That Scandalous Summer

by Meredith Duran

  His brother eyed him from behind that desk—that overlarge abomination of a desk, from which their father, too, had lorded it over the world—like a king considering a tiresome petitioner. “I am prepared to make a very sizable settlement upon you, large enough to fund the hospital for decades.”

  What in God’s name? “That would be more than large.” The hospital treated the poorest citizens of London, and ran entirely on charitable donations.

  “Indeed. But there are conditions.”

  An uncanny feeling ghosted down his spine. A minute ago, he’d felt as though he did not recognize the man across from him. But perhaps he recognized him too well. There are conditions. That had been one of their father’s favorite phrases.

  “Go on,” he said warily.

  Alastair cleared his throat. “You are generally regarded very warmly in polite circles. Accounted . . . charming, I believe.”

  His premonition strengthened. According to Alastair’s hierarchy of virtues, discipline and enterprise ranked first; charm appeared somewhere below a firm handshake and basic hygiene. “I won’t like what’s coming.”

  Alastair’s mouth twisted, less a smile than a grimace. “Perhaps too charming. You must know your reputation. Being glimpsed entering a widow’s town house before noon—that was poorly done.”

  Done three years ago, in fact. “Christ, but you’ve a memory like an elephant! I’ve never been so sloppy again!” He’d never given another lover cause for complaint. He’d refined discretion to a bloody art.

  “Your disinterest in politics does not help matters.” Alastair settled his fingertips atop the rim of his brandy glass, turning it in increments. “You are not taken . . . seriously, shall we say. But that must change. You are thirty years old. It is time you overcame your objections to marriage.”

  Michael could no longer follow even the smallest bit of this conversation. “What objections? I have no objections. I’ve simply never met a woman to inspire the thought.” Perhaps he never would. Their parents had offered a very good lesson on that count. But what difference? “Whether or not I marry has no bearing on any of this!”

  “Not so.” Alastair took up his drink and bolted the remainder. “It bears directly on the family. Unless you marry, the title will go to Cousin Harry’s future offspring. And that is not acceptable.”

  “Wait.” Alarm sharpened his voice. “What of your future offspring?”

  Like a light going out, his brother’s face shuttered. “I will not marry again.”

  Christ God. “Alastair, you did not die with her.”

  He might as well have not spoken. “And so the choice falls to you,” his brother went on, his cadence curiously flat, as though he recited from memory. “I will require you to marry before the year is out. In return, you’ll have the aforementioned settlement, enough to safeguard the hospital until your death, and to make your life quite comfortable besides. However, I reserve the right to approve your choice of brides. Your taste in women to date does not recommend your judgment—and I will not see you repeat my own mistake.”

  Michael felt as though he were underwater, hearing through a great distortion. “Let me be clear,” he said. Let Alastair hear how much a lunatic he sounded. “I must marry a woman of your choice. Or you will see the hospital closed.”

  “Precisely,” Alastair said.

  He stood, the ground beneath him seeming to shift. “You need help, Al. More help than I know how to give you.” God help him, he did not even know where to look for the kind of help that Alastair needed. An institution? Every instinct in him recoiled at it. And how would he even enforce such treatment? His brother was the bloody Duke of Marwick. No one could force him to do anything.

  Alastair rose, too. “Should you refuse my conditions, the cost will be more than your hospital. You will need to look for new lodgings; you’ll not be welcome any longer in the flat on Brook Street. Also, of course, some form of employment. When I cut off your allowance, you’ll require an income.”

  Michael’s laugh felt like a razor in his throat. He had not been treated this way—bullied and ordered—since their father’s passing. And to endure such treatment from Alastair, of all people. “You can’t take the allowance. It was designated to me in our father’s will.”

  Alastair sighed. “Michael. You’d be quite surprised by what I can and cannot do. That said, I do not expect to deprive you very long. Given a taste of poverty, you will no doubt revisit your intransigence.”

