West was fond of his brother, but when, the night of his encounter with James and Violet in Hyde Park, West recalled that he’d invited James over for an evening of cards and brandy, he could not deny a certain sense of foreboding. By the time James arrived, West and Hawthorne were already settled in the library, brandies in hand; James appeared, announced by Briar, and barely so much as blinked at the sight of West drinking with his valet. “Do you know, I think Briar might actually have grown a single gray hair at last,” James said as soon as the door had shut behind the butler, who spared a censorious look for the reclining Hawthorne (one that Hawthorne ignored). “He’s older than I am,” West said patiently, accustomed at this point to his friends’ oft-r epeated jokes on the subject of his butler’s age. “Barely.” James moved to the sideboard uninvited. He flicked a glance over his shoulder at Hawthorne. “Does he disapprove of you?” Hawthorne offered a lazy shrug, taking a sip of brandy. “Probably. He seems to disapprove of most things.” A quick, private smile flashed across his face. James raised an eyebrow at this, but refrained from comment as he crossed to seat himself next to West, setting his half-full tumbler on the card table. James was perfectly aware of the reasons that Hawthorne—who had grown up on the estate of the ducal seat in Kent, the son of the stable master—had wished so badly to flee the village of his youth, and why he’d leapt at the opportunity to serve as his childhood friend’s valet. West, who had his own suspicions as to how, precisely, his valet and butler might or might not be entertaining themselves, carefully did not look at his brother. So long as the household was running smoothly, he had little cause for complaint. “Interesting you should mention entertainment, Hawthorne,” James said, taking a leisurely sip of his brandy and ignoring the cards West had dealt him. “Violet and I were fortunate enough to have some entertainment of our own this afternoon, when we ran into West and his betrothed on Rotten Row.” West cleared his throat. “Yes. Well. We were delighted to see you.” Both James’s and Hawthorne’s eyebrows lifted at that. “It was a nice day for a ride,” West offered. The eyebrows inched higher. “I think I may have had a touch of sunstroke?” he suggested feebly.
“That would go a long way toward explaining it,” James agreed cheerfully. Hawthorne was beginning to look mildly put out. “What on earth did I miss whilst I was spending my afternoon polishing his lordship’s riding boots?” “I was wearing my riding boots,” West said testily. “And don’t think I didn’t notice that my jacket for this evening hadn’t been pressed.” “Appalling,” Hawthorne agreed, reclining in his seat with the insouciance of a man who was comfortable in the knowledge that his employer was also one of his best friends. West’s father had disapproved of this arrangement from the start, and at moments like this, West could almost think that his father had a point. Almost. “West and Lady Fitzwilliam went for a ride in the park and gave a convincing performance as a pair of children acting in a pantomime of how they think an affianced couple should behave,” James informed Hawthorne. Hawthorne leveled his dark-brown gaze on West. “Fascinating.” He drew the word out into an improbable number of syllables. “Isn’t it just,” James agreed. “Violet and I were discussing it and she could not help but observe that something seemed decidedly odd about the entire exchange.” “And so she ordered you to interrogate me?” West asked. “Not in so many words.” James took a sip of his drink, and settled more comfortably in his chair. “She merely asked if I might be amenable to taking advantage of the invitation my beloved brother had already extended, and perhaps conduct a... subtle investigation.” “If this is your idea of a subtle investigation, then I do not think you’ve a bright future as a private inquiry agent,” West said darkly. James’s smile was satisfied. “Which is why I thought instead to simply ask you what in the name of hell is going on.” “A question I have also been wishing to ask,” Hawthorne said, raising his glass in a toast. He adopted an expression of angelic innocence. “But, naturally, I would never presume to question his lordship’s personal affairs.” “Oh?” West inquired. “When did you have this admirable change of principle, Hawthorne?” James let out a chuckle at that, and Hawthorne offered West a cheeky grin. West rested his elbows on the card table, rubbing at his temples. Did he feel the beginning of a headache coming on? Was this a common side effect of acquiring fraudulent fiancées and then engaging in elaborate displays of soon-to-be-marital affection in front of one’s family and friends? Despite his best attempts at bad humor, however, he found that he couldn’t quite manage it. And furthermore, he realized in a rush, he badly wanted to tell someone the truth. He hadn’t appreciated what a
