“I was going to say two feet.” At her innocent giggle, he managed his first smile of the day. And he imagined a world with he and Justina having a child of their own. With her wit and spirit and—
“Are you going to cry, Uncle Dominick?” his niece asked, jerking him back from a precipice of yearning for that vision of a babe born of him and Justina. “Your eyes have gone all sad like Mama’s.”
Sad like Mama’s. His chest pulled. For that was who Cecily had been for so very long. A young, sad mother marred by life. Unhappy almost as many years as she’d been happy. It had been just one more resentment he’d heaped at Rutland’s feet. But that blame was more his and their evil grandfather’s than the marquess’. That realization struck him, belated and true.
“Uncle Dominick?” Felicity tugged at his lapel.
“How can I be sad when I’m here with you?” he countered, forcing another grin. He gave Felicity a light squeeze and set her down. Nick glanced about for a glaringly absent mama and governess. “Shouldn’t you be in a lesson?” he quizzed.
He may as well have committed treason against the king for the outrage in her wide eyes. “Shh,” she hissed, slapping a finger against her lips. His niece stole another furtive glance about. In her bid to escape nursemaids and governesses, how very much she was like Cecily.
“Mama is not home?” he surmised.
“She’s not.” He fought his disappointment. As much as he loved his niece, it had been Cecily’s company he sought. “Will you play chess with me until she returns?” Without awaiting an answer, she grabbed his hand, and began tugging him along. When they’d reached the modest library, Nick and Felicity claimed their usual seats behind the ivory chessboard and proceeded to play in their customary quiet.
Following the tumult of Rutland’s return yesterday afternoon and Justina’s rightful hurt and accusations that had robbed him of sleep, there was something calming in the silence. The calm after the storm where a person could think through all that had come to pass.
He studied Felicity’s bent head as she puzzled over the board. How innocent she was. She saw a chessboard and saw a game. Whereas, he had allowed even that simple pleasure to be perverted by his warped need for revenge. His niece tapped her fingertips distractedly on the edge of the table. After a long stretch, she emitted a sigh.
“What is it?” he asked, shifting in his chair.
“The pawn is useless.” She motioned to the move that she was considering.
His gaze fell to the small ivory pawn. He picked it up and turned it over in his hand. All along, in his scheming, he’d believed Justina was his ultimate pawn. She had even likened herself to that piece. “That isn’t true,” he said quietly. Felicity looked up, befuddlement in her eyes.
“But you always said,” she cleared her voice and spoke in a deeper voice, in imitation of his own. “‘The pawn is the least valuable piece.’”
Yes, he had. “Because I’m a rotted teacher,” he muttered. Just as he’d been a rotted husband. Andrew Barrett’s slurred ramblings ricocheted around his mind. Now, because of his wife, he saw even this small token in a whole new light. “The pawn is the only piece that can promote to any other piece once it reaches the eighth rank.” He paused, looking to the most powerful on the table. “Even queen,” he said softly. With her spirit and valor, Justina could never have been just a pawn. Her sense of justice and right marked her far stronger than him or Rutland, or any other person he’d ever known.
Felicity continued to drum her fingertips. “My only move is to claim your pawn,” she said in beleaguered tones.
“There is always another move.” He stilled. There is always another move to make, Nick. It is about making the right one.
I cannot do it… Not if he wanted a future with her. And he did. He wanted them to be a family who loved and laughed, and found strength in those freeing sentiments. He could not. Mayhap he’d known that all along.
Nick came to his feet.
Felicity looked up. “Uncle Dominick?”
He reached over the table and hefted her into his arms, giving her a quick squeeze. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“Your…” She wrinkled her pert nose. “What did I do?”
“You helped me see my move.” When he’d been too blind to see anything past his own foolishness and obstinacy. “Promise to return?” he echoed their familiar phrase.
“Permission to leave granted,” she said and pressed a kiss against his cheek.
He set her down quickly. Grabbing two pieces from the chessboard, he pocketed them and sprinted from the room. Heart thundering against his ribcage, Nick raced down the corridors.
