Page 35 of A Highland Duke to Claim Her Heart

“It is the duchess,” he murmured. “She is the reason you are so animated.”

“The duchess?” Ewan arranged his face into an expression of polite surprise. But inside, his heart was hammering. “What does she have to do with anything?”

“I saw the two of you at the Midsummer Festival,” Alaric said. “The way you were holding her while she attempted the bow and arrow.”

“Holding her? I was helping her!”

“You were holding her,” Alaric said with a snort. “I have eyes, Ewan. I can see when a man is positioning himself so that he is closer than is usually appropriate with a woman.”

“I do not think you want to talk about positioning oneself close to a woman,” Ewan countered. “You were very close to Miss Ashworth yourself.”

Alaric shrugged. “Miss Ashworth is an amiable young woman. But the duchess is your wife. And it excites the locals when they see their duke and duchess so cozy with one another.”

This time, Ewan felt his cheeks burn. “Cozy?” he repeated, and Alaric laughed.

“Yes, Ewan,” he said, his expression sobering as his voice turned stern, as if he were lecturing Ewan for being a bad student. “It raises their hopes and expectations of a child. An heir…”

Ewan’s throat went dry. “Is that the gossip that you heard?” he asked. “Are the farmers and villagers expecting an heir?”

“Of course they are,” Alaric said, staring at him in surprise. “With Christopher gone, and your only other child a girl, the future of the dukedom is now uncertain. The villagers and farmers trust you, Ewan. Look at what you have just done for Roland’s drainage system! They know you are a generous dukewho works hard to ensure their prosperity. That is not always the case.”

Cassandra, Ewan remembered, had something very similar at the festival.

“If you do not produce an heir, no one knows whom the duchy will pass to next, and there is no guarantee that the next duke will be as generous. That is why they are excited to meet the duchess, to see that she shares your generosity of spirit. And they are hopeful that there will be a new heir by the time the next season is planted.”

Ewan said nothing. But he did put the sketchbook and charcoal back in his saddlebag. All his earlier animation was gone now, and he silently turned away from his friend and returned to the ditch and his shovel.

An heir. He knew what an heir required. It was precisely the thing he had been avoiding. But when he had told Cassandra that he did not plan for them to have that kind of marriage, he had feared he was only harming himself. It had not crossed his mind that he might be harming his tenants as well and the future of his estate.

But it was true what Alaric said. With Christopher gone, and Annabelle unable to inherit, the dukedom’s future was uncertain. How could he ensure that the next duke was someone who kept his drainage systems in place? Who worked to improvethe lives of his tenants instead of viewing the lands merely as extractive profit?

The best way to do that, of course, was for the heir to be his own son. Someone he raised to share his values and ideas.

This preoccupied his mind for the rest of the afternoon, and by the time he returned to the house and bathed, he was feeling much more subdued, and was struck by a deep longing to see his daughter. So after a quick supper in his study, he made his way upstairs to her bedchamber.

Inside, he found Annabelle already in bed, Cassandra sitting by her side reading to her.

The moment he came in, Cassandra lowered the book, her eyes snapping to his. He hesitated in the doorway, his throat suddenly constricted.

“Papa…” Annabelle murmured drowsily from the bed, reaching out a hand to him. He crossed to her and sat down on the other side of the bed, taking his daughter’s hand.

“Have you been enjoying your story?” he asked, and his daughter smiled sleepily up at him.

“Very much so,” she said. “Cassandra is ever so good at reading out all the different voices.”

Ewan glanced at Cassandra, who was smiling. “I enjoy doing them,” she said. “But now it is time for you to get some sleep, little one. I let you stay up too late already with this second story.”

Ewan smiled. “She is very good at talking you into a second story. I myself have fallen for it many times.”

He kissed his daughter on the forehead, bid her goodnight, then blew out the candles on her nightstand. He and Cassandra then made their way out into the corridor, closing the door softly behind them.

The silence of the corridor pressed in around them, and Ewan was suddenly infinitely aware of how close he was to his wife. Her skirts were brushing against his legs, her arm just several inches from his own.

She was dressed in a simple white muslin dress, her hair in a loose coif, strands of her copper hair escaping from it and curling down her neck. Her neck, which was so long and elegant, made him want to trace a finger down it…

He blinked and looked away from the graceful curve of her neck. Unfortunately, from the small smile on her lips, he had a bad feeling she had noticed where he was staring.

“Well,” she said at last. “I suppose you and I should get some sleep as well.”