Chapter Fifteen
“Your breakfast, Your Grace, as you wish here.” The Seton butler gave small bow to Lily, his scowl a storm upon his face. He wasn’t pleased that the young duchess did not stay in bed to break her fast as the lady of the manor should. He was inconvenienced to the nth degree, the intrusion to his day putting her in mind of a bothered scorpion. Silent, stealthy, stinging her with a subtle lash of his rectitude, he’d sneak up on her anywhere in this eerie carcass they called Broadmore House. Like the insects who lived in the southern Texas plains, he’d better learn how to scurry away from any retaliatory strikes. For as sure as the sun rose and set, one day she’d rebel and dress him down like the duchess she’d become.
After three weeks here at Broadmore, being stung by him and hobbled by the Dowager Duchess of Seton, alone save for Julian’s arms circling round her at night, Lily was in no mood to tolerate much more nastiness.
“Wonderful, Perkins. You and the footman may leave me to dine alone,” Lily spoke to the under servant, embarrassed to ask the question which she had asked of him yesterday. “Forgive me, what is your name?”
But it was the butler who cleared his throat in a most reproachful manner and answered her. “Finch, Your Grace.”
“Thank you.” She brought herself up short. Orders from Julian’s mother were she was not to acknowledge staff. In any way. “I shall remember it next time.”
The footman hastened to pull out her chair for her, then pour her tea.
“Put the pot there, Finch. I will serve myself.”
Perkins glared at her. That, she was certain, was not what butlers were allowed to do. The dowager duchess influencing his attitudes, perhaps? She gave him the arch of a brow.
He demurred, unhappy with her, but nonetheless. He puttered about after the exit of the younger man and in his own good time, he closed the double doors upon her.
She was blessedly alone. Again. In the dining room. With the grim countenance of one of the forbearers of the Ash family staring down upon her. He—name as yet unknown to her—loomed over her, six feet tall with lace cuffs dripping down to his ruby-laden fingertips. In his ornate vermilion velvet suit a la one of Charles the Second’s cavaliers, he looked so fancy, he might have been a woman going to a ball.
Lily snorted and consoled herself with a satisfying drink of her tea. Her toast stood in a little silver contraption they called a caddy. She picked up one triangle. And dropped it. Cold. Again.
Is there nothing warm in this entire mansion? Not toast. Not portraits. Not rooms. Not husband.
Not even my husband. Not as he was during our first few weeks together. Attentive, madly passionate but silent as he took her in his arms each night, he made love to her like a man possessed by demons. She had pressed him for causes. He had not shared them. So be it. She did not question him further for the cares that lined his forehead as deeply as the Broadmore butler’s.
She might understand Julian’s troubles, his added responsibilities now as the new Duke of Seton, but she did not like his withdrawal. She vowed to approach the matter, but looked for a suitable opportunity. One bit of news that would brighten his days was her purchase of the Irish lands he’d wanted his father to sell through Leland.
Phillip had arrived yesterday to prepare for the reading of the will tomorrow. Early this morning, he had sent her a note via the butler through her maid Nora that the sale had completed. She was now the proud owner of eight-thousand acres of prime farmland near Tipperary.
That news would lift her husband’s spirits.
She scraped back her chair and headed for the sideboard. The silver salvers had better have kept the heat in the eggs and bacon or she would scream.
The door squeaked open. Angry that Perkins would disturb her, she whirled around.
Her mother-in-law stood upon the threshold.
Well, that put an end to any hope of a peaceful meal.
“What are you doing?” The woman, sans diplomacy or politeness, seethed the words.
Obvious, isn’t it?
Her plate full, Lily resumed her chair. She would not be bated.
“I asked you a question.”
“Have you had your breakfast yet, madam?” Lily had not been invited to call her anything else, nor would she ask for any moniker more informal for a long time.
After the woman had heard her husband pronounced dead in the parlor in London, she’d fainted at her departed husband’s feet. Lily and Marianne had run into the room to see the duke upon the carpet. Julian had caught up his mother and put smelling salts to her nostrils. The duchess struggled up from the floor. Then in a manner Lily understood most staid ladies of the upper crust would eschew as the lowest form of crassness, she wailed as Julian pronounced her husband’s death.