What a bloody mess he’d made of his life. There could be no undoing the wrongs but, as Chilton had said, there could be a moving forward. And ironically, the path forward required a reconciliation with his past.
He reached the foyer just as his sister entered.
As she handed her bonnet over to a servant, surprise rounded out her eyes. “Nick?”
He quickly caught her by the shoulders. “You were right,” he rasped, earning curious looks from the servants. “I cannot do it. I wanted to do this for you and…” He swallowed hard, taking ownership of that at last. “It was for me,” he whispered. “It was always for me. And I cannot do it. I love her.” Lightness suffused his chest.
A slow, smile, the first real one he remembered from his sister in more years than he cared to count, met her eyes. “I am so very proud of you, Dominick.” Cecily swatted at his arm. “Now, go. Go to her.”
He would. But first, there was a matter of business he had to see to. Following a long visit with his man-of-affairs, Nick found himself climbing the steps of a different townhouse.
He came to a stop, staring at the black door. A door he’d once sooner have burned down than visit. Nick briefly closed his eyes. I have to do this. There had never been a choice where Justina was concerned. He knocked.
The door was immediately opened by an aged butler who gave him a quick once-over.
“I am here to see his lordship,” Nick said quickly, fishing out a card.
The older man studied it a moment, his expression revealing nothing. He stepped back and motioned Nick inside. Then, without waiting to see if he followed, the old servant started down the corridor.
Nick adjusted his longer stride behind the slow, shuffling steps of the butler. As he walked, he distracted himself by looking about the walls of the man who lived here. A man he’d spent years hating. And yet, if it hadn’t been for him, he would have never met Justina.
As he moved deeper and deeper into the townhouse, the gilt frames revealed portraits of a smiling, dark-haired lady with two babies on her lap. Nick paused, drawn to that painting. For the man who stood, smiling at her side, his gaze reserved for the top of that painted lady’s head, was not the Devil who’d haunted him all these years…but, rather, just a man. A father.
He peered at Lord Rutland’s softened visage. Mayhap that was the power the Barrett women had. They shattered hatred and left in its place this healing love.
“Your Grace?”
The wizened tones of the butler snapped him back to the moment. Nick continued on until they reached a closed door.
The butler rapped once and pushed the door open. Lord Rutland yanked his head up from the papers at his desk. Surprise flared in his eyes, mixed with a burning hatred. “His Grace, the Duke of Huntly, to see you, my lord.”
The marquess didn’t bother to rise. There was no hint of pleasantries or greetings as he entered and the door was closed behind him. Once he’d built this man out to be a beast. Only to find…he was very human. Just flawed and broken—as Nick was. That silent reminder forced his legs into movement. He came to a stop before Rutland’s desk. His gaze fell to the balled-up sheets and then lingered on the clean paper but for three words.
My dearest Phoebe…
Rutland seethed. “What do you want?” he demanded, bracing his palms on the smooth, mahogany surface
.
Nick forced his attention away from that private missive. Reaching inside his cloak, he fished out a large stack of bound notes. Wordlessly, he tossed them atop the desk. The crumpled sheets fluttered, with one drifting over the edge.
Rutland looked questioningly at him.
He jerked his chin at the stack. “Take them,” he said tightly.
Eyeing him warily, the marquess collected the sheets. Not taking his gaze from Nick as he slipped the ribbon off, Rutland at last attended the pages. “What is this?” he asked cautiously.
“It is everything,” he said quietly. “They are the younger Barrett’s vowels. The properties. The viscount’s debt. They are yours. Everything except Justina’s dowry and a landed property.” The other man lifted his shock-filled gaze.
