The Lost Duke of Wyndham (24 page)

Mary stared at him in shock. And then at Jack. And then looked as if she very much wanted to sit down.

“I am standing in the hall,” the dowager announced haughtily.

“Don't be rude,” Thomas chided.

“She should have seen to—”

Thomas shifted his grip on her arm and yanked her forward, brushing right past Jack and his aunt. “Mrs. Audley,” he said, “we are most grateful for your hospitality.
All
of us.”

Mary nodded gratefully and turned to the butler. “Wimpole, would you—”

“Of course, ma'am,” he said, and Jack had to smile as he moved away. No doubt he was rousing the housekeeper to have her prepare the necessary bedrooms. Wimpole had always known what Aunt Mary needed before she'd had to utter the words.

“We shall have rooms readied in no time,” Mary said, turning to Grace and Amelia, who were standing off to the side. “Would the two of you mind sharing? I don't have—”

“It is no trouble at all,” Grace said warmly. “We enjoy each other's company.”

“Oh, thank you,” Mary said, sounding relieved. “Jack, you shall have to take your old bed in the nursery, and—oh, this is silly, I should not be wasting your time here in the hall. Let us retire to the drawing room, where you may warm yourselves by the fire until your rooms are ready.”

She ushered everyone in, but when Jack made to go, she placed her hand on his arm, gently holding him back.

“We missed you,” she said.

He swallowed, but the lump in his throat would
not dislodge. “I missed you, too,” he said. He tried to smile. “Who is home? Edward must have—”

“Married,” she finished for him. “Yes. As soon as we were out of mourning for Arthur. And Margaret soon after. They both live close by, Edward just down the lane, Margaret in Belturbet.”

“And Uncle William?” Jack had last seen him at Arthur's funeral. He'd looked older. Older, and tired. And stiff with grief. “He is well?”

Mary was silent, and then an unbearable sorrow filled her eyes. Her lips parted but she did not speak. She did not need to.

Jack stared at her in shock. “No,” he whispered, because it could not be true. He was supposed to have had a chance to say he was sorry. He'd come all the way to Ireland. He wanted to say he was sorry.

“He died, Jack.” Mary blinked several times, her eyes glistening. “It was two years ago. I didn't know how to find you. You never gave us an address.”

Jack turned, taking a few steps toward the rear of the house. If he stayed where he was, someone could see him. Everyone was in the drawing room. If they looked through the doorway, they would see him, struck, ready to cry, maybe ready to scream.

“Jack?” It was Mary, and he could hear her steps moving cautiously toward him. He looked up at the ceiling, taking a shaky, open-mouthed breath. It didn't help, but it was all he could manage.

Mary laid her hand on his arm. “He told me to tell you he loved you.”

“Don't say that.” It was the one thing he couldn't hear. Not just now.

“He did. He told me he knew you would come home. And that he loved you, and you were his son. In his heart, you were his son.”

He covered his face with his hands and found himself pressing tight, tighter, as if he could squeeze this all away. Why was he surprised? There was no reason he should be. William was not a young man; he'd been nearly forty when he married Mary. Did he think that life would have stood still in his absence? That no one would have changed, or grown…or died?

“I should have come back,” he said. “I should have—Oh, God, I'm such an idiot.”

Mary touched his hand, pulled it gently down and held it. And then she pulled him out of the hall, into the nearest room. His uncle's study.

Jack walked over to the desk. It was a hulking, behemoth of a thing, the wood dark and scuffed and smelling like the paper and ink that always lain atop it.

But it had never been imposing. Funny, he'd always liked coming in here. It seemed odd, really. He'd been an out of doors sort of boy, always running and racing, and covered in mud. Even now, he hated a room with fewer than two windows.

But he had always liked it here.

He turned to look at his aunt. She was standing in the middle of the room. She'd closed the door most of the way and set her candle down on a shelf. She turned and looked back at him and said, very softly, “He knew you loved him.”

He shook his head. “I did not deserve him. Or you.”

