Chapter Twenty-seven
“London seems …” Alexios hesitated. The three of them were standing at the rail while the tide brought them in on the Thames. “Awfully dirty.”
“Compared to Santorini, yes.” Christian was so excited to be home he was almost vibrating with nervous energy. “The Equus farm is out in the country. Nothing but rolling green meadows. Your mares are going to love it.”
Once Alexios discovered Christian was the owner of the famous Equus Stables, his opinion of his brother-in-law was undeniably altered. Christian was impressed with all Alexios had accomplished with few funds but a remarkable understanding of bloodlines and breeding. When the time came, Christian invited Alexios back to Equus and planned to integrate some of his brother-in-law’s theories into his own practices. If their new friendship and business arrangement helped him get back with his wife, well then that would be excellent. At this point Christian wasn’t above any tricks possible.
It had been two months since he’d seen his wife, and he hadn’t had a dreamless night since. Even staying busy with Alexios and the horses and having epic philosophical conversations with his daughter, Thea was on his mind constantly. One evening when he’d carved out a moment alone on deck and was contemplating whether Thea was looking at the same stars he was, he realized he was pining. How humiliating. If the same thing happened to any of his friends, he would have teased them mercilessly. In fact he had done that very thing when Thomas and Dalton had fallen for their wives.
The three of them climbed into a hired carriage and Christian paid the driver double to get them home quickly. Christian gritted his teeth while Lucy chattered away and Alexios watched the scenery with his mouth agape.
Rolling smoothly along St. James, Christian waved to some of the gentlemen loitering outside White’s. Granted he’d been absent from society for months, but the cheer that rose from the crowd was more than he expected. Several well-dressed men separated from the group and trotted over to catch up with the carriage. Christian had the driver pause in the street to greet his friends. He didn’t have the opportunity to introduce Alexios to them before they launched into excited conversation.
“So good to see you hale and hearty,” Barton told him with a vigorous handshake.
Phillip Greensley agreed and took his turn pumping Christian’s hand. “Certainly better than expected, chap.”
“Thank you,” Christian said, but wasn’t exactly sure what he was thanking them for. “I’ll see you at the club soon.”
“Right-o.” Barton grinned.
“Don’t rush anything,” Greensley added.
Christian signaled the driver to move on. He couldn’t help overhearing Barton holler back to the crowd at White’s, “I told you he could swim. Who won the bet?”
What bet? He cringed at the idea his name was somehow associated with the famous wager book.
At Hyde Park another friend called to the carriage from atop a horse, the same stallion the man had purchased through Equus last season. “I see you’ve been eating your lime ration, Morewether. Bully for you! You had us worried there.”
Christian raised a hand in salute but didn’t stop the carriage this time. What the hell were these people talking about? He’d figure it out after he got home. He had way too much on his mind to care what these idiots were babbling.
“There’s the house.” Lucy bounced on the seat.
“Which one?” Alexios surveyed the street.
“That one,” Lucy pointed at Christian’s townhouse.
Alexios crinkled his brow. “Which part?”
“All of it.” Lucy was standing in the carriage now, overcome with excitement.
Christian’s brother-in-law stared at the house, mouth agape. “I find myself becoming more inclined to your side in the argument with my sister.”
He smiled. It didn’t matter to Christian if his wife’s brother was swayed due to his wealth or his ability to help Alexios with his horse breeding dreams. Whatever got him a leg up in the marriage war he was prepared to launch the minute he got to her townhouse. The first order of business was a bath and fresh clothes. It couldn’t hurt to look as good as humanly possible during the wooing.
“Your Grace,” his footman said from the open front door before the carriage had even come to a complete stop. “Miss Lucy.”
Lucy gave Riley a wave as she raced past him. “Grand!”
“Hello, Riley. This is Alexios Costas, my wife’s brother. Tell Mrs. Cranston to have a room made up.”
