Page 3 of Project Duchess

With much love,

Mother

P.S. Please come. I can’t do this without you.

Grey stared numbly at the words. Maurice, the only father he’d ever really known, was dead.

Please come. I can’t do this without you.

Holy hell, Mother must be devastated.

Apparently, his distress showed in his face, for Vanessa snatched the letter and read it, then lifted a horrified gaze to him. “Oh, Grey, howawful.I’m so very sorry.”

“Thank you,” he muttered, though he felt like a fraud. He’d barely seen Maurice since the family’s return from Prussia a few months ago. He had let his bitterness keep him away, and now it was too late.

She was now rereading the letter with a furrowed brow. “Maurice . . . that would be Sheridan’s father, right? I suppose he will now become duke.”

The odd note in her voice arrested him. “Sheridan?Since when are you so chummy with my half brother? You only met him once.”

“We’ve met thrice actually,” she murmured. “We even danced together twice.”

Uh-oh. Sheridan had best watch himself around Vanessa. When she fixed her affections on a man, she could really dig her teeth in. “Don’t tell me he’s the ‘poet’ you have your eye on.”

His sharp tone made her glance up. “Don’t be ridiculous. Sheridan doesn’t have a poetic thought in his head.”

She was right, but how had she known that? “You’ll have to call him Armitage now that he’s duke.”

“All the more reason for me not to have an interest in him. I willnevertake a duke for my husband, no matter what Mama wants. You’re all too . . . too . . .”

“Pompous and arrogant?”

As if realizing she shouldn’t be insulting a man who’d just lost a close relation, she winced. “Something like that.” When he said nothing, she added, “You certainly have a number of dukes inyourfamily.”

“That’s what happens when one’s mother marries well three times.”

“She’ll be leaving quite a dynasty behind her. Some would say that’s excellent planning.”

“She didn’t plan on being widowed thrice, I assure you,” he said sharply.

Vanessa looked stricken. “Of course not. I’m sorry, Grey, that was most thoughtless of me.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, it’s . . . I’m just unsettled by the news.”

“I’m sure. If there’s anything I can do . . .”

Grey didn’t answer, his mind having already seized on the reminder that Sheridan had become Duke of Armitage. Maurice had only been duke a few months, and now Sheridan was being forced to take up the mantle. His head must be reeling. Grey needed to be at Armitage Hall, if only to help Sheridan and Mother with the arrangements for the funeral on Tuesday.

Wait, today was Sunday. ButwhichSunday? Damn it, had he already missed his stepfather’s funeral?

“When did this letter arrive?” he asked.

It was the maid who answered. “I believe it was this past Friday, Your Grace.”

“That’s right,” Vanessa said. “Friday.”

Armitage Hall was near the town of Sanforth. If he caught the footmen before they unpacked his trunk, Grey could be changed into his mourning clothes and back on the road in an hour. He’d easily reach Lincolnshire by tomorrow. “I must go,” he said, turning for the door.

“I’ll go with you,” Vanessa said.