“Then I could not live with myself.” Montrose passed a hand over his face, looking ashen and weary. “Believe me, Rayne, I am far better gin-soaked.”
“I doubt that.” He sniffed, for he was not going to argue the duke’s future with him. If Montrose wished to poison himself and continue living a reckless life of debauchery, that was his choice. “If your maids do not soon attempt to clean the carpet, you will have to replace it.”
“What are you, my bloody housekeeper?” Montrose growled, unappreciative of his advice.
“Thankfully not,” he clipped, “else I should be concerning myself with such affairs as how to most readily remove the scent of a drunken fool’s piss from the Aubusson.”
Montrose’s eyes were closed, but he scowled. “Go to hell, Rayne. You may be marrying m’sister, but that does not give you the right to pontificate.”
“I am not pontificating,” he denied. “I am merely tired of holding you down for your bone to be set. After today, all such duties will be someone else’s problem. Not, I suspect, Torrington’s, however.”
“Satan’s breeches, do not remind me,” the duke said. “How is Torrie?”
“He will live, though apparently, he has no recollection of anything.” Not even his own name. Alessandro had seen such a case once before, on the battlefield. A man had fallen from his mount and could not remember anything for days. “It is a case of amnesia, I believe.”
“Oh, Christ. Are you certain, Rayne?”
Dr. Croydon had gone to Lord Torrington after resetting Montrose’s broken leg. His face had been grim upon his exit of the chamber. But Alessandro had been relieved the viscount had awoken at last. The final impediment to his nuptials with Lady Catriona had been removed.
He sighed, irritated with Montrose anew for the mayhem he had inflicted upon his plans. “As certain as I am tired of playing your nursemaid, let me be clear on the reason I am here, Montrose. You are a ne’er-do-well scapegrace, and you have been worrying your sister for far too long.”
Montrose’s eyes opened, the pupils dilated and large. “I know. Ought to have sent m’self to Scotland instead of her. My fault she was ruined. I should have challenged Shrewsbury to a duel and gutted him like a fish, too.”
Alessandro had not ruled out such a possibility himself.
The mere reminder of the foppish lord who had dared to ruin Lady Catriona was enough to make a sinister bolt of murderous rage slice straight through him. But today was not a day for violence. Today was a day of new beginnings.
His.With Lady Catriona.
Today, she would be his, in spite of all the obstacles blocking their path. In spite of the duke lying so pathetically before him.
“Forget about that spineless maggot,” he directed Montrose with a bite he could not temper. “I am looking for a promise from you.”
“A promise from me?” Montrose raised a brow. “Look here, Rayne. You are wedding my sister today, not me.”
When he was not being a drunken fool, Montrose was almost a likeable fellow.
Almost.
“I am aware of who I am about to marry, thank you.” He fixed the duke with a determined glare, the likes of which had made many a man crumble before him. “The promise I would ask of you is that you attempt, for Lady Catriona’s sake, to tame your ways. If I am to be leaving her behind to raise my heir, nothing would aggrieve me more than to learn she was forced to chase after you, fretting over you, playing your nursemaid, and keeping you from kicking your butler down the stairs.”
“Cat does not need to worry over me.” Montrose frowned. “I am perfectly fine without her interference. I already have one mother, and I do not really care for her interference either, if you must know.”
“Montrose,” he pressed. “Your promise. Lady Catriona loves your sorry hide. You owe it to her and your mother both—Dios, to yourself, too—to pull yourself together. You cannot spend the rest of your life drinking and fucking and crashing.”
“Any more than you can spend the rest of your life running?” Montrose returned.
Alessandro stilled, shocked by the duke’s rare moment of insight. Perhaps he had been running. Running from the past, from England, from the memories of Maria and Francisco and everything he had lost.
“What I do is none of your concern,” he bit out. “I will see your sister is well-cared for, as is my duty. She will want for nothing. All you have to do is promise not to mire her down with your foolishness. Try to be better. For her. For your mother. For yourself. Starting today, Montrose.”
Montrose’s eyes closed. “For Cat’s sake, I will try.”
“Good.” He would believe Montrose’s promise like he believed pigs would stop living in their own shit. But it was neither here nor there. The duke’s future was in his own, incapable hands. All Alessandro cared about was securing his wife at long last so he could begin his quest for an heir.
But there was one more thing that would have to happen first. He had promised his betrothed an audience with her brother, and an audience she would have.
Montrose had begun to snore.
