Chapter Four

Sterling drank for the next three days straight. The bottom of a bottle of gin didn't provide him with any lasting solutions to the demons that gnawed at his bones, but it dulled the pain from all those sharp, slicing fangs.

Mostly.

On the fourth day he received a letter from Sarah, which he resolutely ignored. Engaged to be married to Lord Hamlin, a viscount of impeccable reputation who had Sterling's grudging approval, his sister had spent the summer at Hanover Park planning for a Christmas wedding.

How nauseatingly romantic.

As for Sterling, he hadn't set foot on the ducal estate since they buried Sebastian in the family mausoleum. An hour's ride to the east, Hanover Park sat high on a hill with some of the best views in all of England. Bestowed upon the first Duke of Hanover by King Edward III as a reward for protecting his son's flank during the Battle of Crecy where the British army slaughtered over twelve thousand French soldiers, the estate had proudly stood for nearly five generations. A wood and stone testament to the bloodlust and political ambition of Sterling's ancestors.

He'd been born there. Raised there. Had explored the woods, played in the streams, had his first kiss in the massive wine cellar underneath the kitchen there. And his first fuck in the carriage house loft.

There were too many rooms to count and enough turrets to officially make it a castle. The gardens alone were larger than most towns, and the stable, of which Sterling's grandfather, a renowned equestrian, had been particularly proud, was almost an estate unto itself. Ancient oaks lined the long, winding drive. Fountains sprayed water into the heavens. Peacocks strolled the rolling lawns and wandered along the granite paths edged in Italian marble.

And that was just the exterior grounds.

In short, Hanover Park was what dreams were made of.

But for Sterling, it was a nightmare. A bleak reminder of what never should have been his. A yoke around his neck that he didn't want. A sword pointing straight at his chest that he'd just as soon run himself through with than claim what should have rightfully belonged to Sebastian. Which was why he'd turned over the estate and all the duties that accompanied it to Sir Edgar Goulding, a trusted family friend and solicitor who knew better than to plague Sterling with any issue, large or small, regarding Hanover Park unless the entire damned place was on fire…in which case, Sterling would say let it burn.

He had already invited Sarah and Lord Hamlin to live there once they were married, and treat it as if it were their own. If such a thing were possible, he would have made her the heir after Sebastian died. Such was his loathing of all that he'd inherited.

He despised every brick, every painting, every bloody peacock, for that matter. Should it all vanish tomorrow, he wouldn't be sorry to see it go. In fact, he'd rejoice. Find a way to get his hands on a bottle of Glenavon Whisky and throw the biggest party the ton had ever seen.

Unfortunately, vast estates did not generally disappear into thin air. Which meant he was stuck with Hanover Park until he keeled over, or he managed to find some distantly related male relative to bequeath it to via an act of parliament, or…or he had a son.

For some inexplicable and completely ridiculous reason, an image of Rosemary flashed in his mind. Beside her stood a little boy with her blue-gray eyes and his tousled black hair. Rosemary had that damned squirrel perched on her shoulder, the boy held a bullfrog clutched between his chubby fingers, and Sterling…Sterling was smiling.

Bemused–and a tad annoyed–he reached for his decanter of gin. But when he went to pour it into a glass, only a few drops emerged. His annoyance growing, he staggered out of his bedchamber and down the stairs in search of another source of alcoholic sustenance. By the way his stomach was growling, he needed food as well, especially since he couldn't remember the last time he'd eaten.

With Rosemary here, he'd still been miserable. But at least he'd had someone to talk to. Someone to look forward to seeing. And yes, someone to kiss. With her gone, the manor was depressingly empty. He was almost tempted to travel to London. Not to follow her. He didn't miss her. Speaking of things that were ridiculous. But he did miss his favorite gambling hells, and his study with the liquor cabinet he'd had custom made and stocked with the finest spirits money and favors could buy, and all right, maybe– maybe –he missed Rosemary the teeniest, tiniest amount.

