“Very good, my lady,” Goring reluctantly replied, though his eyebrows conveyed how little he approved of this irregular behavior.“If you are certain you don’t wish to refresh yourself first…”
Giving in to her urges had become something of a signature for Lucy on her Grand Tour.Italy was not where one went to practice restraint.Accordingly, she leaned in and gave Goring’s impressively clean-shaven cheek a swift kiss.
“Don’t worry, Mr.Goring, all shall be well!They will simply have to take me as I am, dusty and creased and nearly perishing from hunger.I’m certain any guest of my brother and my dear sister-in-law will be equal to the occasion.”
She stripped off her gloves and tossed them to him; he snatched the flying kid leather from the air without turning a hair.Lucy smiled.It was good to be home.
Even if her reason for returning was somewhat worrying.
But if her sister-in-law was well enough to be entertaining a guest, Lucy reasoned as she made her way down the hall toward the grand dining room, perhaps Bess wasn’t quite as poorly as Nathaniel had implied.
The tinkle of crystal and silver was a pleasant accompaniment to the low babble of conversation emanating from the room, punctuated with the occasional burst of merriment.Lucy stopped at the door, easily identifying her dear friend—now sister!—Bess’s musical laughter.And there, to her surprise, was the deeper rumble of Nathaniel’s amusement.
Lucy had never accounted her brother to be much given to humor.It had always seemed to her as if even a mere smile had to be pried from him with a chisel.
Though he had relaxed and warmed considerably once Bess got ahold of him, Nathaniel would never be the sort of man who laughed easily.
Or so Lucy had assumed before she heard him give another low chuckle.Good Lord, who was their guest tonight?The most amusing person alive?
For some reason, a drop of foreboding trickled down her spine.
Ignoring it, Lucy straightened her bodice and threw open the dining room doors with a smile at the ready.
A smile that faded instantly upon seeing that the only guest present was a man seated in the place of honor, on Bess’s right, lazing back in his chair with a slight smile gracing his too-handsome face.
The Duke of Thornecliff.
What in the bloody blazes was he doing there?
“What in the bloody blazes is he doing here?”Lucy demanded.
“Lucy!”Bess stood up from the table to greet her with the warm, open fondness that made Lucy feel as though they were sisters in truth, not just by marriage.
Narrowing her eyes, Lucy scanned her sister-in-law for signs of the ill health that had worried Nathaniel enough to mention it in several of his letters.She thought Bess looked a trifle pale, perhaps, the fine bones of her face more prominent as though she’d lost weight…despite the small, round bump of her belly.
“What areyoudoing here, you scamp?”Bess cried.“Your letter said you wouldn’t be arriving until tomorrow!”
“I took an earlier boat from Calais to surprise you.”Lucy frowned at Thornecliff over Bess’s shoulder.“Why is the worst duke in London sitting at your table and making Nathaniel laugh?”
“Because I invited him,” Nathaniel said in that deep, stern, laying-down-the-law tone of his.
Lucy was not cowed, however, as she had learned over the years that Nathaniel couldn’t help sounding like an autocrat.That was just his voice.
“Is he blackmailing you?Is he concealing a weapon under the table or somewhere in those extraordinarily tight trousers?Because otherwise I cannot account for your choices, brother.”
Nathaniel, who had been starting to glower at Lucy’s rudeness, visibly softened at her use of the wordbrother.
They were half-siblings, in fact, a distinction that both of them had clung to during that difficult Season when Nathaniel had brought Lucy out into society and attempted to make a proper lady of her.
An attempt which had failed miserably, Lucy was pleased to recall, but which had resulted in several happier outcomes: most notably, the union of Nathaniel to Bess, who’d been acting as Lucy’s chaperone for the Season, and a reconciliation between Nathaniel and Lucy that had then spread to the rest of the Lively women.
“Thornecliff is here as our guest, and as such I would appreciate a modicum of politeness from you, Lucy,” Nathaniel grumbled as Lucy released Bess and came over to embrace him.His arms went around her slowly, still unsure of his welcome, and Lucy made certain to hug him extra tightly around his trim middle.
“I would appreciate it,” he amended wryly, “but I know better than to expect it.Come, hellion, sit with us and eat something.”
“Yes, you must be famished,” Bess said, taking her own place once more at the head of the gleaming table of polished inlaid wood.“We’ve only just finished the soup course.”
Stepping back from her brother, Lucy glanced down the table to where the Duke of Thornecliff had sat sprawled, elegant and silent, throughout this exchange.
