The Lost Duke of Wyndham (Two Dukes of Wyndham, #1)(35)

Her stomach rumbled at the thought. For someone who detested mornings as she did, she'd come to adore breakfast fare. If they could only serve kippers and eggs for supper each evening, she'd have been in heaven.

She glanced at the clock. Only fifty-five more minutes. She wondered if Mr. Audley was awake.

Probably. Morning people never awoke with only ten minutes to spare before breakfast.

She wondered what he looked like, all sleepy and rumpled.

"Is something wrong, Miss Eversleigh?" the dowager sharply inquired.

Grace blinked. "Wrong, ma'am?"

"You... chirped." She said this with considerable distaste, as if handling something with a particularly foul smell.

"I'm so sorry, ma'am," Grace said quickly, looking down at her hands folded in her lap. She could feel her cheeks growing warm, and she had a feeling that even in the morning light and with the dowager's diminished vision, her blush would be clearly visible.

Really, she should not be imagining Mr. Audley, and especially not in any state of dishabille. Heaven only knew what sorts of inappropriate sounds she would make the next time.

But he was handsome. Even when all she'd seen of him was the lower half of his face and his mask, that much had been clear. His lips were the sort that always held a touch of humor. She wondered if he even knew how to frown. And his eyes...Well, she hadn't been able to see those that first night, and that was almost certainly a good thing. She'd never seen anything quite so emerald. They far outshone the dowager's emeralds, which, Grace was still chagrined to remember, she'd risked her life (in theory, at least) to keep safe.

"Miss Eversleigh!"

Grace jerked upright. "Ma'am?"

The dowager pierced with a stare. "You snorted."

"I did?"

"Are you questioning my hearing?"

"Of course not, ma'am." The dowager abhorred the notion that any part of her might be susceptible to the usual impairments of age. Grace cleared her throat. "I apologize, ma'am. I was not aware. I must have, ehrm, breathed heavily."

"Breathed heavily." The dowager appeared to find that as appealing as she had Grace's earlier chirp.

Grace touched a hand lightly to her chest. "A bit of congestion, I'm afraid."

The dowager's nostrils flared as she peered down at the cup in her hands. "I do hope you did not breathe on my chocolate."

"Of course not, ma'am. The kitchen maids always carry the tray up."

The dowager evidently did not find any reason to ponder that further, and she turned back to her newspaper, leaving Grace alone once more with her thoughts of Mr. Audley.

Mr. Audley.

"Miss Eversleigh!"

At that Grace stood. This was getting ridiculous. "Yes, ma'am?"

"You sighed."

"I sighed?"

"Do you deny it?"

"No," Grace replied. "That is to say, I did not notice that I sighed, but I certainly allow that I could have done so."

The dowager waved an irritated hand in her direction. "You are most distracting this morning."

Grace felt her eyes light up. Did this mean she'd escape early?

"Sit down, Miss Eversleigh."

She sat. Apparently not.

The dowager set down her newspaper and pressed her lips together. "Tell me about my grandson."

And the blush returned. "I beg your pardon?"

The dowager's right eyebrow did a rather good imitation of a parasol top. "You did show him to his room last night, didn't you?"

"Of course, ma'am. At your directive."

"Well? What did he say? I am eager to learn what sort of man he is. The future of the family may very well rest in his hands."

Grace thought guiltily of Thomas, whom she'd somehow forgotten in the past twelve hours. He was everything a duke ought to be, and no one knew the castle as he did. Not even the dowager. "Er, don't you think that might be a bit premature, your grace?"

"Defending my other grandson, are we?"

Grace's eyes widened. Something about the dowager's tone sounded positively malevolent. "I consider his grace a friend," she said carefully. "I would never wish him ill."

"Pfft. If Mr. Cavendish - and don't you dare call him Mr. Audley - really is the legitimate issue of my John, then you are hardly wishing Wyndham ill. The man ought to be grateful."

"For having his title pulled from beneath his feet?"

"For having had the good fortune to have had it for as long as he did," the dowager retorted. "If Mr. - oh, bloody hell, I'm going to call him John - "

Jack, Grace thought.

"If John really is my John's legitimate son, then Wyndham never really had the title to begin with. So one could hardly call it stripping."

"Except that he has been told since birth that it is his."

"That's not my fault, is it?" scoffed the dowager. "And it has hardly been since birth."

"No," Grace allowed. Thomas had ascended to the title at the age of twenty, when his father perished of a lung ailment. "But he has known since birth that it would one day be his, which is much the same thing."

The dowager grumbled a bit about that, using the same peevish undertone she always used when presented with an argument to which she had no ready contradiction. She gave Grace one final glare and then picked up her newspaper again, snapping it upright in front of her face.