For a lifetime, Nick had strengthened himself by dreaming of the demise of this man and his in-laws. As such, there should be a pained regret in giving everything over to this bastard. And yet… A great pressure eased in his chest, filling him with a remarkable calm. “I wanted to destroy you,” he managed, his throat working. A broken, empty laugh spilled from his lips. “I wanted to return to London and prove I was stronger than you. Wanted to destroy everyone you loved.” His lips twisted in a sad smile. “In the end, I fell in love with Justina. Somewhere along the way, my plan became twisted.” His gaze traveled involuntarily to those notes. “I’d have you set the funds aside for Andrew for when he’s older. He’ll just go through them now at the gaming tables if you turn them over to him. And the rest…I thought you might set it aside and allow the viscountess to come to you when she is of need of those funds.”
Rutland shuffled through the pages and then looked up, again. “Why have me do it?” he shot back. “If you’re determined to win your wife’s heart, why not do this as the ultimate gesture of your regard?” Of course, men such as them would be forever wary and jaded…of all offerings.
“I’m not doing this to win her,” he said quietly. “I am doing this because it is the right thing to do.” When he’d awakened this morn, Lord Rutland’s opinion was the last thing he had cared about or worried over. Now, he’d have Justina’s brother-in-law, this man who’d protected his wife these past two years when she’d needed that protection, know all. “May I sit?”
Rutland jerked his chin at one of the vacant leather wing back chairs.
He settled onto the edge and turned his palms up. “I have been gripped by nothing these past thirteen years but my quest for revenge,” he said quietly. “It sustained me through the misery that had become my life.”
His brother-in-law went motionless.
Nick glanced around the immaculate office. His gaze lingered on a map of Wales that hung above the marquess’ desk. …. She had dreams of traveling to Wales… And eventually, with Edmund, found her way there… He yearned for those still yet unknown and undecided dreams with Justina. He forced his gaze back to Rutland’s. “I have been a shell of the person I once was.” Just as his sister had rightfully pronounced. “Until Justina,” he quietly added.
Rutland set down the documents and leaned back in his chair.
“She taught me how to smile again.” And read books he’d abandoned. Nick’s throat worked. “I lived again. Because of her.” Yet, in the end, he’d repaid those gifts with nothing but heartache. His stomach muscles clenched and he dusted a shaky hand over his face.
“Now, you have an entire lifetime to show her who you really are.”
Nick dropped his arm in surprise. He searched his brother-in-law for a hint of mockery and found none. A ragged, broken laugh burst from his lips, echoing around the office. “There can be no undoing what I’ve done.”
“No,” Rutland agreed. There was no accusation there. “But you can move forward and learn to trust and love together.”
Trust? His face spasmed and he looked away. How did one go about rebuilding a fragile gift that had been shattered by one’s own careless hand? “She hates me,” he said, squeezing those words out past a tight throat.
The marquess stretched his legs out before him. “Yes, but there is a delicate line between hate and love. Have you told her?”
Had anyone told him he would have been sitting down, accepting advice and guidance and forgiveness from the Marquess of Rutland, he’d have called them mad and bound for Bedlam. “I have.” She, of course, saw that pledge as only one more lie. He cursed. What a blunder he’d made of it all.
“It will not be an easy task to win her heart,” his brother-in-law conceded and there was something calming in that direct honesty.
Through the haze of his own misery, Nick looked at him, staggered by the truth. “You know something of it?” he asked hesitantly. This relationship with Rutland was a new one. A cautious one forged by the love they had for women born to the same family. Mayhap in time, there could be complete healing here, as well.
Rutland gave a nearly imperceptible nod. “I do. We’re speaking of you,” the other man added, gruffly. As one who’d shut everyone out about the hell that haunted him, he recognized that protective attempt in another. “You are married to Justina.” The marquess narrowed his eyes, transformed, once again, into the dark scoundrel all feared. “It would be wrong of me to pass judgment on you when I was guilty of the same crimes against my own wife. Whatever I had hoped for in a husband for Justina, you are the man she married…and I would see her happy. If she can be,” he tacked that last part on as a chilly reminder. The marquess came to his feet and stretched a hand out.
Nick stared at those fingers. …as long as you intend to destroy those I love, we can’t even begin to try… The seconds ticked by and then he slowly stood and placed his palm in the marquess’ hand. They shook.