Like a dervish, she’d ordered the service in the Broadmore family chapel and burial in the family mausoleum. She’d moaned, dabbed her cheeks and told tales of how happy she and her husband had been. “Until…” she said with malice, mystery and a dab of melancholy. “Until…”
On, she’d ranted and raved as if she’d lost a cherished partner. To have torn at her hair like ancient mourners might even have been in character for the woman, had she indeed cared for the man. But Lily had seen no devotion between them. For the greater realm of the duke’s and duchess’s social circle, the woman’s drama may have convinced them of her anguish. To Lily however, the lady’s actions were a play. A tragedy. A lie.
Nor had she stopped. One day after the duke’s demise, the woman had led a procession of the family up to Broadmore with the body of the duke leading the way in a black bunting-draped caisson. The dowager rode with Julian and Lily in the Broadmore coach. Elanna and Carbury, their honeymoon cut by the death, followed in Carbury’s carriage. Those two had stayed only two days and at Carbury’s insistence, had departed for the coast of France. If Lily thought that Elanna might be pleased to have some solitude with her groom, she might have envied the young bride’s escape. But that was not the case. As the couple left for Dieppe, Lily witnessed a new resentment take hold of the dowager. Indeed, the woman added another note to her repertoire. Suddenly, she concentrated less on mourning and more on making Lily’s life miserable.
Lily was to do her correspondence in a room upstairs. Tiny, airless and without a fireplace, the room had once been—Lily was certain—a closet. Plus the only chair was wooden, minus upholstery. Extremely uncomfortable.
Lily’s lady’s maid, Nora, whom she’d brought with her after her marriage, was to take on other household chores. None of them was usual for Nora’s stated position.
Furthermore, Lily was not to plan the meals. That was the dowager duchess’s job. Always had been.
Nor would Lily help plan for tomorrow’s reading of the late duke’s will in the library. The dowager had claimed that duty as her own. Elanna and Carbury were to arrive today. So, too, Julian’s cousin Valentine Arden, Lord Burnett. And all the servants of Broadmore would attend. Lily had suggested tea for everyone, but she’d been vetoed because of the expense of feeding the staff tea and cakes. If the dowager pinched any more pennies, they’d all be eating gruel three times a day.
If her mother-in-law had her wish, she could wave her magic wand and Lily would disappear from her house and even this dining room.
“Of course, I’ve eaten.” The woman marched toward Lily, her presence more forbidding than the man on the wall who peered over them. “It is most unbecoming for the mistress of Broadmore to take her breakfast anywhere else but in her bed.”
I take my husband in my bed, not my meals.
“I prefer to dine here.” She tucked into her eggs.
“It’s most, most unladylike. What will the staff think of you? I forbid it.” She took hold of the bell pull, ready to summon a servant.
Lily froze her with a glare. “As I see it, madam, you can forbid me nothing. If I wish to eat here, I harm no one.”
“You know nothing of harm. Nothing of procedures or traditions.”
Lily put down her fork and knife. “I know that if I dine here, I relieve the staff of work they need not do.”
The lady clasped her hands together so tightly, her knuckles went white. “Servants are here to work. They are paid. They have their keep. That is sufficient.”
Lily had no idea what each person earned, nor what their keep cost the estate—and she’d correct that lack. However, she did know that the reason she’d seen so little of her husband of late was his worry over money. For the past ten days or so, Julian had spent long hours with the estate manager to examine the records. He’d told her no financial details. Each day, he worked and each day, he became more vexed, his temper short, his attention wandering, his passion for her dulled. What little time he did take to talk with her was riddled with concern over the incessant rain, the drowning crops and the disgruntled tenants. His preoccupations with the welfare of those on Broadmore, as well as reports of more tenants at Willowreach down with croup and bronchitis, had pushed her aside. She disliked Julian’s aloofness. Feared it might erode what intimacy they’d begun to build. Money, which she’d always taken for granted, might buy comfort and splendor, but it did not contribute to contentment.
“You must finish your meal quickly.” The dowager waved a hand at her.
“This is my house, madam.”
“No, it is mine.” The woman preened, her thin nose reminding Lily of a bird of prey.
