Charmed at Christmas (Christmas at Castle Keyvnor Book 1)

by Claire Delacroix

  That was what she should have been focusing on.

  Not these new—scary yet so undeniably good—sensations.

  “Well, then,” she managed to get out, reaching up to straighten her hair. It was, as always, a wild mess she couldn’t possibly hope to contain on her own. Her maid would have a fit.

  “I did not expect that,” Nicholas said, that slow smirk that was so customary on lips—lips reddened from her kisses. “I mean, I wanted it, but I thought you—”

  He had wanted her to kiss him? She blinked, trying to process this all, but coming up short. This was new too, and she didn’t want the new. She wanted the old, the familiar, the same as her life had been for years.

  She had too much to think about now. “That was enough experimentation, I think. You may go now.”

  Something flashed across his face. Pain, she thought. Hurt, too. Tressa had not mentioned men would be dejected when you asked them to leave. Felicity had never thought she had the capacity to wound Nicholas. He’d always thought so highly of himself, and brushed off all her comments.

  “I—” Nicholas shut his mouth, apparently as confused as she felt too. “I’ll never understand you, Felicity Fields.”

  Then he was gone. Out the tunnel to the garden, she noted abstractly, when he could have just exited through the study.

  So she was alone. Instead of thinking she’d completed this little exercise quite well, she felt sadness. Loneliness, like she hadn’t felt since Margaret passed.

  She did not like this, not at all. The world was changing around her, and she did not know how to bring things back to rights.

  Chapter 9

  Nicholas passed another sleepless night in the room he couldn’t think of as anything other than his Uncle Randall’s chambers; even though his uncle was long deceased, and his father had actually been the last one to sleep in these rooms. The old duke had never seemed to mind staying in his dead brother-in-law’s quarters—he’d simply charged in, demanded the servants deliver his baggage to the master suite, and went to tea with his sister Margaret like nothing had changed.

  But that had been Father. Nicholas couldn’t think of a single circumstance where his father hadn’t acted with self-righteous aggrandizement—as the Duke of Wycliffe, he assumed that the world would move out of his way, and it usually did.

  No matter what he did, Nicholas could not summon that same confidence. The only time he’d felt as though he was truly doing what he was meant to do—truly making a difference—had been with his Night Watch Bill.

  During his summers at Tetbery, he’d watched as Felicity changed one variable in an experiment to see if it produced a different conclusion. As in all things, she was fastidious, observing every result and taking comprehensive notes.

  Science, Felicity had said, was about progress. The human race could not expect to move forward by continuing on as they always had, with the same exact habits and beliefs. So when he’d created his bill, he’d tried to improve upon the existing policing system, increasing communicating and hopefully lowering the crime rate.

  But the House of Lords did not want the new and untried. They wanted the same established strictures giving them power for centuries.

  There was comfort to be found in the old and routine, or so he’d always believed. Toe the mark, and never court controversy. Hardings, as his father always said, did not need to work at being important—by the grace of their lineage, they already had everything anyone could want.

  Aunt Margaret, though, had been different. When she’d married Randall, it was not his title that mattered. It was Randall himself: his kindness, his inherent sense of responsibility, and his love for his family estate.

  That was what had mattered to Randall and Margaret: family. They’d mourned their lack of children fiercely—not because the Tetbery title would go into abeyance without a male heir, but because they longed to share their love with a child. When their friends passed, they’d immediately volunteered to take Felicity in.

  Even as a boy, Nicholas had marked how much happier they were once Felicity came to live with them.

  Now, as Nicholas sat at the long dining table that had once belonged to them, he couldn’t shake the feeling that his uncle was watching him—and frowning in disapproval because he’d kissed Felicity.

  He, who ought to know better than to enter into an emotional entanglement with a woman who didn’t want to be his duchess. Felicity had made it damnably clear that she didn’t want anything to do with the beau monde.

  Or him, for that matter.

  That was enough experimentation, I think. You may go now.

  It was not the first dismissal he’d received from her over the years. Yet it was the first one to feel final, as if a door had been summarily closed—a door he hadn’t even realized he wanted to remain open.

  Before he arrived at Tetbery, he’d been sure of his plan—almost as certain as she always seemed to be. Now that Margaret was gone, Felicity ought to move on with her life. As the daughter of a baron, with ties to both Tetbery and Wycliffe, she could find her place in society, and marry someone who would find all her peculiar mannerisms endearing.

  He’d never stopped to question whether or not Felicity would want this future.

  Or how he’d feel about her marrying someone else.

  He tried to push those uncomfortable sensations to the back of his mind. Outside of this estate, he was sure, any strange yearnings for Felicity would cease. He just needed to get back to London, where things were familiar.

  By the time he’d plowed halfway through his plate piled high with cold meat, cheese, and eggs, Tolsworth had entered the dining room. “Good morning, Your Grace.”

  It never failed to amaze him how the butler managed to sound and look perfectly deferential, yet still convey his disapproval.

  Nicholas bit back a sigh. Tolsworth had never liked him, but he didn’t dare dismiss the butler, given how many times Margaret had said her servants were like family.

