My Fair Duchess

by Megan Frampton

  She stifled a snort, altering it at the last minute to a clearing of the throat. She hoped. Even if Aunt Sophia had had those thoughts—and Genevieve rather doubted she had; Aunt Sophia’s main concern was for Truffles, her dog; she couldn’t very well share her thoughts with Genevieve. She probably didn’t even share those thoughts with Truffles, who it seemed, from her letters, had her utmost confidence.

  “I’ve drawn up a list,” Mr. Salisbury said, dropping a piece of paper on the table beside Genevieve. Then backing away, as though she were going to bite him.

  Did ladies often bite him? she wondered. If so, she couldn’t blame them. He did look quite delicious.

  She picked the paper up and scanned it. It was what he had written to her in the letter, only with a few indications of what the general duties would be—“prepare menus and meals” next to “Cook,” “handle all driving duties” beside “Coachman,” and so forth.

  Genevieve nodded as she read until she realized just what she was reading.

  Did Mr. Salisbury think she was stupid as well as ill-equipped for her new position in life? Judging by what she was reading, he did. Now she was glad she hadn’t gotten him tea. He did not deserve a beverage either hot or cold.

  It appeared that he had not trusted that she would know what a “Cook” did; he had gone ahead and added “prepare menus and meals” next to the position, as though Genevieve might think a “Cook” did anything else.

  And now she felt her face start to burn again, only this time it wasn’t because of the good-looking man in the room. That is to say, it was because of him, but not because of his good looks.

  “Mr. Salisbury,” she began, and she heard how she squeaked, again, and she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, hoping she could settle herself. “Mr. Salisbury.” That was better; she sounded not quite so hysterical. “You seem to be under the impression that I have no idea what I am doing.”

  She kept her gaze locked on him, wishing she could unflush her cheeks, but unwilling to drop her eyes. And it seemed he felt the same way, since they just gazed at each other, neither of them speaking, just . . . looking.

  She rather thought she got the better part of the bargain. She got to look at him, while all he had to look at was she. She knew she wasn’t hideous, but she was definitely not in the same range of attractiveness as Mr. Salisbury; doubtless there were other people who were every bit as good-looking as he, and she would grow accustomed to such beauty over time. Perhaps if she could inure herself to looking at impossibly good-looking people—such as, for example, Mr. Salisbury here—she would be better equipped to face Society.

  And then she giggled at the thought of presenting the idea to him. He seemed to already have a poor opinion of her intelligence. To then ask him to sit while she stared at him for several hours a day would confirm that.

  His lips flattened into a thin line at her laughter. Oh, and now she had offended him. This was going splendidly.

  “Pardon my bluntness, Your Grace, but it doesn’t seem as though you do know what you are doing.” He spoke firmly again, damn him, and Genevieve nearly nodded her head in agreement before she realized just what he’d said.

  It was true, but it wasn’t very polite to say it.

  “Then perhaps you should return to Lady Sophia.”

  “Why?” He looked genuinely puzzled.

  Genevieve felt the bubble of anger rising through her whole self, starting somewhere around her shins, so that by the time it exploded out of her mouth it had built and grown. “Because you are doubting my abilities! Because you have done nothing but be dismissive of me since you arrived!”

  “I’ve only arrived three days ago,” he said in a clipped tone. “I haven’t had much of an opportunity to dismiss you. And you yourself told your aunt in your letter—the letter that prompted her to send me to you—that you were unsure about what to do. What else was I to think?” He crossed his arms over his chest and raised one eyebrow.

  She wished she could yank it back down again.

  She threw her hands up in exasperation instead. At him. At herself. Because he was right, even though he was incredibly rude about it. “Fine.” She did not squeak. She was startled to hear herself sound almost dismissive. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Count to ten, Genevieve, and then—

  “I am sorry, Mr. Salisbury.” She spoke in a calmer tone, biting her lip in an effort to keep her voice from rising up into squeaking territory again. “It is just . . . overwhelming. All of this. And I do need help, and I appreciate your coming here”—even though I did not ask you to—“and perhaps we can work together and then you can return to Lady Sophia. I am certain she has duties for you that require assistance.”