Her smile. Her little peculiarities. The way she bit her lip if she was anxious about something. The throaty purring sound she made in the back of her throat when he stroked her nipples…

Scowling, he landed harder than necessary on the bottom step, startling a passing maid. Clutching the linens she carried more tightly against her chest, she averted her gaze and hurried past, leaving him to wonder what the staff saw when they looked at him.

He was capable of fooling his peers with a smirk and a drawling snicker. Good old Sterling. A bit rough around the edges, perhaps. But always up for a laugh and a good time. Servants, however, weren't as easy to trick. Not when their very well-being depended on being able to read their employer's wants and needs with pinpoint accuracy.

A crotchety old dowager might say she wanted cream in her tea…but what she really meant was honey, and God protect the poor soul who brought her what she'd asked for.

A clipped tone indicated an earl wanted to be left alone to take off his own boots, thank you very much.

A spill of raucous laughter from an ordinarily subdued debutante called for water to discreetly replace the champagne she'd been guzzling down like a damned pirate fresh off a ship.

And a duke who drank himself half to death every night and quartered himself in his room every day was neither up for a laugh or a good time. Rather, he was someone to be avoided. A devil to dance around, not dance with.

His friends didn't understand that.

But the maid did.

So, too, did Rosemary. And yet she'd dared to waltz with him anyway. Which either made her very brave…or very, very foolish.

The Wallflower and the Wastrel , he thought with a bitter twist of his lips. A title that would have done the renowned author Jane Austen proud. Not that he was worthy of being a fictional hero. A villain, more like. In the world of literary characters, he wasn't Mr. Darcy, the brooding protagonist responsible for dampening women's undergarments for the better part of half a century. He was Mr. Wickham, a womanizing scoundrel with no moral compass who had attempted to seduce Mr. Darcy's sister. Except he was even worse than that, because Mr. Wickham hadn't killed his own brother.

"Your Grace." A tall, gangly footman with thinning brown hair atop a pointed scalp approached Sterling in the middle of the foyer. "Someone is here to see you."

Rosemary was his first thought, and he hated that it was. Hated the boyish flutter of anticipation in his chest even more. She was the last woman he should have been thinking about. For both of their sakes. Best he push her from his mind, or–better yet–forget she even existed. To the most of his knowledge, their paths hadn't crossed before the house party. There was no reason to believe they'd see each other now that it was over and she'd gone back to town to begin the Season. Their interlude had been a brief, isolated incident, never to be repeated. And why that should bring him a twinge of sorrow he hadn't the foggiest idea.

"Is it Thomas Kincaid?" he asked, referring to the private investigator he'd hired to clear his name of wrongdoing in regards to Eloise's murder. The two men had first met when Kincaid was a constable for Scotland Yard. Sterling owed him a debt he'd never be able to repay, as it was Kincaid who had recovered Sarah safely after she was kidnapped by highwaymen who attacked his sister's carriage as it traveled from Hanover Park to Bath.

Since then he and Kincaid had become casual acquaintances, if not outright friends, and when Eloise had disappeared, leaving a blood-soaked room behind her and Sterling as the last person to see her alive, he knew that he was in need of Kincaid's particular set of skills once again.

It was the detective who had recommended that he recuse himself from the ton . A leave of absence, such as it were, to allow the gossip–not much of which was very complimentary–to settle before the House of Lords reconvened and decided whether or not to charge one of their own.

A trial of peers was exceedingly rare. It made a public spectacle of the nobility, and thus was only reserved for the most egregious of crimes. Dueling, bigamy, treason against the crown…and murder.

Lord James Brudenell, Earl of Cardigan, was the last to stand trial. He was found not guilty of dueling on a technicality, but his good name was forever besmirched and when he died, his estate and title were bequeathed to a second cousin, thus ensuring that the Brudenell name would never be passed on.