  Intransigence? He took a ragged breath. “Let’s not pretend, here.” So difficult to keep his voice even, to speak in a manner that might persuade his brother to listen, when anger was bidding him to scream. “Your threats, my . . . intransigence—they have nothing to do with your concern for heirs. This is about you.” He’d assumed this isolation to be a passing phase, a peculiar manifestation of his brother’s rage and grief. But for Alastair to make such threats . . . why, it was his soul they were battling over. “You’ve let her win. You’ve given up. On your own life. My God!”

  His brother shrugged. “I must plan for the future. Once the news comes out—”

  That again? “Let the news come out! Let the entire world know that Margaret de Grey was an opium eater—let them think she slept with entire armies! What of it?”

  His brother’s slight smile chilled him to the bone. “Our father’s story taught you nothing?”

  “That was a different time. And he earned his fate.” He’d abused their mother. Flaunted his mistresses and reneged on his debts. “His own actions ostracized him.” Alastair’s only fault had been to trust his wife. “What Margaret did had nothing to do with you. You’re innocent in it!”

  Alastair’s smile widened, becoming grotesquely cheerful. “She made me a fool, no doubt. But I invited her to do so. I fed her the secrets she shared with her lovers, and we lost the elections, twice, because of it. God knows—perhaps we lost more than that. She did have a fondness for Russians, if you’ll recall. So tell me, Michael: are you truly so naïve as to believe I’ll emerge unscathed?”

  Michael bit hard on his cheek. It would be rough going. There would be a scandal. “But you have allies—”

  “No matter. What’s done is done.” Alastair flicked a dismissive finger at the newspaper. “I recommend you consider Lord Swansea’s daughter. The mother is everything proper, and by all reports, the daughter is handsome and mannerly. Should reports reach me of your attendance at their ball this Friday, I will take that as a sign that you’ll cooperate.”

  Silence opened. He could not agree to this. Would not. But something—something had to be done, quickly. Alastair could not go on like this. “I will attend,” he said, though the words grated so sharply they should have properly drawn blood. “But I have one condition of my own: you must come with me.”

  “No. My terms are not open to debate.”

  God above. “You step outside with me, right now—into fresh air—and I’ll attend.”

  “Alas.” Alastair gave a one-shouldered shrug.

  His temper snapped. He lunged forward and grabbed Alastair’s elbow. “You are coming outside!”

  Alastair tried to jerk free. “Get your hands off—”

  With brutal force, he dragged Alastair a step toward the door. And then another. Alastair rocked backward, cursing, clawing at his grip. But three months of confinement did no good to a man’s strength. Michael locked his arm around his brother’s head and hauled him on.

  For long seconds, he made headway. Closer and closer came the door.

  A fist snapped into his chin. He stumbled backward, still gripping Alastair’s lapel. The cloth tore in a long, ugly sound.

  Alastair backhanded him.

  The blow knocked him back a step. He staggered and caught his balance, his hand clamped over his eye.

  “Get out,” Alastair said very softly.

  Shock briefly paralyzed him. Then he forced his hand to fall. No blood on his fingers. That was something, at least. “Bravo,” he sa
id through numb lips. “Your father’s son.”

  The words, their truth, caused his stomach to roil. For a moment he feared he would be sick on the floor. Your father’s son.

  He swallowed. No. Alastair was nothing like their father. This was a temporary insanity, a sickness. It could be healed. Somehow. It would be healed.

  Alastair walked past him back to the desk. Glass clinked. Brandy gurgled.

  Michael pushed out a breath. “Listen to me. I won’t let—”

  “Don’t you grow bored of your own voice?” Alastair’s drawl was cutting. “Make your idle threats elsewhere, to someone who mistakes you for a man with the power to enforce them.”

  Michael sucked in a breath. “There, you’re wrong. That newspaper article gives me all the power I need.”

  Alastair pivoted toward him. Michael advanced a single step, and God forgive him if Alastair’s retreat did not gratify something very dark in his soul.

  No man struck him. Never again. He had vowed it as a boy, when first leaving his father’s domain for the safety of school. Now that he was prepared for the possibility of violence, his brother would never again have the upper hand.

