“The nursery, Your Grace. The morning feed.”
“Do not disturb her yet.” He went down the stairs without hurrying, because hurrying would communicate something he had no intention of communicating. “Put them in the small drawing room. Tell them I will be five minutes.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“And Briggs?”
“Your Grace.”
“Whatever they ask for, give them nothing before I arrive. Not tea, not information, not pleasantries. Certainly not access to any other part of the house.” He paused at the bottom of the stairs. “I want to know what they were told to wait for before I speak to them.”
Briggs inclined his head and went to manage the situation.
Isadora was in the nursery, exactly as Briggs had said, sitting in the chair by the window with Violet in her lap, the morning light filtering in at the angle that made the room look like something from a painting. She looked up when he came in, and something in her expression shifted—the warmth of it, the ease, a smile beginning at the corner of her mouth that he intended to address properly at some point in the near future.
Not now.
“James.” She registered his expression before he said anything. Her smile faded. “What’s happened?”
She reads me.She always reads me.
“Lord Nathaniel Mortimer has just arrived,” he announced. “With Calder, his solicitor.”
The nursery went very quiet.
Isadora looked at him with an expression that showed she was processing it quickly. Her hand, he noticed, had settled more firmly over Violet’s back.
“Unannounced?” she asked.
“Completely.”
“And a solicitor.”
“He came with a satchel.” He met her eyes. “I need you downstairs.”
She was already moving.
* * *
Mortimer stood at the window, which James suspected was intentional, with the posture of a man establishing his presence in a space before its rightful occupants arrived. He turned when they entered with a warmth that arrived on his face too quickly to be genuine.
“Your Grace.” He bowed to James, then to Isadora with a fractionally lesser degree that communicated his opinion of her position. “Your Grace. I apologize for the hour. I would not have intruded if the matter were not urgent.”
“Lord Mortimer,” James said, his voice level. “This is unexpected.”
“Unexpected, yes, but regrettably necessary.” Mortimer’s eyes flicked to Isadora with a curiosity that dressed itself as courtesy. “I hoped to call under more pleasant circumstances. I offer my belated congratulations on your marriage.”
“Thank you,” Isadora said. Her voice was entirely composed. James felt it beside him like something solid to stand against.
“Please.” He gestured toward the chairs because the longer he kept them standing, the more it looked like fear rather than authority. “Sit down, My Lord. I understand you came here to discuss something.”
Mortimer’s eyes moved to Isadora as he sat. “I had hoped to speak with you privately, Your Grace. However…” A pause that performed generosity. “Perhaps it is better that the Duchess is present.”
They arranged themselves—Mortimer in the chair nearest the window; Calder sat beside him with his satchel across his knees. James and Isadora sat opposite.
James was acutely aware of the precision of the space between them, of the satchel not yet opened, of the particular quality of Mortimer’s smile.
“You have traveled a considerable distance,” he remarked. “I find that people do not generally travel to Ashbourne without a clear purpose. What is yours?”
