Secret Wardrobe of the Duchess

Chapter 65

Carl put Edgar on his chair, hid the wheelchair, and brought Mrs. Shaynie in.

“Your Grace! I’ve never been treated this way in my life. Her Grace’s actions are clearly problematic.”

Shaynie was determined and spoke before Edgar even asked why she had come. She left out the part about how she had treated the girls and made it look like she was the victim. In her story, Rubica was an arrogant and stupid woman who kicked out her, the strict teacher who truly cared about her pupils’ future, just because she disliked her.

Edgar waited for her to finish talking and asked, “So what do you want me to do?”

“Please talk to your wife and tell her to cancel her decision of firing me. It’s the only way to keep your honor and the Claymore’s reputation.”

Talk to her? Edgar had to hold back his laughter. It would only make him get scolded. Shaynie had come to the wrong person. He really couldn’t find any way to defeat her. It would have been better to plead to Carl or Ann.

“There must have been a good reason for her to do that.”

“Your Grace!”

“It is fully her right to decide which tutors to hire. I will give you enough severance pay and expenses for your journey home. I’ll also write you a good recommendation letter.”

Shaynie should have stopped there, but she didn’t believe what people said. This cold duke was in love with that girl? In her eyes, Rubica wasn’t even that beautiful. Even if he had been in love, all men cared more about their honor. Shaynie decided to use the fact that Rubica was from a baronet family.

“Your Grace, it seems to me you don’t know about your wife yet. I visited her three days in a row, and she is ignorant about the manners of high nobles. She doesn’t walk with elegance and she speaks like a commoner. Most of all, she needs to abandon her habit of speaking rudely to you. When I pointed it out to her, she…”

“What did you say?”

Edgar’s voice was icy cold. Shaynie thought her plan was working and was delighted. She should have come to the duke in the first place. There wasn’t a wife who could disobey her husband.

“If you permit it, I will teach your wife three times a week and transform her into a mild and obedient woman.”

If Edgar’s legs had been fine, he would have jumped up to grab Shaynie’s throat. However, he couldn’t. Instead, he grabbed a book and threw it at her. Shaynie shut her mouth in surprise and realized his cold gaze and words had been toward her, not Rubica.

“I apologize if what I said displeased you. But I spoke only out of my loyalty to…”

“Why aren’t you accusing me of my behavior?”

“Pardon me, Your Grace?”

“I just threw a book at you. Isn’t that rude?”

His blue eyes were as dry as someone who had been trapped in the desert for three days without water. Shaynie flinched.

“You accuse Rubica of everything she does including the way she talks, but to me, you instantly apologize. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?”

“You, you are the duke, but she is…”

“The duchess.”

“Your Grace!”

Edgar didn’t want to hear this anymore and gestured to Carl. He took out the document he had been looking at, dipped his quill in ink, and started to write in it. He was acting as if Shaynie wasn’t there as if she dissolved into the air.