Chapter 37

CHAPTER 37

“ M arcus,” Hector sighed tiredly. “How lovely of you to drop by just to insult me. The least you could have done was inform me of your intentions to visit and ridicule my appearance.”

“If I did that, it would not mean as much to you as taking you by surprise does. That is why I have won nearly every argument we have ever had since we were little boys. I surface out of nowhere and pick a fight, and you are too confused and stunned to do anything about it.” Marcus shrugged, sitting down in the chair in front of Hector’s desk.

“You won fights because you made absolutely no sense, and no one wanted to waste time in exchanging confusing drivel with you,” Hector pointed out with a narrowed gaze.

Marcus waved a hand in the air, clearly realizing he’d been had and wished to change the topic. “I am not here to discuss the validity of my past wins. We can do that some other time…”

“Or not at all.” Hector lowered his pen, finally coming to terms with the fact that his annoying cousin would not leave until his business was concluded.

“I came to ask why you have not responded to my invitation to have dinner with my family. I had expected to see Juliet lounging around and tolerating your annoying attitude, but she was nowhere to be seen. What have you done with your dear wife?”

Hector flinched, and then he forced the words out of himself.

“She is gone.”

Marcus stared at Hector blankly. “Gone? Gone where? To visit her family? To a carnival? To Spain? To the modiste? Be specific, Hector.”

Hector raised his head to glare at his cousin. “She’s gone back from whence she came.”

“Hector. Please tell me you did not…”

“Due to a disagreement…we decided it would be best if we spent some time apart. She had expressed that she wished to visit her convent, and I let her. That is all there is.”

Marcus snorted. “That is untrue. If that is all that it was, you would not be sitting here looking as though your life had ended without your knowledge. Hector, you look like you have not seen the sun in days—like you intend to shrivel up and die.”

“That is not such a bad idea at all.”

Marcus frowned, and Hector saw that his cousin was no longer jesting.

“Seriously, Hector. What happened? Why has your wife left? Does this have anything to do with the recent rumors spreading around? It is all a pile of rubbish in any event, so you do not have to pay it any heed.”

“That is easy for you to say. You have not been haunted by your past at every turn. I…I seem to owe so much. Debts I can never repay, no matter how hard I work, regardless of my efforts. I always seem to fall short and fall apart when it matters. This is no fault of Juliet’s. I am the one who ended up as a worthless husband and duke. She deserves better.”

Voicing his innermost thoughts simultaneously felt as though a weight had been lifted off his shoulders and as though someone had taken a dagger to his guts.

He had been quietly acknowledging his shortcomings to himself. Admitting it aloud was much more devastating.

“Have you finally lost your mind?” was Marcus’ response.

When he was met with silence, Marcus pressed on.

“Have the spirits finally set what was left of your terrifying mind aflame? What is this talk of incompetence? Since when have you felt like less than a gift from God himself?”

Hector was tired. He had been tired for days now, and his cousin’s presence was only making things worse for him.

“Marcus, I really don’t have the time for this…

“No,” Marcus snapped fiercely. “I am not leaving you like this. Not until you shake yourself out of this ridiculous fugue. I do not understand what has brought this on, but you have never been anything other than inspiring, Hector. You might look at your past and see failings, but all I see… all I have boasted about to my family and friends is your remarkable strength.”

“What strength? I failed to protect my mother. I could not save Lydia. Now, I can’t help my wife. It is all undeniable proof that I should not have tried to get more out of life than I already had. I should never have become so greedy.” Hector snorted, reaching for a bottle of whiskey that had been sitting at a corner of his desk.

Marcus got to it before he did, placing it on the ground next to him, out of Hector’s reach.

“Hector, none of those deaths were because of your inadequacies. Your mother might not have survived her suffering, but you ended the one who had hurt her. You gave your sister peace in her last moments by promising to care for her dear and only friend, and you upheld that promise. I saw the way you looked at Juliet when you both were at my home; you have not yet realized what is evident to anyone who simply looks. You love her, you dolt. Enough that you are shaken by the stress of recent events, and you are trying to deceive yourself into believing that you do not deserve to be happy.

“You have given so much of yourself to those around you. You have sacrificed and toiled, and you have built much with your own abilities. You saved your father’s legacy, and you are shaping it into something kinder and stronger in your own way. I believe that nothing will hinder you if you press forward. Your father has taken enough from you as it stands, but he is dead now. He holds no power over you from where he rots. Lydia would want you to move on with your life, and you can do that with Juliet. Do not run, Hector. Do not push your wife away because you are worried about your future. She is a part of that future.”

A small trickle of hope entered Hector’s heart as he absorbed Marcus’s speech.

He did want a life and a future with Juliet. In as much as he had worried over the likelihood of their long-term happiness and his ability to fulfill her needs, he still hoped for a chance to try if she would have him.

Before he could voice his thoughts to Marcus, there was a knock at his study, and Worthington entered quickly.

“I apologize for the intrusion, Your Grace, Lord Elwike. Lady Anne Somerton is here to see you, Your Grace. She said she must speak with you urgently.”

Hector glanced at Marcus, who simply shrugged, unperturbed that Lady Anne had interrupted their conversation. He wanted to quip that his guests seemed to have grown fond of simply appearing at his door without prior notice, but the expression on Lady Anne’s face told him that there were more serious matters afoot.

“I apologize for dropping in unannounced, Your Grace. It is rather urgent that I speak with you,” she said quickly.

She pointedly stared at Marcus, who eventually realized why she was looking at him.

“Right. I shall be on my way then. Think about what I said, hmm? Remember that marriage gives you a companion with whom you can share your worries and concerns, Hector. The next time you feel burdened, speak with your wife. I certainly do not have the sympathy to listen to your woes as I am a father of three unruly children, and I get enough questions about why the sky is blue on a daily basis, thank you.”

