Page 73 of Forgery, Love, and Other Lies
“Me? You received two estates, lands, farms, three thousand a year, everything that comes with the title. I received the townhouse in London, the remainder of my own dowry that I brought into my marriage, as well as what it had earned through investments. And all the art, which you never wanted, which you hated. Your father was responsible with his money, made wise investments. You, it appears, are not. I was struck bereft when I first learned of your perfidy and could do nothing but cry, but now that I have had an entire coach trip to think it over, I believe I shall go gather your children and your wife and bring them to live with me in London if they so wish. No need for them to suffer for your mistakes.”
“I have made no mistakes!” the baron shouted, jerking at his binding so that the chair jumped off the floor. “And I’ll not suffer for your crimes. That man there is a criminal, a forger.” He jerked his head toward Zander. “And he tried to kill me. And if he does not paint for me what I tell him, what will sell, then I will tell whoever will listen what he’s done.”
“Him? An art forger?” Lady Balantine laughed, putting her hand over her belly as if the mirth made her stomach ache. When she finally quieted, she wiped a tear from her eye and pinned him with a pitying gaze. “Oh darling, the art forger isme.” She closed the distance between herself and her son and leaned forward to wrap her hands around the arms of his chair. She went nose to nose with him, and, without blinking, said, “You may tell the world about my crimes, but you will bring yourself down with me. Do you understand? What connections you still retain will be lost. What gazes view you with respect will soon shift to sneers. There will likely be some publicity that comes with hanging a dowager baroness. And then you will be questioned as well. For haven’t you lately dipped your toes in the art world you insisted on separating me from? And if your mother is a crook… why… they often say that children drink the sins of their mothers with their milk.”
She stood and shrugged, then walked toward Zander. “Any word against this man will open my own mouth and release a flood of guilty confessions. I am, indeed, sorry for my crimes, and the slightest notion that someone else might suffer from them will simply tip me over the edge of my grief, spill out all those words, and then you are over as well as I. I have lived a long life, though. I am glad to give it if it means a free conscience.”
She strode to the window and pressed a palm against the glass. One fingertap, tap, tappedin the silence around them.
Zander cleared his throat. “The things he stole. They’re somewhere in this house. I saw one. It’s upstairs in the portrait gallery.”
Lady Balantine’s head turned slowly, and she smiled at him over her shoulder. “Ah. A good thing to come from today. A blessing. Go find the pilfered items, darlings.”
Zander nodded. “He’s already sold some. But I don’t know what.”
“I’ll get the information from him.” Lady Balantine turned back around, and the gaze she pinned to her son did not bode well for him.
Zander wrapped an arm around Fiona’s shoulder and guided her into the hallway. Theo followed them out, and shut the door to let the mother handle her progeny in private.
“I must admit things have not turned out as I expected them to,” Theo said, staring at the arm Zander used to pull Fiona safely to his side.
At least it should have felt safe. Right now, with his recent confession and his brother’s calm face hiding what must be a storm of pointed thoughts, she felt a little raw, a little vulnerable, a little lost.
Lord Theodore blinked and looked away from them. “Let us spread out to look for the paintings. I’ll retrieve the one from upstairs first. Give a yell if you find anything. I suppose we’ll need to cart it all back to London and to Lady Balantine’s home once we discover it?”
“We’ll put that question to her,” Zander said. “She’s the kind of woman to have opinions.”
Theo rolled his eyes and turned to trudge down the hall toward the front of the house. “I’m rather tired of that sort.”
Zander turned them without a word, and with steps that seemed quite heavy, he ushered her in the opposite direction. “I do not think they will have been hidden upstairs. I can’t imagine old Herbert going to that trouble.”
Fiona fit her strides to his. “Looking at the state of this place, I’m a bit concerned. What if they were not well protected?” Better to focus on the practical, even though that word—his confession oflove—bounced around inside her, begging for attention.
She would not admit the possibility of the paintings having been ruined. If it had been her copies, she would not have cared. She would have celebrated. In fact, she planned to ask Zander to burn the copies she’d made of his paintings as soon as he returned to his home. But these were his originals, the paintings that would allow him and his brothers to release some of the weight of their father’s irresponsibility.
“I wish my own father had been as responsible as Herbert’s,” Zander said. His mind must have been moving in the same direction as Fiona’s.
“Then you would not have ended up as responsible as you are,” she said. “You see, a responsible father formed an ungrateful son. A wastrel. And you were shaped to be a different sort of man.”
“A different sort of scoundrel, you mean.”
She poked him in the ribs, and he yelped and jumped away but quickly returned to her side, the corner of his mouth tugged up.
“You do not have to be a scoundrel, swindling people out of their art. I have seen how good an eye you have for fakes and forgeries. What if instead of helping rich people acquire art at low prices, you help everyone determine whether what they have is of value. Let them know exactly what they have, so they cannot be swindled. As you did at the auction.”
“Value is in the eye of the beholder.” He slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out half of a bent locket. “Trash to everyone, but a reminder to me.”
And that was why she loved him.
She stopped right there in the hall, turned to him, and cupped his jaw in both hands. She bit her bottom lip and shook her head as she stared at him. His usually clean-shaven face had several days’ worth of scruff growing on it, and he was covered in green paint. She needed to tell him. Right this very moment. But… his glassy gaze could not focus. It kept journeying from her to somewhere else.
“What are you thinking?” she asked.
“About the letters. Do you think they truly exist? They must.” He straightened, pulling out of her grasp, and the rough stubble on his cheeks scraped against her palms.
She curled her fingernails in, welcoming the sharp bite.
He paced away from her, then spun around, arms spread out wide. “But what would the man have to say? Why did heknowand never reprimand me? Where were his tears of betrayal? His tirades about ungrateful sons?”
