“I do not need your quarterlies. I have my own funds.” He continued for the door.
“Youhadyour own funds,” his father said.
Julian stopped and studied the man. “What do you mean?”
“You will no longer have a position with the Alien or Home Office.”
He tried not to gape at the man.
“I have always known who you worked for and the true reason behind the Devils of Dalston. When I lost Grayson and learned of Miss Hooper’s situation, I wrote a letter to the Home Office with my instructions as to your employment.”
“You have no right!” Julian yelled.
“Ah, but I do, and they agreed. As heir, you should no longer serve them.”
“Nor am I a child on leading strings. I decide what I do and who I work for.” Could his position have been truly terminated because his father wrote a bloody letter?
Except, his father did have power.
“They will remove you from your position and you are not suited for anything else other than Bow Street or the Thames River Police,” his father said. “They will not hire you either as I have already informed them that it would not be permitted as my heir.”
Julian refused to believe that his father could have so much power, and he would test the possibility. “It does not matter what you do to me, I still will not marry Miss Hooper.”
His father leaned forward and folded his hands on the desk. “Then how will you survive?”
“Well enough,” Julian answered.
“With no income and no quarterlies, how long before your funds run out?”
His stomach tightened. He did well financially on his own, but without an income… “Blackridge Place comes with the viscountcy. It has an income.” That had been his brother’s home, and the land was fertile. He would become a gentleman farmer and he and Cait would make a home there.
His father snorted. “Blackridge Place is attached to the earldom. You will have it only if I allow it, and I will not if you do not wed Miss Hooper.”
Julian had assumed, no, he’d been told, that it belonged to the viscount and not his father. Was he being lied to?
It was also something else that he would investigate.
Julian strode for the door. He’d not do his father’s bidding even if it left him a pauper.
“Where will you go now?” his father called. “You have nothing but your name. Miss Hooper is willing to take you as you are and the two of you can live here. If you walk out that door, you will have nothing.”
His stomach tightened further. How could he court Cait when he had nothing to offer her?
But just because his father said his position would be terminated, did not make it so.
“You’ll also see your friends ruined,” his father called.
Julian turned. “How could you possibly hurt my friends?” Empty threats.
“Are you even curious as to how I learned of your position with the Home Office?”
Julian was but did not want to give his father the satisfaction of asking, though he likely learned from a crony of his in Parliament.
“You play the wastrel so well, when in truth, you are spying on behalf of the Alien Office, under supervision of the Home Office.”
Julian simply stared at his father. He’d not comment.
“Do you think that I have not noticed that you spend an inordinate amount of time with French émigrés and sympathizers, as well as Englishmen who might have radical ideas of their own revolution, gathering information for the Crown?”