“Right away, Your Grace.” He nodded to Alexios and took Christian’s hat, then added in an aside, “Good to have you home. No one believed that Kraken story.”
He narrowed his eyes at his butler, but the man had already turned away to direct the staff, many of whom had made it to the front hall to welcome the duke home.
“It’s good to have you home, Your Grace,” his valet told him as he trailed behind him up the stairs.
“Agreed, Morris. Good to be home.” Christian couldn’t wait to get the travel stained-clothes off and slip into a bath. He shrugged his jacket off on the landing, tossing it back to Morris, and was unwinding his neck cloth before he even made the door to his suite. “I’ll be going back out directly. Find something … matrimonial for me to wear, won’t you? I’m off to woo my wife.”
“Certainly. Shall I tell Her Grace she is requested?”
Christian handed over more creased and grimy clothes. “No. I’ll converse with my mother later.”
Stooping to pick up the trail of discarded garments, Morris said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean the Dowager but your wife, sir.”
Oh, right. Of course. Wrong Her Grace. “No.” The water steamed invitingly and fluffy toweling waited on a warmer. “I’ll have better luck going to her house, hat in hand so to speak.” The heated water sloshed against his back as he eased into the copper tub. He released a mighty, contented sigh.
“Her house?” Morris’s voice drifted in from the dressing room.
Christian didn’t answer. He closed his eyes and mouth and sunk in deep, letting the liquid sluice over his head. He stayed under until his breath ran out.
“… since Thursday.”
“Hmmm?” He gave himself a quick scrub. He was anxious and excited to get to the wooing portion of the afternoon.
“With her young brothers.” Morris held out a warm towel.
“Are they settling into a routine until the school term starts?” Christian asked while he ruffled dry his hair with more toweling. Morris was a great valet, but he was a better gossip. The man knew everything, not only about Christian’s own house, but all the best houses in town. He knew who was flush and who was hiding from the money lenders. He knew who was sneaking in and out of which bedrooms and which spouses pretended not to know about it. Christian hoped his man would have an inkling of his wife’s mood so Christian would know how to expect their reunion to go.
“Not as much as the staff would hope. A bit excitable, but you know how boys are.” Morris whipped shaving soap to a froth while Christian put on his robe. “Still, her staff is settling in together nicely. Greene, you know the tall footman —” Morris was scraping his chin with a razor so he wisely didn’t nod his head. “— is sweet on her maid. Completely understandable as Hudson is a pretty little thing, if a bit skittish.”
Christian grabbed Morris’s wrist. “Sweet on her maid? Did they know each other before?”
“I don’t believe so. Still, I’ve seen them together below stairs, and Greene gets a mighty blush every time she’s near.”
He was confused, and he must have looked it. “Below whose stairs?”
“Yours, Your Grace. No need to worry, though, nothing out of line has occurred. Old Cranston would never allow that, you know.”
“Why is the duchess’s maid below stairs often enough to engender a crush in my footman and worry the housekeeper?”
Morris’s forehead crinkled together around his gathered eyebrows. “Well not alone, of cou
rse. The entire staff is there.”
He stared at the valet for a beat before saying, “I’m not following.”
“Begging your pardon, Your Grace, but what aren’t you following?”
Obviously, at some point, he’d missed Morris explain that Thea and her brothers were living in his house, no longer letting the townhouse she had been in before. “She’s here?” Christian asked, to clarify.
“Yes, Your Grace, since Thursday past.”
Well, this is certainly going to simplify things.
What surprised her most about her return to London, was how the minute the title Duchess of Morewether was tossed about, things happened. Carriages arrived at her whim. Shop girls fawned over her. That was not to say she had ever been treated rudely as Miss Ashbrook, but put duchess or Your Grace in there and all manner of doors opened. Still, hoping to get settled in town before having to deal with her presumably furious husband, Thea and her brothers were back in residence at the same leased townhouse exactly one day before her mother-in-law appeared at her doorstep. Thea squared her shoulders and managed a smile having no idea what to expect.
