Duke, Actually

by Jenny Holiday

“Why are you always suggesting silly, impulsive things like ballets and snow angels?” “Why are you always resisting them?” She almost gasped at the question, which felt like a thin, perfectly honed blade sliding effortlessly between her ribs. The answer was that indulging in snow angels and impromptu outings to the ballet felt like exposing herself somehow. Putting on display the tender, inner part of her that was capable of taking delight in innocent pursuits, and that, in turn, felt like she was setting herself up to be mocked.

The hard truth was she had done this to herself. She had let Vince turn her into this brittle, careful, suspicious person.

misanthrope?

proletariat

“I would never tell you not to get on Tinder or any other app, but please be careful.” His voice was a shock, which made no sense. She had heard a great deal of it not two weeks ago. But over the phone it felt more intimate somehow, which also made no sense. There was an ocean between them. “What do you mean?” “Do all the things you’re supposed to do. Tell someone where you are and send them the man’s name and photo. Meet in public—all those precautions.” “That seems like a lot of work in order to have sex.” “Just text someone the details. Text me the details.” “Text you, halfway across the world when it’s the middle of the night your time, the details about the hookup I’m about to have?” “Yes. I don’t sleep that much anyway, and I’m profoundly nonjudgmental. Send me his picture and the address where you are and check in when you’re done. I promise I won’t be a jerk about

In New York State, pets are treated like personal property in a divorce—they go to the spouse who ‘owns’ them. But I’m the one who did everything. Every walk, every stoop-and-scoop, every vet appointment. He’s my dog.”

“Aww.” Human Max made a noise that was part sympathetic, part amused. “So you can’t leave him alone? That’s too bad.” She thought about agreeing. Yes, I am so devoted to my dog I canceled my New Year’s Eve plans to tend to him. She looked over to where Dog Max was snort-snoring. “I could leave him alone—he’s fine. Honestly, he’s my excuse. The truth is, I’m committed to staying home in my pajamas and watching cheesy Christmas movies.”

profligate wastrel?”

“It’s ten minutes to midnight there, isn’t it? You have to get off the phone.” “No, I don’t.” “You’re going to miss New Year’s!” “I’m reasonably certain that’s not true. Unless you have some kind of uncanny foreknowledge that I’m going to fall off this terrace and perish in the next ten minutes, I will, in fact, live to see the new year.” “But you should go inside and spend New Year’s—” “I’m spending New Year’s exactly where I want to,” he said with a quiet certainty. She wasn’t sure what to say to that

“The one thing about marrying Marie that I was actually looking forward to was helping her with her refugee policy agenda. We’d even talked at one point about starting a foundation.” “Is there not one already?” “There is not.” “Hmm. I always think of the royals as doing good works.” “The royal family is actually in dire financial straits. Their family company, Morneau, makes luxury watches, and the market for those has been declining for a while.” “Leo has told me some of this.” “My family, on the other hand, is obscenely rich, and when I inherit the dukedom, that will be my ‘job.’” He sighed. “You don’t sound thrilled.” “I am not thrilled. I am, in fact, deeply unthrilled. But the point is I don’t need to work. I just need to bide my time until my destiny comes crashing down on me.” “There are reasons to work besides money.” “Right,” he said decisively, as if she’d answered a test question correctly. “What are those reasons?” “You said it yourself a minute ago. To have a purpose. For some people it might be doing something they believe does some good in the world.”

“All right, but for the record, I don’t think you should be entertaining men at your apartment.” “Double standard much?” “Yes, and I’m sorry about it, but it’s the way of the world. You don’t want to end up with a creep who knows where you live.” “Point taken.”

“Daniela, have you been googling me again?” He was actually strangely, sharply pleased by the idea. “Come on. If you were a commoner who suddenly found yourself friends with European nobility, you would be doing some googling, too.” He was also strangely, sharply pleased that she had called him her friend.

“You have a thing for artists.” “I beg your pardon?” “The painter in the other room?” “Ah.” He considered her theory. “It’s more that I find people who make things interesting, especially things that make other people think, like plays or art or books.” “But most people who make things like that are poor. I’m surprised a playwright can afford a yacht.” “Ah, see. That is why you are going to do well when you decide to pull the trigger on your sex app. You’re smarter than I am. It turned out the playwright could not afford a yacht. Her hedge-fund-manager husband, who fancied himself a film producer, could.” “Ah. You didn’t know she was married.”

