“I am a duke,” he said at last. “An unmarried duke with a large estate, all his teeth, a not indecent head of hair. Of course there were many ladies who were vying for my hand.”
“I suppose I should feel lucky, then,” she said primly, “that I was the one that finally won your heart.”
He rolled his eyes, and she laughed wickedly. After a moment, however, she asked, in a more serious voice, “Did these ladies know that you had no intention of marrying?”
“Of course not. It’s not something that one discusses with young ladies.”
“No, I suppose not.” She bit her lip. “Does anyone know?”
Lucien felt his mouth go dry. He wasn’t sure how his wife always managed to disarm him so much. “My close friend, Dorian, the Duke of Nottington, knows,” he said at last. “He was undoubtedly very surprised when he read about our wedding in the papers.”
Emery frowned at him. “You mean you haven’t told him? Your closest friend and you didn’t write him that we were married or even explain the circumstances?”
Lucien felt his neck and face growing hot. “Gentlemen are different from young ladies,” he said. “We do not share things with one another to the same extent.”
“But if you don’t share your feelings with your friend, with whom do you share them? Because I know it isn’t with your sisters or brother.”
“I--” Lucien wasn’t sure what to say. It had never occurred to him before that he should share his feelings.
She seemed to anticipate him, because she sighed and said, “I don’t think it would be such an improper thing if you should share your feelings with those closest to you. I know that your siblings would feel honored to learn more about your emotions. It might help them to feel closer to you.”
“But then how would I remain an authority figure?” he shot back. “If I had divulged my feelings to them, they would not feel that they had to listen to me anymore, and I am, at the end of the day, the patriarch of this family.”
She thought about this for a moment, then she said, a little sadly, “Perhaps they would listen to you better, if they understood you and why you do the things you do.”
There was so much wisdom in this that Lucien wasn’t comfortable with it.My wife is far too clever for her own good.
“Just pour the tea,” he said sourly, waving his hand at the tea tray. “We’re here for your edification, remember? Not mine.”
“Why not both?” she said, with another wicked grin. But she did as he asked, and carefully reached out and took hold of the pot of tea, lifting it up. “It’s very heavy,” she grumbled.
“Just pour it without splashing too much, and it will be alright.”
She brought the pot above the nearest cup and began to pour. The angle wasn’t perfect, and some of it did splash out over the tray, but all in all, it wasn’t a terrible job.
“Not as good as Leah’s,” he remarked. “But not bad.”
“Good enough to be considered worthy of being your bride?”
“I guess we will just have to leave that to the ladies of thetonto decide,” he said with a sigh. “I just do not understand why your parents didn’t teach you all of these things. Even if you were to be married to my brother, a young lady really ought to know all the intricacies of entertaining and distinguishing herself in Society. After all, you were going to be the sister-in-law of a duke! It’s not as if you wouldn’t be required to comport yourself with a certain level of decorum.”
“My parents didn’t care how I comported myself after I was married,” Emery said, and a flicker of anger passed over her face. It was brief, but he saw it, and it made him pause. Slowly, he sat down across from her.
“Why wouldn’t they care?”
She shrugged. “I suppose they thought I’d be someone else’s problem by then.”
Lucien frowned as he felt his own flicker of anger. Neglectful parents had that effect on him. “They really didn’t prepare you at all,” he said slowly. “Which was actually quite foolish of them. What if the engagement had come to an end, for one reason or another? Then they would have been stuck with--”
“An unaccomplished lout?” she asked, her eyes flashing dangerously.
Lucien paused. “I didn’t mean that. You are not unaccomplished or a lout. I simply meant that it was your parents’ job to prepareyou for Society in case of any eventuality. They failed in their duty to you.”
For a moment, a look of gratification passed across her face. Then she shrugged, as if afraid of showing too much vulnerability in front of him, replacing the look with one of bored resignation. “Well now it is your responsibility, I suppose,” she said drolly. “And I apologize for that. Although I have found these lessons more fun than I originally could have hoped.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You really are obsessed with having fun. I haven’t managed to train that out of you.”
“No, in fact, I think it’s worked the opposite way.”
