by KJ Charles
After that, it was inevitable that they had to share a bedchamber.
“I’ve no more space,” the landlady said, fixing Theo with a glare. “We’re not a big house, and I’ve Mr. Hazelwood and the young lady to accommodate.”
“How far is the next inn?”
“No more than eight miles.”
It was a sign of how deeply miserable Theo was that he considered that for several minutes. He could walk away from the lot of them. Let the petulant, pampered Miss Conroy make her mistakes; let Geoffrey claim his fortune attached to a bride, and doubtless send Theo to a debtor’s prison in vengeance for his useless treachery. Let Martin stay here, unhappy and alone and defeated, because Theo was contemptible.
He should have walked to the next inn, or slept in a hedgerow if he had to, but instead he had two glasses of gin, sitting alone and staring into the calamity of every decision he had ever made, and after that he simply couldn’t find the strength.
If he wasn’t a wretched, dishonest, treacherous, greedy liar, he would be sitting here with Martin now. They’d be talking, congratulating each other on having found the runaways and persuaded Miss Conroy to think twice. He’d be seeing the lines around Martin’s eyes relax a little. He’d make him laugh.
And then they’d go upstairs, in an unobtrusive way, and lock the door, and Theo would drop to his knees and use his mouth until Martin couldn’t wait another minute. Until he was bent over the bed, with Martin’s hands hard on his hips and breath hot in his ear, giving each other the fuck they’d both wanted so much, and afterwards collapsing, limbs tangled, together.
He’d even bought oil in Boroughbridge as he wandered around, ducking into coaching inns for the look of the thing—which was to say, in order to keep up the lie he’d been telling Martin all along. What a waste of money. What a hopeless, stupid waste.
He dragged his travelling bag into the bedchamber and shut the door. Martin was sitting on the side of one bed, face in hands. He didn’t look up. Theo hesitated, then sat on the other and took off his shoes. He moved in silence, but every creak of the floorboards and rustle of cloth was as loud as a shout.
“Out of interest,” Martin said eventually. “How much?”
“How much for what?”
“How much was it that you sold me for?”
It was like a blow. Theo couldn’t even make his mouth form the words he wanted to cry aloud. I didn’t! I changed my mind! I told you, in the end . . .
Too little, too late.
“Does it matter?” he asked dully. “What difference would it make?”
“None at all. Miss Conroy has lost her trust in me, and is like to head off into this blighted marriage, and it’s my fault for trusting you as I did, or for not paying you enough. I merely wondered what the price of your loyalty was. And whether you counted your body as part of that.”
Theo’s stomach contracted so hard that he feared he might vomit. “I told you. That wasn’t—”
“It was because you liked me,” Martin agreed. “God preserve me from your hatred, if this is how you treat those you like.”
Theo rolled back onto the bed and lay, staring up at the rafters. “Seven hundred pounds down and seventy a year forever.”
There was a short silence, then Martin said, incredulously, “How much?”
“I owe my cousin Geoffrey seven hundred pounds, and pay ten per cent interest on that sum yearly, no matter by how much I may reduce the principal. I have been paying for seven years. It has been the one motivating force of my life, to find a way to pay on time, because he and his father before him have always made the consequences of defaulting very clear.”
He heard the other bed creak as Martin moved, but didn’t look round. “How did you come to owe such a sum?”
Theo grimaced at the ceiling. “I was always destined to be a curate like my father, you see. All my education was directed towards that, and nobody thought to ask my opinion. But I did not want the Church, not at all, and once at university I soon found I preferred the company of sparks and knowing men. I thought I belonged in such company, and also, I thought I could play cards.” He gave a mirthless laugh. “Well, I soon learned I was wrong about that. By my second year I found myself owing seven hundred pounds, to men who made it clear that it was not merely a debt of honour.”
