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Letty blinked. “Well, yes. Now that we have cleared out the room, and I have measured everything, I would expect to start painting as soon as we have reviewed the plans for color and furniture.” She winced. “Notwe. I meant I would review with Mrs. MacInnes, of course. I would never dream of imposing upon your time, Your Grace.”
“Have you given no thought to ripping up the floorboards?” The duchess glanced around. “Or perhaps replacing the windows? Maybe expanding the size of the room? I expect to beastonished, Miss Barrow.”
Her mind reeled. This would set her schedule back weeks if the duchess insisted upon any of it. “I hadn’t considered changing the structure of the house. I would need to review with an architect to see what is possible. Professional workers would have to come in and give estimates on the time and budget. These arrangements, even if you choose not to pursue the change, would take much longer than I planned.”
The duchess waved a hand. “As I told you, time is no object. I want the job to be done right. If you have other obligations, cancel them and you can discuss with Mrs. MacInnes about any issues with the wage.”
Letty stared. The duchess seemed almost…giddy.
More evidence of the frivolity that one could expect from the nobility. Well, it was no more or less than she had expected. It was only disappointing because she had been lost in the duchess’s sapphire eyes, and in her own dreams for the design. It wasn’t her own house, she reminded herself. The client had a right to make changes.
“I can begin to arrange such meetings this week,” Letty said.
“Thank you. I shall keep you no longer, Miss Barrow. I understand the demands on your time must not permit you to dally.”
“Wait,” she said, and the duchess’s eyebrows flew upward in an almost comical expression. Too late, she realized that no one outside of the royal family told a woman of this station towait. “That is, if you have a moment.” That wasn’t the right thing to say either. But she wanted to prolong the conversation. She wanted to go back to the easy back-and-forth that they had enjoyed over cake. She wanted…oh, shewanted.
But most of all, she wanted to know if she was right in her assumptions.
“I wanted to ask your opinion on finials.”
“Finials?”
“Yes, Your Grace. Naturally, we will replace the bed here, and I wanted your opinion on the topping for the bed posts. I’m rather partial to decorative finials, myself. Smooth, carved, and fanciful.” She couldn’t help herself, even though the duchess was the least likely of any woman she had ever met to respond to something like this. “Pretty, like a woman’s curves.” She winked. Perhaps she would have needed Fraser’s quizzing glass to see it, but was that the barest hint of a smile on the duchess’s lips? Encouraged, she pressed on. “Finials. Would you be interested in discussing them further?”
The smile, if it indeed had ever been there, was quickly no more than a memory. “I don’t think my preferences are relevant here. If you find you cannot accomplish the job with your own decisions—”
“No, Your Grace. I can manage quite well. I had hoped to have your opinion—”
“I am not inclined to provide one.”
“Of course. Then I shall take my leave.”
The duchess frowned and looked out the window once more. “You must take the carriage. I insist. You are working far too late tonight, and it isn’t safe.”
Letty was touched by her concern. She hadn’t been escorted in the ducal carriage since the first house tour, and she relied on hackneys of varying degrees of comfort to bring her to and from the estate if she couldn’t spare the hour it took to walk. The Hawthorne carriage, if memory served, had a thick fur bundled in the corner, ideal for one’s lap on a late night. “I am accustomed to making my way in the world without such means, but I admit that it is cold and I am tired. I would very much welcome a ride.”
“Excellent. Please speak to Mrs. MacInnes and she shall arrange it. I would never expect you to work such hours, Miss Barrow. I am perfectly content for this job to take as long as it needs to. You must have a care for your health.”
“I suppose it is risky to stay,” she said and met the duchess’s eyes.
The duchess took a deep breath. And a step back. Was that a wash of palest pink across those ivory cheeks? “Risk is always best avoided.”
“Then we miss the best parts of life, don’t we? I cannot condone it, Your Grace. I will always embrace the chance of risk.”
“I wish you a good evening, Miss Barrow.”
With a sweep of her gown, she was gone.
Interesting. So, the duchess did have feelings somewhere in there. Maybe she was fixated on the ducal bed to beget an heir, but she didn’t seem immune to Letty’s casual flirtation. She had been right after all. The duchess was more like her husband than people thought.
Letty tucked that fact away like the rulers in her toolbox as she went in search of the housekeeper before she left Hawthorne House for the night.
Chapter Seven
There was nothing so pretty as dawn in December, Letty thought as she peered out the window at the weak amber light glinting off the quarter inch of snow that had fallen overnight.
When the kettle came to a boil, she lifted it out of the fire and prepared two sturdy mugs of strong coffee. She tucked a cloth around a basket of buns and went down the stairs at the back of the house, unlatching the door to the first floor and inhaling the familiar scent of fresh wood shavings and linseed oil varnish.
