Chapter Eleven
“You must tell your father, when we see him next, how very intolerable this journey has been.” Grandmother wrinkled her nose in that way she so often did. “He will, of course, insist that he is the one most put upon. Do not allow him to diminish what I have endured, Dubhán. Tell him all that I have been put through.”
Neither she nor his father would likely give even a moment’s consideration to what Duke had endured. Father seldom did on matters concerning his mother and sister. Grandmother never did on any matter whatsoever.
“You will see him at the same time I do.” Duke set her breakfast dishes on the tray he’d brought them up on. “You could tell him.”
She looked shocked, an expression that quickly shifted to offended. Lud. “You mean to abandon me? Your own grandmother? My children often dismiss me and my suffering. Surely you would not do so as well, you who have often been the only member of this family to consider my feelings, my needs, my happiness.”
And what about mine ? Duke’s feelings, needs, and happiness had always been set aside when family contention reared its head. Sometimes it felt as though his family didn’t notice, let alone care, that they were burdening him with arguments and feuds older than he was.
But Eve cared.
“You don’t look just weary,” she had said, “you also look frustrated and sad and... lonely.”
He really was weary, frustrated, and sad. But until Eve had said as much, he hadn’t realized how lonely he truly was. The Pack had eased that while he’d been away at school. Among them, he was valued and embraced and a welcome part of their family of friends. None of them had ever attached conditions to their acceptance of him. Only when he’d faced the reality of living for decades at his parents’ home, where caveats reigned supreme, had he begun to truly appreciate the contrast between the two situations.
Duke placed the last of the breakfast items on the tray. “I need to take these things back down to the kitchen.”
“I am impressed with the food this chance-found cook has produced.” Grandmother rarely praised anyone. “I’ve half a mind to extend an offer of employment. My cook in Dublin is not nearly this expert.”
“We are fortunate, indeed.”
“Your father is, no doubt, paying for all this, though Penelope really ought to be. Her fortunes have fared better than his.”
If Grandmother were permitted to chase that thread of thought, it would lead to the inevitable hours-long recounting of past disappointments. Duke hadn’t endurance enough for that. From the doorway, he offered an explanation he hoped would end the conversation. “The O’Doyle sisters are compensating the cook, Grandmother.”
“Those girls are, I am quite certain, as poor as church mice.” Grandmother sounded shocked, and well she might be.
“Poor, yes, but they are not complaining.” He gave her a pointed but caring look, then closed the door.
Alone in the corridor, he released a pent-up breath. He loved his family. He truly did. And when taken in small doses at a large distance from the extended family, he even had some pleasant times with his mother and father. But they didn’t last. Though he’d never been to Fairfield without his parents, he felt certain the bitterness and demands for appeasement were far fewer there and much farther between. He needed that. He needed it desperately.
Duke took the tray back to the kitchen by way of the servants’ stairs. It wasn’t that he didn’t like the Marlows; he did. But he was feeling a little weary of people just then.
He smelled freshly baked bread as he drew closer to the kitchen. Eve was working her magic again. She’d done more than keep them all well fed, which was impressive enough. She’d also made him feel less alone and invisible. She’d made him smile, which was an admittedly infrequent thing.
Upon stepping into her kitchen, he began immediately searching for her. He’d missed her in the hour since he’d last been in the room. One hour. He’d told her the night before that he liked spending time with her. But it was more than that. He thought about her when they were apart, wondered what she was doing, if she was thinking about him too.
Eve was asleep in a chair near the fire. She’d admitted when he’d fetched Grandmother’s tray to having been up for a few hours already.
Careful to be as quiet as possible, Duke set the items from the tray into the basin of water before setting the tray on the worktable. He’d watched Eve washing the dishes the night before and mimicked what he’d seen then. She’d already cleaned all the other plates and bowls and pots.
Eve O’Doyle was remarkable, though he suspected she didn’t realize it. The way she navigated Grandmother without being hurt or hurtful, her ability and willingness to work as hard as she had the past day keeping everyone fed, her strength and courage in the face of a future that had just been snatched from her... The more he learned of her, the more amazed he was, and the more intrigued.
He’d come close to kissing her last night in this very kitchen. So exceedingly close. And the look in her eyes had not, to his view, been indifferent. Long after he’d climbed the stairs and retreated to the room he was using, he’d thought about that moment, filled as it had been with the thudding of his heart and the fierce temptation to wrap his arms around her and kiss her.
“You didn’t have to wash those.” Eve’s sleepy voice broke into his thoughts.
He looked in the direction of the fire and saw her walking with sleep-heavy steps toward him. “You washed all the others,” he pointed out.
“I don’t mind,” she said. “I’m certain you and Nia are doing a great deal of work in the rest of the inn.”
“There is work, yes, but it is nice to feel useful and to help people.”
She reached his side, still looking tired and worn. “Innkeeper, then?”
He didn’t know what she meant by that, and his confusion must have shown.
“Is that your dream-fulfilling future?” she asked. “Being an innkeeper?”
He shook his head. “I cannot say I would want to run an inn.”
“But you do want to help people and be useful.” She didn’t pose it as a question. She also didn’t talk about that desire of his as if it were a failing or weakness. “That leaves me with only one further characteristic to discover.”
He dried his hands on a kitchen rag. “And what is that one further characteristic?”
“Whether or not you are enamored of experimental bread.”
He hadn’t been expecting that. “Enamored of what ?”
