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“Go on, tell me another,” I said. “I’m the thorn in his side. Have been since I was born. He just couldn’t ignore me anymore after Mum died. Even worse, that I turned out to be his actual heir.”
Lord, that had been a prize fight. I’d been the one throwing things that night, once I’d learned that not only was I the next Duke of Kendal, but that titles weren’t really something you could refuse. I was what I was. Like it or not.
I turned around and started washing my hands in the sink. Sourdough really did turn to cement when it was left to dry, and it was like glue when wet. Horror to work with, but I was determined to master it no matter what. Plus, one of the few perks about Corbray Hall was the proper bread oven, lined with bricks and fully fired. Most industrial bakeries didn’t have as much. It was too good not to learn.
“Be that as it may,” Henry said once he’d sat down on the stool. “If you do leave again and become a chef—aside from what it will look like for the Duke of Kendal’s son to be a common cook, on top of needing to get that thing on your arm—”
I grinned. I had particularly liked Dad’s reaction when he caught sight of the tattoo I’d brought home from America. Up and down my left arm, a little bit up the neck and over the wrist, so it couldn’t be hidden with the best of collars, the longest of sleeves. A serpent designed to recall Kiyohime, the woman who turned into a serpent demon in order to kill the man who betrayed her. Mum told me a lot of Japanese folktales when I was a kid, but that was one of her favorites. It never occurred to me to wonder why until I’d come to live with Rupert Parker.
“If you left,” Henry continued, “it would also mean you wouldn’t stay here and marry Lady Imogene. As you are meant to.”
I paused, hands still under the half-boiling water. “You want to say that again, Uncle? Who’s getting married to Imogene Douglas?”
Uncle Henry sighed, like he was speaking to someone particularly slow. “It’s been in the works since you were first brought here. It’s the obvious choice, boy. The estates adjoin, and we’ve known the family for generations. Imogene will inherit Ortham and her parents’ income, if not her father’s title. Their estate will become a part of Kendal and still remain part of a different, greater title that can maintain everything. It all works out.”
“Why not Lucy?” I asked. “She’s the eldest.”
“Xavier, please,” Henry replied. “Lucy will not live beyond thirty, if she is lucky. We all know it. That future is not one to be planned for.”
“You don’t know that.”
I turned off the faucet and wiped my hands on my pants. Henry sighed irritably, then yanked a dishtowel from a rack behind him and threw it at me with a bit more force than necessary.
“Imogene?” I asked disbelievingly as I finished drying off. “That’s what this is all about? He wants me to marry Imogene Douglas?” The idea made me laugh outright. “She’s, what, fourteen?”
“Fifteen,” Henry replied calmly.
“Jailbait, that’s what,” I countered. “I’d rather just marry Lucy, if I had to do it at all. Which I don’t. But at least we’re actually friends.”
“Don’t be a fool, boy. For one, Lucy can’t have children.”
“And how would you know that, you old lech?” I leered at him.
Henry would know the ins and outs of a prospective girl’s reproductive system, though. He knew more about this place and everyone in it than anyone who’d ever lived here, I’d wager. He probably had her lady parts tested too. Counted the eggs and everything.
“Her parents told me,” he replied, impervious as ever to my jokes. “We’ve discussed the match a great deal. They are very supportive, even with their prospective son-in-law’s…unusual proclivities.”
I recoiled. The idea of these imperialistic old geezers sitting around talking about my and Imogene’s future like it was a game of chess made me physically ill. And I didn’t even like the girl.
“It’s a no,” I told him. “And I mean absolutely not. I might have to take Dad’s title or die, but I’m not getting forced down the aisle. Lucy’s my mate, but Imogene is…” I made a face. “Well, she’s annoying.”
“She is still young.”
“Exactly. Every time I’m over there, she chases me around like some kind of puppy.”
“Well, she is very young. But it bodes well that she likes you, I should think.”
“It bodes nothing, Uncle. I’m not interested. I’m also not even twenty-one yet.”
“Exactly. She’s coming out this year,” Henry said. “In a few more, she’ll start university. Look, boy. No one is saying you must marry the girl now. Sow your oats, as they say. Do what young men do. But when all’s said and done, you must keep your future in mind. And while apparently that does not include a degree from Britain’s finest institutions—”
I snorted. Yeah, I didn’t fancy getting kicked out of another university. Three was enough.
“It should include doing what is needed to be a true Duke of Kendal,” he concluded. “And eventually, that will mean getting married and carrying on the line. I realize they question you now, boy, but should you marry the Douglas girl, you wouldn’t hear a word about it ever again. Be the heir, establish an heir. Have your fun discreetly. You understand?”
I opened my mouth to joke again, to tell him he’d lost the plot completely. But Henry was looking at me in that way he sometimes did. Like he thought he knew me better than I knew myself. Like he knew that deep down, there was a part of me that wanted to be accepted by my father and his people and be more than Rupert Parker’s funny-looking boy who fought and swore too much. He knew it, even if I wasn’t willing to admit it.
I knew one more thing, though. That, out of the few people left in this world who actually cared about me, Henry was the only one who could tell me the real, honest truth of things, whether I liked it or not.
