“I can’t believe you chose Halsey,” said Cynthia, and laid a hand on Janice’s arm. “Please reconsider. Look how lonely Luke is. And he’s so much more handsome than the duke. His Grace looks like he should be thrown into a mud puddle to loosen him up a bit.”
“Be patient,” Janice whispered, amused that her little sister didn’t comprehend what she was up to. “You’ll see.”
She raised a hand in the air, and the noise died down. “I’d better explain further.” She looked at Halsey. “I said yes to the duke. But I’m turning you down, Halsey. If I were you, I’d cling to your grandmother’s affection. You’re going to need it. You’re going to need her.”
“What the devil are you talking about?” Halsey’s composure was cracking. Beads of sweat dampened that beautiful lock of hair over his eye.
“Yes,” said Daddy. “What’s this about, young lady?”
Duncan and her brothers also looked mystified.
Janice held the notebook aloft again. “Within these pages is an eyewitness tale of the origins of Luke Callahan, born to a mother and father separated by tragedy in a family with dark secrets. And that family is yours, Halsey.”
“That’s ridiculous,” he said, but his face paled.
“There will be plenty of time to tell the entire story,” Janice said calmly to the astonished males standing before her. Luke himself was riveted by her words. “But the duke I say yes to marrying is Mr. Callahan. He’s Halsey’s legitimate cousin—older by two years—and as such is the rightful Duke of Halsey.”
Luke stared at the notebook and then at her, his dear face alternating between disbelief and hope.
“Is it so?” he asked her.
She nodded. “The church, the day, everything.”
Halsey’s expression was black. “You bastard,” he said to Luke.
“Apparently not,” Luke said. “I told you I’d protect this estate, and I am. I’m protecting it from you and your selfish aims. Your father knew I was out there somewhere and passed his worries on to you. Why else would the nuns at an orphanage two hours’ ride away be subject to your threats?” He got up to Halsey’s face and stuck a finger on his chest. “Stay away from St. Mungo’s,” he said in a murderous voice. “They’re under my care now. It doesn’t matter how many weeks, months, or years it will take to sort out this mess with the solicitors, but as of this moment, your harassment of them will cease.”
“We’ll back you up on that, Callahan,” said Duncan. “Attempt to harm a hair on his head, Halsey, or cause the orphanage any more trouble and the Houses of Brady and Chadwick will seek you out and make you pay a severe price. That’s a promise.”
“Indeed, it is,” said Daddy.
“And ours, too,” said Peter, throwing his arm around Robert.
“I can speak for myself,” Robert said.
“You’re not allowed to promise to punish anyone, Lord Robert Sherwood!” called Mama. “You let the older men handle this!”
“Mama!” Robert’s cheeks flamed. “All I was going to say is that we should stop calling him Halsey. That’s Luke now.”
He pointed at the groom who would be duke when everything was sorted out properly, which it would be, Janice knew.
“As he’s to be Janice’s husband, and my brother-in-law,” Robert continued, “I’ll be the best knuckle boxer at Cambridge when I go.”
“That’s years yet!” Cynthia called to him.
“Only three!” he protested. “Imagine how good I’ll be by then.”
Cynthia made an exasperated face, the kind only sisters can make at recalcitrant brothers.
Halsey scowled round at them all. “I won’t let this happen, I’ll have you know. I’ll fight you every inch of the way.” He pointed to Halsey House. “I’m going back there now, and I will not be removed. Is that clear?”
“Of course you’ll stay.” Luke’s voice was quiet. “This is your home. We can’t expect you to leave—and no one here wants that sort of estrangement. If you do, that’s your choice. But you’ve got yourself a cousin. And soon, a new sister. Not to mention all of her family.” He turned and gazed at everyone as if he couldn’t believe his great good luck. “And I promise you that you’re Halsey,” he added, “until the world accepts our change in circumstance, and not before.”
The duke who was not the duke glared at him. “I’d sooner walk the plank than admit our blood connection.”
