Page 11 of The Duke’s Caught Bride

“Perhaps,” Alice chimed in, “they might stay for a few moments. We have only just arrived, and⁠—”

“No.” The Duke’s tone brooked no argument. “They have lessons. They have routines.”

The governess herded the boys toward the staircase. Freddie went with visible reluctance, turning twice to look back at Alice with an expression that mingled disappointment and calculation. Charlie followed without turning, his small back straight beneath his rumpled jacket.

The Duke watched them go without a single emotion on his face.

“I am done for the day.” He did not look at her. “Mrs. Finch will show you to your chambers and acquaint you with the staff. Dinner is at eight. I take mine in the study.”

He turned and walked away, his boots striking the marble with measured cadence, and disappeared through a doorway that swallowed him as completely as if he had never been there at all.

Alice stood in the entrance hall and felt the vastness of it settle on her shoulders. Marble beneath her feet. Vaulted ceilings above. Staff moving through distant corridors with the hushed efficiency of a machine that had been running smoothly long before she arrived to witness its operations.

Mrs. Finch cleared her throat. “Shall I show you the residence, Your Grace?”

“Yes.” Alice straightened her spine.

She had planned to be a spinster. She had planned to disappear into respectable obscurity, to keep bees or paint watercolors or simply exist without the weight of expectation pressing against her ribs. Now, she was the lady of a castle, with a title that weighed heavily on her shoulders.

“Please,” she added. “I should like to see everything.”

The housekeeper nodded, her expression revealing nothing of whatever thoughts moved behind those competent eyes, and led her deeper into the castle that was now her home.

It took hours to explore the entire place. By the end, Alice was exhausted. As night fell, she stood in her new chambers for a few minutes.

She was no fool. She knew what was expected of a bride on her wedding night.

The door between her chamber and the Duke’s stood closed, a slab of polished oak that might as well have been the wall of a fortress for all the communication it permitted.

She moved to stand before it, her hand settling on the exposed part of her ample bosom as she rehearsed sentences that dissolved each time she formed them.

She had been a duchess for approximately eight hours. The title still did not fit.

She raised her hand and knocked.

The door opened. Not immediately. There was a pause during which she considered retreating to the bed and pretending she had been sleepwalking. Then the handle turned, and the Duke stood in the frame.

He had removed his coat. His waistcoat hung open, his shirtsleeves were rolled to the elbows, and his cravat had been loosened to the point of informality. He held a ledger in one hand, its pages marked with a finger that kept his place.

His eyes went wide. The expression lasted less than a second, but Alice caught it nonetheless—the dilation of his pupils, the slight parting of his lips, the involuntary step back, the slight shift of his body.

He was disgusted by her.

Of course, that was what it was. His eyes lingered on her exposed chest for a beat, and she wanted nothing more than to cover it.

She tightened her fingers in the fabric of her nightgown.

“Are we to never dine together?”

She had meant to lead with something gentler, something that acknowledged the strangeness of the day, but the memory of sitting alone at a table set for two while footsteps moved in distant corridors had hardened into something that would not be softened.

The Duke’s expression settled back into its familiar lines. He lowered the ledger. “I fell behind on estate matters. The wedding disrupted the day’s schedule, and the accounts do not reconcile themselves out of consideration for matrimonial obligations.”

“Estate matters.” Alice heard the brittleness in her own voice and could not seem to modulate it. “Of course. How foolish of me to assume that a wedding might warrant twenty minutes of a duke’s attention at the dinner table.”

He pursed his lips. “If you wish to critique my management of time…”

“I wish to understand what kind of marriage this is to be.” The words tumbled out before she could arrange them. “You brought me here to care for your children. To provide stability, you said. And yet, on the first evening, you cannot spare the time to share a meal with us. With your… your family.”