It was a new beginning.
His brother-in-law drew his arm back, lowering it to his side. Nick made to go when Rutland stayed him. “Huntly?”
He glanced back.
“I was wrong. Revenge and hatred only weaken you.”
He started. Rutland did recall those words he’d tossed out to him all those years ago. Regardless, it was a truth he’d learned too late. Nick gave a brusque nod. “I know that, now. I spent years blaming you for my father’s mistakes. He was wrong.” They’d all been. Papa, Rutland—me.
“I was, as well,” the marquess conceded. “I was angry and hollow and broken.” Grief ravaged his features. “And I am so very sorry for what I did to your family. I can never atone for that crime.” His gaze darkened. “Or so many of my others. I can only try to be a better man now.”
That was all they could do. Both of them.
Nick firmed his jaw. And he was determined to spend the rest of his life earning Justina’s trust and love.
With that, he took his leave of Rutland and started toward his future.
Chapter 22
Things were as they’d been three weeks earlier.
Honoria, following Nick’s revelation and Edmund’s arrival in London, had returned from visiting Phoebe and now sat loyally at Justina’s side in The Circulating Library. Gillian occupied the other seat. Andrew strolled the streets of Lambeth. For all intents and purposes, everything was the same.
Only, while Justina sat waiting for the lecture to begin, the room filled with just a smattering of guests, she accepted the truth. Life would never return to the way it had been.
Three weeks ago, she’d been a naïve miss dreaming of love and hiding in a lecture hall, afraid to so much as utter her own opinion. Now, she was a woman married, awakened to the darkness that existed in a person’s soul. Only, it was not solely Nick who’d opened her eyes to the truth of the world around her—but the truth of who and what Edmund had been, as well. She’d spent the whole of her life escaping from her own father’s ugliness with dreams of perfection. She was to have found a loving, devoted husband, larger than life, who didn’t seek to silence her, as her own mother had been. In the end, she’d lifted Nick upon a pedestal which only a fictional figure could dare attain.
“I’m
sorry,” Honoria said in hushed tones. She stretched a hand out, covering Justina’s gloved fingers.
God, how she despised being this object of pity. From the moment her friends had arrived that morning and insisted on accompanying her to a lecture, she’d met nothing more than sad looks and stilted silence. In the end, she’d proven Honoria’s jaded cynicism about a gentleman and his intentions—correct.
There was no “I-told-you-so”, however. Rather, there was a devoted friendship that she’d be forever grateful for.
She had no illusions that her timely appearance was anything more than deliberate; a request from Phoebe. Because, ultimately, she had always been the girl in need of care. Only Nick had treated her as a woman in possession of her own mind and a woman who should speak freely for it. Trusted in her enough that he’d given her one of the most prosperous landholdings her father had held—and lost. What did that say about her husband?
While Gillian and Honoria conversed, Justina glanced several rows ahead to the empty chairs she and Nick had occupied a few weeks ago. This same room he had stolen into and whispered all the words she’d hoped to hear from a suitor; of shared interests and dreams. But then, could he really feign that appreciation for literature? That niggling voice continued. How, when all of Society knew nothing of her interests and desires, would he have not only gleaned that information, but then memorized verses?
It wasn’t all a lie. After the shock and agony of yesterday’s revelations, she could, in this new day, see that there had been more between them. But was it enough? She nibbled at her lower lip.
“I know you’ll both call me a romantic,” Gillian said softly, interrupting her thoughts and calling her attention. “But sometimes, gentlemen do horrid things. And make rotten choices that hurt a person. Phoebe,” she reminded them, looking back and forth between her friends. “My sister. But then they’ll have these moments,” she clasped her hands to her chest. “These grand gestures that prove their love and worth.”
Honoria snorted. “What are you saying?” she asked, just as the lecturer, an old bewigged gentleman, took his place at the podium.
A Heart of a Duke Regency Collection : Volume 2--A Regency Bundle Page 141