“Fine.” Luke shrugged.
And everyone began to talk at once in the usual Brady way.
Janice had to chuckle. What Halsey said or did didn’t matter anymore. It was going to be a rude awakening for him, and if he was clever he’d cling not only to his grandmother but also to the olive branch Luke had just offered him.
But he stormed off to the house, his coattails flapping behind him, his hounds nipping at his heels.
“I’m cold,” said Marcia suddenly. “We’re all cold. Let’s follow Halsey inside and have tea. Perhaps we can convince him to join us. If the men desire something stronger, we’ve got Daddy’s whiskey. Actually … all of us can have a dram. This has been quite a shock for everyone, has it not?” She spoke in her confident headmistress’s voice that Janice knew she’d never be able to acquire, but she didn’t care anymore.
She wasn’t sure how she commanded attention, but she obviously had. A proposal from two dukes in less than three weeks! She was exhausted, quite frankly.
But the best part was that one of them she loved with all her heart.
Isobel was going to be over the moon with joy. So would the dowager, Janice hoped. And so would Mrs. Friday, her new friend.
Janice looked yearningly at Luke. Would he never come to her? She didn’t want Mama and Marcia saying anything more about how a man should chase a woman.
He must have understood Janice’s thoughts, because at that very moment he sent her a slow smile that made her warm all over, even the tip of her nose, which had been frozen till that point.
Come to me, her heart said. He’d done so in her dreams for years. And now …
Now she wanted it to happen here, in front of her family.
“As Lady Chadwick has said, this day is shocking,” he reminded all the company. “I’m a duke.” He glanced down at his dusty groom’s jacket with wry amusement, but then his mood sobered. “It will take some very serious convincing of the legal system to claim my proper title, as you all know. And I’ll need time to figure this new role out, too. But I intend to exceed everyone’s expectations—especially my own—and there’s only one way I can do so.”
He caught Janice’s eye, and her heart began to thump like mad and her breath came short as her one true love wended his way through various relatives to get to her.
At last, he was upon her. “I can only be duke if I can have you as my duchess,” he said softly.
“I’ve already said yes to the duke,” she said with a smile that trembled. “But I’m also saying yes to the groom, to the boxer, to the ex-soldier, and the rescuer of frightened dogs.”
“Oh?” He grinned and captured her waist in his strong hands.
She looked up at the window where Aaron, happy and confident, waved down to her. “And yes to the man who’ll teach our children that any strength worth having always begins in the heart.”
“That’s a lot to ask a brute like me,” he said, “but I’m up to the challenge. Anything else?”
She eyed him speculatively. “How about yes to the man who’ll learn to love a lonely old woman with a temper?”
“It will be an adventure. But how about this?” He leaned close to her ear. “You’ll say yes to the man who comes knocking on your bedchamber door tonight, at two in the morning precisely.”
He planted a lush kiss on her mouth, and her entire body suffused with delicious heat. “But Luke?”
“Yes?”
“Isobel will be asleep in the little closet of a room attached to my bedchamber.”
“Oh.”
“Plus, Mama and Dadd
y will be down the corridor.”
“I see.” He thought a moment. “How about yes to a quick elopement to Scotland then?”
“What a wonderful idea! But only if the whole family can come, don’t you agree?”
“Of course.”
She laughed aloud at the idea of all those carriages going to Gretna. And then she remembered. “Do you mind waiting for Gregory and Pippa? They’re supposed to arrive in London from Paris any day now. I can’t wait for you to meet Little Bertie. Oh—and there’s Alice. In Ireland. If she has to miss the wedding, we need to sail to Ireland right afterward to see her, or she’ll never forgive us.”
He laughed. “I see that I’ll have to say yes to the entire House of Brady.”
“You understand me so well.” She kissed him with such fervor she almost forgot—she reached into a coat pocket and pressed a key in his hand.
“What’s this?”
“It goes to the new cellar lock,” she whispered. “I pinched it from the pantry. I had to try seventeen different ones.”
