“Yet I find no glory in the weakness I live within. No matter the cause. Especially when I needed to be strong to get you out of that mine.” He exhaled a hiss, his head shaking as his look moved away from her. “I knew this could happen. I knew my arm could give out. I never should have made you go down there.”
She took a step toward him. “You are aware I could have refused at any time to go down there, Theo? Yet I did not.”
His head tipped back to stare blankly at the ceiling as his fingers ran through his hair, scruffing the back of his head. “I just wanted someone else to see it—to witness the possibility of what is down there.”
“No one else has seen it?”
His gaze dropped from the ceiling to her. “Not since my mine foreman died down there. He blasted in to what you saw. On the way out to tell me, he dropped dead at the base of the ladder.”
Her hand flew up over her mouth, covering a gasp.
“Yes. And now the workers refuse to go back in—they say it is cursed.” His look went to the fireplace. “It does not help that they haven’t been paid in months.”
“You have not paid them in months?”
“No. I failed them. Failed the estate. I had them working on hope. I was working on hope.”
“Well, that is just irresponsible, Theo.”
He looked at her, his voice dry. “I am aware, Violet. I have been attempting to figure this out for the family for the last two years—how to scrape this estate back into profitability. That new vein was my last chance. And I have failed. I am not my eldest brother—I have not been able to convince any possible investors that I have even a modicum of Caldwell’s intellect—that I have a new vein waiting for exploitation. I have tried, but I am not the man my brother was. So there the mine sits. Empty.”
“True, Caldwell was intelligent. But he was also trained since the day he spoke to become the next earl.” Violet stepped forward, setting herself onto the edge of the wooden chair at the opposite side of the desk. She teetered, barely balanced, barely committing to sitting.
He would take it. As long as she wasn’t walking out the door.
“Why do you not ask the duke for funds?”
Theo gave an emphatic shake of his head and then shrugged. “Ill-placed pride? The man has already done more for me than any brother-in-law has a right to ask. I cannot go back to him for charity. I need to do this on my own, Vee. Can you understand that?”
She nodded. “I do understand—probably too well. I would not have fathomed understanding two years ago, but now—yes. Yes, I do.”
She slid back along the seat of the chair, her hands settling into her lap as she stared at him. “This is odd.”
“What?”
“Growing up, whenever I was here at Glenhaven—this room was Caldwell’s domain. It is odd seeing you behind the desk.”
“It is still odd sitting behind it. I usually avoid it.”
“Yes, well, you look much the same as he did in those days.”
Theo’s head cocked slightly to the side. “How did he look?”
“Like the weight of the world was upon him. Like he had three younger siblings to care for—to raise. Like he had inherited a four-hundred-year-old estate that he had vowed to do right by.” A stray curl of chestnut hair slipped from her upsweep, and she tucked it behind her ear. “But he wore it well. Probably because when I met him, when I came here with Ada for the first time, he had already been the earl for twelve years. So who is to say that two years after inheriting the title he didn’t look like you do now?”
Theo shook his head, his eyes closing as he rubbed the back of his neck. “There was never a time that Caldwell did not wear the title well.”
“Tell me again why no one is working on the mine.”
His eyes cracked open to her. “I’ve exhausted all of my possible funds, Violet. I cannot pay the workers. And they won’t go down there.”
“So find other workers. Find the funds. Surely you can source them from some connection.”
“I have tried. It didn’t work.”
She slapped her palm on the edge of the desk, the clap making him jump, eyes wide.
“Then try again.” She leaned forward, pinning him with her blue eyes. “And again. And again. Try until it does work. You owe this to Caldwell. You owe this to Adalia—to all the work she did to keep the estate afloat.”
Theo instantly bristled, his shoulders pulling back. “Take care in blithely tossing about judgements, Violet. Maybe you should try again.”
Her body snapped backward. “What does that mean?”
“It means that maybe you should attempt to not be irate with half of the world’s population. It means you refuse to look at any man with anything but polite disgust, at best. I saw it at the Revelry’s Tempest when you mingled with the crowd. I saw it with every man we encountered on the way to Glenhaven.” A tight smile curled his lips. “Oh, you hide it well, make no mistake. The fools choose not to see it. But it is there just the same. I see it—the disgust, the hate.”
Her head jerked back with a violent shake of her head. “I do not. Besides we are not talking about me, we are talking about you. About how your sister scraped and salvaged everything to keep the Alton name above reproach—”
His fist slammed onto the desk. “She opened a blasted gaming house.”
“Better that than admit the entire Alton estate bankrupt.” Her hand still on the desk curled, forefinger left straight to point at him. “Adalia saved it—for you. For you, Theo. You. And you are letting it all go for naught. You are giving up.”
Her forefinger curled into her palm, her fist thumping onto the wood. “And I want to know why.”
{ Chapter 7 }
Theo stared at her, his breath suddenly heavy in his chest.
She had no right.
No right to come into his home and demand this of him—challenge him on giving up.
Fool woman.
She met his stare, not wavering from the daggers his eyes shot at her. Blast her. She never would have challenged him like this when she was sixteen. She would have bowed her head at his anger. Meekly gone about her way.