“Your Grace,” Thea said as she glided into the front sitting room where Collins had placed her.
“That’s what I should say to you.” The dowager duchess’ smile was real and generous. “How are you, darling?”
That was unexpected. Thea blinked. “I am well.” She indicated they should sit. The other woman kept her hand clasped in her own and poised next to her on the settee.
“And your voyage?”
“Calm,” Thea answered. “Mostly.” There had been nothing calm about anything once Hektor and Georgios were on board.
The dowager duchess nodded. “And how is my son?”
“I … I … I don’t know. I should think you’d know better than I. I’ve not seen him since I’ve returned.”
“Oh, my.” Her mother-in-law’s free hand flew to her mouth. “You did not see him in Greece then?” When Thea didn’t answer, the woman explained. “He intended to catch up to you in Greece. He left on the first ship he could force to sail after you. His daughter sneaked after him, leaving poor Miss Honeysett and me a note saying she was tagging along to help him. We haven’t heard from either since.”
Oh, no. No. No. No. “I never saw or heard anything from him. I left for the return voyage to England as soon as I could gather my brothers. Collins,” Thea called to the butler. “Send up tea immediately. And maybe something a little stronger as well.” Her mother-in-law did not look well. Thea clasped both hands in hers and squeezed gently. “What do we do?”
The lady shook her head and gave a slight shrug. “More waiting, I presume.”
Thea had so many weeks to convince herself she was in control, that she would take the reins of her life — as she’d always intended — the unexpected news caught her unprepared. Her stomach clenched, and she couldn’t decide if it was more from fear or anger. As angry as she was at Christian, and she was still furious for being made a fool of, she also couldn’t ignore the fact she still loved the scoundrel. But now he was missing, in pursuit of her no less. If anything happened to him, it would be her fault.
“I’m so sorry,” she told the dowager duchess. “If anything happens —”
“No.” Her mother-in-law pulled her hands from the comforting embrace. “We’re not to think anything will happen. There has been no news of catastrophe at sea, no storms. He’ll be home shortly.” She gave a short decisive nod. “Then you may chastise him repeatedly for his misdeeds. We’ll speak no doom and gloom, do you hear?”
“Yes, Your Grace.” A small smile chased away Thea’s fear.
“Come, come.” The older lady stood with a determined air. “Get your things.”
“Where are we going?”
“Home, of course.”
Within minutes her rented house was in a frenzy, the tea cart she’d summoned sitting abandoned in the front parlor. Hudson was repacking her clothes and a battery of footmen were collecting Hektor and Georgios and all the belongings that had accumulated around them.
Anna squealed upon her arrival. Even though her mother-in-law had expressed no disfavor to her, Thea was grateful to have an ally.
“Oh, will your husband be furious he missed you,” Anna said as she embraced her.
Thea pulled her friend into a quiet sitting room. “What am I to do?”
“What do you mean?”
She was still trying to digest the unexpected fact that her stupid husband had chased after her. And the even more distressing detail that he hadn’t returned yet. “How can I possibly stay angry with Christian?” She gripped Anna’s hand in her own, squeezing hard. “What if he never comes back?”
Anna pulled her back into her arms and patted her back the way her mother had done when there were no easy answers. “Everything will work out. I’m certain he’s fine.” She pulled back and saw Thea’s tears. “Really, this is the famous Duke of Morewether we’re talking about. The man was born with a lucky charm in his pocket.”
Thea blinked back the tears. “But —”
“No, we can’t panic.”
“If he dies, then I can’t kill him.” The tears came in abundance then.
Anna laughed and hugged her tighter.
“If he comes back dead,” Thea said, “it better be because a Kraken got him.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
He was both nervous and giddy to see his wife. Christian couldn’t decide if it would be better to go out looking for her or wait until Thea got home from her errands. He had no idea how military men did it, going for months or years at a time with nothing but letters from their loved ones.
