by Merry Farmer
The moment she disappeared into the hall, his smile dropped and his body sagged. His friends and neighbors meant well, truly they did. He’d worked his fingers to the bone for ten years to convince them all he was the happiest man alive and the life of every party he attended. They were all good people in their own ways and he did enjoy their company to a degree. But not one of them knew the man he truly was. Not one of them guessed at anything beneath the polished veneer he presented.
Heart aching over the prospect of adding a return to society to everything else gnawing at him, Blake moved to the piano. Playing was the only thing that gave him even a shred of peace anymore. He brushed his fingers over the keys for a moment, seeing Niall’s smile in their brightness as he did. Then he began to play one of his own compositions. Not just any composition, but the one he’d been working on while rehearsing Niall’s play. It was the song he’d begun when he saw Niall for the very first time, before they’d ever spoken. It started smooth and haunting, then built to an emotional crescendo. He’d penned that part after they’d met, after rehearsals had started, after they’d become lovers. It was rich and full of feeling, but that theme fell away into a faded replica of the original theme toward the end. He’d written that bit afterwards, after his heart had been shattered. It was almost too poignant to play, and as its final, hollow notes lingered in the air, he closed his eyes and bowed his head, consumed with grief.
“You finished it.”
Blake snapped his head up, gasping so hard that this throat hurt, and whipped around to find Niall standing in the doorway.
“It’s beautiful.”
Chapter 12
Blake stood so fast, a strangled cry ripping from his lungs, that he knocked the piano stool over. When he turned to reach for it, he slammed his toe hard into the seat. Pain radiated up his foot and he yelped before grabbing the stool and setting it upright. When he jerked around to face Niall again, every part of him was in agony.
Niall stood framed in the doorway, looking tired and worn from traveling. They’d seen each other a month earlier, but that utilitarian reunion hadn’t felt like a reunion at all. Niall had been busy with Everett Jewel and his friend’s investigation. They’d spoken for maybe an hour then. Seeing Niall in his home now, shoulders bunched and expression wary, was the sort of reunion Blake had longed for these past ten years. Niall. In his home. In the flesh.
“You came,” he breathed, stepping forward, then immediately falling into a limp as he crossed the room.
“I almost didn’t,” Niall confessed in a low, stiff voice.
The sting of that admission couldn’t penetrate Blake’s overwhelming joy at seeing Niall again. Niall’s suit was finer than the sort of things he’d worn at university. He’d matured, grown more muscular. He combed his hair differently, but he still didn’t wear a beard. His jaw seemed squarer than it had before, and his blue eyes were definitely more steel than sky. All the same, Blake ignored the palpable shield he felt around the only person he had, or ever could consider a lover, to stumble into his arms.
Niall was as rigid as a statue as Blake embraced him. Their bodies crushed together awkwardly, all elbows and edges, but Blake didn’t care. He closed his eyes and buried his head against Niall’s neck for a moment, breathing in the scent he’d only dreamed of for years.
Niall remained silent, and far too quickly, their embrace turned uncomfortable. Blake wasn’t forgiven. He could feel it in the brittle way Niall held himself, in the gaping chasm between them, even as their bodies pressed together. He kept a bright smile firmly in place as he stepped back, though. The world thought he was a golden boy, blessed with title, wealth, and unending happiness. By God, if he could pretend for his neighbors, he could pretend for Niall too.
“You look well,” he said, throwing everything he had into keeping his voice light and welcoming. “London suits you.”
Niall’s jaw was clenched so hard Blake worried his teeth would shatter. “You grew your beard in,” he said in a stilted voice.
Blake ran a hand over the bottom half of his face. “It tends to do that all on its own. Neglect does wonders for hair growth.”
Niall blinked. His gaze seemed to shift almost imperceptibly from Blake’s beard to his lips. The air between them crackled before Niall snapped his eyes up to meet Blake’s. “When was the last time you bathed?”
Blake burst into a self-deprecating laugh. It would have been charming, he was sure, except that he couldn’t stop. “I don’t know,” he said, certain he was smiling like a maniac. Why couldn’t he stop laughing? “I can’t remember the last time I slept either,” he went on, growing more hysterical by the moment. He had to pull himself together, but instead, he shrugged and said, “May, eighteen-eighty?”