And he would have gone about his business, holding on to his anger. Always holding on to his anger—hiding it from the world, but clutching it tight. Holding onto it because it was the last thing he possessed. The last thing he controlled.
Because if he didn’t hold on to his anger, the alternative was too grim.
The alternative was to take his rightful place under the headstone outside.
“Why, Theo?” Her stiff countenance didn’t break, but her voice softened, cracking on the two words.
Damn her. He needed her anger to fuel his own. Anger he needed to avoid the truth.
Pulling his fist slowly from the desk, he glared at her. He tried to hold the anger, hold it in a ball in his gut, but it evaporated, dispersing into a thousand intangible shards with her two quiet words.
He slumped backward in his chair. “I was not born for this, Violet. In charge. Fighting for the estate. Fighting for something I want. None of that was ever for me.”
“Why not?” The hard glint in her blue eyes softened.
“Because I learned long ago I would never get what I wanted. Birth order alone determined that.”
“When? When did you learn that?” Her palm flattened on the desk. “Caldwell, Alfred—neither would have ever made you feel like less.”
Hell. He had thought to never tell her.
But she needed to know. For as much as she was demanding to understand, she needed to know this.
He took a deep breath, holding it in his chest for a long moment before exhaling. “You said I was rude to Mr. Nullter.”
Her face contorted in confusion, a frown overtaking her mouth. “You were rude to Mr. Nullter.”
“Yes, well, he was there. He was there to drive me off.” Elbows on the arms of his chair, Theo entwined his fingers as he settled them on his stomach. “Mr. Nullter and your Un
cle Demetrick were the ones to decide I did not rank high enough.”
“What—what are you talking about, Theo?”
“Before I left for the war—before I left you, Vee. You had a fortune, you were beautiful, docile, charming, intelligent, and a title was what you were due. That was what your uncle had decided, and Mr. Nullter was his old friend. Which was why Demetrick had him serving as the solicitor of your fortune—when at the same time he was already the main solicitor of the Vandestile estate.” His gaze centered on her. “Those two bastards were the ones to decide that you would wed Lord Vandestile. Mr. Nullter knew he needed a fortune of your size to keep the Vandestile estate from crumbling under the viscount’s destruction.”
“What?” Violet’s jaw dropped. “But I—I had never even met Lord Vandestile when I was with you.”
“No, you had actually, I remember it. I remember you gave him not even a glance at the introduction, much less retained his name. But that was a minor concern for them, your wishes. I, on the other hand, was a major concern. They needed to remove me from your life, and your uncle was very adept at doing so.”
“Uncle Demetrick—no—he never would have done such a thing.”
“Yet he did. He controlled your trust, Vee. He swore he would not release one shilling to a third son with no hope of the title.” His top thumbnail pressed into his knuckle, the skin turning pink. “Your uncle impressed upon me how cruel it was for me to continue to vie for your affections when I would soon have you in poverty. How cruel it would be of me to make you have to decide between love and money. Mr. Nullter stood in that room and observed the whole debacle—even piped in on occasion—a rabid dog salivating.”
She gasped. “No, Theo.”
“Yes.”
“So you…you just left?”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t even think to give me a chance to decide on my own?”
His tongue jabbed hard into the roof of his mouth as he considered her. “Would you have chosen me over the money?”
Another quick intake of breath—not quite a gasp—lifted her chest as she shifted backward in the chair, her hand falling from the desk. She opened her mouth, then stopped before words escaped, her look going to the dormant fireplace for long seconds. “I do not know. I was so young—we were so…so…so new, even though we knew each other for years. I didn’t know at that time what we would become.” Her gaze travelled back to him. “And then there was never a chance to find out.”
“Because I left.”
“Yes. You left. Alfred died and you left. And my heart broke for you. All I wanted to do in those days was comfort you. But you left without a word directly after the burial. You never even let me talk to you—and I tried again and again to find you alone. And then I waited—waited for word from you. Waited for you to come back to Glenhaven.”
“My brother died the day after your uncle demanded I leave you be, Violet.” His fingernail digging into his knuckle drew a drop of blood. “So I did not even think on it—couldn’t think on it. I just knew I was done. I was done with Glenhaven, done with everyone—done for good.”
“But should you have been? Who knows what I would have chosen, Theo? You made the choice for me.”
“I did.” He leaned forward, his jaw tightening. “I left because I didn’t want to force an ungodly choice such as that upon you, Vee. It was not a fair thing to do to you. I had nothing to offer you. So yes, I made the choice. And I would have done it a thousand times over to save you from it because it was the honorable thing to do.”
She stared at him as she nodded slowly, considering his words. “Valiant, of you. Or so I think you would like me to believe.” Her eyes narrowed at him. “But is it possible you left because you believed I would not choose you?”
He sighed, his fingers unthreading and moving to grip the arms of the chair as he shifted in his seat. “Does it matter?”
“No.” Her lips drew backward on one side, her voice defeated. “No, I suppose it does not.”
She scooted forward, starting to her feet, but then stopped, sinking back down to the edge of the chair as her look pinned him. “You have never fought for anything you wanted, have you, Theo?”