“Stop this talk. I won't hear it.”

“Aunt Mary, you know…” He put his fisted hand to his mouth, biting down on his knuckle. The words were there, but they burned in his chest, and it was so damned hard to speak them. “You know that Arthur would not have gone to France if not for me.”

She stared at him in bewilderment, then gasped and said, “Good heavens, Jack, you do not blame yourself for his death?”

“Of course I do. He went for me. He would never have—”

“He wanted to join the army. He knew it was that or the clergy, and heaven knows he did not want that. He'd always planned—”

“No,”
Jack cut in, with all the force and anger in his heart. “He hadn't. Maybe he told you he had, but—”

“You cannot take responsibility for his death. I will not let you.”

“Aunt Mary—”

“Stop! Stop it!”

The heels of her hands were pressed against her temples, her fingers wrapping up and over her skull. More than anything, she looked as if she were trying to shut him out, to put a stop to whatever it was he was trying to tell her.

But it had to be said. It was the only way she would understand.

And it would be the first time he'd uttered the words aloud.

“I cannot read.”

Three words. That's all it was. Three words. And a lifetime of secrets.

Her brow wrinkled, and Jack could not tell—did she not believe him? Or was it simply that she thought she'd misheard?

People saw what they expected to see. He'd acted like an educated man, and so that was how she'd seen him.

“I can't read, Aunt Mary. I've never been able to. Arthur was the only one who ever realized.”

She shook her head. “I don't understand. You were in school. You were graduated—”

“By the skin of my teeth,” Jack cut in, “and only then, with Arthur's help. Why do you think I had to leave university?”

“Jack…” She looked almost embarrassed. “We were told you misbehaved. You drank too much, and there was that woman, and—and—that awful prank with the pig, and—Why are you shaking your head?”

“I didn't want to embarrass you.”

“You think that wasn't embarrassing?”

“I could not do the work without Arthur's help,” he explained. “And he was two years behind me.”

“But we were told—”

“I'd rather have been dismissed for bad behavior than stupidity,” he said softly.

“You did it all on purpose?”

He dipped his chin.

“Oh, my God.” She sank into a chair. “Why didn't you say something? We could have hired a tutor.”

“It wouldn't have helped.” And then, when she looked up at him in confusion he said, almost helplessly, “The letters dance. They flip about. I can never tell the difference between a d and a b, unless they are uppercase, and even then I—”

“You're not stupid,” she cut in, and her voice was sharp.

He stared at her.

“You are
not
stupid. If there is a problem it is with your eyes, not your mind. I know you.” She stood, her movements shaky but determined, and then she touched his cheek with her hand. “I was there the moment you were born. I was the first to hold you. I have been with you for every scrape, every tumble. I have watched your eyes light, Jack. I have watched you
think
.

“How clever you must have been,” she said softly, “to have fooled us all.”

“Arthur helped me all through school,” he said as evenly as he was able. “I never asked him to. He said he liked—” He swallowed then, because the memory was rising in his throat like a cannonball. “He said he liked to read aloud.”

“I think he did like that.” A tear began to roll down her cheek. “He idolized you, Jack.”

Jack fought the sobs that were choking his throat. “I was supposed to protect him.”

“Soldiers die, Jack. Arthur was not the only one. He was merely…” She closed her eyes and turned away, but not so fast that Jack didn't see the flash of pain on her face.

“He was merely the only one who mattered to me,” she whispered. She looked up, straight into his eyes. “Please, Jack, I don't want to lose two sons.”

She held out her arms, and before Jack knew it, he was there, in her embrace. Sobbing.

He had not cried for Arthur. Not once. He'd been so
full of anger—at the French, at himself—that he had not left room for grief.

But now here it was, rushing in. All the sadness, all the times he'd witnessed something amusing and Arthur had not been there to share it with. All the milestones he had celebrated alone. All the milestones Arthur would never celebrate.

He cried for all of that. And he cried for himself, for his lost years. He'd been running. Running from himself. And he was tired of it. He wanted to stop. To stay in one place.

