“You’re welcome. You are dismissed.”
Nicholas left then without another word. He staggered through this house he would never return to, blind to all its familiar halls and out into the drive where his horse awaited him. He rode away just as blindly, tears stinging his eyes and broken heart throbbing madly. And in those horrible, pain-tinged moments, he made a promise to himself.
He would make a life that never left him beholden to men like the Earl of Bramwell again. Nor would he ever let something so foolish as love leave him open to pain.
Chapter 1
Nine Years Later
Nicholas walked alongside his half-brother Robert through Hyde Park. It was slow going. In the cool of the morning, his leg hurt all the more. He limped while Robert strolled and Nicholas’s bullmastiff, Fortescue, trotted at his side, always watchful of anyone who came near his master. Thanks to Fortescue’s large and rather fearsome demeanor, very few did.
“I appreciate you coming out with me this morning,” Robert said.
Nicholas thought it was to fill the silence between them. It had never been a comfortable one. After all, Robert was the Duke of Roseford’s only legitimate son. He’d taken on their father’s title years before and run it just as ragged and wrong as the man who’d sired them both.
That he had recently come to heel was something Nicholas didn’t wholly trust.
He shrugged. “I needed the exercise, as did Fortescue.”
Hearing his name, the dog tilted his head up toward Nicholas, watching. Nicholas fought the urge to smile like a fool at the animal and kept his attention on Robert.
“I suppose being seen with a duke also doesn’t hurt your current plans,” Robert drawled.
His brother was baiting him and Nicholas took a long breath so he wouldn’t automatically take that bait. “Depends on the duke,” he said.
If he had been trying to insult Robert, his brother didn’t get angry. Instead, he laughed. “Truer words have never been spoken. There are definitely levels of respectability, even amongst those with titles. I suppose my marriage to Katherine has raised me in the ranks, but certainly I am not at the best advantage to help you in your quest to earn a title.”
“Is that why you asked me to walk with you, to talk to me about the title?” Nicholas asked softly.
“It is a rare thing for titles to be bestowed for bravery and sacrifice, though I suppose more common as of late for war heroes like yourself and Wellington.”
Nicholas sighed. This was a topic he didn’t really like to discuss. He didn’t want anyone to know how much it meant to him. Most especially Robert. His brother hardly respected his own title—he would certainly tease Nicholas about desiring his own.
“I’m no Wellington,” Nicholas said. “I have never claimed to be.”
Robert’s brow wrinkled. “In my estimation you are more valuable than Wellington. He won a war—that means something. But you saved men’s lives, at great cost to yourself.” Robert glanced at his leg and Nicholas winced. “Including Selina’s husband. Our sister would not be happy now were it not for your bravery. I think you are owed more than a mere title.”
“Ameretitle. Easy for you to say,” Nicholas said, casting his glance off into the park, watching the milling crowds that had gathered on this fine summer day. How separate he felt from them all. “You’ve been titled all your life, so you’ve never appreciated its power.”
Robert was quiet for a moment, then cast a glance at Nicholas. Nicholas flinched, because they were his own eyes, their father’s eyes, looking back at him on his brother’s face. Dark brown, guarded, unreadable.
“I wouldn’t have pegged you for being power hungry, brother,” Robert said.
Nicholas shrugged again. “There are different kinds of power, you know. Both to destroy and to protect. But all of it requires the command a title can bring.”
And now he’d said too much. Revealed too much to this man he didn’t fully trust, even if their other half siblings, Morgan and Selina, said he was decent. Said he was better. Nicholas wasn’t certain he trusted either of them, even though he was closer to them.
“You really want this,” Robert said softly. “You reallywantto be named Marquess of Songstrum.”
And there it was, his hope, his dream said out loud. After his injury, everyone had thought he would die. He had few memories of that bleary time except for pain and the worry on the faces of those in his life. But as he healed and grew stronger, whispers had begun. One of the men he’d saved that horrible day in the midst of battle and death was the youngest son of Viscount Ludlow. The viscount was a personal friend of the Prince Regent, himself, and apparently a campaign had been launched to gift Nicholas with a title. The Songstrum line had died out ten years before, returning to the Crown with little fanfare.
But now it could belong to Nicholas, just as Robert said in an incredulous tone. So Nicholas fought for a way to ignore it. To put up a barrier between them.
“Fortescue!” he snapped out.
The dog immediately sat at attention, locking his amber gaze with Nicholas’s. He bent with a wince of faint pain and swept up a stick from alongside the path. He tossed it, not quite as far as he might once have been able to, and the dog’s ears went higher at attention.
“Fetch,” Nicholas said, pointing out at the expanse of grass where the stick had fallen.
