The Duchess Takes it All

Chapter Ten

Christian had finally had a productive morning with nary an interruption from his audacious duchess, and it was nearly half past eleven before he realized he hadn’t yet seen her that day. A circumstance he both mourned—for reasons he did not wish to dwell on—and feared—for entirely different reasons.

While he appreciated the time to actually accomplish something, it had been far too quiet. Ominously so. That did not bode well.

The door to his office flew open with a crash, and Christian jumped from his chair, papers flying.

“What the devil?” he shouted. Not that anyone heard him in the utter chaos that had invaded his study.

The duchess was shouting something unintelligible as she clutched a newborn goat in her arms that was bleating as though the entire world had turned topsy-turvy. And, from its point of view, it wasn’t wrong. A larger and very angry goat that must be the baby’s mother was bleating her fury into the void and chasing the duchess about the study, trying at every opportunity to butt the duchess’s legs out from under her.

More commotion sounded from the foyer. Christian wasn’t certain he wanted to know what was going on. Or if he could even get to the door with the duchess dodging behind him every few seconds. Before he could get within a yard of the door, Feldhagen rushed in holding the young duke and looking thoroughly spooked.

“They’re everywhere!” Feldhagen said. “Here!”

And for the second time, Christian found himself with an armful of toddler who was none too pleased. Though his displeasure seemed to stem more from being kept from the goats than from the goats’ presence.

“I quite understand, Your Grace,” Christian said to the little boy before surveying the chaos again. “But you cannot play with them just now. First, I need to rescue your mother from…”

His eyes widened as three more goats invaded his office, followed by a footman holding a broom and a wide-eyed Lucy, who visibly relaxed when she saw the young duke in Christian’s arms. Christian happily passed the child to her, watching until she’d successfully escaped before turning back to the chaos erupting in his office.

“Apologies, my lord,” the boy said. “We’re trying to get them out!”

The boy managed to get one of the goats out, but two more ran in. Or perhaps just one new one and the one who had just left returned. Christian couldn’t keep track of which goat was which. The duchess jumped back to dodge another attempt from one of the goats to get at her and crashed into Christian.

Startled, she glanced up just as he looked down and their gazes locked. The chaos around them faded as she leaned into him, and his arms tightened around her, keeping her pulled tight against his chest.

“Watch out, my lord!” Feldhagen called out as another goat charged in their direction.

Christian blinked and then swung the duchess up into his arms, twisting out of the way just before the goat made contact.

As far as he could tell, the goats weren’t actually trying to attack them. They were simply in the way of the meal they were trying to make of his study. But they needed to get the goats under control before someone got hurt. Preferably while there was still something left of his study.

He deposited the duchess onto his desk with an unceremonious plop, ignoring her yelp of surprise, and turned to face the rest of the fracas.

The mother goat, spying her kid, began to repeatedly ram the desk with her head. But the duchess was safe atop it, and trying to get to her at least kept the mother goat occupied. Two footmen had herded a couple goats into the foyer and were chasing them about but seemed to be getting them closer to the open front door. And Feldhagen had cornered one behind Christian’s desk.

Christian relaxed for all of two seconds before he realized the goat Feldhagen cornered was eating his papers.

“All right, that is enough !” he shouted, loud enough to startle just about everyone into silence. Even most of the goats stopped in their tracks to see what had made the bellowing noise.

“You there,” he said, pointing to the footmen and the three other servants who had been chasing the goats in the foyer.

The poor boy, red-faced and breathing hard, poked his face in the door. “Yes, my lord?”

“Get those two out,” he said, pointing at the goats in the foyer, “and you,” he directed at Feldhagen, “get that one out.”

They all moved to do as he’d ordered. The goats naturally protested. But the momentary pause in their mayhem had given the handlers an opening to get them pointed in the right direction.

“You,” he said to the duchess. “You have a child. You should understand how she feels. Give that poor goat her baby back.”

The mother goat looked back up at the duchess, looking for all the world like she agreed with Christian. But the duchess still hadn’t released the baby.