burden this ruse had become, until he was faced with the prospect of dispelling it. He opened his mouth, then shut it again, considering how best to explain the tangle he found himself in. And so he decided to tell the truth. “Sophie asked me to help her feign an engagement so that her sister would agree to marry Blackford.” Whatever James and Hawthorne had been expecting, it clearly hadn’t been this; they both sat wearing identical expressions of slack-jawed astonishment. At last, James muttered a curse under his breath. “Violet is going to be unbearably smug about this.” “She knew?” “Not the specifics.” James waved a dismissive hand. “But she was convinced that all was not right.” “Well, you may return home and congratulate Violet on being a keen observer of the human condition.” James looked appalled. “I’ll do nothing of the sort; that would merely encourage her. Oh, I won’t lie to her,” he added, seeing West’s stern look, “but I’m certainly not going to compliment her. I’ll have my hands full enough trying to prevent her from hatching some deranged plan to ensure that you and Sophie actually get married after all.” “Well, Sophie did tell Father that we were having a double wedding,” West said. “So I suppose we’ll see whether her desire to force him to attend outweighs her desire to never, under any circumstances, marry me.” Hawthorne frowned. “She told you that?” “She told me that with explicit clarity the last time we discussed it—four years ago. She has not given me any reason to believe her feelings have changed in the interim.” James nearly fell out of his chair. “You asked Sophie to marry you only four years ago?” West frowned now, too. He disapproved of such liberal employment of italics; it was borderline hysterical. “Our paths crossed soon after her husband’s death. We... talked,” he said delicately, which James and Hawthorne—being no fools—naturally immediately understood to mean something entirely other than “talking.” Their eyebrows performed another round of irritating in-unison lifting, which West ignored. “I, foolishly, thought that now that she was widowed, our path was clear and we could wed, once she was out of mourning. She felt otherwise.” A silence fell that felt expectant, somehow. West looked from his brother to his valet, both of whom were regarding him almost incredulously. “What?” he asked, a bit defensively. “That’s it?” James sounded flabbergasted, which was truly saying something, given that his brother was not a man in the habit of expressing strong emotions. They’d both been trained well by their father. “I believe when a lady informs you that she will—and I quote—never marry you, the gentlemanly thing to do is to retreat.”
“West,” James said patiently, “did she tell you why she would never marry you?” “We didn’t get that far in our conversation.” “Of course you didn’t,” James muttered. “Is this a family curse? Did some ancestor of ours offend a witch at some point, generations ago? Though ‘inability to communicate’ seems like an oddly specific curse.” West was unamused. “I think I liked you better before you reconciled with Violet,” he said darkly. “You didn’t joke then.” “I’m only half-joking now,” James shot back. “For God’s sake, you’ve been in love with Sophie for years, and you didn’t even think to ask her why she was so dead set against marrying you?” “It doesn’t matter, because I know now,” West said coldly. “I thought I understood the full scope of things then, but it turns out I was wrong.” He informed James and Hawthorne in as few words as possible about the duke’s intervention—first in threatening Maria, then in threatening him. “Well,” Hawthorne said, “I can’t say I blame her. Are you certain you’re worth all this?” West cast him a dark look. “She’s close to her family—and they’ve been nothing but kind to me. I do not think she can fathom marrying me, if it would mean a permanent rupture with my father, my losing Rosemere... and I don’t know how to make her understand that she is worth more than all of that to me.” “Well,” James said, “I don’t know that I’m in a position to be offering much in the way of romantic advice, given, er, recent events”—West fought the urge to smile at this—“but it seems to me that this farce you’ve found yourself enmeshed in is actually a perfect opportunity.” West frowned. “What do you mean?” “Everyone in the ton thinks you’re engaged. You’ll have to spend an awful lot of time together. This is the perfect opportunity to court her—convince her that it’s worth it. That you’re worth it. That you can be her family, even if Father will not acc ept her.” “I want her to want to marry me, James. I don’t want to have to pressure her into it.” “Then don’t. Simply make her see that she means more to you than anything else on earth—because she does, doesn’t she?” He paused, and glanced at West. Whatever he saw in only the most cursory glance at West’s face was enough to answer his question, which in turn left West feeling oddly naked. “Or...” Hawthorne said slowly, and West suppressed a sigh; he was not accustomed to finding himself in the role of the man receiving romantic advice from his friends, and he did not think he enjoyed it. “You could ask her.” “Have you been listening for the past ten minutes?” West asked, irritated. “I did ask her—or as good as—and she gave me an unequivocal no.” “Not to marry you, for Christ’s sake.” It was Hawthorne’s turn to sound vaguely exasperated. “You toffs and your fixation on marriage, it’s unhealthy.”