Martin didn’t speak, but he was at least listening. Theo went on, his mouth feeling hard and awkward on the words. “My parents had nothing to help me with. They had given me everything they could as it was, and my uncle Hazelwood was already paying, grudgingly, for my education. He was not pleased to be asked for more, had a great deal to say on the topic of his sister’s imprudent marriage, to her and to me. But once I had been sent down for gambling and nonpayment of debts, and it was clear that I was likely to have my legs broken for it, and my mother had begged him, weeping on her knees, then he lent me the money. With conditions, of course, to remind me of my abuse of his generosity. I must pay seventy pounds a year in interest, until every penny of the principal is repaid. Oh, and he can demand the whole outstanding sum at any time, and will prosecute me for debt if I default. That was a condition added to keep me in line, you understand.”
“That’s usury,” Martin said.
“It may be, but I signed the agreement since I had no choice, and the Hazelwoods—first my uncle, now Geoffrey since the old bastard is dead, but he is not one whit kinder—have held that debt over my head ever since. I’ve paid nearly five hundred pounds in interest since then, and chiselled just ninety off the principal. I’ll be paying it all my life.” He smiled bitterly at the ceiling. “I agreed to their terms because I thought they’d be better than broken legs, but I have had cause to wonder about that since.”
“Theo . . .”
“It killed my parents.” He let the words stand, facing them in their starkness. “My father was furious with Uncle Hazelwood. My mother was caught between them. They were both so disappointed with me. Devastated. It aged them. I thought I might be able to mend matters, if I worked hard enough. But the typhus came before that day did.” He breathed out, long and hard.
“And that’s me. That’s why I run the Advertiser, why I take every penny I can, why I write every moment I have. It’s why I lied to you, and took your money under false pretences, and it’s why I couldn’t manage to tell you the truth until I was forced to make the choice at Boroughbridge. When I saw Geoffrey at the White Horse Cellar, I saw a chance to shed the burden on my back, and to be quite frank, I should have cheerfully let Miss Conroy marry him in order to be rid of my debt, if it had not been for you.”
He heard Martin’s sharp inhalation, but he would not conceal this. “You asked for the truth. Or perhaps you didn’t, but you are getting it. And the truth is, I am tired of my life, I am tired of living under this weight, and I have no sympathy for Miss Conroy’s stupidity.”
“She’s little more than a child.”
“She’s seventeen. I was nineteen when my uncle imposed the terms of my debt. And you were four when someone decided you’d make a thoughtful gift for a friend, so why the devil should Miss Conroy be immune to the cruelty of this shitty world?”
There was a long silence.
“But you told me the truth,” Martin said at last. “At Boroughbridge, you told me where they were going. I would not have caught them up otherwise.”
“For what good it has done. If I’d kept my mouth shut, one of us would have got something from this farce.”
“And still, you didn’t,” Martin said. “You changed your mind. Why?”
Theo dropped his arm over his face, covering his eyes. “Ah, I don’t know. Perhaps I am simply tired of the man I have become. I would rather be the man you thought I was.”
“And will your cousin sue you for the debt now?”
“Certainly if this marriage doesn’t come off. He probably will anyway. He holds grudges, and he has always resented anything his father gave me. It was all his by right, you see, and he does not like
to give up anything that is his. Not to mention that he is in huge debt himself.”
“How? Were they not well off?”
“Oh yes, a prospering landed family,” Theo said with a shrug. “Uncle Hazelwood kept the lands up. But farming doesn’t pay so much these days, what with the wars and the taxes, and certainly not when the landowner is in London playing at being a gentleman, rather than minding his affairs in the country. It’s five years since my uncle died and Geoffrey has spent several times his income for every one of those. Clothes, horses, dice. He’s mortgaged Felford Hall, but he won’t sell it unless matters go beyond desperation. It allows him to cling to his gentlemanly pretensions, to be Hazelwood of Felford.”
Martin frowned. “But will your seven hundred be enough to pay his debts?”
