They Broke the Duke's Bastard, Now She Is His Only Heir novel · Chapter 6 of 24
Chapter 6: The Duke's Study
Twenty guards in the Marchbanks blue filled the street, and the one at the front held a rolled paper with a red wax seal.
"A summons from His Grace the Duke of the river lands," he said. "For Liora Ashdown, in his own name. She comes now, or the hall is closed for harboring a runaway convict."
Morna stepped in front of me with her stick raised.
"Over my body."
"Morna." I put a hand on her arm. "They'll close the hall and put the girls in the street."
I stood up without the crutch, and it cost me every bit of my face.
"I'll go," I said.
They did not carry me.
I walked out of the hall between two guards, leaning on one of them whether I wanted to or not, and they put me into a closed carriage with the blinds down.
I had never been inside my father's house, except through the kitchen door.
The guards took me up the front stairs, which were white marble, and down a long hall hung with portraits of men who all had the same heavy jaw, and into a study that smelled of leather and pipe smoke.
The Duke sat behind a wide oak desk with a lamp on it.
Aldous Marchbanks was fifty-six, iron-haired, big-shouldered, and tired in a way I had never seen on him.
He had never spoken to me directly in my life.
Not once, in twenty-four years.
"Sit," he said.
"I'll stand."
"You can't stand."
"Then I'll lean."
I put my hand on the back of a chair.
His mouth moved in something that was not quite a smile.
"You have your mother's stubbornness," he said.
I almost laughed.
"You never knew my mother."
Keep reading free with an account. Start They Broke the Duke's Bastard, Now She Is His Only Heir from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.
← Chapter 5 · All chapters · Chapter 7 →
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend