“As you wish, my lord.”
He walked along the narrow, cobbled road and down into the village he’d grown up running through as a boy.
The day was cool and clear, and still early enough that a few wisps of mist were clinging to the hills behind him. Beyond the small village were cliffs, below which swirled the sea. Another place he’d spent his childhood.
His mother had thought Bidham quaint. A handful of shops catered to the needs of those who lived here or nearby, and when you stepped foot in the village there was someone wanting to chat or offerwell-meaning advice. Toby doubted much had changed, but again, it had been years, so he had no notion of what had taken place within its borders. One thing had always struck him about this little nest of houses and shops, and that was happiness. Whenever he’d been here, someone had been laughing. Had there been anger and sadness? Definitely, but his dominant memory of this small village was happiness. It was an emotion that hung in the air, but something he’d never been able to reach again since the day he’d entered Blackwood Hall as a child.
Toby inhaled the familiar tang of the sea as his eyes moved from left to right, taking in the scene before him. Like everything good in his life, he’d shut this place out, too.
His years living in Blackwood Hall, where he boarded during his school days, had shaped the man he was today. Hard edged, cynical, and a libertine, or so his mother had called him just last month. She despaired of him ever taking a bride as no woman would have him, and then there would be no future Lord Corbyn, as he had not supplied her with a grandchild yet.
Just the thought of caring for a child made him queasy. He could barely care for himself.How would he keep it safe?
Toby walked until he reached the first house in the village. As if it had only been a week and not years since he’d seen him, Mr. Jasper was bent, tending his vegetables. He raised his head as he heard Toby’s footsteps, and the smile fell from his lips to be replaced by a scowl.
It surprised him to see the man had aged, and why it should as it had been so long since last they’d met, he had no notion. Perhaps he’d wanted Bidham and its inhabitants to stay exactly as it had been in his memory. A place he’d once been happy.
“Good day to you, Mr. Jasper,” Toby said.
Mr. Jasper nodded once. He then walked away, up the stairs and into his house, closing the door behind him.
He’d once smiled at Toby when he saw him, and spent time teachinghim things, like when was the best time to plant vegetables. Now, they were strangers, and from that greeting, he guessed his refusal to fulfil his family’s obligations to the village of Bidham had left a foul taste in the mouths of many.
Stomping on the kernel of guilt, Toby walked on.
The Bodkin sisters were the next house, and both seated on their front porch. Toby had thought at least one if not both would have passed by now, but there they were watching him approach. They stared at him, nodded, and then rose too, and went inside. There would be no thick wedge of bread slathered in jam for the young lord and his brother today.
What had he expected? He’d refused to frequent the businesses in the village, or open the annual fair, which a Viscount Corbyn had always done since its inception. So wrapped up in his own hell, he’d given no thought to those he was hurting.
Like her.
He continued to walk, stomping down the guilt and pain, looking at houses, naming the owners in his head, and wondering if they were still living there, while he struggled to come to the understanding that the people who had embraced the young heir once, now ignored him.
As he walked, Toby recalled his butler’s words.Something isn’t right, my lord. There’s something sinister at foot in Bidham.He felt the change. There was no longer happiness here. He could hear no one laughing or people talking together on the street.
“Am I seeing things?”
He turned at the words, sure they’d been spoken to someone else, and saw her sitting there. Miss Ainsley had been the Corbyn boys’ nanny for many years until Toby had gone away to school. She’d seemed old when she’d joined the staff.
“Harry,” he said, crossing to where she sat on a wooden bench outside the home her family had owned for as long as Toby could remember. “At least someone is speaking to me.”
“Did you expect different?” she asked. “You turned your back on everyone in this village, and they relied on your patronage. The Corbyn family has been linked to Bidham for many years.”
“My mother has not come here either?” Toby had never asked her, and she’d not spoken of the village since the day she’d begged him to do his duty as Lord Corbyn, and he’d refused.
“She has not.” Harry’s face was worn like the pages of an overused book. But the woman who had been his first love was still there in the green eyes and lovely smile.
Toby and Mathew had worshipped her because she’d given them everything their parents hadn’t. It had been Miss Harris who had really shown the brothers how to love. How to laugh and be happy. She’d also taught them that because they were rich, titled and in her words, “one day would be more handsome than was good for anyone,” they also had to be humble.
“Your father passed the year before you returned, and since then, no Corbyn has entered Bidham until today.”
“What of the Talbots? Surely a duke and duchess are an adequate replacement?” Toby asked, battling his shame.
“It is the Corbyns who are linked here, my lord, not the Talbots. For all, they have been constant visitors to the village,” Harry said in a sad voice.
He looked across the street and saw the curtains in the Taylor house twitch. Toby was being watched.
“Why are you back here now, my lord?”