“Nothing like, even if I had seven hundred, which I do not. He’ll send me to prison out of spite because I dared attempt to stop him claiming his fortune, which is to say Miss Conroy’s money. That’s his by right now, you see, in his mind.”
“Theo.” Martin said it meaningfully, and waited until Theo moved his arm and looked round. “Is your cousin as bad as you say? Truly?”
Theo sighed. “He is his own sun, the centre of his universe, and he does not forgive those who fail to give him due obeisance. If he marries Miss Conroy and her parents are insufficiently generous, he’ll blame her for letting him down. The imprudence of the marriage will be all her fault. And if they are generous, he will take that as no more than his right, and very soon he’ll be resenting her for any claim she makes on his money. Believe me, I know. I have given him close on six hundred pounds towards a seven-hundred-pound debt, and every time I come to pay him he behaves as though I’ve dipped my hand into his purse.”
Martin’s jaw was set. “I can’t see her marry him. Not knowing this. But . . .”
Theo watched his face. “What?”
“Oh, the devil.” Martin’s hands tightened into fists. “I’m damned afraid that he’s compromised her.”
“In the sense of travelling without a chaperone?” Theo suggested, without much hope.
“In the sense of taking her to bed.” Martin met his eyes. “You don’t look surprised.”
If Theo was, it was only that Martin should share his thoughts on this with him. But after all, nothing he could say would make it worse if those suspicions were true. “I don’t know if I am. It’s a contemptible thing to do, but what better way to secure the marriage?”
“And make her feel she has no choice now,” Martin said grimly. “I think she wanted to listen to me, she believed I was on her side. But—”
“I ruined that,” Theo said. “Played right into Geoffrey’s hands, and undermined your standing with her. Ah, hell’s tits. I’m sorry.”
“I daresay you are, and it butters no parsnips,” Martin said. “I don’t want your apologies; I want to avert this calamity. I have been racking my brains up here for hours, and I simply cannot think what to do. Even if she has been imprudent, even if, God forfend, she’s with child, there must be something I can do other than stand by and let her marry your greedy wretch of a cousin, but what? I intend to follow them to the border and be there in case she changes her mind up until the vows are spoken, but beyond that, I have no ideas at all.” He stood, paced to the end of the room, and turned abruptly. “I can think of nothing other than carrying her off by force, and I’d be prepared to do that, except that I know damned well I should probably find myself gaoled for it and make matters a great deal worse. Curse it. What would happen if this was a Dorothea Swann book?”
“There would be a hero, of course. Someone to sweep Miss Conroy to safety and leave Geoffrey looking the fool he is. Some paper doll of a man with nothing to him, succeeding only because I shape the story to make it possible.” Theo sat up, swinging his legs off the bed. “That’s the problem, you see. When I write my books, I can make the world and its people do what I want. If I could do that in life, I should not have made such a damned mess of everything. Ah, the devil. If I were writing this story . . .”
Martin took another pace so that he was close by. Theo was painfully reminded of last night, when they had been like this: he was sitting on a bed, Martin standing before him. “What would you do?”
“Snatch Miss Conroy from under Geoffrey’s nose. Watch you return her to her parents in triumph. Have you forgive me.”
“Yes,” Martin said, that deep voice so low it resonated in Theo’s ears. “I should have preferred that story too. I thought that we worked well together, when I thought we worked together.” He reached out to brush the hair off the side of Theo’s face, very softly, as if soothing away a hurt that instead grew stronger with every touch. “I wish to God you had been who I believed you to be.”
“So do I,” Theo said, lips dry. “Very much.”
“But you wanted to be free.” Martin’s fingers combed through Theo’s hair, over his scalp, sending shudders down his spine. “I know. I would once have done a great deal for that too.”
The blood rushed to Theo’s face, burning, choking him with shame. “Don’t. My God. I did this to myself, I know I did, and I have piled villainy on venality for years to escape the consequences of my own folly, and— I’m sorry, Martin. I’m sorry.”
