He did know that John’s father had made Henrietta’s inheritance, her dowry, contingent on John delivering an annuity to his old mistress, Mary Forster. Trem had wondered at the time if the old man’s decision had suggested that Henrietta was not his daughter. But when John had found Mary Forster and she had accepted the annuity, he had assured Trem that his father had merely wanted his old lover taken care of. He had wanted to make sure that his son carried out what he had regarded as a matter of honor. Why that would have affected his behavior towards Henrietta was something that Trem didn’t know. He had observed the difference, but, before today, it had never seemed a pressing matter.
Trem sat at his breakfast table and contemplated the options before him. He had dismissed the servants. He never liked reminiscing about his erotic activities with Perkins looking at him and the big footmen were hardly better. But now his solitude pushed down on him and heightened his anxiety.
Trem groaned. Usually, if he had been anxious about a woman, he would have called on John for counsel. But obviously such an option now was…chilling, to say the least.
No, he had only one friend on this earth broad-minded enough to accept what he had done. And he was in desperate need of him at the moment—he needed someone else to reassure him that the world still retained some of its old shape.
Hence, twenty minutes later, Lord Augustus Carrington, the Earl of Montaigne, strode into his breakfast room.
“Bloody hell, Trem,” he bellowed, looking a bit disheveled, but far from the worst Trem had ever seen him.
Montaigne held up the note that Trem had sent him twenty minutes earlier. The only thing emblazoned on the paper was a strange little symbol that looked like a four-paned window and a single line directing Montaigne to meet him at his home. The outside of the letter had been pasted together by his signature wax and seal.
“What in the devil are you doing sending me this at such an ungodly hour?”
It was nigh noon, but Trem knew Montaigne viewed any hour before three in the afternoon as early.
“I need your counsel,” he ground out, annoyed at his friend’s ire.
Montaigne sighed as he threw himself into one of his dining chairs.
“I thought you were dying, man,” he huffed. “I thought we agreed to only send our sign in an emergency.”
“It is an emergency,” Trem said, picking up the piece of paper he had sent not half an hour earlier. The little rune on the page was his and his best friends’ symbol—they only used it when they urgently needed each other. When Catherine had gone into labor with Griffon, John had sent messages with only that sign and they had all shown up at Breminster House. They had invented it long ago at Eton as a way to indicate that they had fallen into trouble. If they needed sustenance while being held for a punishment, or needed to convene, they used the symbol. It was the first initials of their titles overlayed together (well, John’s old title, Forster, he was technically Edington now).
“Why didn’t you summon John?”
Montaigne looked around the breakfast room as if expecting John to pop out of the upholstery.
“Can’t consult John on this one, mate.”
“Leith?” Montaigne asked, his eyebrows raised.
“Erm, no.” Honestly, he might be as afraid to tell Leith as John. Of all of them, Leith had the most taste for propriety and what might be referred to as classical honor. He’d probably thrash Trem himself.
“So, I’m the only one here?” Montaigne said, his blond eyebrows now near his hairline.
Trem nodded.
“Jesus Christ, Trem, what did you do?”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Oh, come now. When any of the three of you call just me, you want someone who is going to tell you that whatever you already did isn’t too bad.”
Tremberley felt himself blanch. Was he that transparent?
“Let me guess,” Montaigne continued. “You finally fucked Countess Fairchild? I told you not to, mate. I fucking told you. Well, if we are going to have to duel Lord Fairchild, I will be your second, but you better bloody miss, brother, because I don’t want a murder inquiry. I’m not twenty-two anymore—”
“I didn’t fuck the Countess Fairchild!”
Montaigne sighed, looking momentarily relieved. But then his countenance clouded again. “Mrs. Forbes then? That would explain why Leith isn’t here. I think that one will be all right, brother—he is well and tired of her now, I think. You know he only likes them for a fortnight and then he gets bored and we’re not far short of that—”
“I didn’t bed Mrs. Forbes either,” Trem broke in, shuddering at the crude idea that he would go after the same courtesan that Leith was currently tupping. Although he had told Monty not too long ago that he found the woman quite beautiful—but the idea of any woman who wasn’t Henrietta now sickened him. He felt towards Mrs. Forbes the way you felt towards the plate of victuals you had eaten just before a stomach ailment.
“Then why did I leave my heavenly four-poster to run across town and come here? You know I love a lie-in.”
“Bloody hell, Montaigne, it is far worse than either Mrs. Forbes or Countess Fairchild. It’s Henrietta.”