He scoffed. “Of course I have. Put a blade, a rifle in my hand—I know exactly what to do.”
“But this?” Her knuckles rapped onto the desk. “Something in your soul you truly want?”
“This…” His hand swung above his head around the room and then fell to his side as he sighed. “I don’t know how to fight for something like this. The estate, the mine, the title. I was never allowed this, Violet. When you knew me when we were young, I always was trouble, I always said yes to everything because I had no responsibility to anything of importance—that was why I was so carefree—there was nothing expected of me. The most I could see in the future was the military—to die in honor for the crown. I was not allowed aspirations. And your uncle very succinctly verified my fate for me.” His eyes met hers. “There has never been anything to fight for.”
“So you don’t know how to fight?” She grabbed the edge of the desk, angling herself toward him. “You learn. You don’t break. You don’t bow. You fight. You learn how to fight and make your life what you want.”
He met her look, the vehemence in her blue eyes startling him, but not swaying him. “Why? Why bother?”
“So you can breathe. So you can wake in the morning and want to move from your bed. So you can smile. Laugh on occasion. So you can make life just a touch easier for those around you. So you mean something.”
His eyes dropped to the center of the desk between them. “Those things are lost to me, Violet. And my will to fight vanished long ago.”
“You think to hide behind what happened to you?”
He shrugged. “It is not yours to judge.”
“No. But bad things happen. I know they have happened to you.” Her words took on a hard edge. “But how long can that be your excuse for being an arse? For wasting your way through life? For pushing your sister away at every turn? For turning what little is left of the fine Alton name into a mockery?”
His look lifted to her. “Tell me what you truly think, Vee.”
Her mouth clamped shut, her lips tight at his sarcasm. A long breath passed before she spoke again. “I think I just did. Do with it what you will.”
Theo met her glare head-on.
He had tried to save himself once from this woman. A woman who could consume him—body and soul—if he allowed it. And he had done a fine job of it.
For a time.
But then she had gone and kicked him on the floor of the Revelry’s Tempest. He had looked up, seen her face, and there hadn’t been a moment since that time when she was not in his mind, devouring him from deep within.
She pushed away from the desk, silently turning from him and walking to the study entrance. Opening the door, she paused and glanced back at him. Disgust marred her delicate face. One quick sweep of her eyes about the room, and she exited, the door closing softly behind her.
He collapsed back into his chair and exhaled a long breath.
Absurd. Absolutely absurd. He now possessed the very thing that had driven him away years ago—a title—and little good it did him for the boor he’d become.
Little good it did him against the growing derision in Violet’s eyes.
{ Chapter 8 }
“You stayed.”
Violet jumped, her fingers ripping out the weed she had just clamped onto. Craning her neck, she looked over her shoulder to see Theo at the arched entrance to Glenhaven’s conservatory.
He walked into the conservatory, stopping at the far end of the plant bed she was working on. In buckskin breeches and dark boots, he was free of his tailcoat, only his dark waistcoat contrasting against the white of his linen shirt. “Your intention must be to attend the ball tonight at the Vandestile estate?”
Not bothering to stand from the short stool she was balanced on, she dropped the weed in her fi
ngers onto the pile of wilting leaves by her feet and looked up at him. “Yes. I decided I can offer one last responsibility to the Vandestile title, and then I do believe I can free myself.”
He nodded and his eyes quickly scanned the overgrown plant bed in front of her. “You do not need to be doing that. I have—had—a gardener.”
She brushed her hands together, flicking dirt from her gloves. “Well, I have pulled thousands of weeds in here with Adalia over the years. And I actually enjoy it. This place became my home, my family after my parents died.” A lump formed in her throat and she struggled to quickly clear it. Her hand swept out over the tips of the many rose bushes. “When was the last time Adalia was here? She would be distraught to see the overgrowth.”
His gaze left her face, fully surveying the large room and the eight neat rectangular plant beds filled with a wide variety of roses. “It has been a year, at least. She came to move some of them to Dellon Castle that she wanted to cross-pollinate with. She had the plant beds cleaned and trimmed then.”
Violet nodded, spying another close-by weed. She leaned forward to dig her fingers into the dirt and grasp the root before plucking. “I was always envious of this room when I visited. It was like swimming in a bottle of the most heavenly perfume.”
Still at the far end of the plant bed, Theo cleared his throat. “I have given up, Vee. You are right. I could not find an easy path forward, so I stopped. I just stopped moving at all. And I…I need to reconsider that.”
She froze, the weed in her grasp only half wiggled from the ground as she awkwardly twisted to look up at him. “What? Truly?”
He stared at her, his jaw flexing. He had said it once, and she wasn’t about to be granted a repeat of his admission.
Once was enough for her.
“Theo, that you said that…” She stood, peeling off her gloves tucking them into the pocket of the dirt-streaked apron she had tied around her waist. “I was going to tell you this morning. But then our conversation in the study turned for the worse and I decided not to.” She paused, her head tilting to the side as she questioned herself. “At least not immediately. But then again, I would have told you…eventually.”
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