Lily itched to be so crass as to remind this lady of those benefits that she owed her. Or rather her father. “You will not chase me off, madam.”
“I am chatelaine here, you presumptuous chit. You come to England to throw your father’s money at us. You are an American spawn of a pirate, spreading your legs for Chelton so that he—”
Lily set her jaw, determined to maintain her dignity. “He, madam, is referred to as ‘His Grace,’ and I detest the insult to my father and myself.”
“As do I, Mother.”
In the entrance to the dining room stood Julian. He looked the very devil, his hair plastered to his skull, wet from the rain, his dark eyes heavy with fatigue.
“This is unseemly, Mother.” He approached her and she sniffed, uncowed. “I thought better of you.”
Lily frowned over that. She hadn’t thought better of the dowager. She’d been given no reason to think highly of her. If Julian and his mother were to have a confrontation, Lily was determined to witness it.
But the woman did not give in easily. “I will not have your wife creating havoc in this house, Chelton.”
Lily’s stomach knotted. How could the woman be so insulting to her son? Was she determined to ignore her husband’s death? Why? Honoring the man now did nothing to redeem herself for the way she’d treated her husband when he was alive.
Julian raked his hands through his disheveled hair. “For Lily to take her breakfast where she pleases does not inspire havoc.”
“The servants will take advantage of her.”
You take advantage of me.
“I doubt that, Mother. She’s had servants.”
“Not ours.”
“Well, I tell you now, madam,” he bit off his words, “she may dine here.”
And soon, I’ll do the menus. Consult with the cook. And the housekeeper.
“You make a mistake to allow it,” the dowager warned him.
Lily put down her napkin and rose. She’d take her power into her own hands. “I must begin my correspondence. You may find me, Julian, in the pink parlor.”
“No!” Her mother-in-law shook in her vehemence.
Giving a small curtsy to both, Lily sailed past them.
“Let her go, Mother, and stop this arguing. She is my wife.”
I am. And always will be.
One look out the window of the salon and Lily put down her pen. Had the rain finally stopped? Days and days of it had become oppressive.
In a rush, she finished her letter to her father. The day the Setons and she had left London for Broadmore, her family had once more departed for Paris. Her father and Pierce had meetings with bankers in Paris and Ada had appointments with Worth and French lingerie designers.
Her father had bid her goodbye on the steps of their house on Piccadilly. Julian left her to her privacy and spoke with the coachman as she bid adieu to her father.
With a kiss to her cheek, her father whispered, “Enjoy your new husband. He’ll recover from this loss in time and be yours again soon. And I like him.”
She hugged him. “Me, too.”
“I noticed that.”
“Write to me of Paris. How Ada and Pierce get on. And Marianne.”
“Ah, well.” He raised a wicked black brow. “That one will have no troubles. Remy will be upon us, I’m sure, with all due haste.”
“Do you object?” she asked while the coachman cooled his heels holding open the door for her.
“I’m not sure yet. That depends on many things. Now get in. Off you go.” He’d handed her up into the carriage. The coachman climbed to his box and slapped the reins.
She’d left her family to come to this one, this house, these conflicts with her mother-in-law. She was not quite as happy with her husband as she had been at the start of their marriage, but perhaps that was a normal change. She was not happy with much else, especially here at Broadmore. And the rains only exemplified her dour mood.
But since the sun was shining…
And it appeared to be glorious outside, she must take advantage of the weather. She sealed her letter to her father, and gathered her others to Ada and Marianne. Lifting her skirts, she raced from the salon, up the staircase to her rooms. Hopes to escape the house and its troubles burst like bubbles in her brain.
In minutes, she’d changed her black gown to her riding outfit. This new one, fine red serge and part of her trousseau, had a skirt she loathed, but it was normal attire—and God forbid, her mother-in-law see her in pants. She hated to think of it. Down the back stairs and out the kitchen doors, she hurried along the shady lane toward the stables. She hadn’t yet visited. Not in the torrential rain. But this was a perfect time.
She’d been introduced to the stable hands the day after they’d arrived from London. The master groom, Docker, was a burly, balding man who had kindly brown eyes and a big smile for her. His two stable boys were sturdy chaps who resembled him. Introduced by only their given names, they were most likely his sons.