“Ah. Good work.” Luke pulled her even closer and looked into her eyes with such tender passion, Janice was brought right back to their very first kiss. “Shall we steal away after tea?”
They both smiled. Then their mouths joined in an ardent celebration of the union they knew was to come. And so it was that Janice and Luke said yes—
To love.
Epilogue
“Read it to me again,” the dowager said from her Bath chair. “It’s like speaking to Emily March herself.”
They were sitting in the dowager’s bedchamber—she, Janice, and Luke—two days after Janice’s family had arrived at Halsey House.
“Very well,” said Janice. She opened the old notebook and cleared her throat:
“And so, Your Grace,” she read, “in addition to being your lady’s maid, I am your darling Everett’s widow, and I shall bear his child. We were going to tell you shortly, but he was waiting, you see, to find the right moment. You already had the shock of your dear husband’s death to contend with. But if it’s any consolation, if I bear a boy, he is the next Duke of Halsey.”
Me, Luke mouthed proudly to Janice, and pointed a thumb at his chest.
“Yes, you,” said the dowager, her eyes lit with amusement.
Luke started, his cheeks red. It was obvious he didn’t realize his grandmother was looking.
“And you’re a scamp, just like your father,” Her Grace added.
Janice stifled a laugh. And Luke, abashed as he was, grinned.
“Go on.” The elderly lady waved a hand at Janice.
It was a gesture the Queen was quite fond of. But Her Majesty was nowhere in sight and hadn’t been seen since Janice had first read the notebook aloud to the dowager, the same day she’d found it.
Janice sat up straight and continued: “But I’m much too afraid of Russell to stay.”
When she looked up at the dowager, the old woman’s eyes were crimped with pain. But there was also tremendous interest there. Somehow, reliving these events was good for Her Grace. This was the fourth time Janice had read her the notebook.
Luke put his hand on Janice’s knee and squeezed.
“I saw him watch his brother drown when he knew how to swim to him to save him,” she read. Her eyes stung every time. “So you see how I’d rather my child grow up in obscurity than risk his life asserting his ducal rights. God bless you, Your Grace, and know that I wander the world with Everett’s love in my heart and his blood in our child’s veins. Your devoted servant and daughter, Emily March Hildebrand.”
“They were fishing,” the dowager said. “The boat sprang a leak.”
“Was that an accident?” Luke asked her softly.
“I don’t know,” said his grandmother. “We’ll never know, I suppose.”
“I’m going to hope it was,” said Janice, “and I’m also going to hope that Russell was too paralyzed by shock to rescue his brother.”
The dowager chuckled. “You’re a good girl. But with the benefit of hindsight, even I, Russell’s mother, believe it might have been planned. My younger son had been jealous a very long time, long before he became duke. After he assumed the title, he was cruel to me, cruel to Grayson, and he died a bitter man.”
“That’s so sad.” Janice sighed and shared a poignant look with her future husband.
“Tell me again your part in all this,” Her Grace asked Luke.
“Certainly.” He settled deeper into the sofa. “Just two months ago, I was dropping off a pouch of coins at St. Mungo’s. I do it every year on my birthday and at Christmas. Secretly.”
Janice kissed his cheek.
Luke smiled, rather embarrassed again. “But Sister Brigid waited up late for me this time. She caught me in the act, and she told me the orphanage needed my help. It seemed that Grayson wouldn’t leave the nuns alone. He’d been looking for Emily’s offspring and was harassing them to reveal what they knew about me.”
The dowager’s brows lowered.
“So that dark night,” Luke went on, “Sister Brigid told me the truth—that I am the Duke of Halsey. Not Grayson. Of course, I had no idea I was related to a peer at all. I was a boxer, a soldier—”
“And a groom,” the dowager added, her eyes gleaming with pleasure. She clearly liked Luke’s dramatic style.
Janice kissed his cheek again.
