The Lost Duke of Wyndham Page 0,8

before, "but I will not have Miss Eversleigh undertaking such manual labor, and certainly not in the middle of the night."

"I need the painting, Thomas," the dowager said, and Grace almost reached out to take her hand. She sounded pained. She sounded old. And she certainly did not sound like herself when she said, "Please."

Grace glanced at Thomas. He looked uneasy. "Tomorrow," he said. "First thing, if you wish it."

"But - "

"No," he interrupted. "I am sorry you were accosted this evening, and I shall certainly do whatever is necessary - within reason - to facilitate your comfort and health, but this does not include whimsical and ill-timed demands. Do you understand me?"

They stared at each other for so long that Grace wanted to flinch. Then Thomas said sharply, "Grace, go to bed." He didn't turn around.

Grace held still for a moment, waiting for what, she didn't know - disagreement from the dowager? A thunderbolt outside the window? When neither was forthcoming, she decided she could do nothing more that evening and left the room. As she walked slowly down the hall, she could hear them arguing - nothing violent, nothing impassioned. But then, she'd not have expected that. Cavendish tempers ran cold, and they were far more likely to attack with a frozen barb than a heated cry.

Grace let out a long, uneven breath. She would never get used to this. Five years she had been at Belgrave, and still the resentment that ran back and forth between Thomas and his grandmother shocked her.

And the worst part was - there wasn't even a reason! Once, she had dared to ask Thomas why they held each other in such contempt. He just shrugged, saying that it had always been that way. She'd disliked his father, Thomas said, his father had hated him, and he himself could have done quite well without either of them.

Grace had been stunned. She'd thought families were meant to love each other. Hers had. Her mother, her father...She closed her eyes, fighting back tears. She was being maudlin. Or maybe it was because she was tired. She didn't cry about them any longer. She missed them - she would always miss them. But the great big gaping hole their deaths had rent in her had healed.

And now...well, she'd found a new place in this world. It wasn't the one she'd anticipated, and it wasn't the one her parents had planned for her, but it came with food and clothing, and the opportunity to see her friends from time to time.

But sometimes, late at night as she lay in her bed, it was just so hard. She knew she should not be ungrateful - she was living in a castle, for heaven's sake. But she had not been brought up for this. Not the servitude, and not the sour dispositions. Her father had been a country gentleman, her mother a well-liked member of the local community. They had raised her with love and laughter, and sometimes, as they sat before the fire in the evening, her father would sigh and say that she was going to have to remain a spinster, because surely there was no man in the county good enough for his daughter.

And Grace would laugh and say, "What about the rest of England?"

"Not there, either!"

"France?"

"Good heavens, not."

"The Americas?"

"Are you trying to kill your mother, gel? You know she gets seasick if she so much as sees the beach."

And they all somehow knew that Grace would marry someone right there in Lincolnshire, and she'd live down the road, or at least just a short ride away, and she would be happy. She would find what her parents had found, because no one expected her to marry for any reason other than love. She'd have babies, and her house would be full of laughter, and she would be happy.

She'd thought herself the luckiest girl in the world.

But the fever that had struck the Eversleigh house was cruel, and when it broke, Grace was an orphan. At seventeen, she could hardly remain on her own, and indeed, no one had been sure what to do with her until her father's affairs were settled and the will was read.

Grace let out a bitter laugh as she pulled off her wrinkled clothing and readied herself for bed. Her father's directives had only made matters worse. They were in debt; not deeply so, but enough to render her a burden. Her parents, it seemed, had always lived slightly above