“Let me take you to her. Arabella is already upstairs,” Vaughn said. “Castleton, Silas is in the west parlor there.” He motioned vaguely up the hallway.
“I’ll find it. You take care of your wife.”
The two of them left and he made his way up the hallway, peeking into rooms before he found Silas Windham in one, already smoking a cigar by a cracked window.
“Celebrating early, are you?” Alexander teased as he stepped into the room.
Windham turned toward him with a start and then looked him up and down with an appraising glance. “Interesting. I assume this means you brought our Julia to us?”
“I did,” he said, and went to pour himself a whisky from the sideboard. “We were together when she got the news.”
When he joined Windham at the window, the other man clinked his glass with Alexander’s. “Well, welcome to the family.”
Alexander scrubbed a hand through his hair and didn’t drink like Windham did. “Jesus,” he muttered. “I wish I could say that.”
“Oh?” Windham tilted his head. “And why can’t you?”
Alexander hesitated. He didn’t know this man very well, but he had few people in his life who he could confide in and there was an openness to Silas Windham that was impossible not to be drawn to.
He shifted his weight before he said, “She just refused my proposal of marriage.”
To his surprise, Windham tilted his head back and let out a long laugh. Alexander did drink then, annoyed at being mocked. “I’m glad you think it’s funny.”
“I don’t, I apologize,” Windham said, pulling himself back together. “I laugh because as much as those three women are very different from each other, in some ways they are the same. Don’t you worry, Castleton, they are prone to refuse proposals.”
He wrinkled his brow. “I don’t understand. You’re saying your wife refused your first proposal?”
“She did. And so did Evie when Vaughn asked.”
“Why? Both couples are so obviously happy now.”
“Yes. Luckily yes.” Windham let out a long sigh and looked toward the door as if he could see his wife there. “What you must understand about the Comerford sisters is that they protect who they love. Even to their own detriment.”
Love. Alexander had no hope that Julia loved him. He wasn’t certain he’d earned such a powerful emotion yet even though he certainly felt it toward her. But he did understand much more about why she might protect those around her.
“It seems they all had to be protectors, based on their upbringing,” he said softly.
Windham’s brows came up. “She told you about that, did she? About their wretch of a father, Devil take his soul?”
“She did. I’m happy your wife wasn’t harmed by him.”
A great pain came over Windham’s expression. “She wasn’t killed, but they were all harmed by him. Still, those stories are not ones any of them drop lightly. If Julia told you about him, about the horror she grew up in, it’s because shedoescare about you. So of course she’d want to protect you. And if you care for her in return, if you’re worthy of her, I know you’ll work it out. Climb over those thorny Comerford walls. So I repeat, welcome to the family.”
This time Alexander did clink glasses with him and drank.
“What’s your first name?” Windham asked. “I refuse to go around calling any of my brothers by their toff family names.”
“Alexander,” he said.
“Silas,” Windham returned with a wide smile. “How about a game of cards? We’ll be here a while, I think.”
He moved to a table across the room where he opened a small drawer and pulled out a deck of cards. They sat and Silas began to deal out cards for a game of piquet.
“Thank you,” Alexander said as he looked at his hand.
Silas shrugged and laid down his first play. And though Alexander had to very quickly put his head in the game so he could find the right strategy to beat the man across from him, he couldn’t ignore the flare of hope that had entered his chest. He wasn’t going to give up on Julia. Not ever.
When Vaughn entered the bedchamber at the end of the hallway and motioned Julia in, it took all her might to follow. Her feet felt heavy and her chest choked with fear for her sister in that moment. And yet, when she dared follow him into the actual bedroom on one side of the chamber, she found Evie sitting up, pale but seemingly alert. Arabella was at her side and a woman she didn’t know across the room, who she assumed was the midwife.
