmured. “Do not move, Jem, or it will go worse for you.”
Murphy gave her a doleful look but sat back, the leg freed.
“Balach cróga,” she murmured the praise with a smile, ruffling the dog’s head. Then she simply pointed to Lully and the dog walked over to stand right by her.
“Now then, Jem Collins,” Georgie said, hands on hips. “What is this about?”
By now the boy was weeping outright. If she remembered, he was all of about eighteen, a good worker and as upright as an oak. She simply couldn’t understand.
“He told me….he….said that me dad would be...turned out without...reference...” He hiccuped and swiped his face with his sleeve.
“Sit up, Jem,” she said.
He did, his face down, his shoulders still shaking with suppressed sobs. Georgy could feel Adam coming to a halt behind her. She almost expected him to try to take over, but he didn’t.