He felt his expression pinch, his eyes burn, his lungs squeeze. He could see the panic that must have washed through him in the sudden alarm in Niall’s eyes. That only pushed him closer to the jagged edge. He couldn’t draw breath. Or feel his hands and feet. His heart pounded. He was going mad. No, he’d been mad for a while now. It was just getting worse.
“Please, have a seat,” he said, his usually rich tenor coming out brittle and high-pitched as he started toward a pair of settees near the French doors. “Tell me all about your journey. How is your play coming along? I’ve been reading all about it. Everyone is saying this one will be your greatest triumph yet. I only wish that I could make the trip to London to see it. I’ve been meaning to take the girls down to London for a theatrical holiday, but I can’t…I can’t….”
He couldn’t breathe in spite of the fact that air was squeezing in and out of his lungs at an alarming rate. He felt hot and cold all over, and his head throbbed and swam. The corners of his vision started to go black, and he tipped toward one of the settees.
“I’ve got you.” Niall’s voice was suddenly soft and close. He slung an arm around Blake and helped him to sit. “Breathe,” he ordered. “Put your head between your knees if you need to, but breathe.”
Blake wasn’t sure how he made it to a sitting position. As soon as the dizziness passed, shame rushed in to take its place. What kind of a man was he if the simple sight of an old lover sent him into a spiral of panic?
No, Niall was so much more than that. He was suffering from the shock of having his heart slammed back into his body.
He did as Niall ordered him and focused on breathing. Breathing should not have been so hard. He gulped down one breath after another, counting them at first, as Xavier had once suggested he do, then letting the air flow in and out more steadily. As soon as he was able to breathe deeply and clear his head, he sat straighter, resting his hands on his knees. As he expected, they were shaking, but with a little concentration, he was able to get that to stop.
Only then did he realize that Niall was rubbing his back. It felt so good that he thought he might cry. But he couldn’t do that either. He had to push past his pathetic behavior and be a man.
“You came,” he said hoarsely, starting the whole reunion over. Slowly, he dragged his gaze up to stare at Niall.
“You said you needed me.” Niall’s expression was hard and blank. He wasn’t going to let Blake in, even though he’d come all the way from London.
“You must have so much to do for your play.” Blake cleared his throat and shook his shoulders, pulling away from Niall and scooting to the other end of the settee. They were grown men with mountains of responsibilities. He needed to act like it and face Niall like a gentleman. “I should be congratulating you on all your successes.”
“Success is its own punishment,” Niall said, inching away. “The bigger you become, the more everyone wants you to fail. Everyone expects this new play to be the talk of the town, but it’s been fraught with problems so far. As every production is. But if I don’t deliver perfection, I’ll be tossed aside, like yesterday’s fish. But that’s not what I came here to talk about, Blake.” The steel in his eyes was so hard as he stared that Blake wanted to wither. “Tell me what
happened.”
Blake opened his mouth, but nothing came out. How could he even begin to describe what had happened? How could he condense the misery of the last ten years of his life into a simple explanation?
“Annamarie took off with the children,” he said, barely above a whisper. He intended to be strong about it, but his spirit was shattered and his face crumpled as though he would sob.
He pulled himself together as soon as he felt himself slipping, though. Dobson appeared in the doorway, looking deeply concerned. Blake shot to his feet.
“Dobson, please have tea for Mr. Cristofori brought to…to the nursery,” he ordered.
“The nursery, your grace?” Dobson looked thoroughly confused.
“Yes. I have something to show Mr. Cristofori there.” Blake shot forward, glancing over his shoulder at Niall to indicate he should follow.
Dobson clearly thought Blake had gone insane, if the look he gave him as he passed was any indication. Niall rose and followed Blake with a frown, almost no emotion apparent in his look. Blake tried not to think about it, tried not to guess what Niall must think of him as he climbed up the main staircase, headed down the hall, then mounted a second set of stairs to the children’s floor.