He couldn’t find anything else to say, but Martin didn’t seem to need anything. He stood, looking down, face grave, running his fingers through Theo’s hair as if stroking a cat, and that gentle kindness was worse than anything he could have said.
Theo didn’t want kindness. He’d rather have had rage at his betrayal, his stupid petty selfishness, than this dreadful acceptance, as though Martin had never really expected anything better. He wanted to make this right, he wanted to put himself back on his damned feet, at least until Geoffrey knocked him off them again, and he wanted Martin’s hands touching him as they had before, not with this sense of mourning something lost.
That was not going to happen with his greed and guilt sitting between them like a toad. But what could he do? What weapon did he have that he could use against Geoffrey?
None. He didn’t have anything. He was under Geoffrey’s thumb, and they both knew it. If he was the hero in a tale, there would be some way to wriggle out from his obligations and make this right, but Theo well knew he was not a hero. He was so much better at villainy.
The thought flashed bright in his mind, like dry paper taking flame. He stared at Martin’s waist, unseeing.
“Theo?”
“I think . . . Martin, listen. Will you listen to me?”
Martin’s hand stopped its movement. “To what?”
Theo took a deep breath. “I have lied to you and let you down and caused this calamity, and there is no reason you should believe a word I say. With all that said, is there any chance you could trust me once more?”
“Trust you?” Martin’s topaz eyes locked with his, steady and intent. His fingers still rested on Theo’s cheek. Theo could feel the pulse of blood and wondered if it was a little faster than usual, or if that was his own. “To do what? For whose benefit?”
It wasn’t cruelly said, but the words nevertheless made Theo flinch. “I know I’ve given you no reason to treat my intentions with anything but contempt. But if I said I wanted to help, that I wanted to do better, would you trust me? Could you do that?”
“No,” Martin said, voice gentle and implacable as his eyes. “No, Theo. I don’t think I could.”
Theo knocked surreptitiously on the door of what he’d been told was Geoffrey’s chamber near eleven o’clock that night. He waited a few moments, knocked surreptitiously again, and a little after that gave up and just banged loudly.
He was relieved to hear steps. He’d not been entirely sure Geoffrey wouldn’t try to consolidate his position by slipping to his fiancée’s bedroom once more. But here was his cousin, yawning in nightshirt and cap, opening the door with a scrape and a sleepy curse and recoiling in horror at the sight Theo presented.
“What the—�
��
“Let me in,” Theo snarled, and pushed past him, clutching the scrap of raw beefsteak to his face.
“Good God, what happened to you? Did the black do that?” Geoffrey demanded. “It serves you right, you little turd.”
“Be damned to you.” Theo put the candlestick he carried on the mantelpiece next to the looking glass, removed the bloody meat, and peered at his rapidly swelling eye and lip.
“Looks painful,” Geoffrey said with some satisfaction. “That will teach you to play both ends against the middle.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” Theo snapped. “He paid me well to accompany him, and I never intended to catch you up. What, do you think I wanted to see your ugly face and throw away the chance of being relieved of your damned usury, you gouging miser?”
“Mind your tongue!”
“The devil I will.” Theo swung to face him. “Do you think I shall show you respect as head of the family now? You’ve lost more money than ever I did, you pustulant prick, and if you’re going to pursue me for debt, I see no reason to pretend I give a damn what you think anymore. Arsehole,” he added, for good measure.
Geoffrey was openmouthed with startled fury. Theo turned back to the mirror, dabbing at his cut lip. It was extremely painful and swelling nastily already. “I expect you’re wondering why I’m in here, apart from not wanting to share a room with that brute any longer—”
“You’re not sharing this room! You can sleep in the stables like the dog you are.”
“Very well,” Theo said. “If you don’t want to know what he’s planning, I’ll go. I don’t give a curse if you secure your prize or end up swinging for rape or bleeding in a ditch; in fact, given the choice, I’d rather the latter.”
“What?” Geoffrey demanded. “What was that?”
