I shall not waste another season in your shadow, nor continue to play the dutiful spouse to a man who scarcely notices whether I breathe.
By the time you read these words, I shall be gone. Do not trouble yourself with following me; you have already lost me, long before I chose to leave. Consider this not a plea for forgiveness but a declaration of freedom. May you find satisfaction in your wealth and titles, since affection and loyalty were never yours to command.
No longer yours,
Helena.
To this day, he had not found out who her lover was.
Well, this one, at least.
He reached for his drink and swallowed the last of the portion he’d poured out. Another memory of Helena’s spiteful words after he’d put off writing a speech for Quorum to take her to the fifth ball that week.
You’re a selfish bastard. You have no heart; you don’t know how to love me.
Helena was a master of manipulation by wielding her feminine wiles like a sword. He recalled how she had reeled him with her innocent glances and shy smiles, but then, turn those looks on other men, he’d thought she’d been friendly.
Young, idiotic naiveté.
When he’d finally caught on and demanded answers from her about her blatant flirtation, she’d twisted it into him being a jealous monster and that he did not love her at all. She had a devious streak; insidiously able to twist him into knots of guilt and anger.
Twenty years old was too old to be that foolish, he scolded himself as he poured out another drink.
Cold fury clawed at him while he felt control slipping from his grasp; he was angry as Leander for being so irresponsible and selfish, irritated at his late wife for being so manipulative, and now he was irked at himself for that spike of attraction to the young sacrificial lamb twenty feet away.
“It was a purely physical reaction,” he told himself, then grimaced when the words rang hollow.
He rang for Allan.
To everyone on the outside, Allan was his manservant; to him, the man who saved his life was his friend. As he entered, Allan bowed, “Your Grace?”
“Close the door,” he said, while pouring out his last drink. Both knew that instruction was a silent code forleave the formality at the door, we’re speaking frankly here.
When the walnut slab clicked in place, Allan’s tone was casual, not servile, “I thought you’d have called for me the moment you returned.”
“I would have if I hadn’t had to speak to Emily first,” Cedric said while turning and resting the back of his thighs on his bar. “I expect you are wondering how I left here with my brother and returned with a wife?”
Nodding, Allan said, “It did cross my mind, yes.”
In succinct tones, he recounted the events of the unfortunate day, not surprised when Allan did not blink an eye. He’d learned for years that there was little that shook the man, and that was a quality he truly needed.
Finishing his tale, Cedric said, “So, that is how I returned wed.”
“I assume you’re going to annul the marriage?” Allan surmised.
“Actually, no,” Cedric said. “I’ll detail the reasons another time, but for now, I need to hunt Leander down. He may be halfway to the Indies by now, but even so, we will find him.”
With one solid nod, Allan replied, “I will place runners on his friends and his mistress. His lordship will turn to one or the other if he is out to run.”
“Good man,” Cedric replied while savagely pleased that his manservant was on the same page he was. “In the meantime, I must write out this marriage agreement.”
“I will contact Bow Street in the next hour,” Allan said.
Cedric knew that any other lord would scorn him for letting his manservant handle such sensitive matters for him instead of his steward, but Cedric trusted the man who had saved his life. “Good man.”
“Should I send up some coffee?”
“Blacker than hell and twice as bitter,” he replied.
