If I Have To Marry the Duke Ch. 3

Starting to wonder where I'm gonna go from here. We can all be suprised together.

Chapter 3

     The weight of Richard’s actions sat heavily in his heart as he sat in his study some hours later. The impulse to take care of the girl wasn’t a new feeling, but that he took her from that place was different. Not that he believed she should have been kept in that awful place, but all the same, she was not his to care for. His thoughts were interrupted as a knock sounded at his door before it was quickly opened and his mother gracefully glided into the room. Richard expected to see her, and the look of disapproval and concern etched into her face was not new either. He stood as she walked and took a seat before him.

     "Richard, we must do something." His mother stated. Richard smiled to himself. His mother was always one to the point, never standing by for ideal chitchat.

     "I thought that is what I had done when I rescued the girl, mother." He replied, resuming his seat. His mother scoffed at his comment.

     "Don’t you go trying to act like your a hero here, Richard" Julianne replied to her sons remark. She raised an eyebrow as he made to respond to her comment. His mouth opened and closed without a sound coming out. "All I mean to say is that you took a girl from the only home she had," Julianne said, "What will the papers say, what will the ton say?" She asked. Julianne knew her son didn’t give a fig for what society said about him. He was powerful and influential. The ton could rot in hell in his opinion. The fact that she knew this caused her more distress.

     "The papers won’t find out about this," Richard responded after a moment of consideration, "Neither the hospital nor I want the publicity." He added. Richard had put a lot of thought into the fact that he may be wrong. The institute could pull this off in a publicity stunt like no other. The recovery of a mentally ill woman from the care they offered. He would have to speak to them before they could think it through.

     "Richard, what will we do with the girl?" His mother asked. It was a good question, one that even he did not have an answer to. "She still does not speak, we have no clue what she has learned, if she will fit into the societies harsh world, we don’t know her!" Julianne stated. Richard was growing agitated. He was not in any way displeased with his mother, for he knew she spook the truth. In all essence he was upset with himself. He could have just waited till her brother came home from his honeymoon and dropped the girl in his lap, if he even wanted to have her out in the first place. Double Damnation. He was not in any position to lay her at anyone’s feet but his own.

     "I understand your concerns, mother," Richard said. He was just as concerned at this point as she was. Julianne could read it in his eyes and she became more anxious. " I will take care of everything." He stated. Julianne nodded and rose.

     "Yes I have faith that you will, but I’m just unsure how that will be." She told her son. As she left the room, Richard sat in thought once again. The girl was his responsibility and his alone. In all reality he could probably stop calling her a girl, for she was no child. This thought haunted him the most. For the past two nights he could only think of the fear in her beautiful blue eyes. Her face was in his mind and he could not rid the imagine from his mind. The harder he tried the more she consumed his thoughts. No, she was not a child, in any sense of the word; She was a beautiful grown women whom he took responsibility for the moment he let her step foot in his carriage. If he had not been concerned before, he was now engulfed in the fear of the matter.

     "Lord help me," He silently prayed as he grabbed a parchment of paper. The note he was writing out would go out to the best governess, and who knew what would happen. They would all just have to wait and see.

***

     Lainey quietly sneaked out the door to the room Richard had placed her in earlier that day. He had been gracious enough to send up a plate, full of the best foods she had tasted in half her lifetime, as well as warm water for a bath. As she had lain in the tub, letting the water encompass her, Lainey had given an inward sigh of pleasure. The normal scrub she was hastily given in the hospital was mediocre compared to the feeling she felt as she laid in that tub. Her fingers had wrinkled and the water long grown cold before she was ready to leave the small piece of heaven. A kind house servant had lain out a simple dress made of corse wool, but the new gown was better then only the thin white robes she was made to wear for the past 12 years. With a full stomach and clean skin, Lainey thus found herself in the hall of the great house she had been brought to.

     "Yes I have faith that you will, but I’m just unsure how that will be." Lainey heard as she was in the middle of her exploration, and realized the voice was coming from behind one of the doors she was passing. The turn of the door handle had her frozen in fear, realizing she was about to be caught. There was nothing more to it, for there was no place to hide, and no direction to go in besides left or right. She began walking left since she had come from the right and heard the door click shut. Turning she saw the women that had greeted Richard at the door when she had stepped out of the carriage. "My dear, what are you doing out of bed?" She asked. Lainey realized there was nothing she could do. She lowered her head. "Now now, no need for that," She said, coming up to Lainey. "We shall just go back to your room, then." She added, taking softly putting her arms around Lainey’s shoulders and urging her back down the hall. After being put back to bed and told she would be better suited resting awhile, the women left and Lainey was again left to her own devices. The urge to explore the house was great inside of her, but the fact that this was not her home, kept Lainey put. The many years confined to her small room had not gone without the skill to keep time going by. Small stories were created in her head and added to as the years had passed. Tales of escape and rescue from the hideous home her parents had forced her to played out, and as she slowly added to her last story Lainey realized the hero had turned into the handsome Gray eyed devil that had rescued her in real life.