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Authors: Rebecca Connolly

Married to the Marquess (6 page)

BOOK: Married to the Marquess
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C
hapter
F
our

 
 

T
wo days later, Derek found himself beside his wife and her father in the parlor of their family home, and he was bored out of his mind. Katherine, ever controlling and interfering, had demanded that, as she and the other ladies had not been present for the service, they would hear exactly what the minister said during such before they received their callers.

He wasn’t sure he could bear hearing it again. He hadn’t expected the service to be amusing or light-hearted, given the circumstances, but he had never in his life been to a funeral or reception that had been so monotonous. Or that had been so devoid of emotion. Not a single person present was crying.

Well, except for Katherine’s sister, Lady Aurelia, who was in the adjacent anteroom sobbing rather unconvincingly into her rotund and ridiculous husband’s now drenched waistcoat. But he was holding her and patting her shoulder, and looking rather subdued, which seemed a decent fit for the act.

The minister, a rather small, balding man, was now reading some psalms or some such from his Bible, and, though Derek appreciated religion as much as any good Christian, he really would rather have skipped the whole thing. What was the sense in trying to be uplifting here? If Lady Penelope were going to Heaven, he would gladly go to Hell when his time came.

     Derek nearly groaned when he saw the minister turn the page and continue reading on the next. Would this day never end?

     At long last, the minister bowed his head and waited for judgment to be passed upon him.

Katherine, looking pale and drawn, pressed her lips together firmly. “And that is exactly as the service proceeded?”

“It is, madam,” the minister said with a nod. “After which the grave site service commenced.”

Katherine nodded and looked at her father, whose expression was too vacant for any sort of reaction. She turned to Derek. “Was that what he said?”

Derek snorted. “More or less.”

She glared fiercely. “Was it more or was it less, Whitlock?”

He shrugged and scratched at the back of his neck. “I slept through it, I have no idea.” He sheepishly smiled at the minister. “Sorry, it was a rather long procession from the house to the church, and I am not used to walking such distances.”

The minister bit the inside of his cheek, but waved his hand a little dismissively. Katherine’s frown grew, but she turned back to the other man. “Thank you, Mr. Clarke,” she said softly, for once not sounding as though she disapproved. “It was exactly the way Mother had wanted it.”

Now
that
did not surprise Derek at all. He did rather expect that the old bird would have been affronted by the lack of attendance, but as she had not been anybody’s favorite person in the whole course of her life, he wondered just who she would have expected to come. He further suspected that she wrote the entire boring service out herself and gave specific instructions on what was to transpire and how it was to do so.

Such was the behavior of Lady Penelope.

May she rest in peace.

He nearly snorted at that. Peace? Ha!

Mr. Clarke shook hands with them all, and then waited for them to leave the parlor. It was time to receive the guests who had come to pay respects.

Derek expected that, given the number of friends Lady Penelope had, this would take all of ten minutes, perhaps fifteen, and then he would be free of this madness.

If it was a good day, even less.

Ever a puppet to duty, he stood obediently beside his wife as a surprising number of people proceeded past them to murmur insincere condolences and far too many handkerchiefs dabbed at completely dry eyes.

To his surprise, his parents came up and dutifully expressed condolences, but said nothing much further. Katherine thanked them for their attendance, which was more than Derek did. They took his hand as well, but moved quickly on. They had never been very emotional people, and mourning for someone they would not miss was not in their repertoire of feelings.

More and more people came by them, murmuring their faux sympathies, and just as Derek was wondering how long he was going to have to stand here and be somber-faced, Nathan and Moira appeared.

He almost grinned in relief, which would not have been appropriate at all.

He sensed Katherine stiffening ever so slightly, but she was far too principled to object to an earl and countess, no matter how she disliked Derek’s friends.

“Lady Whitlock,” Nathan murmured with an incline of his head.

“Lord Beverton,” she said tightly, her mouth stretched in only what the most optimistic of people would have considered a smile.

“My condolences on your loss.”

“Thank you for coming.”

Nathan nodded and moved on to Derek, who allowed himself to smile.

But before he could say anything, Moira had taken hold of Katherine’s arm. “I know we don’t know each other, Katherine,” she said earnestly.

Derek coughed to cover his sudden laughter at Moira’s use of Katherine’s given name, knowing how his wife would be shocked and appalled by it.

“…but if you need anything, I hope you will let me know,” Moira continued, as if she had not just severely breached Katherine’s beloved sense of decorum.

 “Thank you, Lady Beverton,” Katherine said stiffly.

Moira gave a comforting smile and patted her arm again, starting to move away. But then she hesitated, and before anybody could even blink, she had thrown her arms around Katherine in a rather awkward looking hug.

Oh, that was not going to go over well. “Nate,” Derek hissed, seizing his friend’s sleeve, “what is she doing?”

Nathan shrugged. “You know Moira. She does whatever she wants.”

“Well, it’s going to drive Katherine absolutely batty and I’m going to have to deal with it.” And it was going to be terrible. Awful. Horrifying. The stuff of nightmares. He was apprehensive already.

Nathan gave him a rather sardonic look and pushed his hand away. “Why don’t you try to stop my wife, Derek? I’m certainly not going to. I know better.”

