Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
“Did you say the Duke of Langridge? His Grace, Rowan Clawridge?” Dorothy, Lucy’s dearest cousin, asked with widened eyes.
“Yes, you know of him?” Lucy questioned curiously.
There were very few people before whom Lucy allowed herself to be uncertain without shame.
Dorothy was one of them. With her cousin, there was no need for performance, no careful measuring of words or ambitions.
Dorothy had known her before her debut, before expectations, before Lucy learned how to be useful rather than simply herself.
Whatever Dorothy’s reaction might be, Lucy trusted it would be honest and, if necessary, kind.
“I do not merely know of him,” she said carefully. “Rowan Clawridge is, in fact, my husband’s closest friend.”
Lucy stared at her. “You mean he is the Duke’s friend? Your husband? He knows him well?”
Dorothy nodded. “Very well. Rowan is not a man who collects friendships. He does not linger in company, nor does he cultivate affection for its own sake. If Magnus was not present in his life, I suspect Rowan would live quite contentedly without friends at all.”
Lucy shook her head faintly. “Why did I not know this?”
A wry smile touched Dorothy’s lips. “Perhaps because you have been rather busy these past few years,” she said gently.
“Upsetting your mama. Avoiding certain conversations. Running headlong into independence with admirable stubbornness.” She reached out and squeezed Lucy’s hand.
“But also... perhaps because Rowan Clawridge is not a man people speak of freely, even when they know him.”
“This is useful,” Lucy said, nodding. “Very useful indeed.” She hesitated, then looked up. “Tell me what he is like. Truly.”
Dorothy leaned back against the sofa cushions, her expression turning reflective.
“The Duke of Langridge,” she began, “... is a man whose presence commands attention. But most of the time for all the wrong reasons. He does not seek it, and perhaps, that is why it is so unavoidable.” She paused.
“He is sharp-minded. Calculating. Society finds him cold and not without reason. He does not soften himself to be palatable.”
Lucy listened intently.
“He possesses a dark sense of humor, I would say,” Dorothy continued.
“One that often leaves people unsettled rather than amused. Magnus complains that he is the only one who ever understands when Rowan is joking, and even then, it can be exhausting.” A faint smile flickered.
“It is that edge, I think, that keeps most people at a distance.”
“Oh, I know what you speak of,” Lucy said and rolled her eyes. “Yet Magnus tolerates it?”
“Tolerates, understands, and respects,” Dorothy corrected.
“While people whisper about Magnus’ own ruthlessness, he has always said Rowan operates on an entirely different trajectory.
Rowan does not act to impress or intimidate.
He acts because he has already calculated the outcome.
A force of nature, Magnus once called him.
One few are foolish enough to challenge. ”
“Are you perhaps calling me foolish, dear cousin?”
Dorothy smiled at that, a curve of her lips as she studied Lucy over the rim of her teacup. “I would never call you foolish, Lucy,” she corrected lightly.
Lucy huffed out a breath and shifted closer on the sofa, tucking one leg beneath her skirts.
London felt warmer than Langridge, noisier, fuller, yet her thoughts remained firmly anchored to a tall, cold man with a warped sense of humor and an unnerving stare.
“He does not strike me as a man who welcomes interference,” she said carefully.
“He does not,” Dorothy agreed. “The Duke has never welcomed anything he did not choose himself.”
Lucy hesitated, then leaned in further, lowering her voice though the room was empty save for them. “Dorothy… do you know what happened to his wife?”
Dorothy’s hand stilled mid-motion. The teacup paused, suspended for the briefest moment, before she set it down with deliberate care.
“I know she passed,” Lucy continued, choosing her words with care.
“Some years ago. I know it happened not long after the birth of his youngest son. Beyond that, I have no other information. Unhelpfully so.” She glanced at Dorothy, searching her face.
“Was he fond of her? Was it a love match? How did she die?”
Dorothy shook her head then. “No. You must first tell me why you are a guest at the Duke’s residence. You’ll be there for two weeks? Why?”
Lucy hesitated. Dorothy noticed at once. She always did.
“For heaven’s sake,” Dorothy said, lowering her voice as she reached for Lucy’s hands. “That pause alone tells me this is far worse than you are admitting. What have you done this time, Lucy?”
Lucy let out a breath, her shoulders loosening just a fraction. There was no use pretending with Dorothy. There had never been.
“Do you remember...” Lucy began slowly, “... when my mother sent me to live with Aunt Selina?”
