Chapter 13

THIRTEEN

I t took another twenty minutes of wandering around Corbray Hall like a lost mouse, but eventually, I did find Xavier again when he rushed out of another double-doored room.

“There you are,” he proclaimed, spotting me. “Sorry about that. Been waiting all day for those two. It’ll take a lot of money, but they can get us out of that mine. And then Jagger called with another fire at one of the restaurants.” He sighed wistfully, clearly wishing to be doing that work in London, rather than being stuck here.

“It’s all right,” I said. “I just chatted with your stepmother. She was a…” I tipped my head back and forth, trying tactfully to explain my impressions. “Snooty bitch” didn’t seem appropriate.

“Nightmare,” Xavier supplied to my relief, taking my hand in his and pulling me down another corridor. “Ignore her, always. Before she showed up, I meant to show you your room, anyway.”

“Good.” I confirmed. “I need to get changed for dinner. Duchess’s orders.”

“What do you mean?” He looked down at my clothes, which still consisted of the black leggings and T-shirt I’d worn on the train. “I think you look fine. It’s a dinner, not a ball.”

“But aren’t you hosting the Douglases?” I asked. “Or is it Ortham? Orthams? That’s Imogene’s family, correct? Are they the same people?”

Xavier nodded. “Yes. Their last name is Douglas. The title is Ortham, so that only applies to Imogene’s parents. It’s confusing, and frankly, I think they all do it on purpose.”

I tried not to make a face, though it wasn’t because of the naming conventions. The idea of sitting at a fancy table on my first night here, across from someone who basically looked like Elsa from Frozen, sounded less than appealing. Imogene’s entire outfit today had probably been worth more than every item in my closet back home.

Xavier’s wry expression told me exactly what he thought of that. “I suppose we should. Lady Ortham likes to wear her furs whenever she dines here. Even in August.” He pulled me farther down the corridor with renewed urgency. “At any rate, it’s just down here. I imagine you’d like to rest a bit before I wear you out later.”

“Xavi…” I warned, though I loved the mirth in his eyes. It was so much better than sadness.

Xavier ignored me, turning the knobs on a pair of tall double doors which were inlaid with irises. And opened onto what could have only been called a paradise.

I’d thought I understood luxury. After all, Xavier liked nice things. He’d stayed at the nicest hotels in New York, paid for the best food, and lived in a penthouse fit for a king.

Or it would be if this room didn’t exist.

My jaw dropped. This wasn’t a bedroom. It was an entire apartment. Or rather, it was a museum in every sense of the word, filled to the brim with priceless antiques, gilt millwork curling toward twenty-foot ceilings, gaping windows draped with priceless tapestries, and the biggest bed I’d ever seen dressed in sumptuous blue linens so thin they were practically one with the breeze that occasionally floated in from the balcony.

A glance told me the room itself split into a separate sitting room on the other side, along with an en suite bath fit for a queen, a walk-in closet, and some other private sitting area that looked like it was once someone’s office.

“This is—ours?” I stammered as I took it all in.

“Yours. Yeah.”

I looked back at him, unsure of what to make of that, but found I was too distracted by the grandeur to ask. Yet.

Xavier shifted from foot to foot as he watched me explore the space. “It’s a bit gaudy, I know. But what can you do? Heirlooms.”

He shrugged, like he was talking about a nice, crocheted doily inherited from a grandmother, not a castle full of art.

I crossed the room to peer at an oil painting hanging between two of the windows. “Is this—oh my God, Xavi, is this an actual Renoir?”

He followed me, leaned over my shoulder, and examined the painting along with the tiny signature in the lower right corner. “Looks like it, yeah. I’ll ask Gibson if it’s been cataloged. We’ve been talking about auctioning a few pieces to fund some of the updates for the smaller farms.”

I continued to stare at the painting, a still life of vivid pink flowers. “It’s beautiful.”

Xavier looked up from his phone. “Like it?”

I turned. “Well, yes. It’s stunning.” I didn’t know what else to say.

A shy half-smile appeared, almost as if I’d complimented him, not a lost masterpiece. “I’ll make sure that one stays, then.”

I wandered around the rest of the room, taking in the glossy furnishings, the gilt fixtures, and the warm yellow walls covered in art. “I feel like I’m going to break something in here. These things have been in your family for who knows how long. Hundreds of years, I suppose?”

Xavier followed me to the doors leading out to a balcony, then pulled me into his arms so we could take in the view together. “They’re just things, Ces. I don’t care about any of it. Just you and Sofia. If you want me to yank it all out and have a bunch of Scandinavian garbage hauled in to replace it, we can do that too.”

I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t say I didn’t like it. Just that I didn’t want to break anything.”

“Sleep on the bed. Jump on it if you want. It’s lasted this long—it can handle a tiny bird from the Bronx, you know.”

I made to punch him in the gut, but he captured my fist and brought it to his lips for a fleeting kiss. It was uncharacteristically gallant of him. But I didn’t mind that either.

