The Shy Duchess

by Amanda McCabe

  “I’ve never seen a flower like this before,” she said. “What is it called?”

  Nicholas knelt beside her and pretended to examine the pink blossoms. All he could see was her, the light on her hair, the warm scent of her skin, roses and clean water.

  “I’m not much of a botanist,” he said.

  Emily laughed. “I thought you knew about everything. Horses, stars, archery…”

  “Not flowers, though.” He plucked one of the delicate blossoms and tucked it into her hair.

  “I love it here at Welbourne,” she whispered. “I would never have thought it could be, but it has woven its spell on me. I wish we never had to leave.”

  It had woven its spell on him, too. He had to fight to break free of it.

  “We should get back to the house,” he said abruptly. “It grows late.”

  Her smile faded, and she nodded as he took her hand and helped her to her feet. They made their way back to the house in silence, the enchanted pool growing further and further behind them.

  A man waited for them on the drive at the front of the house, pacing back and forth.

  “Who is that?” Emily asked. “Are you expecting a caller?”

  “It’s my secretary from London,” Nicholas said. “And, no, I wasn’t expecting him. There must be some unexpected business that’s come up.”

  “Business on your honeymoon?”

  Nicholas laughed wryly. The reminder of the real world seemed to be a timely one. “The work of a duke never ends. Go on inside, Em. I won’t be long.”

  “Yes, I’ll just go write those letters I’ve been neglecting.”

  Emily started towards the house, her hand trailing out of Nicholas’s clasp. Before she could leave him entirely, he pulled her towards him and kissed her one more time. She tasted of sunlight and faded laughter.

  “I enjoyed our day,” he said.

  “So did I. Very much,” she answered with a wary smile. “Now, your Grace, go and do your duty. I will see you at dinner.”

  His duty. Yes, he could never forget that. He watched Emily disappear into the house, and then turned towards the waiting secretary.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Emily drifted around the library aimlessly, humming a little tune as she picked up various little boxes and figurines from the tables and put them down again. She couldn’t seem to settle to anything, despite the wealth of tempting novels and volumes of poetry on the shelves, all the letters that waited for her. Ever since she and Nicholas had finally roused themselves to dress and return to the house, she hadn’t felt like herself at all.

  She had never felt so restless before, as if she simply could not sit still. But it was a good kind of restless, a happy kind. She wanted to twirl around, to laugh aloud, to run and skip!

  She did neither, of course. It would be most unbecoming for a duchess to be caught dancing alone in the library in the middle of the day! Instead, she drifted over to the half-open window to gaze out at the waning afternoon.

  The breeze was growing cooler, the heat of the spring day dissipating, and it was soft through the damp braid of her hair and on her bare neck. The light was turning pale gold, almost pink at the edges. Soon it would be time to change for dinner, but Nicholas was still talking on the terrace with the secretary who had brought letters from London, and who had been waiting on their return from the lake.

  Emily glanced toward the desk where she had left her own missives, letters from her mother and from Mrs Goddard, a short, chatty note from Jane lamenting the departure of everyone “interesting” from town. And yet Jane had somehow managed to attend two more parties since Emily’s wedding, where she had encountered an “utterly heartbroken” Mr Rayburn, and promised to divulge “delicious secrets” as soon as she could write again.

  She knew she should answer them, of course, right away. It was her duty to attend promptly to correspondence, no matter how much she would rather have a walk in the sunset! And she did rather want to know Jane’s new secrets. She slowly turned away from the lovely evening outside, and from the view of her husband on the terrace, and went to sit down at the desk.

  The desk, an ornate French affair of giltwork and enamel insets, was cluttered with books, little objets, and a cluster of odd rocks and feathers that seemed to be some of Stephen’s good-luck charms. Emily pushed these to the side and reached for Nicholas’s slope-topped travel desk to look for paper and ink. She should at least have time to write her mother before dinner.