Dorothy nodded at once. “How could I forget? Your mama was convinced solitude would cure you of... what did she call it? Romantic impracticality.”
Lucy nodded. “She wished me to understand what it meant to grow up alone,” she said, a faint, wry curve to her mouth.
“To feel the absence of family. Of companionship. She believed seeing Aunt Selina living like a recluse... with no husband or children would wake me up and force my hand into marriage.”
“Right,” Dorothy said.
“Living with Aunt Selina changed everything. Watching her work, seeing how she studied people, how she understood what they needed before they did, it made sense to me in a way nothing else ever had. I wanted to learn it. I wanted her to teach me.”
Dorothy leaned back against the sofa cushions, listening intently.
“It took months to convince her,” Lucy continued. “Months of assisting, observing, proving that I was serious. But just when I thought she would never relent, a letter arrived.”
Dorothy’s brows lifted. “A letter?”
Lucy nodded. “It’s a long story, but Aunt Selina gave it to me as a test. My only opportunity. If I succeeded, she would take me on properly and teach me everything she knows.”
“And success...” Dorothy said carefully, “... means?”
“Finding him a suitable wife,” Lucy replied. “Within two weeks.”
Dorothy went very still.
“That is only the beginning of the complication,” Lucy added quickly.
“What transpired after my arrival at the estate is a tale far too long for tonight. I promise I will tell you everything, every absurd, mortifying detail, another time. For now, all you must know is that I have been granted a fortnight. Nothing more.”
Dorothy’s lips parted. “What happens if the fortnight elapses?”
Lucy did not answer at once. She drew a slow breath, fingers tightening around the porcelain teacup she had scarcely touched since sitting down.
“He said,” Lucy replied carefully, “that if I fail to find him a suitable wife within two weeks, I shall become that wife instead.”
The effect was immediate. Dorothy rose to her feet so abruptly the chair scraped against the floor.
“Of course, he did,” she exclaimed, throwing her hands into the air.
“Of course, this is how the Duke of Langridge would conduct himself, and of course, this is how you would find yourself entangled in it.”
“Dorothy—”
“No,” Dorothy cut in, pacing now. “Do not interrupt me. This is entirely typical of you, Lucy Crampton. Entirely.” She turned sharply, eyes flashing.
“You have an astonishing talent for placing yourself in the very center of catastrophe and then insisting, with great conviction, that it will all resolve itself.”
Lucy straightened. “That is hardly fair.”
“Is it not?” Dorothy demanded. “Shall I remind you? First there was Cecilia, my sister. Your cousin.” She paused pointedly.
“Forcing her into a situation so compromising that the family nearly fainted in unison. A duke trapped, a reputation dangling by a thread, and you—” she gestured sharply.
“—standing in the middle of it all with the calmness of someone arranging flowers.”
Lucy winced. “That turned out well. It was years ago.”
“That is not the point,” Dorothy snapped. “The point is that it could just as easily have destroyed her and you... and half the family.”
“But it didn’t,” Lucy insisted. “Cecilia found her happiness. She is married to a man who adores her. If anything, that should prove I am capable—”
“It proves,” Dorothy interrupted, “that fortune has so far been indulgent with you.”
She exhaled sharply and resumed her pacing.
“After that, you frightened away every eligible gentleman your mama put before you. You argued, questioned, challenged, and corrected. Suitors fled in terror. Your mama was driven to such desperation she sent you to live with Aunt Selina in hopes solitude might tame you.”
Lucy lowered her gaze, though her jaw set stubbornly.
“Now,” Dorothy continued, voice dropping slightly, “you have somehow arrived at a duke’s estate, under his roof, with an ultimatum hanging over your head that would make even the boldest woman pause.”
She stopped directly before Lucy. “You are always running headlong into danger, convinced it is purpose. But I am beginning to fear you do not pause long enough to ask yourself what you truly want.”
Silence stretched between them.
Lucy rose slowly to her feet. “I know it looks reckless,” she said.
“It is reckless,” Dorothy said. “I know you, Lucy. You do not wish to marry. What would you do if that is the only option before you, given that you have agreed to it? He is a powerful man. You cannot break your promise.”
“It won’t come to that,” Lucy assured her. “I know it looks as though I am forever chasing one scheme after another. But this is not a whim, Dorothy. This is the first thing that has felt like it belonged to me.”
Dorothy’s expression softened, though worry still lingered in her eyes.