  If the echo of that thought scored through him like a blade—if, for a moment, bewilderment and hurt swam through him like a toxin—he did not allow them to show. “The hospital is a great credit to you. A loud advertisement for your politics. Tell me, with the elections approaching, how do you think it will look if the world learns that you’re responsible for the hospital’s destruction? For I’ll write to the papers myself to announce your role in it. My hospital, your party’s hopes—my legacy, and yours—they will fail as one. Once again, you will cause your party to lose.”

  Alastair’s smile did not linger. “Impressive,” he said. “But forgive me if I’m not persuaded. You see, I think here of your precious patients. In the end, you’ll concede—for their sake, if not your own.”

  “Test me.” For now he meant it: he would not humor this madness a moment longer. Seven months now—he should never have let it go so far. “Indeed, perhaps it will be a relief to you if I spill this tale. No more waiting for the news about Margaret to break. Your name will be ruined long beforehand, along with your party’s trust.”

  Alastair slammed down the glass. “You will go now. Remove your property from the flat on Brook Street, or I will have it disposed of.”

  By God, that did it. “Here’s a better idea. I’ll leave London entirely. You go ahead, destroy the hospital. Give the public a jolly good show. I won’t be here to see it.”

  Something dark passed over his brother’s face, twisting his mouth into a savage smile. “Oh, you’ll be here. Where would you go? All my properties will be closed to you.”

  “To hell with you.” Michael turned on his heel for the door.

  “Although . . . it would be amusing to see you try to hide. I give you three weeks. Perhaps four. You can’t imagine what it means to make your way in the world without my influence. You’ve absolutely no idea how to go on.”

  The remark was like a hot lance through his chest. Or through his pride. He paused, his hand gripping the door latch, and took a hard breath. This room. He had always hated this study. It was where their father had been at his most comfortable. Lord of the manor. Tyrant extraordinaire.

  “I am not your puppet,” he said. “And I will not dance to this tune. For your sake, Alastair, as well as my own.”

  He walked out, slamming the door shut behind him. The sharp bang triggered an ache in his chest, a bruise that spread deep beneath his skin.

  For his brother’s sake, he meant it: he would leave town. And he would stay gone until Alastair left this godforsaken house to come find him.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Bosbrea, Cornwall, June 1885

  A drunkard lay snoring in his rosebushes. She looked inexplicably familiar, though Michael did not think he would have forgotten such a face. She was one of the more beautiful women he’d ever seen, all creamy skin and long, spiraling, chestnut hair—and she was dressed as though for a ball.

  He stood staring down at her for a long moment. How peculiar. She was unbearably lovely, and . . .

  It’s a trap.

  He took one step backward before catching himself. Christ, what a wild thought! A trap? His brother was not quite so Machiavellian as that.

  Her diamond tiara, one hoped, was made of paste.

  He cleared his throat. “Ho,” he said. “Wake up, there.”

  No response.

  He rubbed his eyes, feeling insufficiently awake to manage such novelties. The scent of bergamot still lingered on his palm from his morning tea. It was not yet seven o’clock—no time of day to be drunk. And she was drunk, was she not? He did not think it was the flowers exuding the stench of whisky.

  He cast a look around the garden, but no help was forthcoming. It being a Wednesday, the gardener and job-boy were both at their homes in the village for the morning. Meanwhile, all around him, the sun was splashing brightly across glossy green leaves, and birds sang in the flowering branches of the camellias. Not the season for drunkenness, really. Summer in Cornwall was better suited to lemonade.

  The woman’s body jerked on a snore—not a small or kittenish sound, that, but a phlegm-filled snort, the more startling because her rib cage didn’t look large enough to produce a whisper. She was laced within an inch of her life.

  Michael frowned. This fashion could go to the devil. Half of his female patients would have returned to instant health if only they were willing to cast off their corsets.

  Sleeping Beauty snorted again. Her arm flopped out. The bloody scratch bisecting her inner elbow would need dressing.