“No Ikea needed,” I confirmed. “Although maybe some things that Sofia can get dirty. A table where she can do some art, maybe. Or a rug where she can play dolls that’s not worth roughly a million dollars. We don’t want another stained angora on our hands.”

Xavier chuckled at the memory. “Your wish is my command. Any time, too. My doors are always open, and just next door.”

I frowned. There it was again. The yours versus mine thing.

“Your doors?” I asked. “So this really isn’t your room too?”

“Oh, I’ll be in here with you. But in the old days, it was always customary for the duke and duchess to have their own chambers. I thought maybe you and Sof would need your own space while you’re here. And to be honest, there will be a lot of late nights for me. That door opens up to the nursery. You might just want to be on your own instead of having me wake you at two in the morning.”

I frowned. It made sense. But what had happened to always sleeping in the same bed? Given his work, it wasn’t like he hadn’t had plenty of other late nights at the restaurants, though until this week, he’d mostly kept that to a minimum. Still, I truly believed he’d invited me to share his life, and on our first night, hadn’t he promised just that?

That was when you were alone , my conscience reminded me.

Now we were going to have walls between us. Relatives watching. Servants noticing. Neighbors checking in.

“Don’t worry,” Xavier rumbled as he pulled me closer. “I’ll be sneaking into your bed every night I can.” He smirked. “I’m pretty good at it too. Quiet as a cat.”

He turned me around and began steering me toward the four-poster as if to demonstrate exactly how he planned to do the sneaking.

“Don’t you run away now,” he said as his hands found their way under my shirt, sliding along my skin in a way that made me forget my initial doubts. “This tour’s just getting started.”

We found our way down to dinner a bit later than planned, mostly because Xavier enjoyed watching me fret more than normal about my wardrobe. He vetoed at least two outfits I’d brought with me from London—none, apparently, were sexy enough for his liking.

“Xavi!” I’d squealed when he tackled me back to the bed after taking off a green sundress. “I can’t meet your neighbors looking like a showgirl!”

“Just wear jeans, then. Or that tracksuit I like. They both make your arse look fantastic, and who cares what they think, anyway?”

I cared, though. And even if he didn’t admit it, so did he. For better or worse, Xavier at least needed to command some respect from these people, even if they were loath to give it. I wasn’t going to give them a reason by dressing like the uncouth American they obviously thought I was.

And so, approximately thirty minutes past the time we were supposed to join them, Xavier and I entered the second drawing room, him dressed casually but elegantly in a pair of black pants and a blue shirt that matched his eyes. Unlike the rest of the guests, he had foregone a jacket but kept a loosely knotted tie and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt so that the tattoos twisting around his collar and sneaking down his forearm were his only other accessory.

I was shooting for elegant in a knee-length purple shift dress impulse-bought on Amazon, a pearl pendant on a silver chain that used to belong to Nonna, and my favorite silver hoops. But the moment I laid eyes on Georgina, Frederick, Imogene, and the other two guests I assumed were her parents, I knew I’d far undershot. I looked like I should have been serving them dinner—probably at a local pub rather than a place as grand as this.

It wasn’t exactly dressing for dinner at Downton Abbey , but it wasn’t far from it. Dinner with the duke was clearly an occasion, even if the duke himself didn’t think so. The other two men—Frederick and someone else I took to be Lord Ortham—wore full suits, down to the ties and matching pocket squares. All three women wore floaty silk frocks and delicate heels, with subtle jewelry that was obviously very expensive without being overly gaudy.

Georgina’s lips drew into a tight line as she took in the purple dress and the slightly scuffed black pumps I wore with just about every “fancy” outfit I owned. With my simple jewelry and simply made-up face, I felt bare. And as common as ever.

Crap.

“Drink, sir?”

We turned to find Gibson, the butler, standing before us, holding a silver tray bearing a glass of brown liquor.

“Macallan?” Xavier wondered, looking at the glass.

“The forty, sir, just as you like.”

“Good man.” Xavier took a satisfied sip. “It’s the best.”

I watched him savor the drink. “I didn’t know you like whisky.”

“I don’t usually drink it, but Henry always kept the good stuff here. Do you want anything?”

I noticed it was he who had to ask me, not the butler. “Ah, sure. A glass of wine, please.”

“We only serve wine with dinner, miss,” Gibson informed me haughtily.

“Do I get a cocktail?” Imogene called from one of the sofas. She wasn’t, I noticed, looking at me, but at Xavier—specifically his tattoos—with the same expression of a dog about to go in heat.

Xavier frowned. “Just open the damn wine, Gibson. We’re having drinks, not signing a state accord.”

“But it’s not?—”

“Do it,” Xavier ordered.

The butler sniffed but turned to do as he was told, leaving us in an awkward silence. Despite the fact that I’d barely said a word, I had a feeling that I had already spoiled the evening.

“You’ll have to ignore him too,” Xavier said as he took my hand and led me to join the others. “Gibson really is a horrible snob.”

“So I was told,” I murmured, thinking of Elsie. Where was she, anyway?

