Page 93 of A Problem Princess

“Of course not,” she agreed. “Marcus sent word about Scepter and told me to remain at home.”

Clayton leveled his gaze at the young duchess. He knew her too well. “Are you truly going to follow his orders?”

“Not if I’m needed elsewhere.” She nodded at Cordelia. “Fortunately, I’m needed here at the moment. How may I be of service?”

“Her Highness is going to Westminster to address Parliament,” he explained. “We need you to make her look as royal as possible.”

“But not too royal,” Cordelia interjected. She murmured to Clayton in a low voice, “I’m still hoping to remain a frog.”

Danielle nodded, completely unperturbed at the request; after all, subterfuge was her second nature. Her eyes narrowed as she cast an assessing look over Cordelia. “I have the perfect gown, diamonds, a tiara…and ermine. Lots and lots of ermine. None will be anywhere near as grand as what should grace a princess, but it should work.” She flicked her gaze to Clayton. “How much time do I have?”

“Two hours.”

“We’d best get started.” Danielle linked her arm in Cordelia’s to whisk her upstairs. “Clayton, you know the way to Marcus’s study. Feel free to use the stationery.” She gave him a knowing look. “I’m certain you have messages that need to be sent.”

With that, the two women swept from the room, with Danielle chatting a mile a minute about how she planned on costuming the princess. Only a glance by Cordelia over her shoulder before she disappeared from sight told him how uneasy she was.

She needn’t have worried. Danielle could be trusted to transform her into the person everyone would recognize. The irony was bitter. He had to save Cordelia by turning her back into the one thing she didn’t want to be.

He only prayed that someday she would forgive him for it.

An hour and a half later, the butler rapped on the study door. From behind the massive desk, Clayton signaled to the man to give him just one more moment, then finished his last letter, the most difficult one he’d ever written in his life.

He blotted and folded the letter, then sealed it with a drop of red wax. He wrote Cordelia’s name across the front.

Finally, he looked up. “Yes?”

“Her Grace has sent for you,” the butler informed him. “May I show you upstairs?”

With a nod, Clayton rose to his feet. He reached for the large glass of cognac he’d helped himself to from Marcus’s liquor cabinet and took a long drink to bolster himself. Then he gathered up the many messages he’d written…to Justice Rivers to thank him for his help, to the Home Secretary to attempt to explain his version of events and what he planned to do this afternoon in Westminster Hall, and to a half dozen other people at the Home Office and in the army who needed instructions for what would come next. He’d even penned one to the blasted prince regent, for whatever good it might do.

“I need you to deliver these immediately,” he ordered as he handed the stack to the butler. “Immediately.And this one.” He held up the last letter with the red seal, then placed it in the middle of the desk. “This one is to be left here for His Grace.” It was a letter for Cordelia, to be personally delivered by Marcus if today didn’t turn out as planned. “He’ll know what do it with it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Clayton followed the butler upstairs through the house to Danielle’s sitting room. In the months since Danielle and Marcus married, they’d turned Charlton Place into a family home, which included changing the master suite of rooms from a shared sitting room flanked by separate bedrooms to a shared bedroom flanked by separate sitting rooms. The nursery wasn’t on the top floor either. It now sat directly across the hall.

Clayton grinned. General Marcus Braddock, the Scourge of Spain, had become domesticated.

He entered the room and froze. The smile vanished from his face.

Cordelia stood near the window where the late morning sunlight fell gently around her. She’d been transformed, and the stunning difference took his breath away. Oh, he’d never been able to forget she was a princess, had never been able to ignore the stately way she held herself or how she moved with an inherent grace crafted over the years by an awareness of position and duty.Alwaysduty. But this…

Good God.

A white and silver gown with a voluminous skirt draped around her, covered in hundreds of tiny pearls and silver threads in an intricate pattern of spring flowers. A diamond and amethyst necklace lay at her throat, and more matching jewels sparkled at her wrists and fingers over the long satin gloves that reached above her elbows. Her chestnut hair had been styled high in a mass of carefully pinned curls to most effectively highlight the tiara placed carefully on her head, and an ermine stole draped across her shoulders. And if all that somehow failed to convey exactly who she was and the power she possessed, then the purple sash draped diagonally across her bosom proclaimed it in spades.

She was a true princess, every inch of her, and the sight of her pieced him. The gap between their lives had never been more evident. Or wider.

“What do you think?” Danielle called out as she fussed with the long skirt.

“Definitely not a frog,” he murmured and earned himself a pleased smile from the princess.

“I hope not,” Danielle scolded in return. “That’s my wedding dress, I’ll have you know.”

He knew he should have said something to appease the duchess about the sacrifice of her gown, should have at least uttered something about ensuring its safe return. But all he could do was stare…and feel his heart die a little more with each passing second.

Cordelia turned toward him with a lift of her head and pointed her chin into the air, so imperiously and so smoothly he wondered if she even realized she’d done it. “Will I do for a princess?”