The stable block was a long red-brick structure half a mile from the main house. She’d glimpsed it from her bedroom, just through the evergreens. The doors were open and she walked in, expecting to see one of the hands. No one was about. All the horses were gone, out to pasture, she surmised. The sliver of sunshine that pierced the heavy clouds must have inspired everyone to get out and about.
Well, she wasn’t going back to the house, that was certain. She wanted to walk, clear her mind.
She turned for the lane south. This was a perfect time to introduce herself to the tenants. As with so much else, the dowager had her own dictums about how Lily must comport herself with these people. At all costs, she had ordered her to stay away from the village.
‘They live in squalor and you mustn’t go near.’ She’d told Lily that night before last during dinner when Julian had brought up the tenants’ maladies. Three of the tenants’ wives were bed-ridden with coughs. Many of the children, most of them very young at three and four, were down, too.
Lily had sighed. ‘But if they are incapacitated, I can help.’
Her mother-in-law had not heard of it. ‘You are strong. Stay that way.’
‘But I was a nurse in a hospital in—’
‘Julian!’ With a clatter, the woman had dropped her fork to her plate. ‘For the love of heaven, forbid her this, will you?’
‘No. He cannot.’
He had put up a hand to stop their argument. ‘Mother, Lily, please—’
The woman had stared at Lily. ‘Your job is to remain strong. Bear an heir. A spare. You are not to go traipsing off and become ill yourself. You might already be increasing.’
Lily had considered her hands in her lap. She would not give her mother-in-law any insight into the passion that bound Julian and her together more than once every night.
She had lifted her face and met the lady’s gaze. ‘I hear your rationale.’
‘Good. That’s settled then.’
She had let the woman think what she wished.
She would, anyway.
* * * *
Hours later, Lily trudged her way back to the stables. The walk to the village had been longer than she expected. The work to nurse the sick there had been more than she’d predicted, but rewarding. She needed another medical kit filled with instruments. She’d order it tomorrow and keep one kit here, one at Willowreach. Today, she’d learned how necessary such items could be. She’d taught two women how to build croup tents and tend kettles for constant hot steam. Tomorrow, she’d return to them. But when she did, she’d ride instead of walk.
Inside the stable block, Lily saw no one. At four in the afternoon, they should have been heading back. But then she wasn’t familiar with English farming ways. Perhaps they let their animals out for more of the day. The searing Texas heat demanded ranchers send their animals out at dawn and bring them in by noon or one before the sun fried them to a crisp.
Resigned to returning to the house, she took a few steps.
Someone was here. She heard them. Two men with bass voices. In the far stall.
Her feet fell on tampered earth and scattered hay so she made no sound as she strode toward them.
But she stopped and cocked her head to listen.
One of the men was Julian.
“The sale of that land in Tipperary was profitable.”
She smiled to herself. I know it was.
“Indeed,” Phillip Leland agreed.
Discreet about it, too. As I asked him to be.
“A stroke of luck, I’d say, to find a buyer so quickly.”
Not very.
“I’d like to thank them for their purchase,” Julian said.
“Not a good idea, Seton. Anonymity is what the buyer asked for.”
“That’s the one bit of good news I’ve had in weeks, Leland. But I must press upon you that tomorrow, I don’t want you to reveal the sale. More than that, I do not want the will read aloud. I wish to heaven you could change this. Overlook it.”
“I’m bound by ethics as His Late Grace’s executor. I must do as instructed in the written will.”
“Why do that? You must see that to read these clauses aloud will only irritate my mother.”
Lily stopped breathing. More trouble from her mother-in-law? Was she not causing enough already?
Leland remained silent.
“I see. Of course.” Julian again, frustrated. “My father wanted the will read aloud. Of course, he wished that. Even after death, they never stop impaling one another!”
She shrank backward.
“Are we certain everyone will attend? I understand you have contagion in the village.”
“We do and yes, they have agreed to come. My estate manager is quite ill. But he will make the effort and arrive to hear the final terms.”
“Lady Carbury, too?”
“Oh, yes,” Julian said, weariness in his words. “My sister brings along the earl. As if he’d let her out of his sight.”
