“Amelia.”
She untucked her handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped it across her face. “Did you know he was the only person to write to me after our marriage? He hoped that it might signal the healing of your family rift. For you to think that I would be happy that my friend has died so that I could have a bloody title shows that you don’t know me at all.”
Amelia stuffed her feet into walking boots and grabbed a coat. Normally she would change into a walking dress before leaving the house, but right now she just needed to get out—away from her boneheaded husband, away from the house and all its reminders of what she’d lost. She just needed a moment to grieve.
Ducky.
There were so many vile people in this world. It wasn’t fair that someone sweet and kind should be taken so soon. Ducky was one of the few people sheliked. He and Benedict might have actually gotten along if they’d managed to set aside the conflict their parents had created. They both had a similar sense of humor. They both liked the work of Voltaire. Ducky was softer, though—more willing to shift and ebb with the plans of others than Benedict was.
The last she’d heard, he’d been courting Josephine Livingston. She should send some flowers.
She kicked a pebble out of her way. It bounced and rolled on the drive. She kicked it again, thoughts tumbling through her head.
Benedict’s accusations had hurt. To call her heartless? To suggest she’d choose a title over a person? It was cruel, and she didn’t deserve such treatment. She almost wished her aim with that vase had been a little better.
But as hurt as she was, it made sense that he’d lash out at her. He had just found out that his life was not going to turn out as planned—in fact, the very opposite. If anyone knew the kaleidoscope of anger, grief, and fear that rolled through you when your life upended unexpectedly, she did.
The pebble rolled and bounced again, lodging at the base of new shoots sprouting through hard dirt.
Winter was beginning to lose its grip. She wasn’t an avid enough gardener to tell what the plant would be—tulips? Jonquils? Daffodils? But in a few more months, this path would be lined with color.
The irony didn’t escape her. She was surrounded by new life but had no idea what it would be.
If Benedict truly refused to take on the title when his grandfather passed, who knew what would become of the people who lived there. There would be no guarantee those who relied on the Earl of Hemshire would be well taken care of.
So Benedict was going to need to take up the mantle, whatever his personal opinions. And as much as he might wish to do so later rather than sooner, it wasn’t possible. It was an immense task to manage an estate properly, to become acquainted with all the information necessary to help run the county. And given Benedict’s blindness on so many aspects of a lord’s life, he was going to need all the time and help he could get.
Sweat rolled down Benedict’s neck as he put his weight into the crank of the slip roller. The sheet of steel between the rollers formed a wide curve as it wound out of the machine. The crank reached the bottom, and he shifted his grip, raising it up, his muscles straining.
“You know, we have people to do that,” John said as he entered the empty workshop.
“I gave them the afternoon off.” Benedict pushed on the crank again. His mind had been a chaotic jumble of thoughts from the moment the solicitor had left. Channeling them into hard labor was the only way he could get them under control.
“Want to talk about it?”
He didn’t particularly, but he couldn’t get his thoughts straight on his own, and of all the people he could turn to, John understood the machinations of the upper class the best.
Except for Amelia. But he was not sure she’d want to help given the way he’d just treated her.
“Alexander Douglass died in a racing accident last week.” He grunted as he switched grips and leaned into the shaft again.
“Ducky?” John frowned. Benedict could almost see John forming connecting lines in his mind until he reached the absurd conclusion. “You’re the new heir.”
Benedict exhaled in frustration. “How is that not a surprise to anyone else?”
John shrugged.
“Of course, I bolloxed things up by yelling at my wife. Who may or may not forgive me.”
He heaved on the crank, his muscles burning.
“And I’m stuck with an estate I don’t want, out in bloody nowheres-shire.”
He huffed with the turn.
“And my damned grandfather has written to me.”
John’s eyes widened at the mention of the marquess. He’d been there when Benedict had received word that Lord Harrington refused to send help to Benedict’s sick and impoverished mother. When the marquess had refused to attend her funeral.