“I spend most of my time in here these days,” Blake explained lamely as he showed Niall into the room.
Niall glanced around at the scattered blocks, at the pile of stuffed animals, the pegs that contained dozens of tiny costumes, the tiny tea set and Jessie’s favorite doll, Alan’s miniature set of tin armor, and the piano. Blake had no idea what Niall made of it all.
“She doesn’t even particularly like the children,” Blake said, feeling as though he had to be as honest with Niall as quickly as possible to keep from falling apart again. “She only took them to spite me.”
“Why would she do that?” Niall asked, his frown deepening.
Blake swallowed and crossed to the piano. He took up the stack of Niall’s letters and walked over to them, holding them out. “She found these.”
Recognition dawned in Niall’s eyes, and he took the letters gingerly. He opened the one on top, the last letter he’d sent on that horrible day. For the briefest of flashes, grief radiated from him and his eyes came alive with emotion.
“She found them years ago, actually,” Blake said, heart pounding. It was only a matter of time before one of the maids came up to the room with their tea, so he had to say the important things quickly. “Thank God we only signed them with initials. Annamarie spent the first few years of our marriage demanding to know if they were written by a Nancy or a Nellie or a Nora.” He laughed and shook his head. Niall closed the letter he’d been scanning and frowned at Blake. “Do you realize that not once did you write a single word that would betray those letters were written by a man?”
Niall glanced at the pile of letters again, but didn’t open any. “I didn’t realize.”
“I reread them from Annamarie’s point of view. Everything you described, no matter how sensual, could have been felt or performed by a woman. She spent years believing I was pining for a female lover my father made me cast aside to marry her.”
Niall jerked his head up to stare at Blake again. “So she knew you had a lover?”
Blake nodded. “She knew I didn’t want to marry her. She didn’t particularly want to marry me either.”
“Then why did she?” Niall asked, his jaw clenched.
“You mistake me,” Blake said, pacing to the piano and running his fingers across the keys before glancing back to Niall. “She wanted to marry my title. She wanted to be a duchess. She wanted to make her father proud and lord it over her friends in New York. She wanted to strut around England, mistress of a grand estate and talk of the town.” He paused, dusting off the resentment he’d felt for her during the first few years of their marriage and examining it, but not truly feeling it anymore. He shrugged. “The poor thing had to put up with me in order to have all that.”
“But she knew you were in love with someone else?” Niall stepped closer to the piano, handing the letters back to him.
Blake took them, staring at them for a moment before resting them back on the piano. “Yes. And in case you were wondering, she didn’t care. Mind you, she did what she thought she had to do to make me interested.” He felt sick at the memories, hurrying away from the piano and Niall and toward the bookcase. “I thought it was a stroke of luck that she fell pregnant almost immediately after we were married. It was hard enough forcing myself to bed her after knowing what true passion—” He shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose.
He leaned against the bookshelf and winced. “It was bittersweet when Greta was born.”
“Greta?” Niall’s question was louder than Blake expected. Niall stalked across the room to him. “You named your firstborn child Greta?”
Blake sent him a guilty look. “It’s Margaret, actually,” he confessed. “I thought Annamarie might figure things out if I insisted we name her simply Greta.”
“Did you—” Niall flinched, his cheeks going red. “Did you name your firstborn child after me?” he asked in a rough whisper.
Blake could only answer with a miserable, sheepish look.
Niall stared at him, appearing more incredulous than flattered, so Blake pushed away from the bookcase, crossing the room to lean against the doorway into the girls’ bedroom. Their beds were still unmade from when Annamarie had whisked them away in the middle of the night, while he’d been asleep downstairs. He’d refused to let the maids touch the room.
“A girl meant we had to try again for an heir, of course,” he said, staring into the room so that he could avoid looking at Niall. “Jessie was born just over a year later.” He turned back to Niall, who had taken a few steps toward him and stood with his arms crossed, a scowl on his face. “Jessica,” he clarified. “After Shakespeare. There was a miscarriage after that, and for a while after, Annamarie didn’t want me in her wing of the house, let alone her bed, thank God.”
