Iled the Duke of Torrance into our modest, yellow home—sunshine-colored paint, matching papered walls adorned every room. Not much else. Many possessions of my proud Wilcox family had been sold to keep creditors away.
The duke stopped at a sun-bleached spot. The window along the stairs had done its damage tattling about portraits that were missing.
Before he asked about it, I pointed him to our parlor to where a sofa and conversational chairs and a pianoforte congregated. “Your Grace, wait in here. I’ll go see if Tavis is ready to see you.”
“Please don’t leave again.” The duke sounded desperate.
Maybe I should’ve allowed his friend to stay. “I’m not going if you’re not going.”
“You have a sense of humor, Miss Wilcox. I like that.”
Before I could curtsy and go check with Katherine and the doctors, I saw movement beneath the blanket thrown over our floral-patterned sofa. Then the dearest, angriest voice sounded. “Is he a bill collector? They come at all hours.”
“Milaya, come out, please,” the duke said. “I don’t wish to be seen talking to furniture. It wouldn’t be the first time my sanity’s been questioned.”
“My name is not Milaya. It’s Lydia.”
“Milaya means ‘sweetheart.’ ” He took off his hat. “Please come.”
“Tell him I’m not his little milaya either if he’s come to take things.”
I stooped near the blanket. “He’s not a bill collector. Come out, Lydia.”
Her little brown face poked out. The five-year-old glanced at him with her solid gray eyes and sniffly nose. “Then he’s not here to buy the business? It’s not for sale. It’s Papa’s. No sale.”
“Fine,” the duke said, “I won’t procure it.”
She came a little closer to him and tapped on his knee. “I said don’t buy it. Leave it for Katherine. She loves it the most.”
“You sure she’ll still love it tomorrow, milaya? I hear it’s a woman’s right to change her mind.” Until now the duke sounded reasonable and polite. These words held a tiny fiery barb.
Katherine might have to explain, but she’d stop confiding in us all when she married Tavis.
He set his hat on the sofa. “Why are you each worried that someone will buy Wilcox Coal?”
“Debt, silly. Our brother-in-law can’t count so well. He spends more than he has. More than we have.”
The little girl confessed all before I could reach her and clap my fingers over her mouth. Giving her the be-quiet eyes, I marched to her. “That’s not polite to say, Lydia.”
“But it’s the truth. And since he mentioned our company, he must know.”
Her wide eyes beamed when the duke nodded.
“I’m aware. I thought this might be a scheme to secure a sympathetic loan.”
The gasp leaving my lips was true.
Shocked that he’d speak so freely, shocked that the outrageous request wouldn’t be beyond Tavis, I stood still beside Lydia. Then I became bold. “But you still came?”
He looked to answer when his gaze turned to the stairs. “You sent for me, Lady Hampton.”
The room suddenly felt hot.
Katherine didn’t say a word, but she returned his greeting with a wordless expression that was part fury and something else.
I braced for her to rail at this stranger, this unknown friend of Tavis’s. Like the sotted fellow who called me gorgeous, Katherine said a lot with her eyes but no words.
“Lady Hampton, I wish I could visit under different circumstances.”
