SHE PRETENDED TO BE A “BOY” FOR 7 MONTHS TO AVOID AN ARRANGED MARRIAGE—UNTIL THE DUKE FOUND OUT…
Chapter 4
Mrs. Osborne was a woman built out of iron and disapproval.
She stood in the servants’ hall at six the next morning with her hands clasped at her waist and her grey hair pulled into a bun so severe it seemed to pull the skin of her forehead taut. Her gaze moved over Josephine the way a butcher’s gaze moves over a cut of meat — assessing, unhurried, entirely without sentiment.
“You are Joseph?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You will address me as Mrs. Osborne.” The correction was flat, automatic, without heat. “I run this household with absolute precision. You will be punctual, clean, and silent. You will not linger in rooms where you do not belong. You will not touch items that are not within your duties to touch. And you will not, under any circumstances, disturb His Grace. Is that clear?”
“Yes, Mrs. Osborne.”
“Good. Come.”
She led Josephine through the manor, and for the first time Josephine saw the true scope of what the Duke owned.
Marble floors polished to a mirror sheen. Chandeliers dripping with crystal, unlit at that hour but catching the weak winter light from the tall windows. Paintings in gilded frames — portraits of ancestors with the same cold grey eyes, landscapes of countries Josephine would never see, a still life of fruit so vivid she could almost smell the peaches. Furniture of dark carved wood that belonged in palaces, all of it arranged with a precision that suggested a ruler had been applied to the placement of every chair.
“You will begin each morning in the drawing room,” Mrs. Osborne said as they walked. “Light the fire. Dust the surfaces. Fresh water in the vases. Then the library. Then His Grace’s study — but only when he is absent. When His Grace is working, you do not disturb him. Not for any reason.”
They climbed the grand staircase, their footsteps muffled by carpet so thick Josephine’s boots sank into it.
“The second floor holds the guest chambers, the music room, and the conservatory. You will occasionally be asked to attend His Grace directly — carrying correspondence, fetching items he requires.” She stopped and turned, and her eyes were like chips of flint. “When in his presence, you speak only when spoken to. You keep your eyes down. You do not presume familiarity. The Duke is not your friend, Joseph. He is your employer and your better. Remember that.”
“Yes, Mrs. Osborne.”
They stopped before a heavy oak door at the end of a corridor, and the housekeeper’s expression sharpened into something like reverence.
“This is His Grace’s private chamber. You will enter only to tend the fire, and only in the early morning when he is elsewhere. You will touch nothing except what is necessary for your duties. This room is sacred territory. Violate its sanctity and you will be dismissed immediately. Understood?”
“Yes, Mrs. Osborne.”
She opened the door.
The chamber was vast, and Josephine had expected opulence — she had braced herself for velvet and gold and the overwhelming evidence of wealth. What she found instead stopped her in the doorway.
It was austere. Almost bare.
A large four-poster bed with dark curtains, the counterpane pulled tight with military precision. A wardrobe of carved mahogany. A desk positioned before the windows that overlooked the grounds, its surface holding nothing but a single silver inkstand and a stack of correspondence squared to the edge. Books on shelves, arranged by height. A fireplace with a marble mantle.
And nothing else.
No portraits. No trinkets. No mementos. No letter propped against a candlestick, no flowers, no sign that a human being with a heart and a history slept in this room. Just functional elegance and complete emotional silence.
It was, Josephine thought with a small chill, the room of a man who had decided that wanting things was a weakness.
“You will enter at half past five each morning,” Mrs. Osborne said. “Light the fire. Ensure the room is warm before His Grace wakes. Then you leave immediately. You will not linger. You will not explore.”
“Yes, Mrs. Osborne.”
“Then begin your duties. I expect perfection, Joseph.”
She left, her footsteps fading down the corridor, and Josephine stood alone in the Duke’s chamber with her heart pounding.
She could smell him in here.
Faint, but unmistakable — soap and leather and the cold, clean scent of the outdoors, and underneath it the smoky remnant of last night’s fire. She stood in the middle of his room and breathed air he had breathed and felt something she refused to name climb up her spine.
Then she moved, quickly, because lingering was a rule she could not break.
Kindling from the brass box beside the hearth. Two logs, crossed. She had built a hundred fires in a hundred grates and her hands knew the work without her mind’s assistance, and within minutes the flames caught and crackled and cast golden light across the bare walls.
She straightened, brushing ash from her hands.
And froze.
Because a man was standing in the doorway.
He wore a dressing gown of dark silk over his nightshirt, and his hair was faintly disheveled from sleep, but there was nothing sleepy about his eyes. They were sharp and alert and fixed on her with the patient intensity of a hunter who has already decided where the animal will run.
“Your Grace,” she managed, dropping into an awkward bow. “I apologize. Mrs. Osborne said you would be elsewhere.”
“Mrs. Osborne assumes I keep to a schedule.” His voice was quiet, unhurried. “I do not always oblige.”
He stepped into the room.
Josephine stepped back without meaning to, and her spine met the fireplace mantle, and there was nowhere left to go.
He stopped three paces away.
“You are the stable boy. Joseph.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“You have been reassigned inside the manor.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“Do you find the work satisfactory?”
“I am grateful for any work, Your Grace.”
His eyes narrowed a fraction. “You speak very little. Most servants chatter constantly when given the opportunity.”
Her throat tightened. “I prefer silence, Your Grace.”
“As do I.”
He moved closer. One step. Then another.
She pressed harder against the mantle, her hands gripping the cold marble behind her, and he stood close enough now that she could see the fine details of his face — the sharp line of his jaw, a pale scar cutting through his left eyebrow, and behind his eyes the absolute absence of warmth.
“You are frightened of me,” he observed.
“No, Your Grace.”
“You are lying.”
She said nothing, because he was right.
Raymond reached out, slowly and deliberately, and adjusted the collar of her rough shirt where it had twisted at her neck. His fingers brushed the side of her throat — just for a moment, just long enough to leave a burn behind.
“You are unlike the others,” he said quietly. “They either grovel or gossip. You do neither. Why is that, Joseph?”
“I have nothing to say that would interest Your Grace.”
“On the contrary.” He let his hand fall. “I find your silence intriguing.”
He stepped back, and the loss of his proximity felt like stepping out of a warm room into snow.
“Complete your duties,” he said, turning toward the window. “And in future, knock before entering, even when you believe the room to be empty.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
She fled.
Down the corridor, down the servant’s stairs, past the portraits with their cold grey eyes, until she reached the kitchen where Edith and Millie worked over steaming pots. Edith looked up, and her eyebrows climbed.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Joseph.”
Josephine shook her head and did not trust her voice.
Because what she had seen was not a ghost.
It was the Duke’s curiosity — alive and awake and turned toward her like a lamp in a dark corridor.
And she understood, with a clarity that chilled her worse than the winter, that a man who never noticed anyone had just begun to notice her.