Page 90 of The Mistletoe Dare

“She complains of her nerves a good deal,” he said, trying to slow his steps as his wife was having to run to keep up. “But I do not know if she’s truly ill. She’s always been fragile.”

“Says who?”

Rochford paused, frowning. “I don’t know. She says it a lot.”

Finally, they arrived at the door of his mother’s rooms. Rochford knocked once and opened the door without awaiting an answer. He turned back to Georgie.

“Well then,” Rochford said, his expression giving nothing away. “Let’s tell darling Mama that she’s no longer the Duchess of Rochford, but the dowager.”

Georgie clung to Rochford’s hand. Not for her own comfort, but for his. She was anxious, yes, but not unduly so. Running a household held no fears for her, because her mama had taught her well. Dealing with difficult staff was a skill she had learned at her mother’s knee as they had spent their time between the many large properties that belonged to her father. Mama was kind but firm, fair, but with a will of iron. Mama had also often reminded Georgie she was not only an Anderson by blood, but a Stone, and no one could wear away one of those. As for dealing with spiteful women, well, she’d been a debutante, and not one that fit the prescribed mould of what a debutante should be. Being on the receiving end of spiteful comments was hardly new. She could do this.

What she had seen on the way to these rooms had shown her a grand medieval castle that was austere and unwelcoming, but beautiful for all its uncompromising lines. The rooms her new mother-in-law had made her own appeared to have been transplanted from somewhere else entirely.

Georgie blinked, appalled and astonished by the surfeit of frills and flounces and lace and… and cushions. The things were everywhere, overstuffed and embroidered. Pictures hung upon every inch of wall space, many of them bucolic scenes of rustic charm, the others paintings of pug dogs in various poses. Two such pups, overfed and snoring softly, were curled upon a large red velvet bed with golden tassels at the edges.

“Mother,” Rochford said, and Georgie followed his gaze to an armchair by the fire where a woman of perhaps five and fifty sat with a book.

Georgie hadn’t noticed her before, as she too was dressed in so many frills and flounces that she’d blended into the décor.

The woman looked up, frowning with displeasure at being interrupted. “Rochford. It’s not the third Sunday of the month, is it?”

“No, madam.”

“And it is not dinner time.”

“No, madam.”

“Then why are you here? I did not ask for you.”

“I am here to present the Duchess of Rochford to you, Mother. I am married.”

The dowager’s eyes widened with shock, and then she turned her gaze upon Georgie. Georgie endured her scrutiny easily enough, too intent on her own perusal of the dowager duchess. She must have been a beauty once, for her bone structure was fine and delicate, and her faded blue eyes large, like a doll’s. Her figure had become plump, though judging from the exquisite portrait on the wall above her of a stunning, slender woman of perhaps twenty years, that had not always been the case.

“Wanted a title that badly, did you?” his mother remarked, raising a gold-stemmed lorgnette to her eyes to get a better look at her.

“No. Not in the least,” Georgie returned, holding the woman’s cool gaze. “I’m the daughter of an earl. I’m not much of a one for society, and the idea of being a duchess held no appeal, I’m afraid, but it came with the man, and I did want him, so….”

Georgie smiled up at Rochford, leaving the words hanging there.

The dowager gave a delicate laugh. “You mean no other gentleman wanted such a large, unseemly creature.”

“You’ll hold your tongue,” Rochford said and, from the way his mother jolted in surprise, Georgie suspected he’d rarely raised his voice to her before.

Georgie squeezed his hand and gave him a reproving look.

“That’s true enough,” Georgie said with a laugh. “I have been blessed indeed to find a man so big and strong that I have not a hope of intimidating him. We are quite perfectly matched.”

She sent her husband another adoring smile and felt his tension ease a little.

The dowager regarded her with a puzzled little frown. “You do not care that the rest of the world pities you for your choice of husband?”

“Pities me?” Georgie repeated, doing her best to look merely surprised and not as if she wanted to throw something at the spiteful old witch. “Why would they pity me? For my happiness? For marrying a man I love and esteem? My friends are happy for me, and I do not give a snap of my fingers for anyone else’s opinion.”

She held the woman’s gaze as she spoke, her voice clear and firm so there could be no misunderstanding her.

“You are outspoken and full of opinions, I see,” the woman said, her face creasing with displeasure.

“I am the Duchess of Rochford,” Georgie replied.