“Kip,” Imogene called, voice crisp like a bird’s, even swallowed by the tapestries that hung from the windows of the elegant room. “Good of you to join us finally,” she joked. “You too, Felicity.”

“It’s Francesca,” I reminded her, staying close to Xavier, who squeezed my hand sympathetically.

Then he dropped it to greet the other two people I didn’t recognize.

“Lord Ortham,” he said as he shook the hand of an older gentleman in a brown suit. “Lady Ortham.”

The other woman, who looked very much like Imogene, right down to the slender frame and elegant height, bobbed slightly to Xavier and accepted his hand.

Xavier looked like he didn’t really know what to do with that but turned away, nonetheless, to take a long sip of his drink. I was glad, at least, that he seemed as uncomfortable with all the formalities as I was.

“Where’s Sofia?” I asked Gibson, who had returned with my wine.

He looked troubled by the question. “Miss Sofia is in the nursery, of course, enjoying her dinner with Mrs. Crew.”

I frowned. “Shouldn’t she be here with us? We always eat as a family. I’m sure Elsie would like to join us too, don’t you think, Xavi?” I didn’t like the idea that the two of them had been shuttled away.

“All together?” Imogene asked. “Oh, that’s so lovely. So very quaint. Can you imagine, Mummy, if Lucy and I had joined you and Papa every night for dinner. Frederick, would you have done so?”

Frederick snorted from his seat in the far corner but didn’t reply.

“So very American,” Georgina added from her place on a sapphire-blue chaise lounge.

“It’s fine, Ces,” Xavier said, blue eyes begging me not to argue. “I reckon they’ll be all right together, happy as clams. Sof wanted to bake cookies with Els, so they’re probably up to their elbows in flower.”

Maybe he was fine with that, but I wasn’t. This was our own little pattern we’d started weeks ago. I’d grown up in a house where family dinner was sacred every night, and it was something I had always wanted to pass on to Sofia. Over the last month, I’d come to believe Xavier shared that goal.

“I don’t really—” I started.

“Just for tonight.” Xavier’s eyes silently begged me to stop. “We’ll eat together tomorrow. I promise.”

“Are you making your assistant take care of that little girl?” Imogene put in. “Xavier, you can’t be so cruel. She’s got far more important things to do.”

“Why would it be cruel?” I wondered. “Elsie seems to like it. She’s always volunteering to take her. And God knows Sofia loves her to death.”

“Volunteering? Or looking for a raise?” Lord Ortham remarked with a tap to his nose.

Everyone laughed. I just frowned.

“Elsie’s not like that,” I said.

They acted like I hadn’t spoken at all.

“Xavier, how long has the girl been in England?” Georgina wondered, standing up to sway across the room and join our little circle. “One week? Two?”

“Four,” I said. “We’re staying the summer.” In case you were hoping otherwise, lady.

Georgina stared at me like an ant she’d like to crush.

“Well, then,” she said to Xavier. “It’s high time you got proper help, is it not?”

“Elsie has a few candidates arriving tomorrow,” Xavier put in, as if to reassure them. The people who didn’t know our family at all. “We’ll have someone straight away so she can get back to London.”

“Candidates for what?”

Georgina’s laugh practically tinkled over the crystal glasses everyone held. Imogene looked like she wanted to join her. Her parents looked embarrassed for me, while Frederick just looked bored in his corner.

“Candidates for a nanny, Ces,” Xavier said gently, though he didn’t look at me while he said it.

Wait, what?

“I—I don’t understand,” I said. “Why do we need a nanny when I’m right here? And when Elsie doesn’t mind watching her.”

It wasn’t as though I didn’t want a babysitter every so often, but I was a bit taken aback. Sofia wasn’t in school, and I wasn’t working. I was more than happy to take her around the English countryside on the days Xavier had to work, then leave her with a sitter—often Elsie, whom she adored—on the nights we went out. It was the routine we’d fallen into. What had changed?

“It’s true, Xavier,” Georgina put in. “It’s not as if she’ll be in charge. Better let her take care of her own child. After all, you’ll be busy, and what else is she to do? Fish in the pond?”

I couldn’t hold back my glare. It was one thing for me to suggest I was the best person to take care of my daughter. Another thing completely to come from a stranger who was basically saying I had no other talents anyway.

I opened my mouth to say as much, but Xavier’s hand on my shoulder stopped me.

“We’re getting a nanny,” he said in a tone that brooked no argument from anyone. “And Francesca is busy enough.” Then, to me, “We’ll talk about this later, all right?”

I wanted to talk about it now. Just like I wanted to talk about why in the hell we had to have dinner with people who clearly did not want me there. Why he felt it was more important to put on whatever this show was for his neighbors than be true to his own family.

“Excuse me, sir,” interrupted Gibson before I could say as much. “Dinner is served.”

Xavier didn’t look away from me, but something flickered in his blue eyes that begged me to wait.

So, as everyone stood to adjourn to the dining room, I did.

I just didn’t think I would regret it so soon.