“No. I know this is probably difficult to believe given my enthusiasm for negronis the other night, but I don’t drink much.” He wanted her to ask him why. “Why not?” “My father is a drunk of the worst sort.” Saying that felt like a lot. He’d wanted to say it, but once it was out, he found he didn’t want to elaborate beyond the topic-sentence version of the mess that was life with his parents. But he was finding this exercise in truth-telling strangely exhilarating, so he told her another one—a different one. “I couldn’t sleep because I was ruminating about my job situation.”

“This may be a stupid question, but if being a duke is a job, why isn’t being a baron? In historical novels, aristocrats are always, like, overseeing the manor or visiting sick tenants or something.” “My title is a courtesy title, meaning it’s a meaningless title given to the sons of aristocrats.” “You people are so weird.” “You’re not wrong.”

You start letting people disappoint you, and you’re never not disappointed.

One way to not be hurt by people was to make yourself immune to their opinions, as Max had done. But perhaps another way was to simply agree with them?

“It may end up going nowhere, so it seems ill-advised to put me on the payroll. I don’t need a salary, anyway. I just . . .” “You want to feel useful,” Seb suggested, with a sudden world-weariness in his tone that made something catch in Max’s chest. Max’s whole mission for the first thirteen years of Seb’s life had been to arrange things so Seb never had to sound like that. Perhaps Max’s mistake had been to assume that once Seb was safely away at school, the work was done.

Also, Logan Bram was hot, in a tanned, muscly, conventional sort of way. That was the relevant point. She just needed someone who was moderately attractive and not a serial killer. The job and the apartment and the nephew didn’t matter inherently; they were merely evidence that he was not a serial killer—though she supposed serial killers could have jobs and apartments and nephews.

“I’m not against love. It’s more that I’m indifferent to it. I don’t think it works on me.”

“What?” “Come here.” “Why?” she asked, but she started coming. “Let’s do the Dirty Dancing lift.” Her mouth fell open as she stopped walking. “Are you insane?” “Come on. The iconic lake lift.” He gestured again. “You know you want to.” She grinned but quickly slammed her mouth shut like she was trying not to appear delighted by his idea. Too late. And more critically, she started moving again. When she arrived, she raised her eyebrows incredulously. “We can’t do the Dirty Dancing lift.” “On the contrary. We can do whatever we want.” “But why? Why would we do this?” “Why would we make snow angels in Central Park?” he countered. “Because it’s fun.”

Max had gone to bed in lots of different places. Suites in the world’s most exclusive hotels. Yachts—though not the infamous one. Even, once, a hammock under the stars on Ibiza. But never had he felt the bone-deep contentment this place inspired. The windows were open, and the steady chanting of crickets outside was melding with the reassuring tick-tocking of a grandfather clock in the otherwise silent house. His body was pleasantly spent from the swimming and the ridiculous Dirty Dancing lifts, and the sheets were crisp and cool in the warm night. Dani was tucked into a guest bedroom down the hall that she’d tried and failed to make him take. Knowing she was near was strangely comforting. He didn’t want to sleep now, as tired as he was. He wanted to lie here all night, letting himself be eased, allowing the pure pleasure of being here diffuse through his veins.

“Whoever came up with the notion that one should feel guilty about things that bring one pleasure should be shot.” She smiled. That was a very Max-like way of looking at the world.

“Right. At work, I’m either the ‘diversity hire’ or else I’m ‘too white.’ Like, people look at my CV and then at my skin and they think, hmm, is she actually Mexican? That’s true in the wider world, too. We spend the holidays with my dad’s parents in Mexico every few years, and I feel like I’m too white there. It’s hard to explain. I feel like I’m always navigating these two worlds but always falling short in each of them. But at home, with my family, it’s not a thing. I’m just who I am.”

“Come on,” he pressed. “We’ll vanquish Vince, and then we’ll go back to the hotel and drink champagne in the sauna.” He looked down at his empty McMuffin wrapper. “And maybe get some more of these awful beautiful things. Then we can watch ghastly American TV—no offense—in our pajamas.”

“She thinks we’re getting it on in here, doesn’t she?” Dani asked when Max, changed into his swim trunks, appeared in the sauna a minute later. “I try not to concern myself with what other people think,” he said as he unpacked their McMuffins and a bottle of Veuve from a bag he’d brought in with him. “You are too much.” He popped the cork on the champagne. “Does that mean you don’t want any of this?” “Heck, no.” She grabbed one of the plastic cups he produced and held it up to be filled. “You do know, though, that not concerning yourself with what other people think is easier when you can buy them off.” “I do know that. Wealth has its compensations.”

