Chapter 26

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

I n the days that followed their adventure northward to Cedar House and their return to London, Max and Caroline both took pains to behave as if they were back at Harewood Court.

Caroline had lessened her overtly loving antics, choosing to be herself in his company instead of the brash and suffocating version of herself that she had thought he wanted. They teased one another, they sought one another out, they shared meals, they did not attend any and every gathering they were invited to; they took time to be alone where needed, and the new ease between them was obvious for everyone to see.

"Max!" Caroline called, noticing as he passed her bedchamber door.

He walked backward, poking his head into the room. "Yes, dear Caro?"

"What do you think of this?" She held up the gown she had been considering: a beautiful creation of coral silk that was not normally in her color palette of choice. "I cannot decide if I adore it, or I hate it."

Lila, who was helping her mistress prepare for Phoebe and Daniel's ball, turned her gaze away, though she could not hide the delighted smile that appeared on her face. All week, the staff had been the same way, blushing and grinning as if they were the ones who were discovering a new layer to their marriage. Mrs. Whitlock had been the most incorrigible of all.

Max tilted his head from side to side, observing the gown. "I am no great expert in fashion, as evidenced by my own clothes, but… I like it. There is some gold in it, or so it appears—it brings out the same hue in your eyes. And anything reddish looks beautiful with your hair. Well, actually, anything looks beautiful on you. You could cut holes in a potato sack and society would marvel at you."

"Can you imagine the scandal?" Caroline laughed.

"I do not want us to court any further scandals at all, but I cannot deny it would be worth seeing what they would write about you," Max replied, leaning against the doorjamb, looking unfairly handsome as always.

Caroline wafted her hand. "That is all I needed. You may leave and let the transformation commence."

"I cannot see it with my own eyes?"

Lila gasped rather too loudly and hurried over to the vanity where she promptly pretended to rearrange some hairbrushes.

Caroline smiled. "Certainly not. There are things that happen in a lady's bedchamber, before an important society event, that a gentleman must never see. It is like knowing how a magic trick is performed. It ruins the illusion."

"Very well, but you should know that, once again, you are doing nothing to fend off the allegations that you are a sorceress. The Countess of Grayling must be thrilled that she has so many acolytes." He pushed away from the wall and, with a fleeting, fond smile, he departed the bedchamber, closing the door behind him.

It was the one place that he did not dare to tread, or so Caroline had noticed. Whenever she called him in to get his opinion on this or that, he always stayed by the door, not fully stepping into the room.

She had quietly hoped that her husband might join her in her bedchamber again, as he had done at Cedar House, just to sleep beside her. There was something enchanting about curling up beside someone she trusted, knowing that they would be there when she woke up, but he had not joined her again. Indeed, he made a point of retiring before her, his chamber door closing long before she went to bed.

Nor had he repeated the magic of kissing her, though the memory was as fresh as if it happened two minutes ago.

"I think those brushes are in perfect order now," Caroline said, raising a knowing eyebrow at Lila.

The lady's maid blushed a shade pinker, clutching a comb in her hands. "I'm so very sorry, Your Grace. I just… can't help it. I don't know what happened at that summer house you were visiting, but there's no denying that things are different between the two of you. It's like… you're newlyweds all over again."

"I do not think we are that much changed," Caroline protested.

"But you are, Your Grace!" Lila insisted. "I can't explain it, but there's a difference."

In truth, Caroline knew exactly what Lila was talking about. She had felt it herself although she, too, could not explain or describe the change. It was subtle, like a new oil added to the bath, or a familiar scent on the wind. It was a tenderness that had not been there before, their teasing more cautious, their quarrels less frequent.

When they were out in the city, she had noticed that he was more protective than he had been before, too. Always finding an excuse to hold her hand or to touch her arm, her face, her shoulder, her hair. They were closer, she supposed, that former distance between them all but gone.

"Come now." Caroline sighed. "Cool your cheeks and then let us begin. My hair will not curl itself—more's the pity—and I cannot be late to this ball tonight. All of my beloved Spinsters' Club shall be there!"

More than anything, she was excited to hear their opinion of what was happening in her marriage. Perhaps, they would have the answers that seemed to be just out of her reach.

"Where are they?" Caroline muttered, scouring the ballroom for any sign of her dear friends. Her mother was also supposed to be in attendance, along with her brother, but, thus far, there had been no familiar faces whatsoever.

Max laughed, plucking two glasses of lemonade off a passing tray. "They will be here, dear Caro. You must have patience. It is fashionable for the hosts to be late to their own event, and it would not be the Spinsters' Club if my sister and those friends of hers did not cause something of a stir upon their arrival."

"I do so hate being early," she grumbled on, sipping her drink.

He shook his head, his eyes shining with mirth. "Yet, when I suggested we might spend half an hour in the drawing room to have some tea before we left, you would think I had suggested we rob the palace of the crown jewels."

"Yes, well, I thought they would also be early." She smiled up at him, wishing she had taken that extra half hour to enjoy with him. Alone. "If you are not averse, we could have tea before we retire tonight. That would make up for my eagerness, I think."

"I admire your eagerness." He lifted his hand and, for a second, she thought he was going to cradle her face. Instead, he plucked something off her cheek and held it up to her lips. "An eyelash, dear Caro. Make a wish."

Her cheeks flooded with warmth as she closed her eyes.

I wish for tonight to be a success for the two of us, and that my friends reassure me that what is happening is a good thing.

She blew on the eyelash, and it flew away, hopefully to the forces that would make her wish come true.

"What did you wish for?" Max asked, as he reached for her hand and brought it to his lips. He kissed the silk of her glove, the gesture taking her by surprise.

Goodness, these wishes work quickly these days!

She tapped the side of her nose, feeling positively giddy. "That would be telling. Besides, when we tossed the coins into the reflecting pool, you never told me what yours was."

"I could, if you want me to?" he said, his voice low and sultry.

She considered it for a moment. "No, I shall be content to stay in suspense, in case my hearing it does prevent it from coming true." She paused, gazing up into his beautiful blue eyes. "Unless you can tell me because it has already come true?"

"Maybe it has and maybe it has not," he replied, smiling.

She groaned, half laughing. "That is too cruel, Max. Are you trying to make me desperate to know?"

"Maybe I am and maybe I am not." He grinned, his hand still holding hers.

"Goodness, would you look at the two of you!" a rather shrill voice popped the lovely bubble that Max and Caroline had been enjoying, while the ball was still relatively sedate.

The couple turned together, to find three older ladies standing there like constables waiting for a thief to come running out of a jeweler's shop. Caroline knew one of them to be a friend of her mother's—a woman by the name of Henrietta, the Dowager Countess of Prenton—but she did not recognize either of the other two.

"Lady Prenton, how wonderful to see you," Caroline chirped, hoping that Henrietta's appearance meant that her mother was not far behind. "Have you been well?"

Henrietta cast Max a thin smile. "I have been exceptionally well, dearest Caroline, which is more than can be said for your poor mother."

"My mother is not well?" Panic struck Caroline squarely in the chest.

In the weeks since her wedding, she had written often to her mother and had received ample replies, but her mother had made no mention of being unwell. Had she been keeping something from Caroline to prevent her from worrying?

"Oh, she is well in the physical sense," Henrietta hurried to correct, "but she was quite beside herself when all of the news was revealed. She has only just begun to recover, or so she told me when I had tea with her this past week."

Relieved and confused in equal measure, Caroline frowned at Henrietta. "All of the news, Lady Prenton? Whatever do you mean?"

"You might be extraordinarily handsome and well respected, Your Grace," Henrietta replied, her attention fixed on Max, "but a gentleman of your standing ought to know better than to embroil an innocent young lady in such a terrible scandal."

One of the other women nodded vigorously. "Of course, there is no harm done now that you are married, but as friends of a friend of Her Grace's mother, we cannot help but say something. Her Grace's mother certainly will not."

"Yes, quite," Henrietta agreed. "It would be remiss of me not to chide you a little bit for your rakish behavior, even if the conclusion was of benefit to everyone."

"I prefer not to judge," said the third woman in a haughty tone. "But it is well known that your younger brother is a terrible rake, and one has to wonder where he learned such behavior."

Caroline shifted awkwardly at Max's side, weaving her arm through his to show her support for him. But one look up at him showed that he was barely listening, his expression serene and indifferent. Taking his lead, she smiled at the three older women, deciding to ignore their remarks out of politeness.

"Is my mother here, do you know?" she asked.

But Henrietta was not content to be ignored by Max, or so it seemed. "I hope you realize the distress you caused, Your Grace. Indeed, I am not convinced that you would have married Caroline if the truth had not been revealed. Caroline's mother claims otherwise, but she is a sweet soul who does not know any better."

"With respect, you know nothing," Max said bluntly, a polite smile fixed on his lips. "And despite your physical seniority, you ought to refer to my wife by her proper title. She is a duchess, after all. My duchess."

Caroline did not know whether to swoon or panic, reveling in the way he called her his while simultaneously knowing that Henrietta would not like his stern remark one bit. Indeed, the older woman was already turning an alarming shade of purple.

"It appears I was right about you, Your Grace," Henrietta snarled. "I tried to convince Amelia that I was, but she would not listen. She insisted that you were a good man, but you are every bit as dishonorable as I suspected, and I shall tell the scandal sheets as much! They were very lenient with you before, but they will not be again. It cannot undo what you have done to Caroline, but I shall be satisfied when everyone knows the true nature of you."

Caroline stared at Henrietta in disbelief, as a ripple of protectiveness ran through her, prompting her to tighten her hold on the man at her side. The good, honorable, generous, wonderful man who was her duke.

She had not thought about the lies that Max had deliberately spread among the scandal sheets in a while and had thought that the scorn was over after the glowing response to their first week in London, but hearing that woman spout unfair nonsense was more than Caroline was willing to take. They did not know him, and she was about to remedy that.

"My husband would not know how to be dishonorable if his life depended on it," she retorted sharply. "Indeed, he is the best man I have ever known. Better than I deserve, most probably. And I will not hear you slander his name, when he is the reason that I am not living at my mother's house as a hermit, hiding from society because I was jilted by his brother! My husband married me to spare me and risked his good name to spare me, and I will not listen to you judge him when he has done so much!"

Henrietta's eyes widened to the whites, her eyebrows almost at her thinning hairline. "Jilted by his brother?"

"Oh, everything you have read was a lie, as one might expect from that gossip rag you tattlers and meddlers enjoy so much," Caroline muttered. "Dickie did not show up to the church, Max stepped in to marry me, and he conjured a story that would satisfy the likes of you. So, before you go spreading nasty lies about him , I suggest you pause to consider whether or not what you think you know is the truth or if it is just a misguided opinion."

The three matrons stared at her in abject shock, paling at the revelation. Meanwhile, Caroline stared right back with a sensation of pride swelling in her chest. For all this time, Max had been the one to defend and protect her, but now she was able to repay him in kind. Nothing could have felt better.

No one will treat you badly again, husband of mine.

She glanced up at him with a smile on her face… but it faded slowly as she realized that he did not look happy at all. He was looking back at her as if she had taken leave of her senses, his blue eyes flashing with anger, his kissable lips pressed into a tensed line of grim disapproval.

"Excuse us," Max said curtly.

He took Caroline's hand, not gently at all, and pulled her away from the horrified matrons. She did not need anyone to tell her that she had just made a terrible mistake.