Page 21 of The Duke’s Guide to Fake Courtship (Daring Debutantes #1)

G race tried not to be impressed by the London abode of the Dowager Duchess of Byrning. She’d been there before, for that first disastrous tea, but she hadn’t understood things as well as she did now. Now she knew that this place was owned by the Duchess alone and housed herself and her sister. The large staff supported only two souls, and that made it a grand palace.

Certainly there were such edifices in China, but she’d been a half-white orphan who could only look at them from afar. Today she was walking into one by invitation. And, though she’d attended balls in other private residences, she had been one of many attending a party. Today she entered alone except for her maid, who was immediately swept away below stairs.

That left her feeling small behind a sour-looking butler as he escorted her past footmen to a different parlour from the one she had been in before. This one was called ‘intimate’, and it was larger than some boats.

The butler left her one step inside the door. It took her a moment to survey the room and see—fully at the opposite end—the Duchess of Byrning and the Countess of Hillburn, sitting on ornate chairs as if they were thrones. They were, of course, the mothers of Declan and Cedric, and they did not look friendly, for all that they smiled and gestured for her to sit.

She could already tell this was not going to be easy, but she also knew that they wouldn’t beat her or whip her.

‘I’m so glad you could join us, Miss Richards,’ intoned the Duchess. ‘I assume you know who we are?’

She did, and she curtseyed to each in turn, with her head bowed and her legs steady. ‘Your Grace, my lady,’ she said. ‘I am pleased to renew our acquaintance.’

They will not beat me. They will not beat me.

She repeated that over and over, to give herself perspective. No matter how intimidating the circumstances, these women would not physically harm her. It wasn’t done in England—at least not between women who shared tea with one another—so she was safe. And, even more important, if her physical body was not in danger, what harm could a few words do? Worst case, she would be insulted, and that had been so common in her life that it felt no more substantial than air.

She sat down in a chair placed opposite them. The tea tray arrived without use of a bell or any kind of signal. There was also a display of sandwiches and tarts, which no one touched.

‘How do you take your tea, Miss Richards?’ the Duchess asked.

‘Strong,’ she answered, ‘and without addition.’

It wasn’t meant to be a challenge. It was merely the truth. To her, sugar and milk were luxuries, and she was not used to such things.

‘Ah,’ the Duchess said as she set the pot down. ‘Then we shall allow it to sit a while longer.’

‘Pray do not wait on my account,’ she said with a smile. ‘There is no reason to deny yourself your preference.’ She meant it as a courtesy, but the Countess sniffed in an expression of disapproval.

‘That is not the way it is done,’ the lady intoned. ‘If the guest waits, then we all wait.’

What was she to say to that? If the women wanted to drink tea they disliked, she was in no position to stop them. She dipped her chin and waited. After a dozen breaths, she finally spoke.

‘I’m sure the tea is fine now. I should be very grateful for a cup.’

The Duchess poured. She served Grace first, then the Countess, before pouring her own. And when the beverage was adjusted to their liking, they both lifted their cups in a single co-ordinated movement. With their gazes fixed on Grace, they sipped their tea.

She scrambled to drink as well. She didn’t know the exact timing. Was she to delay drinking while they sipped? Were they all to drink at once? Surely she should know this by now? And wasn’t that a measure of how rattled she was, that she couldn’t remember even so simple a thing as the English tea ceremony?

The tea wasn’t bracing enough. But then, no tea could be strong enough to combat the sheer intimidation of these two women. The contrast to her first cup of tea in this house was marked. Where the Countess had been mean and petty, the Duchess was reserved, careful with the niceties, and appeared every inch an empress.

They will not beat me .

They would, however, make her sit in uncomfortable silence as they drank and stared at her. Until now, she had not realised how a long stare would be so much more effective when given in exquisite timing with another. These two women had perfected it to the point that she was beginning to sweat.

‘I suppose you are wondering why you have been asked to tea,’ the Duchess intoned.

‘I do not ask such questions, Your Grace,’ she said, in full honesty.

‘Wise of you,’ the woman said. ‘Nevertheless, we shall alleviate your curiosity.’

Grace set her teacup down into its saucer. She waited. And she waited even longer. Oddly enough, this game of pauses was having a calming effect on her. Only women with nothing else to do could spend so much time in pauses. She had been trained at the temple in meditative silences. So she sat, she breathed, and she waited. Eventually they would come to their point.

Besides, this was the worst they could do to her. There was nothing to fear.

Eventually Cedric’s mother spoke, her voice stiff and her expression one of extreme distaste. ‘It has come to our attention that our sons have behaved with an extraordinary lack of kindness.’

What?

The Duchess set down her teacup. ‘To you, Miss Richards. They have been unkind towards you.’

What was she supposed to say to that? ‘I don’t know—’

‘Don’t interrupt,’ the Countess chided. ‘They are men, and therefore unaware that their games can have a profound effect upon the fairer sex.’

‘We taught them better,’ said the Duchess.

‘Most assuredly so,’ said the Countess.

‘But men play games and never think twice about us.’

The Countess nodded, and they both looked to her as if it were her turn to speak.

‘About us?’ Grace asked.

