But she made it only ten paces before she heard Thomas bark her name.
She sighed, stopping in her tracks. She should have known better. The man was as stubborn as his grandmother, not that he would appreciate the comparison.
She turned and retraced her steps, hurrying along when she heard him call out for her again. “I’m right here,” she said irritably. “Good gracious, you’ll wake the entire house.”
He rolled his eyes. “Don’t tell me you were going to get the painting by yourself.”
“If I don’t, she will ring for me all night, and then I will never get any sleep.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Watch me.”
“Watch you what?” she asked, baffled.
“Dismantle her bell cord,” he said, heading upstairs with renewed determination.
“Dismantle her…Thomas!” She ran up behind him, but of course could not keep up. “Thomas, you can’t!”
He turned. Grinned even, which she found somewhat alarming. “It’s my house,” he said. “I can do anything I want.”
And while Grace digested that on an exhausted brain, he strode down the hall and into his grandmother’s room. “What,” she heard him bite off, “do you think you’re doing?”
Grace let out a breath and hurried after him, entering the room just as he was saying, “Good heavens, are you all right?”
“Where is Miss Eversleigh?” the dowager asked, her eyes darting frantically about the room.
“I’m right here,” Grace assured her, rushing forward.
“Did you get it? Where is the painting? I want to see my son.”
“Ma’am, it’s late,” Grace tried to explain. She inched forward, although she wasn’t sure why. If the dowager started spouting off about the highwayman and his resemblance to her favorite son, it wasn’t as if she would be able to stop her.
But still, the proximity at least gave the illusion that she might be able to prevent disaster.
“Ma’am,” Grace said again, gently, softly. She gave the dowager a careful look.
“You may instruct a footman to procure it for you in the morning,” Thomas said, sounding slightly less imperious than before, “but I will not have Miss Eversleigh undertaking such manual labor, and certainly not in the middle of the night.”
“I need the painting, Thomas,” the dowager said, and Grace almost reached out to take her hand. She sounded pained. She sounded old. And she certainly did not sound like herself when she said, “Please.”
Grace glanced at Thomas. He looked uneasy. “Tomorrow,” he said. “First thing, if you wish it.”
“But-”
“No,” he interrupted. “I am sorry you were accosted this evening, and I shall certainly do whatever is necessary-within reason-to facilitate your comfort and health, but this does not include whimsical and ill-timed demands. Do you understand me?”
They stared at each other for so long that Grace wanted to flinch. Then Thomas said sharply, “Grace, go to bed.” He didn’t turn around.
Grace held still for a moment, waiting for what, she didn’t know-disagreement from the dowager? A thunderbolt outside the window? When neither was forthcoming, she decided she could do nothing more that evening and left the room. As she walked slowly down the hall, she could hear them arguing-nothing violent, nothing impassioned. But then, she’d not have expected that. Cavendish tempers ran cold, and they were far more likely to attack with a frozen barb than a heated cry.
Grace let out a long, uneven breath. She would never get used to this. Five years she had been at Belgrave, and still the resentment that ran back and forth between Thomas and his grandmother shocked her.
And the worst part was-there wasn’t even a reason! Once, she had dared to ask Thomas why they held each other in such contempt. He just shrugged, saying that it had always been that way. She’d disliked his father, Thomas said, his father had hated him, and he himself could have done quite well without either of them.
Grace had been stunned. She’d thought families were meant to love each other. Hers had. Her mother, her father…She closed her eyes, fighting back tears. She was being maudlin. Or maybe it was because she was tired. She didn’t cry about them any longer. She missed them-she would always miss them. But the great big gaping hole their deaths had rent in her had healed.
And now…well, she’d found a new place in this world. It wasn’t the one she’d anticipated, and it wasn’t the one her parents had planned for her, but it came with food and clothing, and the opportunity to see her friends from time to time.
But sometimes, late at night as she lay in her bed, it was just so hard. She knew she should not be ungrateful-she was living in a castle, for heaven’s sake. But she had not been brought up for this. Not the servitude, and not the sour dispositions. Her father had been a country gentleman, her mother a well-liked member of the local community. They had raised her with love and laughter, and sometimes, as they sat before the fire in the evening, her father would sigh and say that she was going to have to remain a spinster, because surely there was no man in the county good enough for his daughter.
And Grace would laugh and say, “What about the rest of England?”
“Not there, either!”
“France?”
“Good heavens, not.”
“The Americas?”
“Are you trying to kill your mother, gel? You know she gets seasick if she so much as sees the beach.”
And they all somehow knew that Grace would marry someone right there in Lincolnshire, and she’d live down the road, or at least just a short ride away, and she would be happy. She would find what her parents had found, because no one expected her to marry for any reason other than love. She’d have babies, and her house would be full of laughter, and she would be happy.