“But the poor thing has a thorn… Oh,” she said, looking at its foreleg. “I guess it fell out. No harm, then.”

She slid down from the desk and deposited the kid next to his mother. They immediately took off out the open door, ushered out by the servants waiting with brooms and sticks to herd them in the right direction.

Christian took a deep breath and then surveyed the damage done to his study. Then turned his incredulous gaze on to the duchess. “No harm? You call this no harm?”

She likewise looked about, her eyes wide in complete shock.

“I…I…” She shook her head. “I just needed your help to remove the thorn from his foreleg. The poor dear had been limping around and I—”

“Why didn’t you just leave him there and come and fetch me? Or send a servant to fetch me if you didn’t feel you could leave him?” Could that solution really have completely escaped her?

“I…” She frowned. “I didn’t know what to do. We don’t have goats in London. The poor thing looked hurt. You said to come to you with any problems, and I didn’t want to disturb you more than necessary. So I thought it would be easier to bring the poor dear to you instead of asking you to stop your work and slog all the way out to the paddock. A quick pop in, pull the thorn, and we’d be on our way. I didn’t realize its mother would be so angry. I thought I had her corralled in the pen, but she must have gotten out, and the others followed her. And then she was attacking me and—”

“Do you blame her?” Christian asked. He felt nothing but sympathy for the poor mama goat. In fact, he was more than tempted to punish the duchess himself.

“No, of course not, but I certainly didn’t intend for,” she waved her hand around, “all this,” she finished weakly.

“I’m sorry, Your Grace,” Lucy said, stepping back in. “But His Grace won’t stop asking for you.”

The duchess hurried over to take her son, who wrapped his chubby arms around her neck and looked about, eyes as wide as Christian’s own must be. Then he clapped his hands on his mother’s cheeks. “Goat!” he exclaimed with a giggle, then looked around excitedly.

Christian sighed and ran his hand over his face. The study looked as though a gale-force wind had blown through, leaving hay, debris, and—he grimaced, his eyes watering—goat droppings strewn about his office. Though the biggest upset by far was the papers they had eaten. He went behind his desk and picked up what he could, leafing through them to try and determine what was still there, what could be salvaged, and what was irretrievably lost.

Well, they might be somewhat retrievable, but he had no desire to check if any documents had survived its way through a goat’s intestinal tract, let alone try and read it if it did.

“I am genuinely sorry about the paperwork. Truly,” she said, looking up at him with wide eyes that had the slightest hint of tears shimmering in them.

He didn’t miss the fact that she only admitted to being sorry over the papers. The rest of the chaos he had a strong feeling had gone exactly to plan. Just as his missing quills and ink had, and the stench outside his window, and when she had spent the entire day interrupting him at every turn with the most inane drivel that a woman as intelligent as she seemed to be should have no trouble handling on her own. It had taken him a few days to piece it together. But at this point, there could be no other explanation. The woman was trying to sabotage her way back to town.

The goats, however, did seem a bit more than she’d anticipated.

James yawned and laid his head on his mother’s shoulder, and the knot in Christian’s stomach eased a bit. Oh, he was still angry. From what he could tell, most of the documents would be salvageable, so thankfully he hadn’t lost too much work. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t positively put out.

But James was such a sweet child, and the sight of him cuddling his mother’s neck plucked at Christian’s heartstrings. The memory of her pressing back against his body while she stared into his eyes wouldn’t leave his mind, either. He rolled his lips together to keep his frustrated groan inside. What was he going to do with this woman?

“My lord, I—” she started, her forehead creased with worry that he hadn’t responded yet.

“It’s all right, Your Grace. The servants will have this place righted in no time, I’m sure.”

She gave him a hesitant smile that made him want to gather her in his arms and never let go. He blew out a breath and ran his fingers through his hair again. He needed to get this estate in order and get back home as soon as humanly possible. A few more weeks of her smiling at him like that, and he’d never want to leave. And that wasn’t a choice he was at liberty to make.