“She’s very unhappy,” Leland said. “I scarcely knew her when I visited last week. She is beside herself. A different person.”
“Yes. From the night he decided to court her, Elanna turned. At the Paris Opera, we were.” Julian cursed beneath his breath. “I wish she hadn’t agreed to wed him. Nothing for it now.”
“Carbury required no dowry. Shocking that.”
“Ugh. Not really, Leland. Carbury wanted only her in his bed.”
“That much desire is not healthy when it’s one-sided.”
Julian sighed. “The crux of their problem.”
“One good thing about tomorrow. Lord Burnett agreed to attend.”
“Ah, my cousin Valentine will be ecstatic if my father has given him that painting of his mother. He’s been after us for years for that. With more money than a choir of angels, he needs only those things he desires. He’ll be over the moon with the gift.”
“And what of the gratuities to the servants?” Leland’s voice was low and troubled. “Can you pay them?”
“I can.”
Julian had not shared with her any of the conditions of his father’s will. Awards of money to the staff was a noble gesture of the late duke whom she never would have thought capable of such kindness.
“Should I ask how you got it?”
Lily would bet it was her marriage settlement.
Julian scoffed. “I didn’t win it at the tables, if that’s what you’re after.”
“Your wife’s dowry then?”
“No.”
No?
“Your Grace, to settle the questions in the City of your finances, I need to know how you got the cash. I daresay it’s not a new mortgage. I would have had to officiate at that.”
“The Irish sale was a boon. But I also had those winnings at cards from the last time I was in Paris. That’s where the money came from to pay Elanna’s debts. And that other money I told you to put aside for her.”
Julian put aside money for Elanna?
“Kind of you to offer her that means of escape,” Leland said with sorrow.
“She took Carbury’s offer too quickly.”
“Yes,” Leland said. “She had to marry, sooner or later. At least she does not bear your financial burden.”
“We’ll weather this,” Julian said with a steely will and a bit of bravado. “I will.”
“Your determination is welcome, Your Grace. But we are in desperate straits. I’ve done the tally. Our mortgage payments equal now more than half our income.”
Lily’s mouth dropped open. Her father always said that one did not accumulate debt greater than a tenth of one’s income. Julian’s was more than half?
“Lack of money,” Julian said with a weary sigh. “It rules estates, marriage, even the question of love.”
The question?
Lily’s head reeled. She stepped backward, her palms to the rough wood of the stall to steady her. How much of Julian’s statement was true? She had believed he had married her at the very least because he valued her. Liked her. Even desired her.
She had thought that as their marriage progressed, that he and she had a relationship built of respect and passion which could blossom into love.
Could she have deluded herself?
Julian was pacing, his footsteps crunching dried hay. “I had approximately eight thousand pounds left. I used half to spruce up Willowreach before my wedding. So I have the cash for the servants, Leland. I’m happy to pay it. It’s the one request my father made of me that makes me proud of him.”
Lily put her hand to her throat. Tears blurred her vision. That her husband would use his money to save his sister from a disastrous marriage was valiant. That he’d use it to refurbish his home for her was sweet.
But if he loved her wealth more than her, what value did he place on their marriage?
* * * *
“Are you concerned about the reading of the will tomorrow?” She ventured to ask Julian in their bedroom that night, hoping to draw him out and have him confide in her.
“My mother will wail,” he said, shrugging out of his robe and kicking off his slippers to climb into bed naked. “She always expects more than she gets. Nothing new there. An embarrassment. As for Elanna? She appears to be without emotions.”
“I worry about her.” Lily walked around to Julian and sat beside him. “I hate to think how much she dislikes him.”
“Dislike? Hardly,” he said, wincing. But he took her by the wrist and planted a seductive kiss in her palm. “Don’t think of it. Come here.”
Happy to do that, she bent closer.
His lips on hers were a brand.
“I miss you,” she whispered.
“I’m here.” His eyes cleared, registering her complaint. But he chose to turn it aside and sank to nibble at her shoulder. “Always have been.”