Hector smiled a little. “You are incorrigible.”

“You would not like me as much if I were any less than the special person that I am.” Marcus mock saluted as he left the study.

Hector felt thankful for his cousin and then shifted his attention to Anne.

“Sit, Lady Anne. To what do I owe this surprise visit from you? And…” he paused, glancing over her shoulder, “…without your brother, no less? If you are here to see Juliet …”

“No, Your Grace. It is you I need to speak with.” She shook her head quickly.

Hector was confused by the urgency in her voice but prompted her to speak freely.

She hesitated for a moment, then said, “I know who has been spreading the vicious rumors about you and the Duchess. It is my brother, Your Grace.”

Hector felt his blood run cold. “What did you just say?”

She nodded quickly. “I heard him discussing it with an associate of his a few days ago, Your Grace. I was angry, so I confronted him about it. We had visited Jul…the Duchess, many times during your absence, and she was always sad and upset by the cruel talk surrounding her. I felt betrayed when I discovered that my own brother, who had looked her in the eye and offered her support, was the mastermind behind the source of the Duchesses’ pain. He became angry with me and told me to mind my business as he was trying to work things out in my favor. He went on to explain that he planned to have you marry me, Your Grace, and I suppose he was trying to chase the Duchess away from you.

“But that is not what I want, Your Grace. The Duchess and I are dear friends, and I truly hope that she is happy. Also…I have no interest in you in that way. There is a man that I love, Lord Emerson. He is good and kind, and he is the one my heart wants. I am…I am terribly sorry, Your Grace. If I had known or discovered sooner that Edwin was scheming against you, I would have done something about it. During one of our visits, he tried to poison the Duchess against you, talking about how your absence from her likely meant that you had been taken by another. The Duchess loves you, Your Grace. While you were away, she missed you dearly and spent most of her time worried about whether or not you were doing well. Please do not dismiss her due to the mess my brother has made.”

Hector had no words at that moment.

Many pieces were now suddenly falling into place. From the beginning, Somerton had been overly interested and curious about Juliet and their marriage. He had also made many strange comments to Hector and Juliet that Hector now realized had been deliberately malicious and provoking.

At the time Hector had dismissed Somerton’s drivel, believing that the man had seriously been thinking of getting himself a wife.

Hector now saw that Somerton’s plan all along had been to marry into Hector’s family, one way or another.

“Thank you, Lady Anne. I am profoundly grateful for the insight you have provided,” Hector told her, standing up.

“What will you do? Will you help Juliet?” Anne asked, concerned.

Hector nodded. “Of course, I will. She is my wife. But first I need to have a word with your brother.”

It had been easy to find Somerton.

He was a man with loose lips and an even looser purse who liked to frequent gentleman’s clubs. It had taken a brief questioning of one of Hector’s solicitors to find out the one he would be at, and all Hector needed to do was find him there.

Somerton was engrossed in an ongoing gambling game, a glass of whiskey in his hand.

Hector wasted no time ripping him away from the crowd, pulling him into one of the private rooms, and locking the door.

“Y…Your Grace,” Somerton stammered, looking confused. “I did not know you liked to frequent such places, or else I might have…”

“I was told that you are the one I have been searching for. I have lost count of how much time and effort it has taken to find the perpetrator of my current misfortunes, and yet you have been under my nose this entire time,” Hector glowered.

Somerton laughed, but Hector had seen his jaw twitch slightly. It was a sign of nervousness he’d learned to recognize early to keep Somerton from lying to him.

“I have no idea what you mean, Your Grace,” he said in an earnest tone.

“Is that so? Then I presume that you were in fact not plotting to ruin my wife, destroy my marriage, and jeopardize my reputation and business for the sole purpose of getting your sister to marry me?”

The man paled visibly, and Hector smirked in satisfaction.

“Do not try to lie your way out of this. It was your sister who informed me of your scheme. Unlike you, she is a reliable source. She also told me how you tried to put ideas into my wife’s head that I was being unfaithful to her.”

Knowing there was no longer any need to lie, Somerton’s face took on a dark edge.

“That little wench,” he growled. “After all I have done for her. Ungrateful brat. I shall be sure to teach her a lesson she will not soon forget.”

“You will do no such thing,” Hector said lowly, stepping forward, so he could look down at him. “It is my fault that you believed you could get away with fooling me and trying to do harm to my wife. But my magnanimous nature ends now, you weak, scuttling scoundrel. I will not simply ruin you; I will end all your dreams and aspirations for a rich and easy life. I will leak all of your underhanded schemes too in the scandal sheets, and with your obsession over my sister still fresh in everyone’s mind, no one will doubt the credibility of that information.”

“Your Grace! Please, Islington, I did not mean to…I was forced! Some of your competitors coerced me…”

“I have had enough of your lies, you foul little man. You will leave your sister be. You will allow her to marry the Lord she loves, and then you will provide them with a very handsome dowry. Additionally, you are to leave London at once. I do not care where you wish to go, so long as you are gone, and I will never have to look at your face again. If you are spotted around London after your sister’s wedding, I will be forced to give you a more lasting reminder of the instructions I have now given you. A broken hand and a dislocated knee might inspire you to do what is necessary, would you not agree??”

For what Hector was willing to wager was no doubt the first time in the Earl’s life, Somerton made a wise decision and nodded. Although Hector was not entirely placated, he had bigger things to worry about and watched with mild disgust as Somerton scurried away like the vermin he was.

Now that the pest had been dealt with, there was only one thing left for Hector to do.

It is time to bring my wife home.