Ash grimaced. “You’d know something about that, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes, well,” Chev replied. “You deserved a beating, didn’t you?”
Ash looked away. “Our arrangement was for three nights.” His breath caught. “I never meant to cause her harm.”
“What happened on the fourth day?”
“Kent saw her off.”
Chev and Hurtheven exchanged a speaking glance.
He knew he’d been a fool. He should have fought with all his might. But even if they’d managed to wrest a time of happiness, the end would have been the same.
What hurt most was that she believed he would harm their child. That he was mad like his father.
“I am not mad,” he said.
“Oh?” Chev replied. “You pursued a woman you’d never laid eyes on before. Then you abandoned her without so much as a farewell. And after you found out she was with child, you accosted her in her own home.” He leaned in. “It all sounds perfectly rational to me.”
“It wasn’t...rational, I know.” Ash frowned. “But neither was it the work of madness. When I saw her—” An image of Alicia rose in his mind—so beautiful, so untouchable, so fine. What the devil was happening to his eyes? He shook his head and wetness seeped between his lashes. “Damnation.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Good God,” Chev said. “You love her.”
“He loves her.” Hurtheven hit the arm of his chair. “And yet, he let her go.”
“I am protecting her! Chev told me she had scandal enough.” He propped his elbows on his knees and dropped his head. “She said I wasn’t any better than the slime that bought tickets to my father’s trial.”
“She saidthat?” Chev asked.
Ash winced. “I may have implied she owed me.”
Cheverley whistled. “You deserved worse, then.”
“Don’t I know,” Ash sighed.
“Come, now,” Hurtheven scoffed. “Something real is at stake, here. You had a mad father. Her husband was a cheat. So? These things aren’t rare. What is rare is you, weeping into your scotch—finally in love.”
Ash looked up to see Hurtheven grimace.
“I loathe you both for finding love.” Hurtheven’s gaze moved to Chev. “I’ll loath you both even more if you let it go to waste.”
“What if,” Ash’s voice cracked, “she ends up dead, like Rachel?”
Hurtheven’s gaze softened. “Stop right there. You are a league past wallow. Enough is enough, Ash. Where’s the spirit you had when you claimed your father’s name? Lady Stone has seen your darkness. Reveal your light.”
“I have no light.”
“Who—as soon as he was old enough—protected the servants, ensuring anyone who wished to leave found a position in a household where they would be safe?”
Ash frowned. “You?”
Hurtheven’s lips twisted. “Atyourrequest.”
“Who,” Chev asked, “made frequent trips to visit my wife, making sure she had everything she needed? Yes—I know about that.”
“She is a good woman,” Ash replied. “You would have done the same for me.”
“Iwilldo the same for you,” Chev replied. “I will plead your case.”