“I’m unhappy because my father is a vicious drunk. Or perhaps I should say that my father is vicious, period, since he’s drunk all the time. He terrorizes all of us, but no one seems to mind except me.” The word terrorizes gave her pause, but she didn’t want to interrupt him. “I hate living on the estate. I have no purpose in life other than to consume resources while I wait for my father to die so I can become the Duke of Aquilla, which I very, very much do not want to do. Hell, I don’t even want to be a baron.” He laughed bitterly and raised his cup. “Poor Max, right?” He rolled his eyes, then closed them like he was sick of himself.

“Seb.” Max let go of the steering wheel with his right hand and grabbed his brother’s left. “I’m sorry. I’m laughing at myself. At how obvious it was—or should have been. I’m sorry I didn’t see it.” Another glance over showed that Seb’s eyes had gone wide, and Max rushed to add what he should have led with. “It doesn’t make a whit of difference to me. In fact, it makes me happy. It makes me happy to think of you being more authentically yourself. I’m glad for you and glad you told me. I’m sorry if you felt you couldn’t previously.” “Really? That’s it?” “Well, excuse me for forgetting to pack my rainbow confetti.” Seb laughed and took his hand back. “I was expecting more of the opposite reaction, to be honest.” “From me? Really?” That stung. “No, not really. I’m sorry. That’s not fair. You’re just so . . . heterosexual.” “I am not!” Max protested reflexively. “You’re not?” Seb’s jaw dropped. It was Max’s turn to laugh. “No, I am. But I like to think I’m a modern sort of heterosexual. I’m very live-and-let-live.”

Remember that first night in New York? I asked you what you would do if you could do anything, and you said hole up in in a garret and write. You won’t tell me about the mystery project, but I assume it’s something that needs to be written.” Oh, Max. Max who listened and remembered. Max who coaxed her to make snow angels and do Dirty Dancing lifts. Max who conjured ballet tickets and garrets.

she found the Maxes in bed together. “Good morning.” She made a kissy-face at the dog, who lifted his head from where he was snuggled into Max’s side and let loose a happy bark of greeting, but instead of bounding over to her as he normally would have, he merely turned, licked Max’s cheek, and tucked himself back in. Max Maximus lowered the newspaper he was reading and made a kissy-face back at her. She rolled her eyes. “Are you trying to steal my dog?” “Yes, Daniela. Our friendship has all been an elaborate long con aimed at stealing your mongrel.” He mock scowled at Max Minimus. “Who, I hasten to add, snores like a dog of significantly larger stature.”

“Do you drink coffee? Tea? I find it odd that I don’t know that about you.” “Coffee. Gallons of it. But why should you know?” When they’d woken up together at the Four Seasons, they’d rushed off to intercept Vince, so there had been no morning beverages. “I can name all eight of the men you’ve rejected since New Year’s, so it seems odd that I don’t know how you take your coffee.” “I take it black.” “Like your heart.”

Max had been in bed last night doing his usual insomnia thing when something vaguely wet nudged his shoulder. “Something vaguely wet” had turned out to be Max Minimus’s nose, so he’d lifted the covers, and after a moment of shuffling to get comfortable, his namesake had fallen asleep nestled in his armpit. Oddly, Max had fallen asleep, too, and wakened refreshed several hours later. That was unusual.

Max wanted to tell her to come sleep in his bed with them, that they could have a big slumber party, but of course he didn’t. But damn. He wanted to . . . cuddle her. Her dog, too, fine, but mostly her. It wasn’t a sexual thing. Well, that wasn’t true. But it wasn’t only a sexual thing. He couldn’t turn off the constant simmering awareness of her. She was gorgeous. Her face and her brain and her everything. But he accepted that the feeling wasn’t mutual. He accepted that the feeling was profoundly ill-advised. So, in the spirit of taking what he could get, he was happy to carve out the garret of her dreams and just . . . be near her.

“This is sounding better and better.” Not only did Max like the idea of all her work not being for naught, he really liked the notion of her writing a cooler, better, more popular book than Vince. He would cheerfully admit to being petty that way.

He tried to make Max Minimus go with her. He really did. All right, he didn’t try that hard. When the mutt responded to her summons by yawning and burrowing deeper into Max’s armpit, he could have removed him. Picked him up, handed him to Dani, and shut his door behind them. Instead, he scooched himself, his armpit, and the dog it contained to one side of the bed and threw back the covers. When she hesitated, he started to get up, aiming to hand over Max Minimus, but she shocked him by getting into the bed. They didn’t touch. They didn’t talk. She just rolled over and went to sleep. And so did Max.

She burst out laughing. She laughed so hard, she started waving her hand in front of her face as if she were apologizing for laughing. It was contagious. How extraordinary. Laughter was not Max’s customary reaction to encounters with his parents. Even Max Minimus joined in, barking happily alongside them.

