Percy wasn’t sure it was in his daughter’s best interest to be associated with a man like him. That was nearer the truth of the matter. But he couldn’t admit such a thing to his father, not with the way he was looking at him, his golden boy. It was too much. Percy hadn’t been that boy since the Battle of Maya.
“But, Percy, I must say something to you, and I’m not sure how.”
Percy’s pulse doubled. “Yes?”
“Whatever it is that you’re caught up in now, be careful. I can’t lose you again. Those years you were unaccounted for were the worst of my life.”
“You have my word, Father.” A promise Percy hoped he could keep. Yet if matters went sideways with Montfort . . .
Well, they wouldn’t.
The Duke held Percy’s eye until, at last, he nodded. As he rose to his feet by slow stages, it was all Percy could do not to assist, but he knew better than to offer.
“Son, you’re in need of a proper shave. I shall send Drummond to the cottage in the morning.”
“Drummond?” Percy asked, astonished. “He’s still alive?”
“Too mean for the devil to take, I suspect.”
“He must be eighty.”
“Eighty and three on his last name day.”
“And this is the man you’d like to apply a straightedge to my neck? I thought you wanted me to remain amongst the living.”
The Duke snorted. “That man has the sharpest eye and steadiest hand in England. He will be there by eleven of the clock.”
With the Duke gone, Percy was left alone with Princess Polly, her foal, and his thoughts for company. He slumped against the boards and closed his eyes. The mare was making it through without infection. If only other matters would sort themselves out so easily.
These last few days, it seemed that every decision he’d made in his life, both wrong and right, had converged on him. In all honesty, he was mightily tempted to collapse beneath its weight and let it pull him under.
To do so, however, would be unworthy of the man his father believed him to be. Even if Percy understood at a fundamental level that he wasn’t and would never be that man, his father thought him so.
Those years you were unaccounted for were the worst of my life.
As if Percy needed more motivation to pursue Montfort to the ground, he had it. The year Montfort had held Percy under his influence had hurt the Duke, a hurt that still resonated within his father’s eyes.
Montfort must be stopped. It wasn’t a matter ofif, butwhen.
Chapter 19
Isabel took the stairs one careful step at a time, precious cargo in her arms. “Pequeñolion, why won’t you sleep?”
Wide black eyes steady upon her, Ariel blew bubbles by way of slobbery reply, and Isabel had no choice but to smile and nuzzle the top of his fuzzy head. “You win.”
Her feet found the ground floor, and she began pacing about the drawing room—plumping goose-down pillows, arranging fresh-clipped roses in their vases—any little activity that kept her moving and Ariel content and quiet. Anytime she stopped for longer than ten seconds, his chubby face scrunched in the disquiet presaging a very loud squawk. If only he would nap.
Since yesterday’s encounter with Montfort, she hadn’t left Rosebud Cottage, pleading a return of the megrims. Predictably, the Duchess’s tonics had appeared both morning and night. Blessedly, Isabel didn’t have to drink them as they’d arrived by servant.
However, by remaining ensconced in the cottage, Isabel had no choice but to assist in Eva’s rather ambitious sewing project. Not only were they reworking dresses for the Misses Bretagne and Radclyffe, but for Tilly and Nell, too, since they would be partaking in Gardencourt’s breakfast and dance as it was a day to be enjoyed by all.
An hour ago, they, along with Eva, had ventured to the village to pick out a few pieces of trim, which was how Isabel ended up with the baby. Not that she minded. The little mite made her smile down to her toes.
Her ear picked up the not-too-distant drone of male voices. The sound was coming from the servants’ corridor. One of the voices she knew.Percy.
Curiosity piqued, she found herself creeping toward his room, her heart doubling its beats with each step. Although confined to the cottage, she had stayed decidedly away from this part of it, which hadn’t been necessary. Percy hadn’t been here.
She’d have felt his presence.