Luke winked at her, then went on: “Sister Brigid had promised Emily before she died never to reveal the truth to me of my origins. Emily was afraid it would put me in danger. But Sister told me she must. She said I was a man now and well able to take care of myself, as I clearly am. And St. Mungo’s needed me to claim the title so that Grayson’s harassment would cease.”
Her Grace let out a frustrated sigh.
“Don’t give up on Grayson yet,” said Janice. “Surely he’ll come round eventually.”
“But it wasn’t true that I wanted to stay up in that stifling bedchamber.” The dowager pouted. “I can’t believe he told you that.”
Janice winced. “Well, you did say that, actually, Your Grace. You were so upset with me when I tried to take you out.”
The dowager’s eyes registered some confusion.
“It’s all right, Granny,” Luke said. “Part of you didn’t want to face what had happened. And another part of you wanted to rejoin the world.”
“And part of Grayson was looking out for you,” said Janice. “And another part of him found it terribly convenient that he could tuck you away so that no one would bring up the awful events of the past.”
“Go on,” the dowager snapped at them both. Much like the Queen. But there were no sneezes. “Finish your story, Luke.”
Apparently, she wasn’t ready to analyze the situation or couldn’t, which was fine. It was early days yet.
Luke nodded. “All right, Granny. So Sister Brigid had heard from Emily herself that Russell was responsible for Everett’s death. But Sister knew nothing more than that—except for the very important fact that Russell would gladly kill me if he could find me. Somehow, he managed to trace me to the orphanage. But a kind nun put money in my pocket when I was eleven and told me to run. There was another orphanage in Bristol. But I never made it. I grew up on the streets, and after Russell died last year, Grayson started the search up again.”
“Which takes us back to Sister Brigid,” the dowager said.
“Right,” answered Luke. “All that could possibly help me establish my claim was the missing diary. Emily had told Sister about it, but we didn’t know if it still existed. But it did, obviously. Janice here found it.”
“Good for you, Janice.”
“Thank you, Your Grace.” Janice put the notebook down, and Luke wrapped his hand around hers.
“Well.” The dowager inhaled a deep breath. “That’s a fine tale. And I’m glad it has a happy ending. Tomorrow we’ll go over the part involving my stove house. I always knew that gardener was special.”
“He is,” said Ja
nice.
Luke stood and pulled her up with him. “We’re off now, Granny, for our daily walk.”
Janice nodded. “But we’ll come back later.”
“Very good,” said the duchess. “But before you go on this walk of yours…”
“Yes?” asked Luke.
“I have a favor to ask.”
“Anything,” said Janice.
“Is there anyone staying in the old wing?”
“No,” said Luke.
“Oh, well, in the old wing, there’s a fine bedchamber at the opposite end of my tiny one. I left a pair of spectacles there. Please look for them.”
“But Your Grace, I’ve never seen you wear spectacles,” Janice said.
Her Grace merely stared at her. Her silence spoke volumes.
Heat spread across Janice’s face as she began to realize … there was no way the dowager was leading them to a trysting spot, was she? And then she realized the Queen would. Oh, yes, indeed, she would!
Luke cleared his throat. “Of course we’ll look for them, Granny.”
The dowager finally settled her gaze on him. “Very good. And if you don’t find them, you’ll have to look again tomorrow. I’m sure they’re there.”
Luke and Janice left the room feeling like two naughty schoolchildren, and as they walked up the two flights of stairs and got closer to their destination their legs carried them faster and faster.
“There’s something very strange about this,” Janice said.
“I like her,” Luke replied.
They both chuckled.
And when they got to that bedchamber, they actually looked for a pair of spectacles—
For about three seconds.
And then Luke shut the door, Janice flung herself in his arms, and they fell back onto the enormous poster bed, side by side, kissing all the while.
“This beats the cellar,” Luke said against her mouth.
“But it had a charm of its own,” replied Janice, running her hand down his shirtfront.
“Yes, and spiders, too.” Luke sat her up and undid her laces.
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