Page 1 of Bred By the Duke

Chapter One

Rochelle

The letter has been sitting on my kitchen table since it arrived this morning, and I've read it enough times now that I could recite it at a party.

Following a strategic review, we regret to inform you that your role as Senior Project Manager with Lyle and Fox is no longer tenable…

I already knew. My boss had called me into his office last thing on Friday and told me the news. They tried to frame it as a mutual agreement, but we both knew I was being pushed.

My phone goes off face down against the wood and vibrates itself in a slow circle toward the fruit bowl. Cassia's name lights up on the screen with an image of her behind it, smiling over a dripping ice cream cone.

“Rochelle.” Her voice is up at a pitch I've only heard twice, once when her horse got out and once at her father's funeral. “Rochelle, I need you to not panic.”

I raise my eyebrows. “Hmm. That's usually your job.”

“Delia's gone,” she squeaks.

I run through my mental rolodex of names associated with Cassia. “Who's Delia?”

“My wedding planner.” There's a wobble under it. “She emailed at eleven o'clock last night. Family emergency, terribly sorry, returning half the fee. Ro, the wedding is Saturday.”

I turn the letter over so I don't have to look at it. “Okay. What's actually still to do?”

“Everything. That's the maddening part. Marquee, flowers, caterers, quartet, car, cake, all of it. It’s all booked and paid for, and I have the receipts. But she was doing the week.” The words start coming faster. “She had a schedule. She was supposed to be here from tomorrow to tell everyone where to go and what time the vans arrive. Mamma thinks the marquee people come Thursday, Theo swears it's Friday, nobody knows whether the chairs come with the marquee or separately, there are eleven bedrooms to make up, and I've called the florist three times, but she hasn't picked up.”

“Breathe,” I say, though I think we’re passed that and into full-blown meltdown territory already.

“You do this.” She says it like an accusation. “This is literally your entire job. You stand in the middle of a disaster with a clipboard and make people in high-vis do things on time.”

“That's a beautiful summary of my career.” Ex-career, my brain reminds me.

“Could you come early?” She asks very fast, like she is ripping off a band aid and crossing everything all at once. “I know it's an enormous ask and you'd have to get the time off, and if you can't then say so and I'll cope. I'll just be sick in a hedge and marry him anyway with half a marquee and no chairs.”

I look at the letter, the signature, the last line about wishing me every success in my future endeavors.

“Funnily enough,” I say, “I can get the time off.”

There’s a sound like she has clapped her hand over her mouth, then a muffled, “Oh my God.”

“I'll drive up first thing in the morning.”

“Rochelle.” She's crying now, in the same loud, unembarrassed way she does everything. “You are the best human alive, and I'm naming my first child after you.”

I snort and think how her family would have a coronary if any of their descendants were named Rochelle.

“You don’t need to do that.”

After she hangs up, I sit for a while with both hands flat on the table and just breathe. I have two months' pay, a house that needs more repairs than I know how to handle, and grandparents who ask me every Sunday how work is going because it makes them proud to hear about it. I haven't told a single person that I’ve lost my job because I don’t even know how to say those words out loud.

At least helping Rochelle with her wedding will take my mind off it. And as her best friend and maid of honor, it’s my duty to step up when she needs it.

Even if that means spending five whole days at Fernwicke Hall.

***

Fernwicke Hall in September, with the sun coming in low across the front and the whole west face gone the color of a peach, is truly breathtaking. Seven years I've been coming here and it still does that to me, that little lurch in the chest when the house comes out from behind the beeches.

There's a lorry parked square across the courtyard entrance with nobody in the cab. There's a man on the south lawn holding one end of a tape measure with the other end lying in the grass thirty feet away. Two women in aprons are carrying a trestle table out of the east door and appear to be arguing about where to take it.