Chapter Sixteen
“Ye’re starin’ at that box like it’s about to bite ye, milady.”
Cecilia startled, her hand flying to her throat. The sudden movement sent her pulse skittering beneath her fingertips, a frantic moth trapped against skin. She’d been so absorbed in the small, folded square of paper resting beside her jewellery box that she hadn’t heard Velma enter her chambers.
“I wasn’t staring,” Cecilia protested, though the lie tasted bitter on her tongue. “I was merely... thinking.”
“Thinkin’.” Velma’s tone suggested she found this explanation wholly inadequate. The maid crossed to the vanity with her usual brisk efficiency, arms laden with freshly pressed linens. “And would this thinkin’ have anythin’ to do with that wee note ye’ve been glarin’ at for the past quarter hour?”
Cecilia’s fingers trembled as she reached for the paper. The cream-coloured stationery felt heavier than it should, as though the words inside had physical weight. Three days. Three days since the fire had nearly consumed the east barn, three days since Adrian had almost…
She forcibly redirected her thoughts. The lake. The fire. The way Adrian had looked at her across the smoke-darkened courtyard before retreating behind his impenetrable walls once more. None of it mattered now, not compared to the words scrawled across this innocuous slip of paper.
“Read it,” she said quietly, extending the note toward Velma.
The maid’s work-roughened fingers took the paper with surprising delicacy. Her eyes scanned the message once, twice, then her face went pale beneath her freckles.
“Not everythin’ is as it seems. Right, Cecilia?” Velma read aloud, her voice dropping to barely above a whisper. “Mother Mary preserve us... who would write such a thing?”
“I was rather hoping you might have some insight.” Cecilia rose from her vanity stool, crossing to the window where early morning light streamed through gauzy curtains.
The floorboards were cool beneath her stockinged feet, sending tiny shivers up her calves with each step.
Below, Ravenscar Hall’s gardens stretched in geometric perfection—all clipped hedges and ordered paths, much like the Duke himself.
“I found it on my vanity this morning when I woke. Just... sitting there, as though someone had waltzed into my chambers whilst I slept and placed it deliberately for me to find.”
The thought sent ice cascading down her spine. Someone had been in her room. Had stood mere feet from where she’d lain vulnerable and unknowing, had watched her perhaps, had—
“Milady, ye’re shakin’…”
Velma’s hand settled warm and grounding on Cecilia’s shoulder.
“I’m fine,” Cecilia managed, though her voice emerged thinner than she’d intended. “Merely... a wee bit unnerved.”
“As well ye should be!” Velma’s practical nature reasserted itself with characteristic force. “Someone in this household kens exactly who ye are, milady. And they’re tryin’ to frighten ye.”
“Or warn me.” The words surprised Cecilia even as she spoke them. “Perhaps it’s not a threat at all. Perhaps someone is attempting to tell me something… something about Adrian, or the household, or…”
“Or perhaps,” Velma interrupted with the bluntness that came from years of friendship rather than mere service, “someone resents ye for yer deception. Half the staff still whispers about how ye infiltrated the household as a companion. Some think ye’re manipulative.
Others think ye’re brave beyond measure.
But all of them have opinions, milady, and not all of those opinions are charitable. ”
Cecilia pressed her forehead against the cool window glass. The condensation from her breath fogged the pane, obscuring the perfect gardens below into watercolour smudges. “Then what do you suggest? That I simply ignore anonymous threats left on my vanity like unwanted calling cards?”
“I suggest ye tell the Duke.” Velma’s tone brooked no argument. “He deserves to ken if someone in his own household is threatenin’ his duchess.”
“He doesn’t care.” The admission tasted like ash. “Adrian has made his feelings about our marriage abundantly clear, Velma. We are bound by duty and obligation, nothing more. He’s not going to suddenly transform into a concerned husband simply because someone left me a cryptic note.”
“Ye dinnae believe that.”
“I don’t know what I believe anymore.” Cecilia turned from the window, wrapping her arms around herself despite the room’s warmth.
“One moment he’s kissing me as though I’m the only woman in existence, the next he’s ordering me from his presence as though I’m some sort of contamination.
At the lake, he was…” She stopped, heat flooding her cheeks.
“And then, nothing. Three days, Velma. Three days of polite nods across the breakfast table and carefully orchestrated avoidance.”
“That’s nae right, milady.” Velma’s voice had gone sharp, protective. “I dinnae care how complicated his feelin’s are, or how frozen his heart or what other poppycock—ye deserve tae be treated better than that.”
Cecilia blinked, startled by the fierce tone.
“I mean it.” Velma continued, setting down the gown she’d been mending.
A sharp knock at the door froze them both mid-conversation.
“Duchess?” Adrian’s voice carried through the heavy oak with unmistakable authority. “I require a word.”
Velma’s eyes went wide as saucers. “He cannae have heard—”
“Shh!” Cecilia frantically gestured for silence whilst simultaneously attempting to hide the note.
Where? The jewellery box—too obvious. Her reticule—within reach?
No time. In a moment of pure panic, she shoved the folded paper down the front of her morning dress, feeling it settle awkwardly between her breasts, the paper’s edge sharp against tender skin, just as the door swung open without warning.
Adrian’s broad frame filled the threshold.
He was still dressed in his riding clothes—buff breeches tucked into gleaming Hessians and a dark coat emphasising shoulders that seemed to fill the entire doorway.
The scent of leather and horse and autumn air preceded him, masculine and intoxicating.
His black eyes swept the room with that particular intensity she’d come to recognise, cataloguing her pale face and Velma’s protective stance in less than a heartbeat.
