Page 10 of The Broken Marchioness (Lords of Inconvenience #3)

CHAPTER TEN

F rederica pulled herself out of the bed at dawn. The sun had barely risen above the trees across the estate when she clambered from the bed and moved toward the window, peering out at the early-morning white light.

She had barely slept. Between dreams of her parents glowering at her from the pews and the memory of her new husband standing so close the day before, sleep had seemed an impossible thing.

Yet the door adjoining their chambers had remained closed.

She glanced back at that door from the window, feeling relieved that he had not come to her in the night though there was also a knot in her stomach when she thought of how they had left things the day before.

I will not have an angry life now I am wed. If I am free of Lord Wetherington, after all, then I shall make the most of it. I shall find a way to be happy.

She turned and looked out of the window again, thinking of what made her happy in this world.

She thought of Charlotte, Dorothy, and of Honora. She thought of her silhouette cutting, of how she liked to play the harp, and the duties she had done at Honora’s house. She had been very content indeed helping at Honora’s house, and now, there was a greater estate to take care of.

Smiling with the thought of being useful to her new husband and this house, she rang the bell for her maid, a new energy and enthusiasm consuming her.

Once dressed, she left the room with some paper and a pencil in her grasp and her new maid with her.

Lucy, a young and very eager girl, was such pleasant company that Frederica asked the maid to stay with her for a while.

“And how is everything downstairs?” Frederica asked. “Do you have everything you need?”

“Of course, My Lady,” Lucy said, brushing her red hair under her coif as she attempted to keep up with Frederica’s fast pace around the house. “It is a beautiful home.”

“Indeed, it is though a little updating is needed.” Frederica went first to the breakfast room. The wallpaper, old and peeling, needed changing. She wrote down some notes, intending to send off for samples of new colors, then appealed to Lucy for her thoughts. “What do you think of green?”

“Green?” Lucy said in surprise, pinkening almost to the color of her hair. “You wish for my opinion, My Lady?”

“Of course.” Frederica’s answer made Lucy blush all the more.

“Well, I quite like green.”

“Oh, good.” Frederica nodded as she turned in a circle in thought. “Allan loves his garden, so maybe we could bring more of the outside in. Some more plants too. Now, to the music room.” With as much purpose in her stride as before, she moved on with Lucy racing to keep up again.

Frederica was in the midst of planning a new scheme for the music room when Lucy sat beside her, beaming as she looked around the room.

“I should return downstairs,” Lucy said eventually. “I will be needed to help carry up breakfast, and that spiral staircase takes a while to get up and down.” As Lucy stood, Frederica turned around in thought.

“What’s wrong with the stairs?”

“Oh, nothing, My Lady.” Lucy shook her head, suddenly looking quite abashed. “It’s perfectly serviceable.”

Not quite ready to believe this, Frederica went with her to the servants’ staircase leading from the breakfast room down to the servants’ quarters. Narrow and poky, Frederica could see at once that it would be no easy thing to carry trays up and down here.

“Show me more, Lucy, please,” Frederica asked, tucking her pencil and paper under her arm.

Lucy smiled again, looking quite delighted at having the mistress of the house come downstairs. Frederica descended, finding that yes, indeed, the staircase was too small to be of any great use without some hazard involved.

She found the kitchens alive with activity. Most of the cooks turned in alarm and one young scullery maid accidently dropped floured dough when she saw Frederica.

“My Lady.” An elderly woman, who Frederica recognized as the housekeeper, Mrs. Long, scurried forward. “Is there something wrong?” Her eyes were wide to find Frederica down there.

“I’m continuing my tour of my new home,” Frederica explained. “They are warm kitchens indeed. Everyone is working so hard.”

The cooks who had been staring at her, jaws agape, now madly returned to their work. The poor scullery maid who had dropped the dough had to start her kneading all over again.

“Well, if there’s anything you’d like to know, My Lady, you need only ask,” Mrs. Long said, sharing the same beaming smile as Lucy.

Frederica looked between them, wondering if they were mother and daughter, for they shared such a similar smile.

“It would be good to know if there’s anything you need, Mrs. Long.”

“Need?” Mrs. Long said in surprise.

“Yes, I can see the staircase up to the breakfast room could do with some work, but is there anything else you need?” Frederica asked. She saw at once a flicker on Mrs. Long’s face that betrayed there was something needed though Mrs. Long hid it fast and smiled.

“All is well, My Lady.”

“Please, feel free to share things with me,” Frederica pleaded with the two women. “This is to be my home, now, and I wish to be of use to it and to you all. Never feel afraid of talking about anything with me.”

Mrs. Long and Lucy looked at one another, a curious and hopeful expression between them.

“Well?” Frederica softened. “What is it I can do for you?”

* * *

Allan stared at the empty chair beside him at the breakfast table. The table was all set up for breakfast, he was there waiting for his wife, and yet she… was nowhere to be seen.

He kept glowering at that empty chair, a sadness rising within him.

The day before, on their tour of the house, Allan had been determined to conjure one of those smiles in Frederica that Dorothy and Charlotte could conjure, but he’d had no luck. Instead, he had just earned her telling him she didn’t mind if he had a lover.

Like I would ever take a lover now.