  Unlike the Welbourne desk, Nicholas’s was surprisingly neat and tidy, with everything in their proper slots. A small account book sat on top of the blank stationery, marked with the ducal arms pressed into creamy paper.

  “Mama should appreciate that,” Emily murmured as she reached for a piece of the fine paper. But as she pulled out a pile of sheets, she dislodged a small gold box. It fell on to the desk with a loud thunk, one of the little hinges knocked loose.

  “Oh, blast!” She scooped it up in dismay. Surely breaking her husband’s possessions was not the way to impress him! The tiny, intricately worked lid fell open, spilling out a miniature portrait framed in pearls.

  Emily caught it on her palm. The gold edge was engraved “V. M. M.” Behind a clear panel on the back coiled a dark curl of hair entwined with a finer blond strand.

  She turned it over, and found herself staring down at a beautiful woman, possibly the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. Glossy, dark-brown curls fell over her shoulders and framed an oval face that was all high cheekbones, classical aquiline nose and melting dark eyes. She smiled up at Emily, her eyes sparkling as if at some hidden joke.

  Emily felt as if the breath was knocked from her. This could only be Nicholas’s first wife, his Valentina. She rubbed her thumb over the smooth ivory. The dark woman really was uncommonly beautiful, and she seemed to glow with some inner fire of life. A fire which Emily herself had only begun to understand when she came here to Welbourne. Here, she had felt the first hopeful stirrings of something real and vital deep down inside.

  Now she only felt cold. How could she compete with a woman like this? A dark, vivid beauty who was gone and therefore perfect.

  She carefully replaced the painting in its damaged box and hid it down deep in the desk. She closed the lid over it gently, but still it seemed to glow.

  Her glance fell on Stephen’s little pile of charms, and she began to think he must have the right idea. The title of Duchess of Manning seemed cursed. First Nicholas’s mother; then Lady Linwall, who died of a fever in Naples as soon as she married her love; now foolish Emily Carroll. Did Stephen have a charm to fight off a curse like that? She rubbed her palm over the tiny horseshoe that hung around her neck with the precious emerald pendant that was Nicholas’s wedding gift to her. Were they enough to ward off ill luck?

  She heard a sudden noise in the corridor, voices and heavy footsteps on the marble floor. Quickly, she wiped her damp eyes and reached for the paper and a pen. She could not let anyone see that she had found that portrait! She couldn’t cry to Nicholas, and demand to know why he kept Valentina’s portrait so close. Like a jealous wife. Not when they were both trying so hard to make this ridiculous marriage work.

  Nicholas opened the library door, letting in more of the dying daylight. It fell across his damp, curling hair, turning it as pale as the second curl in the portrait casing. “What are you doing so industriously, Em?”

  She glanced up at him and forced herself to smile. She couldn’t let him see that she had found the portrait. “I’m writing to my mother. She chided me in her letter for not sending word as soon as we arrived.”

  “Well, she can see you for herself soon enough.”

  “What do you mean? We’re meant to be here a fortnight, then go on to Scarnlea Abbey.”

  Nicholas sat down in the chair across from the desk. He smiled at her, but his brow was lined with a tension that had not been there at the lake. “A slight change of plans, I fear. Some business has come up in town I must a
ttend to at once.”

  Emily stared at him in shock. “Y-you’re going back to London? Already?”

  “I thought perhaps we both might go. Then you could see your parents before we travel to Scarnlea, and I dare say there might be a party or two to attend.”

  “But what sort of business…?” Emily remembered the letter he had received from Derrington. “Not your sister Charlotte?”

  “No, no. In fact, Charlotte has given birth to a beautiful baby girl. Drew says that mother and daughter are recovering well, thank God.”

  “Then your niece Katherine will have a playmate!”

  “She will indeed. No, my business is something dull to do with an unfortunate loan my brother Leo took out. It should not take long to solve.”

  Emily nodded, but she couldn’t help but wonder if there was more to it all. Perhaps the dark-eyed lady needed him, or maybe he could not bear to be away from her so long. Whatever it was, she would have to find the strength to bear it. To be that perfect duchess she had resolved to be for him.

