To say that Benedict was having a bad week would have been, perhaps, the understatement of the decade, if not the century. If fainting like a delicate young miss in front of the most influential men in the country, then being scolded by one's friends and sister was not bad enough to qualify, the events following his departure from Bath were sure to prove that he had been cursed. If he were a superstitious man, he would half suspect that his Duchess may have been behind it.

To begin with, his incredibly well-trained horse that had been his mount for nigh five years developed a limp the day he was to leave his sister's townhouse thus he was forced to substitute it for his brother-in-law's temperamental Arabian. The creature was spoilt and ill-mannered and Ben's considerable skill in the saddle was only just enough to keep it from rearing up at every slight sound. If he wasn't careful, the steed would happily chuck him off and run off into the countryside. Then, of course, he had to leave his valet behind to ensure that his own horse was brought to Hartley upon its recovery because he did not trust his sister's groomsman to give him the attention he needed. Benedict could dress himself for a few days if that was the price of being assured that his horse would be well taken care of.

Yes, perhaps, he was a touch possessive and oversensitive about his mount, Haider, but he had gotten Benedict through the dark days following his father's death. So really, Haider deserved every damn luxury Benedict could provide him.

The day following their departure from Bath, they had gotten caught in some rain at least an hour's ride from the nearest inn – God, how he hated the country- and had to find shelter under the trees because his horse had refused to budge. So he had spent three hours trapped in a carriage cramped with luggage, with absolutely nothing to do because Graham had the convenient skill of being able to sleep damn near anywhere.

The day after that, they had been set upon by highwaymen and robbed blind. Apparently, robbers armed with guns were not particularly impressed nor frightened by Dukes and Marquesses, rather they found the carriage with his Ducal Crest to be an easy mark. He was of half a mind to sack the footmen that had accompanied them, but what could they have done in the face of four gunmen?

Had he mentioned that he hated the country? No one would have dreamed of robbing him in London.

The final indignity came on the day he arrived in the town of Marshall Glenn, half an hour away from Hartley Manor. He had made the foolish mistake of being relieved that his journey was at an end, thinking that nothing else could possibly go wrong. That was when a stray hound had darted past them, sending his moody Arabian into a panicked gallop. He was wrestling the beast for control when he saw a woman practically run onto the road, right into the path of his charging mount. She was going to get them both killed.

Honestly, it served him right if he died here, in the middle-of-bloody-nowhere, Cornwall. If he hadn't been so prideful as to ignore his doctor's orders, he might not have been here. In fact, if he had just swallowed his pride and gone to spend a few weeks in the same estate as his Duchess, all this indignity could have been avoided.

He yelled a warning, beseeching her to get out of the way, but his warnings may as well have fallen on deaf ears. The horse saw the woman in the way and veered to alter its course. It reared onto its hind legs, and the force of the jerk was so great that it was beyond even Benedict to keep his seat. He was flung sideways, barely remembering his training on how to properly break a fall. He felt a threatening crack, somewhere in the vicinity of his ankle as his entire body met the ground barely half a meter from the woman who had caused it all.

His ankle smarted, yet, his rage at the stupid woman propelled him to half-crawl his way to her and grab her by the shoulders. She had sunk to her knees and had a faraway look in her eyes, all glazed over and confused.

'What the goddamn hell is wrong with you, madam?! Jumping in front of my mount like that?' He demanded, his voice was sharp and furious. 'I could have died, you fool! And so could you!'

Her eyes- a startlingly familiar sapphire color- rolled back in her head and she trembled in his arms. Benedict did not care.

Well?!' He demanded. 'Are you entirely addled, madam?!'

Her eyes seemed to come into focus, her face was drained of color.

'Ben-Benedict.' She spoke through chattering teeth. At first, he couldn't believe the audacity of the shabbily dressed woman to have addressed him by his Christian name....But how on earth could she have possibly known it?

Good God! It couldn't be!

But her eyes! And her pretty oval face, and the goddamned accent.

Why in the seven hells was his Duchess alone here? That too, without an escort? Dressed like a pauper to boot?

'I am going to be sick.' She whimpered.

Dear God. Dear God, he needed to get away, but even as his limbs began to move, he knew it was too late. He could only watch on in horror as his wife cast up her guts onto his coat, then fainted. His hands came up reflexively to cradle her head before it hit the ground. 

At least, if she had cursed him, he was not the only one to suffer a humiliating fainting spell, he thought wryly.

'Your Grace!' One of his footmen had finally caught up to them. 'Are you alright?'

'I think I've twisted my ankle. You must take me to a physician.'

'Dear Lord, what madness! Let me handle this woman, Your Grace!' The footman gasped in horror. 'I shall reprimand her thoroughly, what on earth could she have been thinking!'

'Thank you, Gerard, but I do believe that I can reprimand my own wife myself. Where the hell did Graham go? He was riding right beside me barely a moment ago.'

Gerard's face fell open in shock.

'I-I shall find a physician immediately. Lord Graham went after the man who accosted.....' He paused as if trying to wrap his head around the situation.'...Her Grace?'

