Page 58 of A Family Bargain with the Duke

He rubbed the wrong cheek.

Louisa shook her head, unable to suppress a smile. “The other one.”

“You’re enjoying this far more than necessary.”

“Immensely.”

He handed her his handkerchief. “Then you may fix the damage you find so entertaining.”

She paused. “May I?”

“Unless you intend to let me spend the afternoon looking ridiculous.”

Laughing softly, she leaned forward and brushed the charcoal away with the corner of the handkerchief. It took only a second, but her hand lingered.

Eleanor, who had been content to blink at the clouds for the better part of ten minutes, chose that moment to announce her displeasure with the arrangement, her small face crumpling, a thin wail rising from where she was propped against the shawl.

“Oh, none of that now.” Louisa reached for her, but Julian beat her to it, lifting the baby and settling her against his shoulder with the same unhurried patience he brought to everything.

“There,” he murmured, one hand splayed wide against her back, rocking her with a slow, instinctive motion that required no thought. “You have interrupted a very important sharpening operation, you know. Kit will not thank you for it.”

Eleanor’s wail softened into a series of small, hiccupping protests, and Kit, glancing up from his sketchbook, dropped his charcoal and signed something steady with his hands..

Louisa laughed, delighted. “He says that Eleanor has terrible timing and that she interrupted him at precisely the moment he’d gotten the horse’s ears correct.”

“She has never been particularly considerate of anyone’s artistic timing,” Julian said, still rocking Eleanor with the same slow, patient rhythm. “I understand this is a family trait. Her mother interrupts my work regularly as well.”

“I do no such thing.”

“I was writing a letter to my steward yesterday when you came to inform me that the camellias needed repotting.”

“They did need repotting. Even Mrs. Whitfield agreed with me.”

“I do not doubt it. I’m only saying that bad timing seems to be a family trait that has skipped me.”

Louisa laughed again, plucking a blade of grass absentmindedly.

Kit’s shoulders shook with silent amusement, watching the exchange with the particular satisfaction of a boy who considered himself entirely on Louisa’s side of any argument involving his guardian.

Anyone looking at us now would see nothing more than a family enjoying an ordinary afternoon together.

The thought startled her enough that she nearly dropped the blade of grass from her fingers. She sat with it for a moment, turning it over the way she turned over most things that unsettled her, and found she could not locate a single reason to argue against its truth. There was no artifice in the scene before her, no careful performance of domesticity for the benefit of watching servants or curious neighbors.

It simply was what it appeared to be. It had been for some weeks now, without her quite noticing the exact moment it had stopped feeling like an arrangement and started feeling like a life.

* * *

“Can we see?” Julian asked.

Kit hesitated only long enough to add one final stroke before turning the sketchbook around with unmistakable pride.

Julian studied it carefully. It was, he decided, undoubtedly a person. Beyond that, the matter became considerably less certain.

“Simmons, definitely Simmons,” he said, with the confidence of someone making a thoroughly reasoned assessment.

Louisa turned to him, amusement tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Simmons?”

“I believe so.”