Page 110 of The Ladies Least Likely

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

A maranthe felt a bit dazed as she and Mal left the courtroom and looked out at the crowd browsing the market stalls set up in Westminster Hall. It seemed incredible that the world outside the courtroom could have been going on in ordinary fashion all this time.

“How do you feel?” she asked Mal. He still held her hand. She made no attempt to detach herself.

“Like I parted company from my horse and took a blow to the head.”

He looked down at her, his expression sober, his eyes searching.

She savored the sight of him, the strong lines of his face, the arresting blue eyes, the shape of his lips.

The pull grew every time she looked at him, every time she learned more of his character.

Familiarity increased her adoration rather than dulling it.

Love indeed, then. Not infatuation or a passing fancy, but a deep appreciation for the man he was, and for everything that belonged to him. Love in truth.

“You will leave this hall the Duke of Hunsdon,” she said quietly. “Are you prepared for that?”

“No.” He studied her in return, as if he had discovered something new of her as well.

Releasing her hand, he pointed his elbow toward her, and she took it.

Once again that feeling struck her of pieces quietly slipping into place.

Him at her side. The two of them, together.

Something about it felt inevitable and delicious and right.

He held out his arm to her. That had to mean he wanted her beside him? He wasn’t going to cast her off after all? Or was he only being polite?

“Will you come with me to the house?” he asked. “I have to tell the children, and I’ve no notion how to prepare them. It will require some planning.”

She nodded. She was past pride. She would cling to him as long as he let her.

“May we stop by my house first? I must see to something.”

Davey strode up to them, settling his hat on his head.

“I found a scarf for Eyde and the most cunning toy for Derwa,” he reported.

“All wrapped up and put to bed then, miss? Mr. Grey? Saw the duchess storm out in a perfect rage, I did, so I guess things went your way? Knew the judge would see sense, I did.”

“The resolution was not satisfactory for the duchess,” Mal answered. “She will not be residing at Hunsdon House henceforth. We’ll allow her in to collect her things, and I hope you’ll watch her like a hawk the whole time.”

“Davey, we will have to address Mr. Grey by his new title,” Amaranthe said. “He is?—”

“Let’s speak of it later,” Mal said, laying a hand on hers. “You will join us for dinner? We have much to discuss.” He met her eyes and she nodded.

A warm thrill curled around her heart. He was holding her close.

He was speaking of plans together. In the days since he had stormed from her house she had tried over and again to steel herself against losing him, against losing the intimacy and rapport that had grown so deep and strong between them in such a short time.

Against losing the one man who made her come alive in his presence the way no man ever had.

She had known from the start that she could not have him.

But here he was beside her, and her blood hummed with excitement and a wild, unlikely hope.

A line of carriages for hire stood in front of Westminster Abbey, awaiting the whims of visitors and tourists, and Mal crossed the street to inquire about one. Davey showed her the scarf he had bought for Eyde, and Amaranthe stroked the expensive imported lace, one made dearer by the tax.

“Davey, this is quite a fine gift,” she said, though she couldn’t help wonder where he had come up with the money. She paid him as well as she could, but she herself could not afford such luxuries.

“Aye, but she’s serving in a duke’s house, miss,” Davey said proudly, and Amaranthe smarted. How disappointed her staff would be to leave Hunsdon House and come back to her quiet little corner of George Court.

“And the vails one gets in a duke’s house!

” Davey added. “A man come around a day beforehand asking all manner of questions about the house and the staff, who was come and gone, who ran it and such, and he gave Ralph coin for all of us, if only we’d speak with him should he come again.

” Davey shook his head. “Never heard such a notion, but the coin was solid enough.”

Sybil’s spies, Amaranthe guessed. Or perhaps someone hired by Froggart to make inquiries on behalf of Sybil’s case. No wonder he had known of Amaranthe’s business at Hunsdon House, though he’d put the worst possible cast on the situation.

Oliver had addressed her as if she were Mal’s intended, not his mistress. An embarrassed flush moved through her. Oliver didn’t know the whole of her doings. He’d never recommend her if he knew.