Sterling didn't give a damn about his reputation, but all things being equal, he did prefer his head to be attached to his neck. Nor did he particularly desire to rot away in Newgate for the rest of his life. Thus, he'd heeded Kincaid's advice and had been twiddling his thumbs in the countryside while he awaited news of how the investigation was progressing.

"No, Your Grace," said the footman, causing Sterling to frown. "It is not Mr. Kincaid."

"Well then, who the devil is it?" he demanded.

"Me," Sarah chirped as she sailed out of the parlor and wrapped her arms around her brother in an embrace that he was too caught off guard to return. "Your favorite sister."

"My only sister," he managed to counter after he'd subdued his initial surprise. "And far from my favorite if you've come here to pester me."

Placing his hands on her shoulders, he set her away from him. While he loved Sarah, he was also wary of her. She may have been six years his junior, but that didn't stop her from taking on the role of a mother hen. Except he was no wayward chick to be brought back into the nest. Nor did he want to drag her into his nest of demons, which was why he'd made it a point to keep his distance. Yet here she was, all the same.

"Pester you?" Sarah's eyes, hazel like their father's and filled with feigned innocence, widened. "I'd never dream of doing such a thing." Then she shook her head sadly as her gaze traveled from his unkempt hair all the way down to his bare feet. "It's clear that I've arrived just in time. You look a fright, Sterling, and you smell even worse. Haven't they water here at Hawkridge? You there"–she pointed at a maid, who stopped dead in her tracks–"have a bath prepared. Extra hot, extra soap. Then I want clothes laid out. Clean ones." She touched Sterling's rough cheek and clucked her tongue. "Where on earth is your valet?"

Swatting her arm aside, he pinched the bridge of his nose where a dull throb had already settled in. "I left him in London."

"That much is apparent. A bath, clean clothes, and have a barber called," Sarah told the maid before her gaze shifted back to Sterling. In the depths of those hazel eyes there was exasperation, but also worry. "Won't you walk with me? I've been in a carriage for an hour, and should like to stretch my legs."

"I was just getting ready to take a nap," he grumbled.

"A nap? It's not yet noon. Come along. Some sunlight will do your complexion good. You're as pale as a newborn babe." Linking their arms, she pulled him–still grumbling–outside and onto a flagstone path that led to the rear gardens where fragrant smelling roses were beginning to wilt as the nights grew cooler and the days shorter.

"What are you doing here, Sarah?" he asked.

"Can a sister not visit her brother without an ulterior motive?"

"Some can, I'm sure. But you're not one of them."

"No, I am not," she said, the corners of her lips twitching. Halting in front of a fountain that sprayed a steady stream of water in a graceful arc, she pivoted to face him and took both of his hands in hers. "But I am worried about you, Sterling. I've been worried, for quite some time."

As the throb behind his eyes turned into a pounding, Sterling gritted his teeth and looked past her at a green wall of shrubbery. "You needn't concern yourself with me. You've a wedding to plan, and the Season to participate in. Isn't your plate full enough?"

"I've heard the rumors about your mistress."

His gaze cut to hers. "Young ladies shouldn't talk of such things."

"Don't tell me you are going to start playing the part of chaperone now . I know what a mistress is, and what they're for. I also know that you didn't kill yours and put her body in a trunk and ship it to America."

He snorted. "Is that what they're saying? Last I heard I disposed of the body by feeding it to sharks. Or maybe it was crocodiles. I can't remember."

It was morbid, to talk of his mistress in such a way. But then, their entire relationship had been morbid from the moment he'd stolen her away from some hapless lord who didn't know his cock from a carrot. All fighting and fucking, with nothing in between. A carnal, animalistic partnership that had suited both their needs perfectly.

He had wanted a way to drown out the demons. She'd wanted a little pain with her pleasure, which he'd happily provided. Along with money, of course. Eloise had always been a greedy little strumpet, and never bothered to hide it.