Her captivating laugh pulled his gaze immediately to her, his heart pounding in anticipation. He’d learned very quickly during this journey that when Eve O’Doyle was laughing, he didn’t want to be looking anywhere other than at her, seeing her silver eyes sparkle, her bewitching dimple make an appearance, her lips turn up in a dazzling smile.
“Enamored of experimental bread ,” she said as if he ought to have known what that meant but with too much amusement in her expression to make her comment anything but teasing. “I found herbs in the kitchen garden that were still alive and usable. It seemed a sign that I ought to use them. I added what I gathered into the bread I baked, and I’m hoping it’s worked.”
There was something wonderfully refreshing in hearing Eve’s lilting Irish voice lending the musical quality of Irish speech to her words. And it made her ever more captivating.
“You’ll try a bit, won’t you?” She looked hopeful but also a little nervous.
“Of course.”
Eve snatched hold of his hand and pulled him to the worktable. It was a simple touch, one she didn’t appear to engage in for any reason other than excitement over her baking, yet his heart lurched at the feel of her hand, small and warm, in his.
But it was there for only a moment. As soon as they reached the bread, she slipped free. He knew she needed her hands to cut into a loaf, but how tempted he was to ask her to let him weave his fingers through hers and keep hold of her in that small way. He didn’t dare. Instead, he inched a little closer, near enough to hear her breathe and feel her warmth.
She cut a thick slice of bread, then handed it to him, watching him closely.
It smelled divine. Duke took a bite. “Delicious,” he said. “Absolutely delicious.”
She clasped her hands together in front of her heart. “I’d hoped it would be. I love trying new things and creating my own recipes. I do wish it were something ladies didn’t have to be ashamed of.”
He tore off a piece of his slice and handed it to her. “I certainly hope you aren’t ashamed of this, Eve. It is something far too impressive for you to be anything but excessively proud of.”
She took a bite. “It is good.”
“Very good.”
She smelled her bit of bread, looking entirely pleased. “Outside of my family, there are only two people who have any idea that I bake.”
“I am honored to be one of those two.” Honored. Touched.
“If I had to choose someone to be trapped at an abandoned inn in the midst of a torrential downpour with, I’d put you at the very top of my list, Dubhán Seymour.”
Duke turned a bit so he leaned a little against the work top and faced her more directly. “What other lists do you have that I can work my way to the top of?”
She thought about it a moment. “I could form a list of people who have Irish names but use interesting English substitutes.”
“ Interesting English substitutes?” He shook his head. “I would say Scuff ought to be at the top of that list.”
Eve reached for his hand again, excitement in her expressive face. “You would adore Scuff. He reminds me so much of Charlie and Toss. Both of my brothers do.”
“I’d like to meet your brothers.” He adjusted his hand so his fingers threaded through hers, just as he’d hoped to. “You said they are still in school?”
She nodded. “They attend Shrewsbury. I realize that isn’t as prestigious a school as Eton or Harrow.” There was a hint of embarrassment in her tone.
“My father was educated at Shrewsbury.”
Her eyes pulled a bit wide. “Truly?”
He nodded. “But even if he hadn’t been”—Duke bent a little closer to her—“I hope you know that you need never worry that I will think less of you or your family over something as inconsequential as what school your siblings attend or the size of your house or the depth of your family coffers. Society may set great store by those things, but I don’t. I never have.”
She smiled once more but this time softly. “Thank you for being so kind to my father when you spoke with him on the docks. Not everyone in the ton is.”
“Are they unkind to you as well?”
Her shrug wasn’t as nonchalant as he suspected she’d intended it to be. “I am poor and Irish. What do you think?”
Duke pressed their entwined hands to his heart. “Tell me if anyone is ever making you unhappy. I’ll be in London instead of at Cambridge now. I can actually do something about their unkindness.”
“You are very thoughtful. I suspect you don’t fully realize that about yourself.” Eve had a way of making him feel one hundred feet tall.
“I stand by my offer,” he said. And knowing she had worried about being a burden the way his family often was, he added, “And that offer is being made eagerly and willingly.”
“And kindly,” she said. “But I won’t be in London for the Season, for any Season. The Huntresses and the Pack will be. My parents and sister will be. My brothers will be at Shrewsbury. And I—” She blinked a few times, clearly attempting to hold back her emotions. “I’ll be left behind by everyone.”
A tear slipped from her eye, and without a thought, Duke pulled her into an embrace.
Eve buried her head against him and took a shaky breath. “I don’t know why I’m suddenly so overset by this. I understand why it needs to happen, and I’m grateful that some of my family’s burdens will be lightened.”
“But your burdens have been added to.” His heart ached for her. “You love your family, and you don’t want them to suffer or be unhappy, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t permitted to be overwhelmed by all that has been placed on your shoulders or to grieve what it is costing you.”
Another of her breaths shook with emotion. “I feel as though my entire future was snatched away without warning, and I don’t even have anyone to talk to about it. My mother was so clearly heartbroken, and my father looked crushingly guilt-ridden. And I’m not supposed to tell Nia. ’Tis as if I’ve been abandoned already.”
“ I’m here,” he said softly. “I know what you’re facing, and I know what it is to feel very alone in carrying a family burden.” She was the one who had spotted in his eyes the loneliness he’d not ever acknowledged, even to himself.
“When Nia eventually learns about all this, promise me you won’t tell her I cried.”
“I won’t tell her.” He hoped he was offering Eve some comfort and reassurance.
“And if London is unkind, will you look out for her?”
“Like she is my own sister.”
She released a slow breath but a steady one this time. “That will help me worry less about her, though I will still miss her terribly when she’s in London.”
“We will miss you.” He silently added, And I will miss you.