  Well, at least she passed out in advantageous spots. Better the bushes of a doctor than a baker. Or a candlestick maker, his tired mind helpfully nattered.

  Dear God. Rustication was rotting his wits.

  He stepped forward to grasp the woman’s wrists. She was wearing only one glove, long, elbow-length, delicate lace. The other was missing.

  Foreboding crept over him, prickling along his scalp. But what an absurd instinct. She had drunk herself silly, and then she had stumbled down the hill from Havilland Hall in search of God knew what. A water closet, probably.

  He lifted her into his arms, discovering with a grunt that she was not as light as she looked. “Mmm,” she said. Her head lolled into the cradle of his shoulder, and he felt the wetness of drool.

  A laugh slipped from him. Such an effect he had on women! He kicked open the garden gate, then shouldered his way through the front door.

  “Mercy me!” This shocked exclamation came from the depths of the hallway. Mrs. Brown hustled into view, visibly appalled by the bundle in his arms. “If it isn’t Mrs. Chudderley!”

  The bundle in his arms was married? What kind of man would let his wife wander off in such a state? And such a woman, too—

  He closed his brain to the path his mind had started down. He was doing a very good job (he congratulated himself) of avoiding particular notice of the woman herself. Missing glove, expensive gown, possibly real jewels, very tight lacing: these details would occupy his brain rather than the feel of her in his arms, the curve of her arse surprisingly substantial.

  No women. Not until his brother recovered his wits. Michael would give him no inroads for trickery. Alastair would have to sire his heirs himself.

  He cleared his throat. “Mrs. Chudderley, you say? Well, then—send for her husband.” He started down the hall, the rustle of starched skirts announcing his housekeeper’s pursuit.

  “Oh, she’s got no husband,” said Mrs. Brown. She sounded as stern as those occasions when she discovered dust on the mantel. “Don’t you read the newspapers, sir? She’s a widow—and an infamous one at that!”

  To his discredit, he recognized a stir of interest at this announcement. Infamous. Widow. So many ways, so many words, by which to label a woman fair game. Widows had always been his favorite type . . .

&nbs
p; Don’t be a bastard, Michael.

  Granted, if Mrs. Chudderley was infamous, she herself probably had no small hand in it. A woman who passed the night in a stranger’s garden, drooling on her diamonds, clearly felt comfortable flirting with an ill fate.

  As he mounted the stairs, the boards underfoot squeaked like small creatures being tortured. The thought crossed his mind: need to fix those.

  Ludicrous. He would not be here long enough to make such improvements. And as Mrs. Brown constantly reminded him, the household budget could not accommodate such luxuries. He’d leased this house—five rooms and a garden, no land attached—for six months, all his small savings could afford. But surely that was all it would take. Michael’s continued absence would goad Alastair like a thorn in his side. He would bestir himself from that creaky mansion and come looking soon enough.

  Until then, Bosbrea made an ideal place to hide. The only other medical man in the vicinity was over seventy and glad for the help. Furthermore, Michael had no connections in this area of Cornwall. It would take time for Alastair to find him here—enough time to properly prick his temper, and, so Michael hoped, goad him out of that house.

  I give you four weeks, Alastair had predicted. Pompous bastard. Michael hoped he was enjoying his feast of crow.

  He deposited Mrs. Chudderley on the bed in the front room. The depth of her sleep concerned him somewhat. He laid two fingers to her pulse. Her skin felt clammy from the alcohol poisoning her system, but her heartbeat was steady and strong.

  Her upper lip looked to have been drawn by an artist’s hand, so precise were its peaks on either side of her philtrum. Her lower lip was . . . lush. What color were her eyes?

  Brown like her hair, he supposed. A rich, dark shade, like Parisian chocolate. Bittersweet.

  But highly edible.

  Christ almighty. He stepped back, both amused and appalled. In London, he’d always known a woman willing to entertain him. But here, in the chaste countryside, he was learning ever so many things about himself. For instance: abstinence made him a very bad poet.