  He nodded once. And the eyebrow came down, thank goodness. “That is all I want as well, Your Grace.” He gestured to the piece of paper Genevieve still held. “And I likely should apologize to you. I have yet to entirely adjust to civilian life, and sometimes I forget that I am not in charge of a regiment. My suggestions can sound like orders, your aunt has told me. Shall we proceed?” He accompanied his words with a conciliatory smile.

  And Genevieve felt her knees buckle, which was remarkable given that she was seated.

  He was remarkably handsome when his expression was neutral, but when he smiled? Oh mudpies! He was blindingly handsome, so attractive that she wondered if there was a row of flattened women in his wake, unable to raise themselves from the ground after beholding his splendor.

  And yet it wouldn’t do to think too much about that, not only because he was a steward, not someone she could possibly have any kind of interest in other than his stewardship. Even if she could throw caution to the winds—or her reputation to Society, which was nearly the same thing—he showed no interest in her at all that way anyway, in fact seeming to think she was slow to comprehend perfectly obvious things.

  Things such as a duchess in her own right would never allow herself to marry a gentleman, no matter how handsome or capable he was, if he wasn’t an appropriate match.

  She heard an odd sound emerging from her mouth, and realized it was a snort. Oh no. Even she knew duchesses did not snort.

  “Your Grace?” he said, sounding doubtful.

  Of course. He was likely now questioning not only her capability, but also her sanity. Or her lungs.

  The sooner they were done with each other, the better.

  “Thank you, I accept your apology. Let us begin to discuss what needs to be done, shall we?” she said, her tone as bright as she could make it without sounding, well, insane.

  “Excellent,” he replied, looking skeptical for a moment, then back to that blandly neutral expression.

  Letter

  Dear Duchess,

  I am writing to you again. I know we are in the same house. No, I don’t know why I keep writing. Perhaps because I do not wish to seem as rude as I know I can be. It is understandable that you wish to present yourself to Society in as good a light as possible. I would therefore urge you to just be quiet and listen to me clear out your schedule so we can work with one another toward that goal.

  Goals, in my experience, are only achieved when one has set them. Obviously. Perhaps we could meet anytime but teatime at your convenience to establish these goals and lay out a battle plan strategy to meet them.

  Respectfully,

  Mr. Archibald Salisbury, Capt. (Ret.)

  Chapter 3

  The knock at his door came only thirty minutes after he’d asked one of the soon-to-be-let-go footmen to deliver the letter. Either it was coincidence, or perhaps the footman was actually doing a good job and should be kept on.

  “Enter,” he called out as he stood from the desk he’d been working at. Lady Sophia had sent her own letter with perhaps seven questions phrased fifty-seven different ways, and he was trying to summarize his answers so he wouldn’t have to take the time to answer each and every single one.

  He could hear Bob’s laughter from here.

  “Mr. Salisb
ury?” Of course it was she, since the only business he had here was with her. Not that he was disappointed; far from it. But that meant he did not want to examine what he felt instead.

  He strode over the door and opened it. “Do come in, Your Grace.” She entered, and he kept the door ajar, looking around the hallway. He did not want the servants to gossip, even though he was also technically a servant. There was no one in the hallway, however, so if the visit was brief, it would not be remarked upon.

  He walked around her to pull the chair of his desk out for her, the only place to sit beside the bed. He would not suggest they sit there.

  “Oh no, I don’t need to sit, I just came by to ask a question.” And even though she’d said she didn’t need to sit, she punctuated her words by plopping down in the chair and glancing around her with what appeared to be great interest.

  Of course. She had likely never been in a gentleman’s bedroom before.

  At least, he assumed not. He knew so little about his new recruit.