Damn, he missed his wife.
He couldn’t wait to get her in his arms, kiss her beautiful face, close his eyes and listen to her murmur to him with that lovely accent. The last two months had been miserable. Tonight they would have the honeymoon night they should have had before.
In the absence of his beloved, he would have appreciated some motherly attention, but all the women in his life were away from home, probably on their visiting rounds. Even if he wanted to hit the streets of Mayfair to find his wife, he wouldn’t have any idea where to start.
His homecoming was dramatically less exciting with no one to come home to.
Lucy was probably upstairs with his mother’s cat. His daughter had spoken about that damn cat ad nauseam the last two days. He had no idea where Alexios was now, but he’d had enough conversations with his brother-in-law in the last weeks to hold him over for a while.
What Christian wanted was someone soft, someone who smelled sweet when you nuzzled her neck. He wanted someone to kiss. He wanted a wife who would ease the ever-present ache for a wedding night which had never happened. He’d made the epic mistake of going into Thea’s bedroom only to be awash in her scent, and now he couldn’t get it out of his mind.
He wandered the main floor of his townhouse, through the conservatory and around the ballroom. Outside the glass-paned doors, he stepped into the garden. The skeleton of the famous burned-out tree stood testimony to his life as a reprobate. All that time on a ship gave a man ample time to review his sins. Why had he left it there? Surely he hadn’t actually thought it funny, had he? In the past, he had gossiped about how that mistress had been a raving lunatic, he had even enjoyed the notoriety, but in reality hadn’t she actually been quite sad in her distraught, manic state? He found the gardener and instructed him to have the tree removed and a new one — something that flowered — planted in its place.
He was in the front hall willing the door to open when the knocker sounded, causing him to give an embarrassing little hop, which the footman was well-trained enough to ignore when he answered the summons. The grinning face attached to his best friend stood on the front step.
“Hi ho! So good to see you back whole,” Thomas said, as he strode confidently into the foyer. He grasped the hand Christian extended for a shake and yanked him in for a hug. After a he
arty slap on the arm, Thomas stepped back and assessed him. “Let me see you. No eye patch. No signs of tentacle damage. Hearty and whole are you?”
This again. “What in Hades is everyone talking about?”
Thomas chuckled. “When your wife returned without you, it started going around town that you were taken prisoner by pirates. Or fell overboard in the Mediterranean Sea, never to be seen from again.”
Christian narrowed his eyes. “But what the hell is with the tentacles?”
A great booming laugh filled the foyer, suggesting whatever Thomas told Christian was going to irritate him. He was intimately familiar with his friend’s many laughs and this one was definitely at his expense. “That would be the tale that the Kraken that dragged you off the ship into a watery grave.”
“Why would anyone get such preposterous ideas?”
With a dismissive wave, Thomas said, “Conversations may have been overheard and misinterpreted. You know how gossip spreads and grows.”
“What conversations were you people having?”
Thomas got a hold of his laughter and wiped the damn grin off his face. “Perhaps I’ll let you have that conversation with your wife.” He steered Christian towards his study. “I came as soon as my valet heard you were home — people talking, as I said. Your escapades have been a source of great amusement these last months. First, with a whirlwind marriage to a woman you’re so obviously mad for, who then runs off with you following close behind. The great Duke of Morewether brought low by a foreigner, no less. Things really went mad when she came home without you. Really, man, I think I can safely say old Lord Farley could take up an affair with a sheep and no one would notice.”
That idea didn’t please Christian one bit. Perhaps if the stories didn’t have him looking like such a buffoon … “I notice you didn’t list my daughter’s appearance in that list of my sins.”
Thomas’s expression grew serious. “She’s with you, isn’t she?” When Christian nodded, he continued. “We’ve managed to keep her out of it, but not because it would hurt your reputation.”
The Duke of Morewether’s Secret Page 22