‘Yes. Us women,’ the Countess stressed. ‘They don’t think about us.’

‘About you , Miss Richards,’ inserted the Duchess. ‘They don’t think about how their game might affect you, and for that we have brought you here to explain.’

‘Explain?’ Grace asked.

‘Yes, Miss Richards. Pay attention,’ the Countess huffed. ‘My son Cedric—Lord Domac to you—needs ten thousand pounds to buy a boat and cargo. Some business about selling things to the Chinese?’

Grace nodded. She already knew this. He’d been very open about how he would spend her dowry.

‘It is difficult,’ said the Duchess, ‘to admit that one’s nephew is a fortune-hunter, but there it is. He was courting you for your dowry.’

‘That’s not true,’ said the Countess, and she turned away from Grace to address the Duchess directly. ‘He had no plan to actually marry her. He was just using her to get the family to invest with him.’ She turned back to Grace. ‘You’re unsuitable, you see. You must know that. He’s to be an earl one day, and he must marry a woman of appropriate breeding. It was just one of his games. A way to get money from the family because they’d rather that than see him marry someone unsuitable.’ She paused for a long moment, then curled her lip. ‘You.’

Grace held her tongue. She already knew this, and yet they were speaking as if it was the deepest secret.

‘It’s all very distasteful,’ the Duchess fumed. ‘Lord Domac threatened to marry you if the family did not give him ten thousand pounds.’ She shook her head. ‘I knew I had to intervene, and I went straight to Declan.’ She pointed her fan at Grace. ‘The Duke of Byrning to you.’

Yes, she knew who Declan was.

‘You did the sensible thing, my dear,’ the Countess said with a fond smile. Then she turned back to Grace. ‘She asked her son to intervene and put an end to Cedric’s nonsense.’

‘I meant him to speak to Cedric,’ the Duchess huffed. ‘Instead, he thought he would have some fun—’

‘Fun!’ the Countess sniffed.

‘Fun—the idiot boy.’ The Duchess shook her head. ‘He set about gathering the funds, of course, but he had to delay your growing infatuation with Lord Domac. I did not think he’d make such a spectacle of himself by courting you.’

‘To be fair,’ the Countess said, ‘ she is the spectacle, not him. Nevertheless, Miss Richards, it was cruel of him to engage your affections.’

‘Most cruel...’ said the Duchess.

‘And so you have been brought to tea so that we can explain the way of things.’

‘So you will understand.’ The Duchess leaned forward. ‘You do understand, do you not?’

She did, she supposed. These ladies were explaining the shallowest aspects of what was happening between herself and their sons as if she could not understand them on her own.

‘It is a boy’s game,’ the Duchess emphasised.

‘It isn’t real. None of it,’ the Countess continued.

‘And you are telling me this because it’s cruel?’ She didn’t elaborate on who was being cruel—these ladies or their sons.

The Countess pursed her lips. ‘We are telling you this so you will not put any thought to marriage with either of our sons.’

The Duchess tapped her fan into her palm several times before she spoke again. ‘Pray, let me be blunt. You are a foreigner, not versed in our ways. We fear that you do not understand that there are expectations of a duke’s wife—’

‘And an earl’s!’

‘—that a foreigner is simply not able to fulfil.’

Now they were getting to the point. But she needed them to put it more plainly. ‘What kind of expectations?’

‘Duties. Tasks. They’re quite significant,’ said the Duchess.

‘Exhausting and unending,’ echoed the Countess.

That wasn’t specific enough.

‘I am a hard worker, my ladies,’ Grace said. ‘And a quick study. Both your sons have expressed awe at my accomplishments.’

The Duchess waved her fan in the air. ‘But they would, you see. That was all part of their game.’

The Countess released a heavy sigh. ‘She doesn’t understand. Look at her. She hasn’t the wits to comprehend.’

If anyone was lacking in wits, it was them, for underestimating her so thoroughly. She’d known from the beginning that it wasn’t likely that the English would accept her any more than the Chinese had. Both countries saw her as half of a whole rather than a full person. But her father had told her his status would change things. No one had protected her in China, he’d argued, but he would protect her in England. His name would keep her from being discarded.

And she now saw it was true. After all, she’d known from the first moment that his status would prevent her from being beaten by these women. She would not be whipped for daring to speak to their sons. She would not be poisoned or stabbed or in any way physically damaged for her audacity.

What she hadn’t realised until this very moment was that lies could hurt so much more than a beating. She knew that every moment she had spent with Declan had been more than a game. She felt it in her heart. But her head questioned it.

Could a man reared by such women truly feel love for her? Or had she simply believed what her heart wanted her to? Was it likely that most English gentlemen were like her very unusual and generous father? Or was it more likely that her father was unique and that the men of his country were like the men everywhere else in the world? They play with lives—with her life—as a game with each other?

And while she struggled with her doubts she heard the door behind her burst open. The next sound was loud, the heavy tread of boot heels echoing in the large chamber. She knew who it was before she heard his voice. But even so, she braced herself from the sheer impact of his tones. They were heavy with fury, for all that his words sounded polite.

‘Mother! Aunt!’ said the Duke. ‘What tales are you spreading today?’