“I know it feels dark right now,” Moira whispered to Katherine as she held her close, “but it gets better. I promise.” Then she let go, smiling gently, and took Nathan’s arm. She glared at Derek, and he returned it with a completely lost look of his own. What, did she really think that
he
had killed Katherine’s mother? Other than that, which was actually a rather intriguing idea, he had no idea what he could possibly have been in trouble for.

“Be nice,” she mouthed, looking rather severe.

Nathan snickered quietly, and escorted her away.

Derek glowered after them, wishing they would have stayed. Pleasant conversation would be difficult to come by for a while. But thankfully, he and Nathan and Colin had arranged to meet tomorrow morning at his home for a quick breakfast before meeting the other two of their friends at Dennison’s Stables, Moira’s family business.

Kate would not appreciate the company in the morning, which was, of course, all the more reason to do it.

He turned slightly to look at her, dreading what he would see, and sure enough, she looked as if she had suddenly smelled something rather pungent, but her eyes were also shimmering with unshed tears. Surely she was not so offended that she was brought to tears?

No, that was ridiculous. Not even Moira could offend someone to that degree.

Well, perhaps Colin, but he was sensitive.

“Kate?” he asked quietly.

“Katherine,” she snapped, blinking rapidly.

He rolled his eyes. She was just fine, tears or no tears. “Whatever. Would you like to retire now?”

“I would like
you
to retire now,” she muttered under her breath. Then, louder, she continued, “But I will leave it up to my father to decide when we are finished. After all, it is his wife that was buried today.”

Unable to help himself, Derek responded, “Technically, it’s only her body. She’s not down there at all. Just bones and muscles and flesh.”

She looked up at him with a half-disbelieving, half-aghast expression. “Are you completely without mental capacity or do you just manner yourself after a pig?”

“Katherine,” her father said softly, as if just now realizing there was a conversation occurring around him.

She looked over at him, and it pleased Derek to no end to see the slight fear of reprimand in her eyes. But her father did not even look at her, so she turned back to Derek again.

“Do not be unfeeling towards him, Whitlock,” she hissed. “He may remain here however long he chooses. If you would like to leave, then be my…”

“I would like to retire now,” Lord Dartwell announced in his quiet voice.

They both turned to look at him in surprise. “You would?” Katherine asked, looking confused.

He nodded. “What’s the use? No one really misses her. They’re only here for the food.”

Derek had to bite his lips together to keep from grinning or laughing, and quickly clasped his hand behind his back, as he also had the sudden urge to poke Kate in the shoulder.

“Besides,” he continued, “I’m hungry myself.” And with that, he turned and walked away.

Derek very properly offered his arm to Katherine, who very reluctantly took it. “Have I ever mentioned how much I like your father?” he asked rather brightly.

“Shut up, Whitlock,” she muttered.

A satisfied smirk crossed his lips, which faded as he saw that Sir Nigel and Lady Aurelia were crossing over the room to meet them. Of all the people in the world he couldn’t bear to converse with, these two were at the top of the list. Sir Nigel never said anything worth hearing, though he seemed to think his whole purpose in life was to grant his wife’s every request, and to speak to anybody nearby about whatever he could think about for however long he could think about it.

Aurelia was not much better. Everything should have been her idea, everybody should do things to her satisfaction, every fashionable item would look better on her, which Derek knew for a fact that it would not, as Aurelia more often than not looked as though someone had tried to stuff a pig into a dress. He also had no doubt that people were much wiser than he gave them credit for, as nobody ever asked Lady Aurelia’s opinion on anything.

He held his breath as the approached, as if that would make them avoid speaking with him.

He had no such luck.

“Whitlock!” Nigel cried joyously, as if they had not just spent the last two hours in the exact same places, and if those places had not revolved around the funeral for the mother of their wives.

“Nigel,” Derek answered with a nod, trying to hurry Katherine along just a little bit more, though she seemed to be moving a touch faster on her own.

“Whitlock, it is
so
good to see you,” Aurelia gushed, very nearly hauling her husband along to keep speed with them.

“And you as well, Aurelia. May I say how lovely you are looking this morning?” He bit the inside of his cheek as he felt more than heard Kate groan next to him. He knew better than to say such things, but really, sometimes Aurelia said the most delightfully insipid things that it was worth asking just to hear it.

“Oh, I daresay,” Aurelia replied, pretending to blush, and not very convincingly, “this is a
mourning
dress, Whitlock. Nobody looks lovely in a
mourning
dress, not even pretty Katherine. Look at how that black color simply washes her out! Ugh, I cannot even begin to imagine what it must feel like to look so pallid.”

Kate stiffened next to him, but still said nothing, which was much to her credit. He didn’t even like his wife and he felt his ire rising.

“The service was quite good, didn’t you think, Whitlock?” Nigel asked peering around his wife, which took some effort, given that he was so large that peering around anything took effort, and Aurelia was hardly small.

“Oh, but it would have been
so
much better if I had been in charge of things,” Aurelia broke in. “Nigel told me there were no flowers, no music, and the minister who spoke? So drab and little and hardly worth looking at. I should have chosen that Mr. Emery who is the clergyman over where we live. He is quite attractive.”

BOOK: Married to the Marquess
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