West had no r eply to this, considering that Hawthorne had his own, very valid reasons for being sk eptical of the institution of marriage, and the rules surrounding it. “I meant,” Hawthorne continued, “that if, last time, she felt that you weren’t taking her concerns seriously... perhaps, this time, you should ask her how you two could make this work between you. An affair—marriage—whatever it is you want. You could be her partner, rather than her protector. Work it out together.” Hawthorne fell silent now, looking mildly embarrassed to have offered this little speech, full of uncharacteristic sincerity as it was. James, for his part, looked impressed. “When did valets get so wise?” “When they had to spend all their time learning how to tie cravat knots, and therefore had a fair amount of extra mental energy to expend,” Hawthorne shot back. “I’ll think about this, thank you,” West said, feeling strangely overwhelmed. This was a novel sensation for him; because of the position he had been born to, he was accustomed to people turning to him for counsel, to the heavy weight of responsibility he had borne on his shoulders since a young age. He spent hours with his secretary each week, sorting through correspondence, all from people who were certain that they had a problem that only the Marquess of Weston would be able to solve. And it would only get worse—exponentially so, he knew —once his father died and he assumed the title. There would be votes in Parliament—a dizzying portfolio of ducal properties to manage—men of importance seeking his opinion. This had never daunted him; it was his birthright. But this? Seeking to convince Sophie, once and for all, that he was a good bet —that he was worth whatever unpleasantness his father heaped upon them, should they wed? Trying to create a future for them, rather than simply mourning the life they hadn’t led together these past seven years? This felt more intimidating than any task he had ever approached. He wished that David were here; he missed his friend often, though over the years he’d grown used to his absence, and was no longer in the habit of turning multiple times a day, looking over his shoulder for a man who would never be standing there again. But David, for all his recklessness, his rakish behavior, his refusal ever to take anything too seriously, had been an uncommonly good listener—and, too, he had seen West clearly, in a way that others often didn’t. To most of the world, West was the heir to a duke, stern and powerful, a man to be admired; to David, however, he’d been the boy he’d met at the age of ten who had a horror of frogs (particularly when hidden in his boots). David never hesitated to take him down a peg, when he deserved it—to tell him when he was making a mistake. He would give anything to have a friend like that with him now; for all that James and Hawthorne were closer to him than any other people in the world, he was still the elder brother of one, the employer of the other. With David, he’d been close to an equal—and his friend had never been in the slightest bit awed by him. But David was not here—and that was another weight that rested on his shoulders, and would for the rest of his life.
“Are you feeling noble and gloomy and martyred about something?” Hawthorne’s voice broke into his thoughts. “He is,” James informed him. “I can always tell. He’s got his Long-Suffering Tragic Duke expression on.” West blinked. “I beg your pardon?” “Violet calls it that,” James said, having the grace to at least look a trifle she epish. “I seem to have picked up the habit. It’s not inaccurate, you know.” West paused; considered these words. Contemplated the satisfaction of chucking a vase at his brother’s head versus the fuss Briar would kick up about having to scrub bloodstains out of an Aubusson rug. And instead said, his voice utterly pleasant, “James?” “Yes?” “Please bugger off.”