The last sentence hung unsaid in the air between Leonora and her half-brother. But it was true, nonetheless. She saw it all so clearly now, for though her husband had done his best to hide his true intentions from her, she knew precisely what they were now. She realized, too, why he had acted as he had.
“I understand Searle,” Alessandro said then, his tone bitter. “Perhaps better than he knows himself. In Spanish, we have a way to describe men who are forever changed by the horrors they have seen at war,estar roto. He is a man broken, and he blames me for whatever he faced at the hands of the French. He will not give in until he has what he wants. Nothing has stopped him yet.”
Estar roto.
The unfamiliar phrase turned itself over in her mind. Yes, the Marquess of Searle was a man who was broken on the inside, where he wore even more scars than he did on his skin. Little wonder he had never confided in her. That he had never shared anything more than the physical with her. Caring for her was beyond his capacity. His quest for vengeance had overtaken him, until nothing remained for her.
“I do not believe in this duel,” she persisted. For the more she thought about it, the more terrified she became.
No good could come from Searle and Alessandro meeting each other with pistols at dawn. The past had already shaped them, made them who they were, left them scarred. Sins had already been committed which could not be undone.
“I love you,hermanita, and I will make him pay for what he has done to you,” her brother told her, rising to his feet. “See that you get some rest this evening. Tomorrow will be a long journey back to London, and I hate to see you in pain.”
“Alessandro.” She gripped his coat sleeve when he leaned down to buss a brotherly kiss over the crown of her head. “If you love me, you will not do this.”
“Rest now.” His mouth was once more compressed into a harsh line. “My love for you is the reason I am meeting him on the field of honor.”
Leonora watched her brother take his leave, a true feeling of helplessness swelling within her like a river after heavy rains.
Sometime later, a second supper tray arrived. She did not miss the brilliant red strawberries in their fine porcelain bowl, in stark contrast to the muted colors of the rest of the meal.
And she knew without question Searle had sent them to her.
Why? To mock her, or as a reminder? She could not be certain. All she did know was that, despite her growling stomach, she could not bear to eat a single bite of food from him.
“Tell his lordship the thought of strawberries makes me want to retch,” she relayed to the maid who bore the tray.
If only it did.
Chapter Fifteen
Morgan told himselfit was just as well his idyll at Westmore Manor—a false happiness, not meant to last—had come to an abrupt end. He told himself he did not miss her delicate floral scent or the soft, seductive sounds his wife made when she spent. He told himself he was on the precipice of garnering what he had wanted ever since he had burrowed his way out of the old stone barn in which he had been kept during his imprisonment, revenge.
And then, he told himself to finish his claret and pour another.
So, he did.
What else was there to do, after all, awaiting the appearance of his scapegrace cousin, who was presently not at home according to the disapproving butler? If Monty wasnot at home, it meant he was probably still abed, even though it was nearly four o’clock in the afternoon. Not much had changed in Morgan’s absence while he was away at war, at least not where his cousin was concerned. Monty had become a duke early in life, and, blessed with the sort of looks that made the fairer sex swoon, he spent his days drinking and fucking his way through the demireps and dissatisfied wives of London.
Morgan was halfway through his second claret when Monty appeared at the threshold, clad in what appeared to be the previous day’s evening wear. His breeches were rumpled, and he wore no coat, only shirtsleeves, waistcoat, and flattened cravat. His hair was mussed, and beneath his eyes, he sported the telltale bruises of a man who had spent the night carousing.
“Seated upon my throne,” drawled Monty, raising a brow. “Drinking my bloody claret. What is next, Searle? Tupping my mistresses?”
Mistresses. Naturally, Monty possessed more than one.
But there was only one female he wished to tup, and it was the same female who had refused to dine with him, speak to him, and subsequently, ride in a carriage with him for the lengthy return trip to London the day before. Nor had she deigned to acknowledge him this morning, so he had promptly left Linley House in search of his errant cousin. He chased those thoughts from his mind, because he had not ferreted out Monty so he might pine over Leonie.
Morgan stood, vacating his cousin’s chair. “You look as if you spent the evening swilling blue ruin and slept in your clothes,” he told Monty.
Monty’s dissipation was an old story, but Morgan had spent the last few years staring into the face of not just his own mortality but that of everyone around him. As he traded places with his cousin, he could not help but to think Monty was getting older. Three-and-thirty now. Surely far too old to still be playing the young buck about town.
“You sound like my mother,” Monty quipped, grinning unrepentantly. “She pecks me like a hen.Montrose, you need a wife. Montrose, you need an heir. Montrose, you must stop drinking to excess. Montrose, if you insist upon keeping company with slatterns, you will get the pox.It’s all deadly boring. I do not regret sending her to Scotland with my sister for a moment.”
Morgan had just taken a healthy gulp of his claret when his cousin had begun his impersonation of Aunt Letitia. The falsetto, combined with the bit about the pox, nearly made him choke. “Good God, please tell me Aunt did not say anything so untoward.”
“She did,” Monty confirmed, splashing some claret into a glass for himself and settling into his chair with an undignified plop. “Now tell me why you have come, daring to rouse me from my much-needed slumber. As you mentioned, I had not even the time to prepare myself, and I have been forced to greet you in the garments in which I slept. Dreadfullyde trop, I am afraid.”
Under other circumstances, Morgan would have laughed at Monty’s lighthearted dismissal of his indulgences the night before. But there was too much turmoil roiling within him. Too many important matters weighing upon his mind.