She didn’t want to argue, but she pushed away. His large dark eyes swept over her, desire for her sending her into a frisson of need. She trailed one hand over his muscular chest to his lean hip and groin. “After the will is read tomorrow, we’ll put our lives in order, won’t we? And get back to adventures in hay stacks and carriages?”
He threw back his head to laugh and grabbed her to him for a stunning kiss. “We’ll do them all, Your Grace. But first—” He wiggled his brows, happy for the moment. “Why don’t you perfect how well you ride?”
He was too disarming. “Haven’t I proven that?”
“With my horses, darling. Not with me.” He led her to spread her legs and sink over him, large and hard as he was.
Her mouth fell open. Her body swelled to take him inside. And she was lost, found, swept up, his arms around her.
As his fingers pushed up her negligee, she surrendered conscious thought. When he sucked her nipples into diamonds, Lily arched up into that lusty realm where he made her soar and tremble. As he rocked her to a throbbing height, she joined him in the rapture she craved. Later, mindless, she crashed into his solid embrace.
Reality returned with a piercing thought. In the midst of enjoying him, she’d forgotten that new torment that he might not love her. The lack cut her like a knife. The wound, salved by his caresses, went deep. No sutures bound it up.
Searching for remedies, she lay awake for hours while Julian slept on. The only one was simple—and superficial. She could seduce him to remain in bed with her for endless days where she might have physical proof of his devotion.
But that was foolish.
A young girl’s daydream.
In reality, she was a woman whose husband had married her for her money.
A woman who loved her husband—and had no idea if he might ever return the affection.
* * * *
Hours later, Lily entered the salon on Julian’s arm and took her place in one of the two large Sheratons by the window. He sat in the other and nodded to Phillip Leland, the lawyer, that he could begin.
Lily had never been to a reading of a will. It seemed morbid. She’d even thought it unnecessary but Julian had told her that while his father’s title and entailed lands automatically became his on his father’s death, any other gifts granted were outside that. According to his father’s orders, they were to be announced and were to be given only when all named in the will were present.
Lily gazed upon the assembled guests in the crowded salon while Leland adjusted his glasses. Julian looked wooden, drained. The dowager staid, safely shielded from observation by her black veil with velvet chenille drops. Elanna? Elanna was more of a mystery.
She wore no veil, carried no handkerchief. Effecting a haughty demeanor as Lady Carbury, she’d pulled taut her lustrous rosewood hair into a severe braid curled like a half-crown at her nape. In a move utterly de trop for the occasion, she’d rouged her cheeks and her lips. Her black serge gown was as plain as a serving girl’s, her lack of fashionable bustle a reason—in addition to the rouge—for her mother to take her aside minutes ago and scold her for it. But the new Countess of Carbury had considered her mother with a detachment that set the older lady sputtering. Elanna was done, it appeared, with pleasing others. Even her husband was a recipient of her daunting sang froid.
Among the others in the room, Lily saw no sobbing. No tears. No grief so much as impatience and among the servants, hope.
Money did that to people. Whether its possession or its lack, money made them hungry. Or covetous. Angry or resentful. Happy for a moment.
Which does Julian feel for the acquisition of my money?
She fidgeted in her chair.
“Are you well?” Julian leaned toward her, his anxious face turned from the guests.
“Yes. Yes, quite.”
“Your cheeks are flushed. You seem distressed.”
Unwilling to lie to him, she told him what she could. “I wish this were over.”
His mouth quirked up at one corner. “You are not alone.”
She licked her lips and focused on Leland. He began his reading.
Julian Quentin Ash, only son of Quentin Fernshaw Ash, was to claim his father’s personal effects, including jewelry, robes of state, private carriage and personal property of twenty thousand acres of land in Ireland and ten thousand in Australia.
Charlotte Deirdre Anne Ash, wife, was to claim the dower house at the Broadmore Gate, along with one phaeton and the services of two staff for the remainder of her days. She was to have what jewels her husband had made expressly for her and they were enumerated. All other items were to remain in the family vaults for use by future mistresses of the house.
Elanna Corinne Ash, daughter, was to receive the pair of blue and white Chinese Ming vases from her dressing room.
Valentine Jasper Arden, Lord Burnett and the duke’s nephew, was to receive the portrait of his mother, Louise Caroline Ash, by Frederick Winterhalter.
