had already admitted she loathed his father. And he did already like her, despite himself. And despite that blasted cane.
“Meanwhile,” she said as she made her way slowly to the door, “please review your invitations so we can discuss what social events you should be attending. I will see you at dinner. Five o’clock, I presume.”
Nash’s mouth opened in protest, but no words emerged.
As soon as the door shut behind her, he did the only thing that he could—he picked up the chair he’d been sitting on and smashed it against the bookshelf, the pieces scattering over the plush carpet. But because of the damned carpet, the pieces didn’t make a satisfying cacophony, but instead thumped softly on the ground.
He stared down at the now broken chair, that previous dread turning to panic as he realized what he’d just done—reacted in a violent way to unpleasant news.
You take after me. In every way.
He had to take control. He couldn’t allow himself to lash out without cause. He never used violence unless it was justified—that was how he justified using his fists to exorcise his demons. There were plenty of reprehensible people he could pick fights with to assuage his constant anger, if only for a short time. And it was all for a greater good.
But the broken chair had done nothing to him. A ridiculous thought, of course, but what if he erupted around a person who had done nothing to him?
Could he trust himself?
Goddamn it, but he knew the answer to that question.
“Achoo!”
Ana Maria blinked to clear her damp eyes.
“My lady?” Jane, her lady’s maid, held out a handkerchief.
“Stop calling me that,” Ana Maria said in a grouchy tone, taking the handkerchief and wiping her nose.
Ana Maria and Jane were seated in the main salon of the Duke of Hasford’s house, which was where Ana Maria also resided, newly redecorated by Ana Maria in colors that made her spirits soar, nothing like the room’s previously staid blues and browns. Bright reds and purples and pinks created a fantastical setting that made Ana Maria grin every time she walked in, only now the room was also filled with flowers that were just as bright, but they made Ana Maria sneeze as well as smile.
She had to figure out which one was the culprit and forbid them entrance to the house. She hoped it wasn’t the tulips. She loved tulips. Though she loved all flowers, so a tiny part of her hoped it was just dust. She did not like dust.
“You’ve been my lady for as long as I’ve known you,” Jane replied tartly. “It’s just the dragon wouldn’t let us call you that.”
“The late duchess,” Ana Maria corrected.
“The dragon duchess,” Jane said, accompanying her words with a rolling of her eyes.
It had been six months since the carriage accident that had claimed the lives of Ana Maria’s father—the duke—and his wife, Ana Maria’s stepmother. Six months since Ana Maria had been released from her life of servitude, treated as an unwanted, unpaid servant by the duchess. She still lived in the London town house she’d always lived in, except now her room wasn’t the tiniest one in the attic, but the most sumptuous room on the upstairs floor.
“But can’t we just be Ana Maria and Jane here, as we used to?” Ana Maria couldn’t help her plaintive tone.
The words weren’t even out of her mouth before Jane had folded her arms over her chest and was shaking her head. “You have to accept it, my lady. You’re a lady, daughter of a duke, cousin to another duke. Like it or not, you are entitled to being treated as though you are a special person.” Her voice softened. “And you are special, it is just that the dragon—that is, the late duchess,” she said, at Ana Maria’s stern look, “was determined to keep you in a particular place. And now she’s gone, you should take your rightful place among all those other ladies.”
My rightful place. What place was that? Ana Maria wondered. For more than twenty years, she’d been the late duchess’s unpaid and unappreciated drudge, doing anything that required doing, if the duchess ordered her to.
And now? Now she was supposed to become a lady overnight, a person who didn’t know how to polish silver, who would order a bath without considering just how long it would take to boil water, and who treated the help as though they were just that—help, not people or even friends. Who did not