Dukes By the Dozen

“I had what was best,” she assured him, her own voice softening. “I had my Jamie, and I had my Lully. And when you considered the title to be more important than your own children, I had Olivia and Little Jamie. And now, I have Jack back, and I have Adam. I would also like to have you and mother and the rest of the family back in my life. That is what has been important to me. If you can bend a little, you might realize exactly what ‘best’ is.”

It took a long moment during which the room hummed with unspoken tension. Finally, without his posture easing by an inch, the marquess waved one of his hands. “Call for Williams. I will need the keys to the safe. I would also call for the children.”

Even as the over-starched butler opened the door and bowed, Georgie began to climb to her feet in protest.

Her father lifted a hand in her direction. “I would know my granddaughter, Georgiana. She is a duchess now. I would like to introduce her to the dignity of her position.”

He looked confused when the younger people in the room began to laugh.

Their laughter was quickly enough explained when a few moments later the same butler opened the door, bowed as if at a grand ball, and grandly announced, “The Viscount Amberly and Miss Lilly Charlotte Grace.”

At which point young Jamie came romping in followed by the lumbering Murphy who waited at the door for the very prim, very serene little girl who followed as if on the stroll in Hyde Park, her pretty green velvet dress spotless and unwrinkled, her green hair bow precisely placed in her bright red curls.

Jamie popped a quick bow to his grandparents and ran over to be folded into Olivia’s arms. Lully strode to the center of the room and gave Georgie her little-girl curtsy. “You called me, mama? Hello, Grace.”

Adam nodded, having long since given up trying to correct her. “Hello, Lully.”

“Lully,” Georgie said to her baby. “Allow me to introduce you to your grandparents, the Marquess and Marchioness of Wyndham. They felt you might like to learn a bit about the dignity of your family.”

Whereupon Lully turned her raised eyebrows at the couple who were now staring at her from their thronelike chairs. “Indeed,” was all she said.

Georgie’s father coughed. “She certainly has taken to her title well,” he managed.

Georgie laughed outright. “She has no idea about the title,” she informed him as everyone else chuckled. She lifted the marriage lines Williams had retrieved from the safe. “We haven’t told her yet.”

“What title?” Lully asked.

Georgie smiled. “Cutest sprite in England.”

Lully immediately let loose with one of her lovely giggles. “Silly.”

“Give your grandparents your best curtsy, please,” Georgie instructed. Bi cúramach, Murphy.”

Lully wobbled a curtsy and straightened. Murphy stepped up right alongside his tiny mistress so she could lay her hand on his neck.

“This is our dog Murphy,” Lully informed her gaping grandparents with the gravity of a doyenne. “If you try to hurt me, he will eat you.”

And for the first time Georgie could ever remember, he father broke into a genuine smile. “I have no doubt. I promise he will have no cause, Lilly Chalotte.”

She nodded as if bestowing a boon. “Good. I want to like you.”

Then she did something the marquess’s children had never had the temerity to do. She ran up to the two very starchy gray-haired people seated on their stately chairs, motioned them to her and gave them a smacking kiss on the forehead.

The marchioness actually exhibited tears. “Thank you, sweet girl,” she whispered. “That was….the best.”

“Indeed,” the marquess acknowledged unsteadily, reaching out a hand that Lully accepted with aplomb. “Indeed.”

“Me, too?” Jamie demanded from his place alongside his mother.

His grandparents looked even more startled.

“Why, yes,” the marchioness said, hands out. “I suppose so.”

Jamie ran into them, and suddenly the two children and their grandparents were talking as if they had been together for years.

Georgie didn’t realize she was weeping until Adam set a handkerchief in her hand. “All better now?” he asked.

She nodded. “It is certainly on the right road, my love.”

He smiled at her. “My love,” he echoed. “That is the best of all.”

“Yes,” she smiled back, knowing that with the support of this man she had finally reclaimed herself. “It is.”

For the first time in her life, she felt good about the future of her family. But even if she had walked away from her parents empty-handed, she had more than her heart could hold. All because Adam Marrick had kept his cousin’s promise.

Thank you, Jamie, she thought as she considered the family he had given her and the future she thought he blessed. Thank you for loving me enough to give me Adam. And for telling me to look past his perfectly forgettable face.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

New York Times bestselling, RWA Hall of Fame author Eileen Dreyer has published 32 romance novels and novellas in most sub-genres, 8 medical-forensic suspenses, and 10 short stories.