Page 80 of A Baby to Seal the Duke’s Fate

“I am making no effort to lie about walking into the village for supplies.”

She stared at him a moment longer, then said, with the tone of a woman who disliked being told no in front of other people, “Do as you like.”

Leopold inclined his head. “I intend to.”

Phoebe had been watching the exchange with a face that gave little away. Leopold looked at her then, and she looked back, her expression carefully neutral in the way it had become when she was measuring what was safe to say.

“You will need a coat,” she said.

He glanced toward the front hall. “I have one.”

She looked as though she might smile, though she did not quite allow it. “Then let us go before the weather changes.”

It was the first time they had left the estate together.

The carriage would have been unnecessary for such a short distance, and Leopold had chosen, perhaps deliberately, to walk, the road to the village dry enough underfoot though the edges still held the damp of the night.

Phoebe walked beside him carrying Cecily against her shoulder, and Leopold found himself aware, almost at once, of the way they must have looked to anyone passing by.

A duke, a nursemaid, a baby. More specifically, a reclusive duke, a nursemaid who came seemingly from nowhere, and a baby that had just appeared at his home rather than an orphanage.

People they passed on the lane looked at the three of them and then looked away too quickly. A gardener near the turn to the lower field pulled off his cap and stared after them once they had gone by. Two women carrying market baskets slowed to watch them from the far side of the road before whispering to each other and continuing on.

Leopold noticed all of it.

He also noticed, with some irritation, that he did not entirely dislike it.

Phoebe kept pace with him easily. Cecily, warm and content, stared over Phoebe’s shoulder at the world with bright seriousness and clutched at the edge of her sleeve.

At the first cottage they passed, a dog barked from behind the gate.

Cecily turned her head immediately and made a delighted sound.

Leopold glanced at her. “You approve of village life already?”

Phoebe said, “She approves of noise.”

“That explains the household.”

This earned him a brief look from Phoebe, though the corner of her mouth shifted as if she had nearly smiled.

They reached the village not long after.

It was still early enough that the road had a quiet look to it, though the market street was beginning to wake. The village shop had its shutters half open, the bakery smelled faintly of fresh bread, and a boy carrying firewood stopped to stare at Leopold before being shooed onward by his mother.

Phoebe was beside him now in full view of the village, and Leopold saw the change in the people around them almost at once. More than curiosity. Recognition. Assumption.

He had no idea how many of them knew who she was or what they thought she was to him. The answer seemed to alter every time a pair of eyes fell on them.

At the draper’s shop, a woman came to the counter while Phoebe was explaining what she needed. The woman looked from Phoebe to Cecily to Leopold and then, with the kind of confidence that came from speaking before thinking, said, “Good morning, Your Grace.”

Phoebe froze.

Leopold saw the reaction at once.

Phoebe’s head turned, her cheeks went faintly pink, and she said too quickly, “Oh. No, I am not. I mean, that is not...”

The woman blinked. “Pardon?”