*
LEO’S PULSE HAMMEREDlike he was about to enter the worst fight of his life. In fact, he was ready for one. He’d pictured this day so many times over the years. What he would say, what he would do. Sometimes there would be a scathing monologue, but typically he’d envisioned throwing fists before even letting the man over the threshold.
How could his mother be so calm? This man had ruined her life. Every bit of it. He’d taken her independence, her money, her dignity. He still sometimes had nightmares of the thinness of her arms, how bulbous her wrists looked in comparison, as she had slowly starved so that he could eat.
But the money had belonged to Reggie and what he did with it was his business. Regardless if his wife and child starved in front of his eyes. Sometimes Leo believed Reggie drank all their money out of spite. He wasn’t a man to raise his fists, but he wanted to punish his mother for not being the mark he’d believed her to be. She was stronger and calmer and smarter than Reggie, which was the most heinous sin she could have committed in Reggie’s eyes.
There was nothing that made Reggie Morgan madder than someone who truly was better than him.
When Leo grew big enough, he’d tried to help his father make more money, in the hopes his father would be satisfied. But there wasn’t enough gold in the world to satisfy Reggie Morgan. Because it wasn’t only the money, it was prestige. All the things a low birth prevented. Odd, then, that somehow, despite Reggie Morgan, Leo had managed to garner that wealth and status Reggie had craved. Leo and his mother attended London ballsand rubbed elbows with titled men and women. As the man of the house, Leo had done what his father could not.
And since Leo was the man of this house, he could protect its occupants how he liked. Leo could defend his territory, his women. His hands shook as if he were still that hungry child.
The knock at the door startled him. His blood thrummed. Jeffrey looked at him; he was tall and handsome as all footmen were somehow required to be, but he was an idiot. Leo pulled at his clothes, smoothing any wrinkles. “I’ll be in my study,” he told Jeffrey, nodding at the door.
Jeffrey thankfully was smart enough to wait until Leo had gone past the threshold of his room before he opened the door.
Leo heard the voice. He knew that voice even after the fifteen-odd years since he’d heard it last. It was raspier than it had been. Not as threatening and full. Still subtly slurring his words. Leo made his way to his desk, aware that the women all watched him. His mother appeared at ease, but he could see the strain in her jaw as she clenched it. How her posture went falsely rigid—the way a person braces for the impact of a blow. He hated seeing it. The woman he’d remembered her as—gaunt, eyes made larger from lack of flesh—overlaid the plump older woman who sat before him.
Prudence stared at him, her gray eyes wide in surprise and wariness. God, she was pretty. He’d mucked the whole thing up, and after this business with his father was sorted, he’d make things up to her. He wanted her around. He liked having her around. More than anything, he wanted to have time at Thornridge, the two of them sipping morning tea in the sunshine, making love with a cool afternoon breeze wafting in through the open window. He’d give anything to go back in time and outbid Eyeball. He’d happily pay well more than eleven hundred pounds now. This was a nightmare to have her embroiled in the debacle that was Reggie.
“A Mister Reginald Morgan, sir.” Jefferey bowed as he admitted Leo’s father. It was completely unnecessary for Jeffrey to bow, but it did make the impact on Reggie Morgan, who looked around the room, no doubt assessing the value of every piece in it.
His father lookedold. It was hard to miss the left-sided limp. The droop to his face. The left arm that was smaller than the right, and curled up in a tight slender fist, as if it might never unclench again. “You’ve done well for yourself, Len.”
“Leo,” he corrected. While his father and those men called him Len or Lenny, it was his mother who’d always addressed him as Leo. Her lion. And he meant to live up to his name.
“Of course. My mistake. Ah, and Mrs. Cabot and Miss Pendansky, lovely to see you again so soon.” Reggie turned to address them, and again, Leo had the opportunity to see how the man’s body had diminished. Reggie was in an old man’s body. But Reggie had never had an old man’s mind. He couldn’t let his father prey on any of them. He wouldn’t allow it.
“I thought you called him Leo,” Prudence said softly. “Your little lion.”
Reggie’s head bobbed this way and that. “Leo, Len, does it matter? He can be both.”
Leo stood, his heart wrenching when he realized that Reggie had already begun lying, but also realizing his father would never make it all the way across the room without assistance. The white-knuckled fist of his diminished hand looked painfully contracted.
“And there she is,” Reggie said, grabbing his chest in overdramatic theatrics, and ignoring any censure from Prudence. “The love of my life. My heart, my reason for living.”
“Good morning, Reggie,” Leo’s mother said. Her voice betrayed nothing. No fear, no apprehension. Calm and cool and collected, as she’d always been.
“Morning, Lena.” Reggie gave her a wide, lopsided smile. Leo came around the side of the sofa quickly enough that he saw his father attempt his seducer’s smile. The one that had bewitched her.
Glancing at his mother, he was terrified she might succumb to this man that she’d once loved—for she had loved him, hadn’t she? Had she used that word about him? He couldn’t remember now. But his mother’s placid expression still held.
“Won’t you have a seat?” Mrs. Moon said. “It is a relief, is it not, to let our old bones rest a bit?”
Was she baiting him? Leo’s pulse leapt at the thought, terrified that he’d have to make the seven-foot distance between them if his father was upset. But no.
Reggie Morgan sank gratefully into the chair next to his mother. “You’ve called it correctly, love. The things we used to do aren’t so easy now, are they?” He winked at her, and his double-entendre made Leo’s stomach churn.
For her part, Mrs. Moon tittered. Like a schoolgirl. Damn it, he was going to have to bodily haul his father out of this house before his mother fell to his charms again. “Reggie, if I believed for an instant you could still do that, I wouldn’t have let you in the house.”
Leo’s mind felt like a curdled milk. His mother was dealing with Reggie far better than he was. How could she forgive him like this? How could she wipe away the neglect and hurt?
“Might I have a bit of tea? Always helps.” Reggie looked at the ladies, no doubt noticing the extra cup waiting on the tray. The cup that was meant for Leo. Miss Pendansky leaned forward and poured. “I do better in the mornings. It’s after I’ve walked a bit, my hip stiffens up and I have a bit of a go.” Miss Pendansky handed him the teacup and saucer, which Reggie took with obvious relief. “Cheers, love.”
His mother, for her part, put down hers and folded her hands into her lap. “Reggie. After all this time. What precisely is your aim in visiting us?”
Reggie had time to take a sip and make innocent calf eyes at her before he was forced to respond. The man had the audacity to look at Leo. “Can I not catch up with my very successful son? Take pride in his accomplishments?”