I could do with a little unpleasantness, or else you’ll never be rid of me.” He could only wish. Having Dani here was a balm for his soul, as corny as that sounded. When she was around, the circumstances of his life, the ones that usually chafed, faded in importance. She made him feel like he existed as a person, an interesting and worthy person, independent of those circumstances. Plus, she was just so damn fun.

If the past week, with all its talking and cavorting, felt like a movie montage, he knew what kind of movie it was. A romance. Or, worse, one of those dreadful Hallmark movies Americans seemed to love where they just made up a fake European country so they could have a fairy tale free from the inconvenient constraints of reality.

I swear to god, the moment the divorce is final, I’m going to do it with the first moderately attractive man I lay eyes on. Her joking vow crash-landed in her mind. She wondered if he remembered it. His eyes were burning as he stared at her. They contained blue fire, like in the center of a flame—the searing, powerful part. He remembered.

Max was not the kind of person who believed in visions, or fate, or any of that. But looking at Dani standing there in that white dress, her hair done up in an elaborate braided updo, he underwent some sort of . . . moment, a record skip in his chest, where he saw himself at a different wedding. He had a moment when he thought, Mine. And then the text from the lawyer, as if fate were a real thing, as if it had decided to favor him for once.

If Dani gave him her heart, he wouldn’t break it. He would actively do everything in his power to not break it. No matter what it cost him. If he could have that vision, her in a white dress, her eyes finding him automatically in a room full of people, he would do anything. Dear god.

“Everything is grand.” He patted her hand that was on his arm. “You’re getting married, and not to me! I couldn’t be happier for you.” “I’m getting married, and not to you!” she echoed incredulously. “I’m getting married to Leo!” She grinned as if she could not believe her good fortune.

“You looked at me first.” “What?” What was he— Oh. Oh. She gasped as goosebumps rose on her skin. He remembered. She was frozen in place, shivering with his hand on her bare shoulder, his skin on her skin. She was his prey, and she could no sooner move than if he’d literally caught her in a trap. “Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“Do you want to dance later?” “No.” “No?” she echoed laughingly. “I can’t dance with you,” he scoffed. “Why not?” “I can’t touch you. God. I can’t even look at you.” “But you’re going to do a lot more than—” He held up a hand. “Later. That’s later. I’ll see you later.” “Are you going to go back to ignoring me until then?” “Yes. Yes, I am.”

He couldn’t look at her. If he had to, he was at risk of throwing her over his shoulder caveman-style and carrying her out of here regardless of the fallout it would create.

“Max, darling, I’d like to take your father upstairs.” Other than a brief conversation in the receiving line after the ceremony, he’d succeeded in his mission to avoid his parents. But he couldn’t avoid this. “Max, darling, I’d like to take your father upstairs” was code for “Your father is drunker than usual and about to embarrass us.” Max and his mother had an unspoken agreement to put aside their differences and join forces to extract his father in these sorts of situations.

“I’m not doing this.” Mother, who’d proceeded a few steps ahead of him before noticing his absence, turned. “I beg your pardon?” “I’ve been helping you extract Father from potentially embarrassing situations since I was a child, and I’m not doing it anymore. I’ve spent my whole life listening to you two tell me what’s wrong with me. Seb and I have spent our whole lives being abused by Father while you stood by and let him. Why would I help you? Why have I been helping you for so long?”

There was none of that with Max. And although she’d been momentarily freaked out when he’d cornered her with his “You looked at me first” possessive growling, it had only taken her a moment to understand that yes, she had looked at him first, and yes, she was going to sleep with him, and maybe even, yes, she had discarded all those Tinder guys because they weren’t him. He knew about all her junk, and she knew about all of his. They were best friends. Nothing was going to change. Except they were going to have some really hot sex. They were completely in sync. So in sync that by the time she told herself to lift her head to kiss him, he was already kissing her. They were kissing each other.

“Have you ever thought about how in English, the word abandon has two vastly different meanings? To abandon someone is to leave them, but to do something with abandon is to really throw yourself into it?” “Are they really all that different? If you’re doing something with abandon, it means you don’t care about the consequences. You’re leaving behind the consequences, in a way.”

Max understood her. He had seen her fears and witnessed her less flattering moments, and it hadn’t changed anything between them. Well, it had changed the fact that her ever-simmering attraction to him could now be acted on. That wasn’t “normal,” but it was pretty awesome. Unfortunately, it couldn’t be acted on now, but a person couldn’t have everything.