“I believe the duke had a hand in the departure, Your Grace.”
So Ambrose had sent his mother away. She recalled how he said he’d begun to resolve matters. Sending the Dragon Duchess away must be part of his plan.
And with the dowager gone, they might just accomplish something.
“That is good,” Willow murmured, sparing another look of disgust at the toast. She was so ravenous, she felt tempted to snatch it up just to stave off her hunger. But she decided if she were to prove a point, the toast should remain lifeless on that plate.
Her belly protested as she turned away.
“Wendell, if you will lead me to the kitchen, I would like a word with the cook. And please inform my husband that the toast was left uneaten.” Let him believe she was starving.
“Of course, Your Grace.”
The cook, much to Willow’s enjoyment, was adorable. A plump woman with kind eyes, she had been rightly shocked when Willow appeared in her kitchen. But after a few words of encouragement and the prospect of a better atmosphere, Cook was on her side as well.
They both agreed the time had come to liven up the dining room once more. And what better way to erase the gloom-ridden energy the breakfast of blazing stares had left behind than coming up with a menu fit for a king and queen?
“I suppose the duke will be quite put out with me tonight,” Willow said, taking a bite of buttered toast spread with raspberry jam and cream. She planned to dine tonight. With or without him.
“I suspect he will,” Wendell said, swallowing the last of his coffee.
Cook nodded. “It’s about time the dining room is put to good use again. It has been far too long since we heard laughter echoing off these walls.”
Willow nodded, understanding from Cook that Ambrose hadn’t always been this way. This made her more resolved to draw out the man beneath the mask. And more hopeful that their marriage could have a kinder, less warring future.
“Have you been with the family long?” she asked Cook.
“Since before the lad’s birth.”
“Then you know why the duke changed?”
Wendell suddenly looked uncomfortable. “That is also not our place to say.” He shot Cook a warning look.
“Oh posh, it’s high time for some change to come about this place.” Cook glanced at Willow with sad eyes. “If it helps your cause, child, you must know that His Grace was never the same after his sister, Lady Celia, passed away.”
He’d lost a sister? How had she not known? “How did Lady Celia die?”
“An ailment of the heart, the doctor claimed,” Cook answered.
How sad, Willow thought as her chest tightened. She could not imagine losing any one of her sisters. “How long ago was this?”
“Ten years,” Wendell said.
Ten years! It seemed an insurmountable amount of time. Enough time for any one’s ways to become engraved in stone. “Let us hope I can find a way to win the duke over,” Willow murmured.And find a way to heal him. “And my mother-in-law,” she muttered as an afterthought.
“Do not worry too much over her, dearie. As soon as you win the Duke, the Dowager will follow suit,” Cook said.
“That will be hard to do with her crying about the disgrace and shame I brought to the family,” Willow said, sipping on her tea.
“Oh, she will come around, you just wait and see, dear.”
“Let us hope that is true.”
A part of Willow still wondered if her husband had more motives for sending his mother away—like say, to clear the battlefield. A brazen assumption, yes, but not one she’d put past her husband. He was, after all, a master puppeteer, pulling the strings of people in a most clever, if not unscrupulous, way.
This knowledge that he was once a carefree man made the situation so much more bittersweet. Her heart practically bled that he may still be deeply hurt by the loss of his sister. It changed everything.
Well, almost everything.