  She laid aside the pen and smiled at him. “Well, the news from Derrington is certainly welcome. Hopefully we will soon add to all those little playmates.”

  To her surprise, he responded to her light words with a fierce frown, and leaned across the desk to grasp her hand. “Emily, are you…?”

  His clasp was too tight, his reaction to her teasing not at all what she expected. Surely he wanted children— an heir—and very soon? It seemed to be what all men wanted.

  “No,” she said. “At least I don’t think so. Surely it is too soon to know?”

  He nodded, and raised her hand to his lips for a quick kiss. “There is no hurry at all,” he muttered. “There are so many Mannings running about, I don’t think we need to add to them.”

  “Of course there isn’t,” she said, bewildered. Was he disappointed in her, that there was no child already? “We are young, and only just now married.”

  He pressed her hand to his cheek. “Emily, my dear, if you suspect anything you will let me know at once, won’t you?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “I won’t let anything happen to you, I promise. Nothing will ever hurt you, not while I am here.”

  “I know you will take care of me, Nicholas.” She slowly reached up to rest her free hand on his head, the strands of hair like damp silk against her skin. “I will never let anything hurt you, either.”

  Emily kissed Nicholas, putting all her hidden feeling into it, all she couldn’t say to him. Inside she felt cold and hollow. She had always longed to be a mother, to have her own children to love and care for, but Nicholas did not seem to share her desire. Would a baby just be one more tie to the wife he hadn’t really wanted? And if that was so—how could she ever live with it?

  Nicholas watched Emily across the dinner table as she told him the news from her mother’s letter. The candlelight cast a soft amber glow around her, making her look like a gentle angel in some Renaissance painting, all golden and ethereal.

  Here at Welbourne, she wore her hair in loose waves pinned atop her head rather than stylish ringlets, and her evening gown was simple pale-green muslin trimmed with gold ribbons, though she wore it with her emerald pendant and the pearl earrings Justine had given her. In the last few days, she had laughed and smiled more than ever before, her expression taking on an open, curious aspect as she stepped into the magical world of Welbourne, explored their new life with him. Though she still seemed rather shy and careful, so much of that had melted away to show the laughing, tender-hearted girl beneath.

  It was entrancing to watch her slowly blossom. It made him feel alive again, too, made him want to jump into the world in a way he never had since Valentina died. Tonight, though, it looked like her smile was strained, her chatter just a little too quick, too taut and bright.

  What had made her change? The prospect of returning to London?

  Or perhaps she had sensed his panic at the thought she might be pregnant. He had grabbed quickly on to his self-control again, but that fear had been too real, too raw. The force of it shocked even himself, that realisation of what it would be to lose Emily when he had just found her.

  He had never dreamed he could feel that way about quiet, proper Emily Carroll. But then again, she was not always so very proper. And she had so many hidden, fascinating depths, like a summertime rose with its golden heart hidden away. His world would be dark without her. She had made him see the way to a new life, a new brightness. He had to protect her in return.

  And yet he had not been as careful in bed as he should.

  “…says we must give a ball as soon as the next Season begins,” she was saying. She nodded to the footmen to bring in the next course, and they scurried to obey her. Even the servants of Welbourne, so stubbornly devoted to his family and wary of outsiders, had taken her to their hearts. Crusty Mrs Courtney made sure her linens were laid with rose sachets, and Signor Napoli made new titbits every evening to tempt her.

  “Your parents are giving a ball?” he said.

  Emily laughed. “Certainly not. They could scarcely fit twenty people into their town house. Mama says we must have a ball, and put Manning House to fine use again, as it was back when they were such friends with your father.”

  “You can have any sort of party you want next year, Em,” he said as he reached for his wine glass. “It may take some time for the redecorating, though.”

  “That can be my excuse for putting a ball off until the next year, then!” She bit her lip uncertainly. “Unless you think people will expect one sooner?”