  Even if Felicity was certain there were no ghosts, he didn’t want to risk Margaret’s unearthly wrath.

  “Miss Fields mentioned no one had informed her of my arrival.” When Tolsworth did not comment, Nicholas continued, “Did you not receive my letter?”

  “Oh no, Your Grace, we did.” Tolsworth stood there, hands at his sides, that vaguely-respectful-but-not-really expression upon his old, square face.

  “I assume there is a reason why you did not inform Miss Fields of my arrival.”

  Tolsworth nodded.

  “And that reason is?”

  Tolsworth’s lips turned down in a pained grimace. “Would you want to be the one to inform Miss Fields of your arrival?”

  The butler looked so aggrieved at the thought, Nicholas found himself nodding in agreement. “It wasn’t the most pleasant experience, I’ll grant you that.”

  Tolsworth nodded again, yet this time Nicholas could have sworn he saw the hint of a smile on the stoic man’s lips.

  “I have to ask, Tolsworth, how has she been these last few months? Since Aunt Margaret’s death.”

  Tolsworth swallowed, that small smile eradicated. “There is some concern, Your Grace, that Miss Fields has not processed the countess’s demise well. It might be to your advantage to visit the mausoleum.”

  Were it not for how the worry etched deep in Tolsworth’s forehead, Nicholas would have thought the man was criticizing him for not coming home for Margaret’s funeral. Instead, it sounded as though the butler was genuinely concerned for Felicity—as though he were trying very hard to delicately express something he didn’t know how to explain.

  “I see,” Nicholas said. “I will take that under advisement. Do you know where Miss Fields is now?”

  “I believe she said something about the kitchen, Your Grace.”

  Nicholas nodded. She’d always liked baking—she’d said once that every recipe called for a specific amount of ingredients added in a specific manner, and the slightest deviation from the norm
created a different result.

  Perhaps that was what he had done wrong with his bill: he had deviated too far from the norm, too fast. He ought to have taken it slower, changed one thing at a time and observed the results.

  How funny it was that the girl who claimed she’d never prosper in society might know how to navigate it better than he had.

  Chapter 10

  Felicity had spent the morning in the kitchen with the cook, Mrs. Manning, as she always did when she couldn’t solve a puzzle. While cooking was chaotic, leaving too much room for experimentation, baking had a set order. She knew the precise amount of time she had to whip heavy cream to get a perfect filling for her cake; stopping too soon would make the cream watery, while whipping too long produced butter.

  Being in the kitchen soothed her disordered mind, and often she found the solution she was looking for while in the midst of a recipe. And she got to eat the results, so it was as delicious an enterprise as it was productive.

  Baking was logical.

  Science was logical.

  Emotions were not.

  Felicity sighed, drying her hands on her apron. She’d just placed her famous three-layer lemon cake in the oven, and she was nowhere closer to knowing why kissing Nicholas had affected her so. All of her attempts at reducing the kiss down to a purely physical reaction came up short. She could attribute her pounding heart, heavy breathing, and sweaty palms to anatomical responses; the increased blood flow had given her stiffened nipples and contributed to her fluttery stomach and her tingling core.

  Yet knowing that—and even knowing that physical responses could also simulate attachment—did not ease her mind the way it should have. Science had been her touchstone, offering explanations devoid of the messy complexities of emotion.

  Margaret’s death had changed all of that. The rules she’d prized so highly kept failing her. Never had she worked so hard, for so long, without achieving the right result.

  Never had she doubted her own choices.

  “You need to move on, Fieldsy,” Tressa had said, when she’d first found out about Felicity’s attempts to recreate the Philosopher’s Stone. “You need to accept that Margaret is gone. This isn’t healthy.”

  Since the first day she’d come to Tetbery as a scared and lonely four-year-old, Tressa Teague had been Felicity’s constant—almost as much of a guide, a comfort, to her as science was. Though they were vastly different, their friendship had stood the test of time because they understood each other.

  We deserve more, Tressa said. We deserve happiness.

  She’d always been so certain that Felicity had worth. It didn’t matter to her what Felicity accomplished scientifically—Tressa had believed in her long before she’d ever converted that secret room behind Uncle Randall’s old study into her laboratory. While the rest of Bocka Morrow—while Nicholas—considered Felicity dispassionate and awkward, Tressa thought she was brilliant. Loyal. Caring.

  The kind of woman who maybe, just maybe, was deserving of love. Real love, like what Tressa’s sister Nessa had found with Lord Harry Beck.

  Felicity had been lucky to know familial love. To have the love of friends like Tressa and Mallory. But she had never known—never really wanted, she would have claimed—the love of a man.

  And she’d certainly never thought about Nicholas that way, before this week.

  Had she?

  She frowned down into her empty mixing bowl, swiping at an errant curl that had escaped from her chignon. After the first summer, she’d viewed Nicholas as a necessary nuisance, like wearing a petticoat or going to church. Every once in a while, he was useful when conducting an experiment, or he surprised her by saying something clever. The rest of the time, he was simply there, his endless chatter becoming background noise.

  In the last six years without him, the estate had become quiet. When Margaret was alive, she hadn’t much minded that. She’d claimed for so long she wanted silence to do her work that it seemed hypocritical to complain—to wish for Nicholas to return, and foul up the works again.