  Archie remained standing, clasping his hands behind his back and staring down at her. He wished he could tell her it was entirely and totally inappropriate for her to burst in here like that, not to mention looking at his shaving kit with such curiosity, but there was something natural in the way she did it. He didn’t want to ruin that for her, to make her even more self-conscious about who she was.

  Plus he had to admit to enjoying it.

  “Sit down, won’t you?” she said after a moment, her brow wrinkled. “You look all large and . . .” She fluttered her hands. “Large,” she repeated, “looming over me. It’s hard enough to do this.”

  He perched on the edge of the bed. “Do what, Your Grace?”

  Instead of replying, she held a piece of paper out to him, her cheeks starting to turn pink. He leaned across the short distance between them to take it, recognizing it as he drew it closer. “This is my letter. To you,” he said, in case she didn’t understand that part.

  She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “I know it is your letter, I brought it to you.”

  “Yes?” Was there a problem? Also, he should make sure that footman wasn’t fired. Because he was remarkably speedy.

  “Why are you showing me my letter?” he asked in as mild a voice as he could muster. Which didn’t sound very mild to his ears.

  She snatched it back from his fingers and tapped her index finger on it. “Because”—tap—“you keep writing me when”—tap—“we are in the same household. Why is that, Mr. Salisbury?”

  Archie opened his mouth—again—to reply, but couldn’t. The moment hung there between them, too still and too silent.

  He got up from the bed and began to speak. Even before he knew what he was going to say.

  “I don’t believe you know who I am, Your Grace.” She looked puzzled, naturally enough, since he had introduced himself. Even before they’d actually met, in fact. Just as he’d known she had newly acceded to this position for which she had not been prepared. He hadn’t known her, though. And she didn’t know him.

  He started to pace, then realized he shouldn’t be so rude as to turn his back on her. So he planted himself right at the end of the carpet, willing himself not to move for fear of being disrespectful. “My family didn’t want me to buy a commission. My uncle understood why I wanted to go, and so he helped me pay for it. But what I wanted, what I really wanted,” which he hadn’t even known himself until he began speaking, “was there to be order in the world. For things that were right to be right, and for things that were wrong to stop being.”

  He paused, grateful she didn’t interrupt. Instead, she listened, her expression thoughtful, her hands folded in her lap atop his letter.

  “And I find it so much clearer when I can write things down, see them as words. I like that I have time to react and prepare—real-life battle is never so expected.” He’d grown to hate the chaos. Or maybe he always had hated the chaos, and was doing his best to change that. But this, this organization of sending a letter, then getting a reply—it felt safe. Organized. And correct.

  And now he understood why he’d chosen to take a position as a steward, where he could organize things to his heart’s content.

  “That makes sense to me,” she said at last, accompanying her words with a brisk nod. “I should not be so self-absorbed as to think your letter writing had anything to do with me, and that you might possibly dislike me.”

  “I don’t know you well enough to dislike you.” That sounded a lot harsher than he meant it. But it was the truth.

  She didn’t take offense, however; she just chuckled and glanced somewhere past his head to the corner of the room.

  He was smarter this time, not turning his head to see what she was looking it. Did she find him unpleasant to look at? He knew he was regarded as handsome, but could it be that she didn’t find him so?

  That made him curious to discover just what she thought of him.

  Only he shouldn’t want that, not when he was just here to do a job. A job that, should he perform his duties correctly, would mean that she would never have cause to speak to anyone of his low stature again, except in a purely professional capacity. Certainly not coming into his room to sit in his only chair with a bed—his bed—conspicuously in the room as well.

  “Since we are to be working together, we should get to know one another. Shouldn’t we?” And she accompanied her question with that direct stare of hers (direct when it wasn’t directed toward the corner of the room), and he felt a flare of sexual interest at her words.