“Your Grace!” Velma bobbed a hasty curtsy, shooting Cecilia a look that screamed Tell him now. “We were just—”
“Having a private conversation, clearly.” Adrian’s voice was deceptively mild, but Cecilia heard the edge beneath it. “About something that requires closed doors and worried expressions.” His gaze fixed on her. “What did Velma mean by ‘telling him’?”
“I—” Cecilia’s mind raced, scrambling for plausible explanations. Her heart hammered so violently she was certain he could see it through the thin fabric of her shawl. “It was nothing, Your Grace. Merely a household matter.”
“What sort of household matter?” He stepped fully into her chambers with the casual presumption of a husband—which he was, she reminded herself, though the intimacy of having him in her private space whilst she wore nothing but a morning dress and shawl felt suddenly, dangerously charged.
Velma, bless her, leapt into the breach with admirable creativity. “A misplaced order from the modiste, Yer Grace. I was suggestin’ Her Grace mention it to ye, but she insisted ‘twas too trivial to bother ye with.”
Adrian’s expression remained impassive, though something flickered in those black eyes—doubt, perhaps, or suspicion. “I see. And this misplaced order requires such furtive conversation in dimly lit bedchambers?”
“The draperies were merely drawn against the morning glare, Your Grace,” Cecilia said with as much dignity as she could muster while actively concealing evidence against her person. “I find the light rather harsh before I’ve had my tea.”
“Hmm.” The sound conveyed volumes of scepticism.
He studied her for a long moment—long enough that Cecilia felt certain he could see straight through fabric and flesh to the paper burning against her skin—before apparently deciding to let the matter rest. “I came to inform you that we’ve received an invitation.
Cassian and Charlotte are hosting their anniversary ball next week.
Your presence, as my duchess, will be required. ”
A ball. A grand social event where she would be required to smile and make pleasant conversation while all of London society dissected every word, every gesture, every interaction between herself and her husband.
“How delightful,” Cecilia managed, injecting false brightness into her tone. “I shall look forward to it immensely.”
He turned toward the door, then paused, glancing back over his shoulder with an expression Cecilia couldn’t quite decipher.
The morning light caught the sharp plane of his jaw, throwing half his face into shadow.
“Cecilia…if there were something troubling you, something beyond misplaced modiste orders and morning glare... you would tell me. Wouldn’t you? ”
The question hung in the air between them, weighted with unspoken meaning.
This was her chance. She could reach into her bodice, produce the note, explain everything.
Let him shoulder this burden as husbands were meant to do.
But the memory of his cold dismissal after the lake, the way he’d ordered her from his presence as though her touch contaminated him, rose like bile in her throat.
“Of course, Your Grace,” she lied smoothly. “Should anything of import occur, you shall be the first to know.”
Something that might have been disappointment—or was it relief?—flickered across his features before the mask of ducal composure settled firmly back into place.
“Then I shall leave you to your morning preparations. Good day, Duchess.” He nodded curtly to Velma.
The door closed behind him with a soft click.
Cecilia remained frozen for several heartbeats after his departure, hardly daring to breathe.
Only when the silence pressed against her eardrums did she realise she’d been holding her breath, her lungs burning with the effort.
Only when his footsteps faded down the corridor did she extract the crumpled note from its hiding place, smoothing it against her skirts with trembling fingers.
“Ye should have told him, milady,” Velma said quietly. “He would have protected ye.”
“I can take care of myself, Velma.”
The maid sighed, deep and weary. “Ye’re plannin’ somethin’, milady. I can see it in yer eyes.”
“I’m going to find out who sent this.” Cecilia moved to her dressing table, opening the ornate jewellery box and tucking the note beneath the velvet lining that held her mother’s pearl necklace.
The pearls gleamed milky-white in the morning light, each one a tiny moon holding memories of Edinburgh, of her mother’s gentle hands clasping them around her throat.
“Before the ball. Before they have a chance to expose me in front of half of London society and destroy whatever fragile standing Adrian’s managed to rebuild. ”
“And how exactly d’ye plan to do that?”
“I’ll watch. Listen. Pay attention to who’s been where, who has access to my chambers, who stands to gain from exposing my lies.
” Cecilia closed the box with a soft click.
“Henry’s the obvious suspect, but Velma—you were right.
A jealous servant. Someone from my father’s household… it could be anyone…”
Velma looked troubled. “That’s a dark thought, milady.”
“These are dark times.” Cecilia pressed her hand against the closed jewellery box, feeling the solid wood beneath her palm. “Someone is playing games with me. With us. And I’ll be damned if I let them win without a fight.”
“Just promise me one thing.” Velma stood, her expression serious. “Promise that if it gets dangerous—if whoever sent that note makes a move—ye’ll go straight to His Grace. Pride be damned.”
“I promise.” The lie came easier now, worn smooth by repetition.
Velma didn’t believe her—that much was obvious in the tightness around her mouth, the way she shook her head. “Ye’re as stubborn as yer mother was. God rest her soul.”
After Velma left, Cecilia remained at her vanity watching the afternoon light shift.
Dust motes danced in the golden beams, tiny galaxies suspended in stillness.
Inside the jewellery box, the note waited.
On Friday, she’d stand beside Adrian at the ball while someone held the power to destroy everything.
If someone thought they could frighten her with threats, they were about to discover that Lady Cecilia Bedford—Ravenscar now—jilted bride, failed spy, reluctant duchess—was far more dangerous when cornered than anyone suspected.
Whoever was playing this game had made one mistake: they’d assumed she’d run and hide behind her husband’s protection. They didn’t know her at all.