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The real news is from HG, back from his first session with the Lords, only to cause yet another scandal, which I have promised not to detail here, though the papers may not be so generous, despite our donations to their cause. Sufficed to say, the engagement to Lady Harwood has been called off, and it’s most likely he shall have to weather the storm here in Kendal rather than resuming his place in town.
You can imagine how happy he is about that. The camellias are more cooperative, frankly.
M is pregnant.
So much for keeping promises.
Honestly, I don’t know what to do.
* * *
“Ces? Ces, did you hear me?”
I looked up from the journal, which I’d been engrossed with ever since arriving in Kendal yesterday evening.
Xavier had surprised me yet again on our wedding night by booking not a lavish suite at The Plaza or some swanky penthouse, but instead the same room he’d occupied when we’d first met. The boutique hotel on Riverside was a far cry from a five-star place on Central Park and certainly wasn’t up to Xavier’s usual standards, but he teased he’d gotten used to smaller quarters after living in my basement for the last month.
Besides, tradition was tradition.
“And I want to fall in love with you all over again tonight,” he pronounced as he picked me up and carried me across the threshold.
I couldn’t argue with that.
The next morning, however, we went to Nonna’s to kiss Sofia goodbye (she would fly to London with Elsie to give Xavier and me a few days on our own), then met up with Jagger at Teterboro and flew to Manchester, where Ben was waiting to drive us straight to Kendal while Jagger left for London.
It was quite a different entrance from the one I’d made the first time. For one, we arrived at the estate to find the entire staff waiting outside in a line, ready to welcome their duke home again.
“Is this always how they greet you?” I asked nervously as Xavier helped me out of the car.
“It is when I come home with a bride,” he said with a purely piratical leer.
Then he turned to the row of people who made the estate function, pulled me in front of him, and introduced me to everyone as the new Duchess of Kendal.
The men bowed.
The women curtsied.
I felt like I was on the set of a BBC drama. And desperately in need of some etiquette lessons.
The next morning, after a long night spent rechristening our bedroom and sleeping in far too late, Xavier and I were cozied up in his office while he went over the accounts that Frederick had overseen in his absence, and I dove into another of Henry’s journals.
“What’s got you so interested over there?” Xavier asked from his desk. “You’re making the same sounds as when you discover a new Marvis flavor.”
He wasn’t particularly stressed. That was good news. It meant that in spite of his stepmother’s best attempts at interfering, Frederick had done right by the place while Xavier had been gone.
I paged forward, hoping that Henry would elaborate on whatever scandal was happening that ruined Rupert’s impending marriage. It didn’t seem to be related to Masumi’s pregnancy, especially since he said point-blank that he wouldn’t write down the details. But then again, wasn’t that scandalous enough?
“Well, for one, you’ve finally made an appearance,” I said. “Your mother showed up again in Henry’s journals. And now she’s pregnant.”
“Ah.” Xavier seemed oddly uninterested in the revelation.
I put the journal down. “Don’t you want to know what he said?”
My husband—it was still surreal to call him that—just shrugged his big shoulders. “I already know what happened. I was there, wasn’t I?”
“Well, not yet, you weren’t.” I picked the journal up again and re-scanned the section. “Do you know of any sort of scandal that happened in 1985? Regarding your father, I mean?”
Xavier snorted. “Besides my conception?”
