“Oh no, the company of my sisters is irresistible, I understand.” Passing his horse’s reins to the stableboy who’d jogged up to them, Jack kept his other hand on George’s slender shoulder and steered the man back to his front door. “Come along, George. I must still have a bottle tucked away in the cellar somewhere. You look like you need a drink, my dear.”
Dalcher did indeed appear with a decanter the moment the two men entered Jack’s study. George fidgeted, a splash of colour on his cheeks, looking like his necktie was strangling him as Jack slowly poured them both a glass.
“A toast, eh?” said Jack, passing George a glass. “To the honesty of friends.”
“Jack,” protested George, stricken. “I hated every moment of it; I was sorry for it from the start. Iamsorry—”
“Or perhaps we should drink to loyalty,” interrupted Jack, eyeing George’s mortification for a moment before relenting. He chuckled, dropping his severe tone. “You fool, George,” he said warmly. “Do you think I could ever hate you for choosing Lucy over me? You found it an impossible position, I’m sure, to either help her or hurt me, but you made the only choice that could ever make me love you more dearly.”
He put down his glass and went to George, grasping the back of his head and bringing his forehead to George’s. Both men had tears in their eyes. “If you’re ever in the same position, make thesame choice. Promise me that. Serve Lucy, and to hell with me, andthenI will know you truly my friend.” He released him with a rough kiss to his brow and returned to pick up his drink. “Ithankyou, George. I drink to you.”
He took a large swallow. George sipped his, letting out a shaky breath like a man getting a last-minute pardon from the firing squad.
“You didn’t get hurt, George?” Jack asked softly. “I once believed you truly were developing atendrefor Lucy.”
“Oh, no, no,” protested George. “Nothing like that. You know me, Jack. Always falling for someone. It’s never serious. And there’s always another girl around the corner.”
But how true was that? Jack had always thought George incapable of deception. He’d just had a sharp lesson to the contrary.
They both looked round at a knock on the door. Dalcher opened it, face disapproving, and Miss Sedgewick stepped hastily into the room, as flustered as Jack had ever seen her.
“Will you please tell your man I am neither a bailiff’s agent nor a harpy!”
“You may go, Dalcher,” Jack told him with a frown. “Whatever’s the matter, Caroline?”
“I both hoped and dreaded to find you here. It’s as I feared, then. She’s gone alone!”
“Who has gone where alone?”
“Lucy! Her aunt is ill, dying it seems. But the letter arrived when I was out, and by the time I returned home, it was only to the news from William that she’s taken her maid and left London already!”
Jack’s world tilted, his heart squeezing painfully. “Good God, gone? Alone? Without my escort? But I’ve been out of town most of the day in Richmond, so even if she’d tried to reach me… But she left no note for me? Dalcher would’ve mentioned it, surely.”
“She did send you a note,” said Caroline, very grave. She handed him a folded piece of paper. “It was unsealed, Jack. I found it on the floor by my desk and read it without realising.”
Jack, I have heard of yourdifficulties…His fingers clenched at the underlined word.
“She tried to deliver it,” said Caroline. “But William says he was turned away.”
God damn it. She’d heard of his near ruin, her servant had been denied by his house, and now she was travelling the length of the country alone and thinking the Lord only knew what of him. “And I bet she’s taken the common stage,” he muttered. Yes, crammed into all that discomfort, the impertinence of strangers, and with him nowhere in sight to help her, probably even the thought of him more a torment than a help…
“William said that was her plan.”
Jack cursed. “I’ll go after her. I can easily overtake the stage. We can travel post the whole way up. Except—” He stopped halfway to the bell pull. “Dammit.” He had no money to travel post.
“I can lend you the money, Jack,” said George, but just as he began to argue the point, the door was flung open, and this time it was his mother and Nell who hurried into the room.
They were both white faced and half crying. Jack stared at them in bewilderment. “You’ve heard? It’s not that bad, Mother. I’m leaving now to catch her up. She’ll not be unprotected.”
“Oh thank goodness! Thank goodness! You’ll catch her, Jack? And bring her home? You’ll bring her home unharmed before thatwretch…that wretch—”
“Who is with her?” Jack asked, his heart thudding. “Whatever do you mean? It’s only her maid.”
“Her maid!” wailed Nell, a handkerchief to her nose. “It is only just now that we learned the whole from that wicked girl!”
“The whole of what?”
“That she has…” sobbed his mother brokenly. “She has run away, she has…eloped with that monster, Captain Sedgewick.”
