"Mia." While under normal circumstances Cullen would be less than thrilled for his meddling sister to arrive unannounced, after the year the family had he embraces her with open arms.
She too is surprised by the outpouring of affections, her eyes crossing back and forth over him. "I am concerned that brigands have absconded with my brother and replaced him."
"Droll as always," he sighs, roughing a hand back through his hair. He'd been letting the curls grow, of no mind to face a barber in his state. Besides, it was no challenge to tie his hair back when the winds blew off the seas.
His face falls as he accepts that it was not the ocean at his command but an estate left in his keeping due to the loss of half their family. Mia, a pain but an astute one, pats his hand. Down the long lane lined with shrubbery comes an infectious giggle. Cullen feels his own lips twitching in tandem at the young boy rushing to meet his favorite aunt.
To his surprise, the governess is hot on Branson's heels. Her cheeks redden from the exercise, her hair loose in a plait that glistens by the strong sun. For a moment, their eyes meet, unspoken words exchanged in that glance about the exuberance of the boy left in their charge. Cullen's stomach flips at the surprising but not displeasing intimacy.
"Auntie Mi!" Branson shouts launching forward. The governess tries to catch him, but she is too slow. In an instant, Branson wraps his arms around his favorite aunt and she hugs him back. "What did you bring me?"
"Oh," she laughs, glancing at Cullen, "right to the heart of the matter. You'll have to wait until after dinner, young man."
Branson pouts, his face twisted up as if he ate a lemon, but that only causes the pair to laugh more. It is the governess who locks a hand to his shoulders. "Come along, young Master. We have more of your studies to attend to." While Branson gives into her tactics, Miss Trevelyan curtsies to Mia, "My lady." Then she turns to Cullen. "My lord."
It is innocuous and expected, and he feels Mia's gaze burning through him in an instant. "What...what brings you here, sister?"
"You, failing to accommodate the season." She leaps right to the problem without a preamble.
"I'm dressed in linen." Cullen glances down at the outfit chosen for him, missing the uniform.
His sister glares. "Every year, the Rutherford estate hosts a ball for the season..."
"Here it is." He rolls his eyes. "I have no interest in balls, dances, soirees, or anything else of that like."
"In order to maintain the dignity of our name..." Mia begins, getting a growl for her efforts. She sighs and switches tactics. "I know you didn't want this title, that you planned to turn it over to Branson once father..."
He thought himself so smart, announcing on his 18th birthday that not only would Branson take the title of Duke but how Cullen would join the royal navy. God made fools of them both in one wrathful smite.
Mia grips to his forearm. "It is tradition, and, it's what father would have wanted."
God save him, but when she used the full might of her begging eyes he could not say no. "Very well," Cullen sighs. "I assume there are others to handle all the details."
"If I left them up to you it would be a cask of wine and a jug band by a bonfire," Mia snickers. That didn't sound bad to him at all, but she was already spinning her ideas. "Oh," she pauses through her litany of needs for the ball, "and I suspect Caroline will be there."
Caroline?
"Word is she's stewing mad for fate making you a Duke after all. Shame she couldn't wait a few years."
Caroline. His ex-fiancee. A cannonball lands in Cullen's gut as he thinks back to the woman that could have been. From the fountain perched beside topiary comes a laugh as golden as a nightingale's song. Peering through the branches he spots the governess with her sleeves rolled up and skirts lifted as she and Branson splash water at each other. The heartwarming sight melts the shot of metaphorical lead in his gut.
"Ah," Mia speaks up, shattering his calm, "And you will require an escort."