But Mal had exonerated her from forgery, in the eyes of the law at least. That he had done so caused the warm tendrils around her heart to tighten painfully. Whatever he thought of her in private, he had made her doings look aboveboard to the court.

He had to do so, of course, if he wanted his own claim to stand.

Associating with a known forger would undeniably call into question documents one suddenly produced proving one’s legitimacy.

She’d known that when she went to St. Mary Redcliffe searching one more time for the parish register and the truth.

It was why it had been necessary to have the rector pen an account of why the marriage record had been hidden away.

She’d known her own word would not stand, not as a woman, and not as a woman known as a copyist.

Known around London for having some skill, it appeared. She couldn’t contain a thrill of pride at that.

And now Mal was a duke’s heir. No, not the heir—the duke himself.

He’d vaulted in an instant from an acknowledged bastard to the highest rank of nobility.

The warmth around her heart seared into pain.

He had not been entirely out of her reach as a duke’s bastard.

She could have been—she had been—of some use to him.

But a duke? Any union between them was impossible now.

He would require a bride of birth and family, and preferably some little wealth, to aid his connections, influence, stature in society, and in keeping the estate solvent.

She could be of some use to him if he had a problem finding staff, or if he found a manuscript in the library he wanted to commission a copy of. That was all.

She clutched her pelisse close about her, though her chill was not from the damp breeze off the river. Mal rolled up in a phaeton, and she took his hand as he helped her inside. Davey clung to the back, and Amaranthe relished being near Mal a while longer.

“Did you mean what you said in court?” she asked as they rolled through Whitehall, past the Banqueting House, the Treasury buildings, and the impressive facade of the Horse Guards. “About me not being a forger in truth.”

“I as much accused you of it in your home, didn’t I?

” he admitted. He watched the traffic flowing about them, but his weight beside her was firm and steady and warm.

“I regretted my hasty words, after. So I betook myself to the Stationer’s Company and made a study of the Statue of Anne and England’s copyright laws.

Turns out there were some finer points I hadn’t considered, such as the notion of public domain. ”

“It was stealing,” Amaranthe admitted. “The treatise. The St. Johns manuscripts. And the manuscript that Ned found in the Hunsdon House. Mr. Karim mentioned he’d heard rumors of it,” she said guiltily.

Might as well get everything out in the open.

“I did not come to Hunsdon House with entirely altruistic motives.”

“Who among us is entirely altruistic?” Mal said in a mild tone. “Did you enter a contract that you were prohibited from making further copies of any of these manuscripts?”

“As you observed, the possessors might feel such a prohibition was implied in the circumstances of the commission,” she said dryly. “Most certainly the librarians of St. Johns might feel a violation has occurred.”

“If you did not agree to the restriction, I maintain you cannot be prosecuted,” Mal said as the driver took them through Charing Cross. “And if anyone brings you to court on these grounds, I will ensure the suit drags on until we are both dead and buried. I have the resources to do it, now.”

She giggled. Mal wanted to share the flush of victory with her; that was the reason for this new amity between them. Tomorrow, or tonight after dinner, he would come to his senses and see how impossible things must be between them.

She would make the most of tonight, then.

Davey held the horses in the narrow passage of George Court while Amaranthe brought Mal inside her house. Before she had gone far Inez appeared at the top of the stairs leading down to the kitchen. She wore her cloak and carried a valise of clothes and her few other small possessions.

“Inez! You’re leaving us?”

“I’m sorry, senhorita, but I cannot spend another night under the same roof as that man,” Inez said. She held herself proudly, but her lower lip trembled. “I have imposed upon your hospitality long enough.”

“You have not imposed,” Amaranthe exclaimed. In truth, the girl had been a great help to her. “What has Joseph done? Has he insulted you in some way?”

“His very manner is an insult! But if you are asking that, senhorita, ” she hurried to say, reading Amaranthe’s face, “no, I cannot complain of advances. He is no more thick-headed and foolish than any man. But I have reached the end of my patience.”

Inez glanced at Mal, who offered no defense for Joseph or males more generally.

“I am very sorry to see you go, Inez, and I hope you will find a position that suits you,” Amaranthe said. “Please come to us if you need anything at all. Anything. I shall do my best to ensure Joseph doesn’t trouble you.”