“Need I remind you which of us is the eldest?” Carlisle returned.
For a moment, Griffin forgot about the troubles facing him like the gaping maw of Hades, and instead, he marveled at the change in the two men he had come to know over the years as his comrades. They were half brothers with an incredible bond, Ludlow having been born on the wrong side of the blanket to the woman Carlisle considered his mother. Where once they had been rigid and unforgiving, both men seemed somehow happier now. More relaxed. There was an ease about them, a calm pleasure, as if all was well in their worlds.
He wanted to believe it was borne of their departure from the League, for his service to the Crown had been a simultaneous burden and joy. But another part of him, the part that had been roused for the first time by Violet, suspected it was the love they had found with their respective wives that had truly transformed them.
“You look and act older than I,” Ludlow countered.
“But I am younger, nonetheless,” Carlisle pointed out smoothly.
Truly, Griffin did not comprehend this sibling banter, having no living siblings of his own. His mother had suffered half a dozen miscarriages, and his only living brother had died as a babe. To someone who had spent a lifetime without anyone sharing that blood bond, it seemed deuced odd, this penchant for squabbling.
He cleared his throat. “As much as I enjoy watching the two of you argue as if you are both yet in the nursery, I feel compelled to remind you the rather large matter of my impending incarceration looms.”
The brothers exchanged a look, and only Christ knew what it meant, for Griffin certainly did not.
“All roads lead back to Arden,” Carlisle said then, taking up the reins once more. “Whether he is guilty of hiding the incriminating documents in your study in an effort to cast guilt upon you or not, he is the man holding the sword and leading the charge, is he not?”
“Yes.” Arden was also Violet’s brother, and the more Griffin ruminated upon that fact, the greater his discomfort grew. “He is determined to see me in prison, that much is undeniable. Violet told me as much herself. It was what spurred our flight and our impromptu wedding vows.”
“That was the only reason, I am certain of it,” Ludlow said solemnly, the bite of sarcasm underscoring his words.
Ludlow’s inference nettled.
“Saving my neck seemed of rather great import at the time, I must admit,” he defended.
“And it had nothing at all to do with the lovely Lady Violet,” Carlisle added, his tone teasing.
Since when did the Duke of bloody Carlisle tease? Griffin would have sworn upon his mother’s grave the man did not possess a lighthearted bone in his body. He had to admit it was almost as if he was seeing a different man entirely, and the same could be said of Ludlow. Griffin did not know what the devil to do with such unabashed, blinding contentment.
It almost made him ill.
Ill with jealousy, but that was something he did not wish to pursue for the moment. Right now, all he could manage to do was attempt to find the man responsible for planting the false evidence in his study. Freeing himself. Proving his innocence.
Being Violet’s husband, said a voice inside himself.
But it was a foreign voice for a foreign feeling. Griffin was not accustomed to caring for anyone other than himself for the last few years. Being responsible for someone else was sudden and alarming. Alarming, because it felt far, far too comfortable.
Shefelt far too comfortable, as if she fit him perfectly. And in more ways than merely the tight grip of her cunny and the match of her luscious curves to his unforgiving planes.
“Oh, Christ, look at you,” said Carlisle then. “Look at him, Clay. He is following in our illustrious footsteps.”
“You are falling in love with your wife,” Ludlow said plainly.
Griffin swallowed, staring back at the two men who currently held his freedom in their hands. The thought of falling in love with Violet took his breath. It made his gut clench. It made his palms sweat and his mouth go dry and his jaw tense. The idea of falling in love on its own was anathema, something he had never envisioned for himself, an impossibility. But the notion he was falling in love with Violet was more than he could bear.
Because it was so painfully close to the truth.
Because he feared it was true.
And that was why he denied it swiftly. “I am doing nothing of the sort. I have no fear of falling in love with her. She is the sister of my greatest enemy.”
And falling in love with her would mean his complete vulnerability. It would mean granting another person the power to hurt him. He had been hurt enough in his past. The scars all over his battered body attested to that. And he had no wish to experience such helplessness or anything like it ever again.
Chapter Seventeen
After sharing breakfastwith the ladies of the house, all of whom were lovely and welcoming, from the Duchess of Carlisle to Mr. Ludlow’s wife, the dowager Duchess of Burghly, to Mrs. Ludlow, the warm and sweet matriarch of the entire group, Violet could not contain the restlessness within her. She was grateful to make new friends, having possessed no female friends thus far in her life, but it was perhaps also that shortcoming that rendered her interactions with them stilted and awkward.
But perhaps it was also because Violet was not accustomed to strangers, and she found herself feeling suddenly, painfully shy. Her entire life had been transformed in the span of a few days, and she was still catching her breath. With the whirlwind of new faces to add to the mix, she was at a loss. She had always been the sort who preferred time spent alone to time with others.
