Page 100 of Better Than a Duke
She grabbed his arm. “No. It didn’t happen. I’m not marrying him.” Another wave of giddy relief flowed over her. “And if he needs a thrashing, I will do it.”
Beckett grinned. “I don’t doubt it for a moment.”
“You have to let us go, Bradley!” Edmund yelled from the kitchen. “This was not part of the plan!”
“What happened in the morning room?” Rebecca chimed in. “Were they kissing? Do they have to get married now?”
Iris caught Beckett’s frown. “What the devil?” he murmured.
“Oh, I have no idea, but I mean to find out.”
In the kitchen Mrs. Alliday sat at the servants’ dining table,her hands over her ears, while Bradley still had an arm around each of the children, holding them half off the ground as they struggled to get away from him.
“What plan?” Iris asked succinctly, and both children froze.
“What?” Becks asked, putting on an angelic look of confusion.
“Oh, don’t even attempt to look innocent, Rebecca,” her father took up. “Explain yourselves. Both of you.”
“Make Bradley put us down first. This is undignified,” the little girl stated.
“Bradley, if you would. Children, sit down. Everyone else, out of the kitchen.”
“It wasn’t only them, my lord,” the footman said, his face going red. “They shouldn’t get all the blame.”
Beckett cleared his throat. “Very well. In five minutes, I want to see everyone who hadanythingto do with this in this kitchen. No, make it ten minutes. After all the guests are gone.”
The footman bowed. “I’ll see to it, my lord. Mrs. Alliday, come with me.”
“Oh, thank goodness,” the cook said, sprinting for the door. “I don’t wish to faint into the dessert.”
Rebecca ran forward, her arms wide. “Papa, are you—”
He backed away a step. “What is all over… Never mind. Sit down, Rebecca. You too, Edmund.”
“Do I have to, Papa? I’m quite sticky.”
“Yes, I can see that. The bench will manage. Sit.”
The children sat down next to each other. Iris took a seat on the other side of the servants’ table, and a moment later Beckett sat beside her. “I don’t know if I can stand much more of this,” she muttered. “My mind is rattling about like a bucket with one rock in it.”
“We’ll explain everything,” Edmund said. “But first we have to know: Are you engaged to His Grace, Mama?”
“Are you engaged to Lady Pauline, Papa?”
She glanced at Beckett to find him looking at her. That was the bit, the part that kept sticking in her mind and refusing to go anywhere. She and Beckett—at the least, neither of them had ended the evening betrothed. In fact, the things he’d been saying before the earth opened up had been… quite remarkable. A daydream, except she was wide, wide awake. “I am not engaged, Edmund,” she said slowly.
Beckett cleared his throat. “I am not engaged, Rebecca.”
The children grabbed hands and squeezed, then settled onto the bench again. “I have another question,” Rebecca said. “Are you sad, Papa, that you’re not engaged?”
Beckett took a slow breath. “Not particularly. Why?”
“Because she said it made you sad to have to look after me all the time and that I leeched all the happiness out of you. That you would only be happy again if you were married and had someone to look after you.”
The marquis stilled. “Who said that to you, Cricket?” he asked, his voice mild despite the hard clench of his jaw. Beckett had a much better rein on his anger than she did. More practice, Iris supposed. It gave her some hope for herself, at least.
“Lady Pauline said it,” his daughter answered in a small voice. “That was when I choked on an orange slice.”