  Yet without Margaret…she couldn’t ignore the fact that she’d missed Nicholas’s companionship.

  That scared her most of all.

  Nicholas was never a permanent fixture in her life. He came and went every summer, and then he’d disappeared for a long time.

  But unlike Margaret, who had never wanted to leave, he’d stayed away by choice.

  So when he hustled into the kitchen, she braced herself for the worse. He would surely be leaving soon—how could he not, when he’d looked so miffed the day before? She’d never been adept at reading people’s faces, but even she knew she’d wounded him.

  She just didn’t know what to do next.

  “There you are, finally.” He did not sound upset. Just…concerned. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I was just about to check your laboratory when Tolsworth mentioned you were in the kitchen.”

  She hated it when anyone worried about her, for those worries usually came with a side of judgment and disapproval. She heard Georgina’s voice in her ears, then Tressa’s quiet disavowal of her experiments.

  You’re not right in the head, Felicity. I wish my aunt had never taken you in.

  You’re opening Pandora’s Box, Fieldsy, and I worry you won’t be able to close it.

  Yet…she could not summon her usual level of irritation. She felt—God help her—almost pleased by his concern for her.

  And that frightened her almost as much as kissing him had.

  She scrubbed at the counter with a towel, wiping up the egg she’d spilled. She took far longer than necessary, because it made her look occupied. As if she had a purpose.

  “That smells amazing.” Nicholas crossed to the big coal-fired stove. “Is that your lemon cake? God, I’ve been dreaming of that.”

  He reminded her of a bunny rabbit with his wild sniffing—but bunny rabbits did not befuddle her the way he did.

  Another metaphor that did not work as she wanted it to.

  She tried not to wonder what else he might have been dreaming about. Had he thought about their kiss? Did she care if he had?

  This was why she hadn’t wanted romance. It distracted her, when she needed to be focused on alchemy.

  “It is, but it’s for dinner tonight, so you’ll have to wait.” She busied herself with tidying up the kitchen, seeking solace in the activity. That was what she was best at: action. The concrete, the actionable, the provable. “Why did you want to see me? I haven’t changed my mind about London. I’m not going with you.”

  He ignored her quarrelsome tone, smiling at her. Not his customary smirk, but something gentler—something that felt akin to a soft caress, if that were possible. “I have been thinking about that.”

  “Lord save us all.” It was easier to be acerbic. Easier than confronting the way her heart pounded against her chest as he stepped closer, his masculine scent blending with the sweet tartness of the baking lemon cake, the combination somehow complimentary, as if they were meant to be together.

  But that was nonsense—dukes did not usually spend time in the scullery.

  Hell, he probably didn’t even approve of her being in the kitchen.

  “If you’ve come to tell me I shouldn’t be baking because we have servants for that, you can save your breath.” She notched her chin higher, steeling herself for his reproach. “Mrs. Manning is doing me a favor by giving me access to her oven. I asked her to leave me alone for a few hours. I won’t have you scolding her for abiding by my request.”

  He drew back from her, hurt flashing across his face. “Bloody hell, Felicity, what kind of man do you think I am?”

  “I don’t know. You don’t make sense to me.” She hadn’t meant to be that honest, but the words had popped out before she could stop them. “I used to think that you were different from the rest—that you were my friend. But then you stopped visiting, and you didn’t come to Margaret’s funeral. Now you demand I abide by your rules, with no care about what
I want.”

  “I am your friend, Lissie.” He selected an apple from the bowl on the table, giving it a quick rub against his breeches. “And I care about you.”

  “Mrs. Manning will be annoyed at you,” Felicity said, with a nod to the apple. Not that the cook could do much to Nicholas, given that he was her employer. “Those are for dinner tonight, too.”

  “I will apologize,” he said, as if that made everything better.

  It didn’t. Apologies were pretty words that changed nothing.

  Nicholas took a large bite from the apple, chewed, and swallowed—all the while watching her, studying her reaction. It was unnerving.

  She narrowed her eyes as she gathered up the kitchen implements she’d used so that the scullery maids could wash them. “Why are you staring at me?”

  “I was wrong before,” he said, ignoring her question. “You don’t have to come to London with me. If you want to stay here, I’ll make sure you have enough money to run the estate, and I’ll hire you a companion.”

  His words took her by such surprise she dropped the mixing bowl she’d been holding, and it clattered to the floor. She looked from the bowl to Nicholas and back again, her mouth agape, eyes as wide as the bowl’s rim.

  “Is that what you want?” Nicholas asked, as he knelt down to retrieve the bowl.

  “Yesyesabsolutely.” She nodded emphatically, all her words running together.

  He’d given her the greatest gift—the chance to work in peace. She could continue her efforts to bring back Margaret, and she wouldn’t have to worry about money.

  “I’m glad you’re happy, then.” He placed the bowl on the counter, then took her hand in his, giving it a squeeze. “I should have seen it before. I had breakfast with a friend today, and he reminded me of my real duty to you.”

  There it was again, that word: duty. What was she to him, then? An obligation? A friend? Or something more?