“You lived in separate parts of the house?” Niall asked, narrowing his eyes.
Blake nodded. “My room is downstairs, just below the nursery. Annamarie has the entire south wing to herself.”
Niall’s mouth dropped open and he shook his head, but he didn’t say anything.
“Then Father died unexpectedly, and I was left a duke at age twenty-five. I think Annamarie knew at that point I had to have an heir. We finally succeeded in that. Alan just turned five in August.” He paused, wincing, but knowing he had to spill it all. “Alan Siegfried Williamson, current Marquess of Stanley, future eighth Duke of Selby.”
Niall jerked his head away, blinking as if fighting tears, his jaw so tense Blake was certain it ached. “And she still didn’t suspect a thing?” he asked in a gravelly voice.
“No.” Blake stepped cautiously closer to him. “She didn’t seem to care that I didn’t touch her once after Alan was conceived. Maybe she thought I had a mistress. She certainly had lovers after that.”
Niall snapped to look at him again, eyes wide. “And you know that for certain?”
Blake nodded. “I caught one of them sneaking out of the house in the early morning once. I should have thanked the man instead of pretending I didn’t see him.”
“Thanked him?” Niall let his arms drop. “Blake, listen to yourself. You are not a carpet to be walked all over.”
“Aren’t I?” he asked, feeling himself shrink inwardly. “Don’t I deserve to be stepped on after the way I—” He turned away, shaking his head, and marched across the room to the piano. Without sitting, he played a few bars of one of the girls’ favorite dancing songs before losing the heart for it.
“And what about you?” Niall demanded, his voice darker as he walked toward the piano. “Did you take a lover?”
Blake’s shoulders sagged and he let out a heavy breath. “Not really. There was a footman three or four years ago.” He shrugged. “When my previous valet came down with influenza, he stepped in for a week.
He figured things out right away. I…I had him suck me off a few times and I returned the favor once, but….” He shook his head, feeling dirty for doing it, much less telling Niall. “I couldn’t have him in the house after that. Fortunately, he was a good man. I explained the truth of things to him, why I had to sack him. I paid him a generous stipend and helped him to get a position as a valet for a friend. He never said a thing.” Blake forced himself to face Niall. “I was only tempted because he reminded me of you,” he whispered.
Niall looked as though Blake had slapped him. It was horrible, a nightmare.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t had lovers since….” Blake swallowed hard, walking away from Niall and plucking Jessie’s doll from her seat at the table.
“I have,” Niall said without emotion. “Several.”
Blake’s heart shattered, though he had no right to be hurt. He nodded, hugging Jessie’s doll.
“None of them were serious,” Niall murmured. “None of them were you.” His voice cracked.
Blake sucked in a breath, daring to hope, and pivoted to face Niall. He couldn’t do a damned thing, though. The maid swept into the room with a full tea tray. She smiled and moved easily at first, but the second she saw the look on Blake’s face, her smile dropped. She must have sensed the tension sizzling through the room. She set the tray on the girls’ table, pushing their make-believe tea set aside, then stood and curtsied.
“Will you be needing anything else, your grace?” she asked, averting her eyes from both him and Niall.
“No, thank you, Bonnie. This is lovely.” Blake smiled at her, letting her know she could flee as far and as fast as she wanted.
Bonnie curtsied again, then did just that. As soon as she was gone, Blake moved to the table, returned Jessie’s doll to her chair, and sat in one of the ridiculously small chairs—one he’d had reinforced to hold his weight while he played with the girls—and set about pouring tea.
“When you came up here last month with Jewel and Wrexham,” he said without looking at Niall as he poured, “I didn’t know how long you’d be up north. I asked Annamarie if you could stay here for a while. I wanted you to meet the children.” He glanced up at Niall, who frowned down at him, hands behind his back. “They’re wonderful, Niall, all three of them. I didn’t know it was possible to love someone so much until I had them in my life. It’s a sort of love that I’ve never felt before. I’m their father, and they are mine. You can’t know what that feels like until you have it. But that doesn’t replace how I feel about you,” he said before he could stop himself.