The door from the servants’ stairwell opened. Allan turned toward it, amazed not because his breakfast was being brought in by the staff, but behind them, Frederica came in too.

He sat back in alarm in his seat as she moved toward him.

“Good morning, My Lord,” she said pleasantly enough though her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes as she stood beside him.

The maids and manservants placed down honeyed cake and freshly baked bread, along with fruit and pots of tea and coffee, then they returned to the stairwell.

“Good morning,” Allan said in surprise as Frederica stood beside him, looking over what appeared to be notes she had scribbled across various pages of paper she had made. “I thought I had explained that I wished you to call me Allan,” he softened his voice as he spoke, wary of the staff overhearing them.

The staff closed the door behind them in the stairwell though swiftly enough, and he could talk at a normal volume again.

“My name is Allan, Frederica.” He tried to keep all anger out of his voice which had been there the day before when she had talked about lovers.

Let us start again today.

“Allan.” She looked up and met his gaze, and then the most wonderful thing happened. She blushed. It was the sweetest of pinkening to her cheeks, and the smile she offered was a truly pleasant one — not quite as full as those she shared with his sister, but it was a start.

Then it was over all too swiftly as she turned to look down again at her notes.

“I was wondering if we have a budget for making changes to the house? Some renovations,” she explained, sifting between her notes.

“Frederica.” He gestured to the chair beside him though she took no notice.

“I wish to be of use to this house. If I am now your wife, a marchioness…” She hesitated, looking rather panicked by this thought. “… then I would like to help.” She offered up her notes to him. “This chamber could do with updating as could the music room. I’m also concerned this stairwell for the servants is something of a hazard. I’ve just been hearing that two maids have fallen on it this last month.”

“Fallen?” he said in alarm, taking the note from her. “Mrs. Long didn’t tell me.”

“They are also in need of a new bread oven downstairs.”

Allan looked down the lists she had given him. There were indeed changes she wished to make to the house, but something he found both curious and warming was that the list for the servants’ quarters was greater than the list she had made for the two of them.

She wishes to help them.

“This room, too — it’s so pleasant and has such a nice view of your rose garden; I thought we could do more with it.” She was in full throw now, something pleasant to see indeed. “We could bring in some green colors and maybe some more plants.”

“Frederica—” Allan tried to get a word in edgeways.

“I fear it may be too much, so that is why I need to know what we can afford before I make any plans.” She took the notes back from him, now biting her lip. “Is it too much? Shall we start with something small instead?”

“Frederica!” he had to call her name a little loudly to get her attention. She halted, staring at him with her notes now plastered to her chest. “I will talk about all of this with you, but first…” he gestured to the chair beside him. “… would you sit with me and eat breakfast?”

“But…” she paused, holding up the notes. “… there is much to do. I’m also going to sit down with Mrs. Long and talk about the running of the household —”

“And that can wait until after breakfast.” He pointed to the chair yet again. She didn’t appear to be listening though. She was looking through her notes once more.

Allan sighed and rubbed his temple.

He wished to be close to his wife. God damn it, he wanted love from his wife. Wasn’t everyone around him fortunate enough to have that? Stephen and Gerard had it. Before he came, his parents had it too. Was it so wrong to hope that, with a little patience, he and Frederica could have something akin to love? Such a hope was useless though if she would not even sit with him.

Let down your walls, Frederica.

He stood from his seat, and she looked up in surprise from her notes. As gently as he could, he prised the notes from her hands and placed them on the table beside him.

“How about we make a deal?” he said plainly, his frustrations bubbling to the surface. She swallowed, and he hated that look of nervousness in her.

Be bold with me as you were before. Let me see that, Frederica.

“You can make any changes you like to this house,” he said slowly. “The money doesn’t concern me; we have plenty of it. I’d be very happy indeed to see this place under careful care and management — better than I could give it. My time is much taken up with the tenants and the estate.”

He nodded to the window.

“Truly?” She smiled. There was such excitement in her now that something jolted in his stomach. It was a happy feeling, a bit like the one when he had first ever seen Frederica and thought much of that pretty face.

He had to clear his throat in an attempt to shift that memory from his mind.

“Truly,” he said again. “On one condition.” He held up a finger. “If you sit and start having your meals with me.”

“If that is your wish, but must it start now?” she murmured in surprise. “There is much to do. I have to write to my aunt, too. She doesn’t yet know I am even married.”

She is looking for excuses not to be with me.

Any semblance of happiness vanished from within Allan. He returned to his seat and proffered her notes up to her.

“Very well. Escape if it is your wish.”

She took the notes carefully from him. Was it in his mind or was she taking special care not to touch him?

He remembered the way he had touched her the day before at the wedding ceremony. When he had kissed her hand, he thought he had seen a flash of excitement in her eye, a spark of warmth, but perhaps that had been his hope creating something that had never been there in the first place.

“I shall share dinner with you,” she promised as she took the notes and left the room.

He stared after her, hurrying to eat his food though he no longer had much of an appetite. As he stared at the doorway through which his wife had just left, the sadness spread through him.

“You’re keeping me at arm’s length, Freddie,” he whispered, adopting a nickname for her in his own mind. “That will have to change.”