  Of all the times to be reminded that he was a man with a healthy sexual appetite. It was not appropriate, not at all, but she looked so—courageous, and enthusiastic, and she still looked awry, and he wanted nothing more than to straighten her clothing. Perhaps by removing it entirely and then putting it back on, after a healthy interval of close examination.

  Stop that, Salisbury, he warned himself.

  It didn’t do any good, no matter how accustomed he was to obeying orders.

  “And how do you wish to go about getting to know one another, Your Grace?” he asked, taking a cue from her and looking not at her, but at the wall behind her. Unfortunately there was a portrait that appeared to have been done by somebody who thought red was a good color for—well, for everything, so the effect was far more jarring than if he had just looked at her.

  Not that she was jarring. Except to his peace of mind. That was very jarred.

  He needed to do the job and return to the safety of Lady Sophia, Truffles, and all the admiring ladies.

  She smiled at him, nearly flooring him with the brilliance of it. An openmouthed, exuberant smile that hinted—no, that proclaimed—that the woman who wore it was a delightful, intriguing person. That she was, in fact, a magnet disguised as a female.

  And he was the element, or whatever it was, that was entirely attracted to her.

  “We cannot let anyone go until we have a replacement.” Genevieve spoke decisively, not mentioning to Mr. Salisbury that she felt terribly for the current staff—it wasn’t their fault they had served under her father, who probably treated his servants as he did his daughter. Either ignoring them or . . . ignoring them.

  And she had spent most of her first month hiding out from everybody, which meant that she, too, was ignoring them, but it wasn’t because she was more interested in seeing how irresponsible she could be. “In fact,” she said, trying to sound as though she’d just thought of it, “I would like to see how they do, now that you are here, and I am preparing to enter Society.” Until she said it, she hadn’t realized just how much the thought terrified her. Which meant she should probably do it sooner rather than later, so as to get it over with.

  That entering Society was like seeing a dentist about a sore tooth nearly made her laugh.

  “Should we go down to the sitting room and start making plans and lists and such?” She had no idea what those plans and lists and such would be, but she felt confident tha
t Mr. Salisbury would know.

  “And perhaps we can set up some sort of timeline for implementing the changes,” she continued as they walked down the hall.

  “That is sensib—” he began, sounding surprised. His words were interrupted by a flurry of footsteps on the stairs, with no fewer than three people (two, minus Chandler) scampering up.

  “Your Grace, these people would not—” Chandler began, only to be drowned out by the shriek of the female who had reached the landing. She was tall and lean, not as tall as Mr. Salisbury, but definitely taller than Genevieve, and she wore nearly as many ribbons as it seemed she had years.

  And she looked to be a healthy age. The result of all that festooning made her look like a Maypole, and Genevieve felt a giggle start within her, but stifled it at Mr. Salisbury’s stern look.

  Duchesses, apparently, did not giggle. At least not according to her Duchess Expert in Residence.

  “And you are?” Mr. Salisbury said, his lip curling. Could pure, arrogant confidence assist in derailing a potentially scandalous situation?

  That might explain why he was the Duchess Expert.

  The woman’s mouth opened, and her eyes widened, and she tilted her head back slowly, as though surveying him inch by handsome inch.

  Genevieve wished she could be so bold. She’d like the chance to embark on that kind of appraisal as well.

  “I am Lady Houghtsman; I am the duchess’s second cousin.”

  “Once removed,” the gentleman added, sounding out of breath. He stood behind and slightly to the side of the lady, and he was just as lean as the woman who was presumably his wife, but nearly as short as Genevieve. He had removed his hat to reveal a few strands of black hair, inexplicably brushed from one side of his head to the other as though his head was imitating a thatched roof. “And I am Lord Houghtsman.” He stepped in front of his wife, rotating his hat in his fingers. “We came as soon as we’d heard about your father’s untimely death; we are so sorry for your loss.” He didn’t look sorry, but then again, neither did Genevieve. It was hard to be sorry for losing a person you barely knew.