Now she was gone, taken in the dead of the night after one of their infamous arguments, and while he knew that he hadn't killed her, someone most likely had. And in a gruesome manner, if the amount of blood he'd found was any indication.

Yet since her disappearance, he'd been nagged by an unsubstantiated hunch that there was something more to the story. Something that he'd hoped Kincaid's investigation would uncover. Something that would reveal Eloise was actually still alive, and had–for reasons unknown–staged her own death. Which was why he could make light of it. In a dark, twisted way. Because there was a part of him that didn't believe–didn't feel –as if she were dead.

A stupid assumption. So stupid that he hadn't even bothered to mention it to Kincaid. But how else to explain the timing of it all, and the fact that nothing had been taken from the house, which ruled out a robbery? No jewelry, no furs. None of those bloody crystal swans with rubies for eyes that she'd insisted he buy her whenever they were out and about town. Nothing of value…except for Eloise. Even then, there'd been no note. No threatening letter. No ransom. She'd simply vanished…leaving him as the prime suspect for a murder he hadn't committed.

Or maybe he had.

Maybe his mind was so far gone, so rotted and filled with filth, that he had killed her.

Just like he'd killed Sebastian.

"I don't know why anyone would believe such absurd conjecture," Sarah scoffed, and Sterling might have smiled if his mouth didn't feel so heavy. His baby sister, always coming to his defense. Even when there was nothing left to defend. "Sharks and crocodiles. How ridiculous."

"People like the ridiculous. It distracts them from how small and meaningless their own lives are."

"That's a dark way of seeing the world."

"The world is a dark place."

She squeezed his hands. "Sterling, I know that you blame yourself for what happened to Sebastian. But it–"

"If you're going to tell me it wasn't my fault," he interrupted, "save your breath."

"I just wanted to say–"

"I do not wish to discuss this subject. Choose another."

"Surely it would be better if we–"

" I said I do not wish to discuss it ," he snarled, for once using the power of his title to command authority. No one questioned a duke's order. Not even his own sister. Jaw hardening, he went to the fountain and sat on the edge of it. The water hit his back in a light misting spray, but he welcomed the wet as it helped subdue the fire raging inside of him.

After several minutes, Sarah sat beside him, her voluminous skirts spilling across his legs as she rested her head on his shoulder, much like she'd done when she was a young girl and he was a young boy and Sebastian was alive and everything was right and good. "I think you should come to London," she said quietly. "I understand why you've spent the summer here, and your absence did allow some of the gossip to die down. But now I fear the longer you stay out of the public eye, the more that people will begin to assume your guilt."

He sighed. "Haven't they done that already?"

"Some. Not all of them. It's those sitting in the House of Lords that matter most. They are the ones that you need to convince of your innocence. You might begin by repairing your reputation."

"Is something wrong with it?" he asked dryly. "Here I thought I was a paragon of virtue."

She poked him with her elbow. "Anything but. The House of Lords won't want to convict a duke, or even put you on trial. It would bring too much negative attention to the aristocracy. But they will if they think you're more of a risk out of prison than in it."

"What would you have me do? Stop drinking and gambling, start attending mass, find a proper wife, and settle down?"

"Precisely."

"You've got to be jesting." A pained grimace rippled across his countenance when she merely arched a brow. "You're not jesting."

"I wish I were. I wish I'd come here on an amusing whim, and not out of desperation to save my brother. You're not well, Sterling." Lifting her head, she gazed at him in earnest. "You haven't been well for a long time."

Because her words struck a chord of truth deep down inside of his black, rotting soul, he didn't try to refute them. Instead, he clenched his jaw and stood up to pace a restless circle around the fountain before he stopped at where he'd started.

"You're here because you think you can save me, Sarah. And I commend you for it. I love you for it." He drew a breath, dragged a hand through his hair, managed one last, pitiful smile in an attempt to disguise the hurt, the pain, the misery. The raw, aching emptiness . "But what if I'm not worth saving?"