With Grace.

He would not lose her. He did not care what he had to do to ensure their future, but ensure it he would. If Grace said that she could not marry the Duke of Wyndham, then he would not
be
the Duke of Wyndham. Surely there was some measure of his destiny that was still under his control.

“I need to see to the guests,” Mary whispered, pulling gently away.

Jack nodded, wiping the last of his tears from his eyes. “The dowager…” Good lord, what was there to say about the dowager, except: “I'm so sorry.”

“She shall have my bedchamber,” Mary said.

Normally Jack would have forbidden her to give up her room, but he was tired, and he suspected she was tired, and tonight seemed like the perfect time to put ease before pride. And so he nodded. “That is very kind of you.”

“I suspect it's something closer to self-preservation.”

He smiled at that. “Aunt Mary?”

She'd reached the door, but she stopped with her hand
on the knob, turning back around to face him. “Yes?”

“Miss Eversleigh,” he said.

Something lit in his aunt's eyes. Something romantic. “Yes?”

“I love her.”

Mary's entire being seemed to warm and glow. “I am so happy to hear it.”

“She loves me, too.”

“Even better.”

“Yes,” he murmured, “it is.”

She motioned toward the hall. “Will you return with me?”

Jack knew he should, but the evening's revelations had left him exhausted. And he did not want anyone to see him thus, his eyes still red and raw. “Would you mind if I remained here?” he asked.

“Of course not.” She smiled wistfully and left the room.

Jack turned back toward his uncle's desk, running his fingers slowly along the smooth surface. It was peaceful here, and the Lord knew, he needed a spot of peace.

It was going to be a long night. He would not sleep. There was no sense in trying. But he did not want to
do
anything. He did not want to go anywhere, and most of all, he did not want to think.

For this moment…for this night…he just wanted to
be
.

 

Grace liked the Audleys' drawing room, she decided. It was quite elegant, decorated in soft tones of burgundy and cream, with two seating areas, a writing
desk, and several cozy reading chairs in the corners. Signs of family life were everywhere—from the stack of letters on the desk to the embroidery Mrs. Audley must have abandoned on the sofa when she'd heard Jack at the door. On the mantel sat six miniatures in a row. Grace walked over, pretending to warm her hands by the fire.

It was their family, she instantly realized, probably painted fifteen years ago. The first was surely Jack's uncle, and the next Grace recognized as Mrs. Audley. After that was…Good heavens, was that Jack? It had to be. How could someone change so little? He looked younger, yes, but everything else was the same—the expression, the sly smile.

It nearly took her breath away.

The other three miniatures were the Audley children, or so Grace assumed. Two boys and one girl. She dipped her head and said a little prayer when she reached the younger of the boys. Arthur. Jack had loved him.

Was that what he was talking about with his aunt? Grace had been the last to enter the drawing room; she'd seen Mrs. Audley pull him gently through another doorway.

After a few minutes the butler arrived, announcing that their rooms had been prepared, but Grace loitered near the fireplace. She was not ready to leave this room.

She was not sure why.

“Miss Eversleigh.”

She looked up. It was Jack's aunt.

“You walk softly, Mrs. Audley,” she said. “I did not hear you approach.”

“That one is Jack,” Mrs. Audley said, reaching out and removing his miniature from the mantel.

“I recognized him,” Grace murmured.

“Yes, he is much the same. This one is my son Edward. He lives just down the lane. And this is Margaret. She has two daughters of her own now.”

Grace looked at Arthur. They both did.

“I am sorry for your loss,” Grace finally said.

Mrs. Audley swallowed, but she did not seem to be near tears. “Thank you.” She turned then, and took Grace's hand in hers. “Jack is in his uncle's study. At the far end of the hall, on the right. Go to him.”

Grace's lips parted.

“Go,” Mrs. Audley said, even more softly than before.

Grace felt herself nod, and before she'd had time to consider her actions, she was already in the hall, hurrying down toward the end.