“And for the servants of Broadmore—” Leland began the bequests the late duke made to each of the household staff from Perkins the butler down to the scullery maid, the groom Docker and his two stable boys, the head gardener and his men. Even the game keeper received a sum of money for service to his master. These particular monies would be paid each servant tomorrow morning at nine o’clock.
The servants filed out. Perkins followed and closed the doors behind him.
Lily allowed herself a sigh of relief. This ordeal was nearly over. Tomorrow morning, Elanna, her husband, Leland and Lord Burnett would depart. Lily would have then only the dowager to contend with. And she’d find the right opportunity—and the right words—to deepen her relationship with Julian.
Her mother-in-law shot to her feet. Her face was red, her hands clenched.
Everyone turned to her.
“The dower house is mine to use, but with only a maid and a butler. Are you quite mad?” she asked, her gaze skewering Leland, then pinning Julian.
“That is the stipulation, Mother.” Julian did not move, sans all emotion.
Lily could feel the winds of a storm brew, the roar of it whipping through the rooms of the mansion.
“I will not go.”
Julian clasped his hands together. “We can discuss this after all have left us.”
“No.”
Her belligerence sent Lily backward in her chair. All others in the room, save Julian, got to their feet, intent on the doors.
“What is my portion?” the dowager persisted, her inquiry of Phillip Leland.
“Tell her. She might as well know all.” Julian rose.
She sneered at him and fixed her gaze on Leland once more. “My portion? You read no amounts.”
Leland stood with an apologetic glance at Julian. “His Grace, your husband, did not wish the sums to be known publicly, Your Grace.”
She grumbled. “But I must know.”
“Three thousand a year.”
She winced. “Absurd. When I married it was to be ten.”
Leland inclined his head. “It was. But conditions have changed and three is what the estate can afford you.”
She faced Julian. “I demand more.”
“There is no more to give you. Father did not invest your jointure in stocks that bore sufficient interest. Even three thousand a year is a huge amount to divest from the family assets.”
Her mother-in-law cast her gaze about the salon, her dark eyes a venomous snap. Beneath her black veil, she indicated her sorrow with a quivering chin and an appropriately crushed handkerchief in one hand. “I cannot live on three. I will not.”
“I’m sorry.” With a polite incline of his head and finality to his tone, Leland let that be the end of this topic.
“The servants’ stipend?” The dowager duchess would not let go her ire, pinning the lawyer to his spot. “Where did that money come from?”
Lelanddid not seem to breathe. “Your son, the duke, gave it to the estate.”
“Really?” She spun toward Julian with violence in her gaze. “From where?”
Lily could bear this woman no longer. Her bitterness, her false dignity, her sense of entitlement were appalling. Lily could not wait for the day she moved to the dower house.
“Where?” the woman insisted with a stomp of her foot. “Ah. The American’s dowry.”
One brow arching high, Julian considered her with a disparaging eye. “No.”
“Where then?”
“You are being unruly, madam,” Julian warned her.
“I insist.”
“Do it all you like,” he said and made for the doors. “I will not remain to listen.”
“I am your mother.”
He whirled to face her. “Yes. And I wish, only once, you might have acted like it. But for more years than I care to recall, I have seen you teach me by word and example, that more than my mother, you have become a selfish, rude, ruthless creature.”
Lily stood, she knew not how. Never had she heard anyone in her family have such an exchange. Never had she deemed it possible. But at once she saw clearly one reason why Julian might never love her. Might not even be capable.
He’d been nurtured by people who knew not how to care for others. Not selflessly. Not completely.
One glance at Elanna told Lily she was horribly right.
The young woman was smiling, the expression triumphant. Sardonic.
Marriage had transformed Elanna. How, why, what Carbury and she did together, how they got on, would never be known to Lily. Nor did she wish to learn.
But to look at Elanna told her one more fact. Elanna had withdrawn from her husband along with all others in her family. Her reasons were her own. She’d had examples set before her of parents who tormented each other. If her own marriage was not happy, she could think that the norm.
Did her brother bear the same tendencies?
Could Julian turn on Lily the way his mother had turned on his father? Would he love? Or did he only lust?