Ah, that would explain why she had seemed so frightened. Damn. A self-respecting gentleman couldn't be livid with a woman in distress, now could he? That wasn't to say he wouldn't give her a piece of his mind later, it was just that he would have to be nicer about it.

If word of this incident ever got out, he would never let down the shame. The entire world would think that one of the most esteemed Dukes of the peerage kept his wife like a pauper, without even a proper staff to take care of her while he enjoyed memberships in the most expensive clubs in London. He could practically hear the jeers about how his investments had nearly tripled his fortune in six short years, but his wife still wore shabby gowns and frolicked about a town like a commoner. Did she have no inkling about how poorly her foolish actions reflected upon him as a husband? Loathsome, inconsiderate, selfish American wretch.

He twisted to shoot her an irritated glare and let out a pained yell as his ankle jostled. Damn, damn, damn. He would have to live with his Duchess after all, for no way would his throbbing ankle allow him to make a return journey to another one of his estates. Ophelia and Phillip were likely toasting to his predicament at this very moment. It did not take him long to deduce that no word had ever been dispatched from Bath to announce his arrival in advance, because this was precisely what his sister had wanted. A master manipulator, his darling little Ophelia. Who could have guessed it?

Perhaps he could convince his wife to leave. Or behave badly enough that she would feel compelled to leave him to his own devices. God knew he wasn't above a little deplorable behavior these days.

An hour later, dressed in a fresh shirt and coat, lying on a cot in the local physician's practice, it became increasingly clear to Benedict that his wife was an incredibly popular woman. His first hint was when the physician's wife came to pray by her bedside, not even bothering to address him with the proper honorifics or courtesy properly. Though he keenly felt the insult, he held his tongue because the woman seemed genuinely distressed. His second hint was when the vicar's wife all but barged in - she, at least, offered him a proper courtesy- then knelt by his wife's side and began to weep. Then, after her eyes were dry, she began to regale Benedict with her many virtues.

'Never met a kinder soul in my life, Your Grace.' She nodded sagely at him, and he did his best to not visibly gag. Only years upon years of training in etiquette allowed Benedict to hold his tongue. It was one thing to make his distaste known to his sister and another thing entirely to disparage her in front of a stranger. He had some sense of decorum and respect. But by God, he was tempted.

The third and most glaring hint was when a bruised-knuckled footman appeared alongside Graham, who had managed to apprehend the scoundrel with the footman's help. The livery he wore showed that he belonged to his wife's household.

'Why was the Duchess alone in town, if you were meant to be her escort?' Benedict asked with a voice so frigid that the man actually blanched.

'She bid me to take the carriage to deliver a gift to the vicar, Your Grace. 'He said defensively, even as he hung his head in shame. 'I found the bastard with his lordship's help. Beat him to a pulp, I did. He had no right to put his filthy hands on Her Grace.' No small amount of reverence when he spoke of her.

Graham informed him that half the village had mobilized to find the brigand and then had basically beaten him to the point of unconsciousness. The situation had gotten so out of hand that the local magistrate had to rescue him from the crowd of his wife's most ardent defenders. It would appear that the woman he loathed most in the world was practically a saint to half the population of the-middle-of-nowhere, Cornwall.

How fucking typical.

By God, he swore, he was in hell. How was he supposed to spend the foreseeable future here, if every person under the sun worshiped her? Didn't they see her for what she was? An unfeeling, manipulative, insipid thing that did not have a care for whose life she ruined as long as she got her way?

Apparently, all it took was shoveling some money into an orphanage and all your sins were meant to be forgotten. Well, he had many virtues but forgiveness was not one of them.

When the physician was finally satisfied that the swelling around his ankle had gone down enough for him to make the short journey to Hartley, he had his footmen make the arrangements for his departure immediately. If he had any sense of decency, of course, he would have been compelled to stay until his wife regained consciousness. Now it is important to note that Benedict had decency in spades. He had been, after all, raised a Duke's son, with all the airs and graces and etiquette expected of a gentleman. But after being robbed, thrown from his mount, and vomited upon, he was not feeling very magnanimous. Particularly towards his wife. Staying at the clinic, on the very uncomfortable cot, would require giving a singular damn about his wife. His duty as her husband was to make sure she was living and physically unharmed, and he had seen to that. Asking for more was indecent, it really was.

So Benedict went and sat in his carriage and set out for Hartley. As the manor appeared in his view, he bit back a groan. Because of course, it was larger than all of his other homes, with the most magnificent modern architecture he had ever seen. How it pricked his male vanity to see it. No matter that it belonged to him in the eyes of the law, both he and his wife knew that it was a symbol of the immensity of her wealth. What was one woman doing living in a manor that would put the Prince of Wales to shame in its splendor? More importantly, how on earth was he going to survive the next three weeks of rest the doctor had prescribed him?

As his carriage pulled up in front of the main entrance, Benedict was resolute. He was going to be absolutely miserable for the entirety of his stay.

The fates that had brought him to his wife's doorstep, however, had other plans.