  “They can expect whatever they like. We’ll just have to be very lavish, and thus very slow, in our refurbishments. Maybe we could order a new painted ceiling from France? Silks from India? Plasterwork from Italy?”

  “A hardwood dance floor from the West Indies, maybe?”

  “You are the duchess. Whatever you want is what we shall have.”

  “I want something simple and pretty, and smaller than Manning House. But I also want you to be proud of your house. I have so many ideas for refurbishment, but I want to be sure it’s just right.”

  Nicholas frowned as he studied her through the candle light. Her eyes looked so worried, her thumbnail ragged as she reached for her glass. He had learned that when she bit her nail it was a sure sign of inner turmoil. His heart ached at the thought. He had vowed to make her life easy and happy, not cause her more worry! He hadn’t yet learned how to be a husband; probably he never would.

  “You could never do the wrong thing, Emily,” he said gently. “Everyone is quite envious of me already for marrying the most beautiful lady in London. They will look to you to set the styles now, to tell them what is the right thing to do. If you wore a pineapple on your head, they would all do the same.”

  Emily laughed, and to his relief some of the clouds cleared from her eyes. “I doubt I should want to wear fruit on my head, but if I decide differently I will keep that in mind.” She was becoming more confident of late, but perhaps not that confident. There had to be other fashions she could start that would not involve groceries!

  “You’re already a splendid duchess. Now, what else does your mother say in her letter?”

  “She and Papa are packing to return to the country, and the noise of it all is giving her fainting fits. And she has caught a cold. And she tells me I must stay out of the sun or I will freckle. Advice that comes too late, I fear.”

  She told him the other news from town, and they laughed together over a card game after dinner. Yet still Nicholas couldn’t quite shake away the dark cloud that had descended over their golden idyll. Even as he held her in his arms that night, listening to her soft, sleeping breath, she was drifting further and further out of his grasp.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “Emily, I was just…” Amy stopped abruptly in the doorway of Emily’s Manning House bedchamber, one glove half off her hand. “Oh, Emily, are you ill?”

  “Close the door, Amy, quick
ly,” Emily croaked. She shut her eyes tightly and clung to the chamberpot where she had just lost her breakfast. The queasy dizziness still washed over her in clammy waves, but not as intensely.

  Amy swiftly shut the door behind her and hurried over to the basin of water on the wash stand. She rang out a cloth and knelt beside Emily to gently wipe her brow. “Better now?”

  Emily leaned towards her, grateful for her sister-in-law’s brisk efficiency, her take-charge manner. She needed such sensible help now.

  “Yes, thank you, Amy,” she said.

  “You are certainly doing your duty as duchess very quickly, Emily,” Amy answered, a hint of satisfied amusement in her voice.

  “My duty?”

  “Yes. This is not just a food that didn’t agree with you, is it? It’s morning sickness. My mother always said she had it right away with me and my sisters.”

  Emily sat back hard on her heels, stunned. Underneath her shock, a bright spot of hope bloomed, flickering and tentative. “You mean—I might be enceinte? Already?”

  Amy covered the pan with a wrinkle to her nose and put it away when it seemed Emily’s sudden illness had passed. “I haven’t been blessed with my own child yet, but I do know the signs. It must have happened on your wedding night, you clever girl.”

  Emily pressed her hands to her stomach. Under the soft muslin of her morning gown it felt as flat as ever. But she remembered that wedding night, or rather the morning after, and that wondrous pleasure she found in Nicholas’s arms. Could they really have made a new life then? She smiled to think of it, a tiny child growing inside her. The start of a new family.

  “When will I know for sure?” she said. She slowly got up and made her way to the chaise by the fireplace, feeling shaky.

  “Not for a few weeks, I would think,” said Amy. “But how do you feel? Do you sense it’s true?”

  “I certainly hope it’s true, but I just don’t know. Everything is just so new—being married, being a duchess.” Being in love.