Chapter 13
“Grim news, Adam. Your father, Michael Whitaker, Viscount Linley. I’ve received word that he’s dying.”
Standing in front of Donovan’s desk, Adam couldn’t have been more stunned, not because Donovan had said his father was dying…but that he knew anything about the man at all.
“How did you…?”
“Forgive me for not telling you, but I’ve been corresponding with your uncle,William Stanhope. Guy’s Hospital gave me his name when I wrote to them about a doctor to take your place in Porthleven. Stanhope indicated from the first that you wouldn’t care one whit about the viscount’s illness, and why, but I thought you should know. He’s your father, after all.” Donovan sighed heavily and tossed the opened letter across the desk to Adam. “Read it. All the details are there.”
“You can burn it. I’ll not be at his deathbed, just like he wasn’t at my mother’s no matter she cried out for him for hours. Too busy dallying with his whores, the bastard.”
Bitterness nearly choking him, Adam sank into one of the leather chairs opposite Donovan’s desk, the ducal library three times the size of the one in Porthleven.
Everything about Arundale Hall was massive, but no more sothan Linley Grove in Wiltshire County bordering Hampshire. His father had sunk some of the fortune he’d gained from marrying Adam’s mother, Judith Stanhope, the only daughter of one of England’s wealthiest merchants, into rebuilding the Tudor manor house to its present monstrosity.
Decadent, ostentatious, and furnished with enough gilt and scarlet velvet to rival the finest brothel, another indignityhis refined and beautiful mother had been made to endure. All because she had fallen in love with a titled cad who had courted her relentlessly during her London Season, wooing her with false promises of eternal devotion.
“I understand your reaction,” Donovan said quietly after giving Adam a moment for the news to sink in, though he sat stiff with tension. “I, too, tried to escape the grip ofmy father by going to war in Portugal and Spain. I despised him, especially for how he treated my mother.”
“Then we have much in common. But where you’ve ultimately come back to this”—Adam waved to the well-appointed room around them—“I renounced my father seven years ago after my mother died and I’ll not set foot in that accursed house again.”
“Even if he begs for your forgiveness? Staringdeath in the face has brought many a wretch to his knees. If you would read your uncle’s letter—”
“I will not.” Adam thrust himself up from the chair. “A memory came to Linette when we walked through the garden, but it slipped away as quickly as it struck her. She’s feeling unwell and I told her I’d check on her as soon as I could. Are we done here?”
“Not until we have this out. By God, man,think of Linette then, if not your dying father! She’s not as sound as when you first met her, as you well know. Yes, her wound has healed, and we pray every day that her mind will clear—but do you truly think a doctor’s wage will give her the care and comfort she needs if you wed?”
Adam stared at Donovan, as stunned by the query as that the man he’d come to look upon as a friend and brotherhad uttered it.
“Harsh, I know,” Donovan continued, his expression darkening as he rose from his chair to meet Adam eye-to-eye across the desk. “I had no such reservation when it became clear to me early on that you harbored affection for Linette, and she for you, and nor did Corie. That day we met you at the crossroad and invited you to supper was our plan to help mend whatever misunderstandinglay between you, but then our very lives changed! Corie and Estelle were escorted to visit a seamstress today under armed guard! Who can say if more men like the ones we shot dead will follow whatever clues they might find to bring them to our doorsteps? You’ll never afford such protection for Linette on a doctor’s wage, but as the next Viscount Linley—”
“I’llneverbe Viscount Linley,” Adamcut him off, his hands clenched into fists. “I told you I renounced my father and everything about him, his title, his wealth. When he dies, the Crown may have it all back with my blessing.”
“Then you’re a fool. I believe Linette loves you, no matter the malady she suffers. I thought to discuss this sooner with you when I learned your father was ill, but I waited, anticipating your reaction.”
“Clearly, I haven’t disappointed you.”
Now Donovan glowered at him, and splayed his hands upon the desk to lean toward him.
“Oh, you’ve disappointed me, Adam. I hoped you would see reason now that your father’s death is imminent. I hoped you and Linette might announce your engagement at the surprise gathering Corie has planned for next weekend after Easter. She thought that having all of hersisters around her, and our friends Lindsay and Jared, too, and all the children, might help to spur her memory—hell and damnation, man! If your hatred is stronger than your love for Linette, then you don’t deserve her!”
Adam didn’t wait for what he fully anticipated Donovan to shout next, but stormed from the library into the foyer. He paused for only an instant to glance at the sweeping staircase,and then strode toward the front door that was already opened for Corie and Estelle and a host of servants laden with packages.
“Adam?”
He said nothing to Corie, moving sideways through the door past her and a startled Estelle, Luther wriggling in her arms.
Adam didn’t stop even when Corie called after him again, his only thought to saddle Samson and ride as hard as he could from Arundale Halland the glaring truth of Donovan’s words pounding into his brain.
***
“Adam’s gone?”
Corie nodded, her eyes filled with concern as she drew closer to where Linette sat upon the edge of her bed.
When she’d heard the knock at the door she thought it might be Adam, accompanied by one of the lady’s maids as propriety demanded, come to see how she fared as he’d said he would. She had wonderedwhat had kept him…wondered, too, what Donovan might have had to say to him. Now she could but stare at her older sister, panicked confusion overwhelming her.
“I…I don’t understand. Where did he go? Why? He told me he would come to check on me. We’d been in the garden and a memory came to me, Corie—but so fleeting, and then it was gone—”
