Page 59 of Vanquished By A Viscount
Howard looked back at him with surprise. “Why would you think that?” he asked.
Gray nervously rubbed the back of his neck and glanced up the grand staircase beside them and on toward the family wing of the house. “I abandoned Charlie once, and I believe he fears I will do the same again.”
Howard’s expression pinched with confusion. “Did you not tell me once before that Lord Broxbourne threw you over and not the other way around?”
“Yes, he did,” Gray said, squirming on his spot as an avalanche of emotions swirled in him. “But I did not need to sell myself around the way I did after. I did not need to overindulge or enjoy myself quite so much on the Continent.”
Howard surprised him by laughing loudly. He clapped a hand on Gray’s shoulder that made him feel as young as he’d been when he first flung himself into another man’s arms to spite Charlie. “Young men are never wrong to enjoy themselves and gain experience of the world,” Howard said.
“I am uncertain whether I agree with that,” Gray answered him with a suspicious look.
“You were young,” Howard tried again. “Green. Inexperienced in both the ways of the heart and the ways of the body. If any mistakes were made, they are easily forgiven. Youth is folly, but that is how we gain wisdom.”
Gray tilted his head slightly to the side in consideration. “I suppose that is true.”
“I see your true concern, though,” Howard went on, much of the man’s wisdom showing in the genuine caring in his eyes. “You have been given a rare chance to reclaim a love you lost,and you fear that too much folly lies between where you left off with Broxbourne and where you are now.”
“I do not know whether he distrusts me or doubts himself more,” Gray said as more of the tangle became clear. “Either way, I would hate for any of it to stand between us.”
Howard shifted his hand from Gray’s shoulder to the side of his face in an almost fatherly gesture. “You know what you want in your heart, Grayson,” he said. “After what I have seen in the last few days, I believe that Broxbourne wants the same things. That does not mean it will be an easy path from one to the other, but I am certain that if the two of you talk things through, you will find the place you are meant to be.”
“I hope so,” Grayson said, sighing. He rested a grateful hand atop Howard’s on his cheek.
“And you would be an utter fool to travel to Australia now,” Howard added, teasing back in his voice. “Unless you took Broxbourne with you.”
Gray shook his head. “He would never go. He would not leave his sister so far behind him. Charlie is nothing if not painfully responsible.”
He meant what he said without any sort of malice, but it happened that a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye drew his attention, and when he turned his head, he saw Charlie watching him and Howard from the top of the grand staircase.
Charlie wore a stricken look, as though he’d heard what Gray said and took it as an insult.
No, it wasn’t what Gray said that had put the expression on Charlie’s face or that made him turn sharply and stride quickly back down the corridor toward his bedroom. It was the way Gray stood close to Howard and the way Howard still had his hand on the side of Gray’s face.
“Oh, no,” Gray groaned, taking a large step back from Howard. “You see?” he asked, taking a step toward the stairs.“Everything I do, Charlie is going to interpret as the beginning of the end of things.”
“Then he is an even bigger fool than you are,” Howard called after Gray as he reached the stairs. “Give it time,” Howard added as Gray started up. “He will only trust you again if you build up that trust bit by bit over time.”
Gray was certain his friend was right, but it did not ease the discomfort gnawing at Gray’s gut.
That discomfort was only made worse when Gray reached Charlie’s door and knocked, only to receive no answer. “Charlie?” he asked before turning the handle and stepping into the room.
The room was empty, though. Wherever Charlie had gone when he’d fled something he saw but did not understand, it was not to his room.
Gray sighed heavily and leaned against the doorframe, wondering what he could possibly do to reassure the only man he would ever love and win him back for good.
Nineteen
War raged within Charlie as he walked away from the sight of Bradford with his hand on Gray’s face. Every bit of good sense he had screamed at him that he should not jump to conclusions and immediately assume the worst between the two men.He’dbeen in Gray’s bed the night before, not Bradford. There were a thousand explanations for the contact between the two men.
But the heart was difficult to convince to see reason when it was already tender and exhausted. What would stop Grayson from having whatever affair he wanted if he was departing for Australia before the end of the month? Bradford very much seemed like a better man than him at any rate.
The arguments raged in Charlie’s head as he stomped toward his bedroom. He wasn’t even certain he believed any of the arguments various parts of him were making, he was simply exhausted. He could not bear to remain at Hawthorne House for a moment longer if doing so would only grow the attachment between him and Grayson. It was time to leave.
Just before reaching his bedroom door, he remembered that Olivier had gone downstairs with one of his jackets that needed repairing. Instead of entering his room, he continued down the hall, heading toward the servants’ staircase that would take him belowstairs.
Except instead of heading down in search of his valet, he marched right past the stairs to the doorway of Barbara and Robert’s bedroom, knocking quickly. He did not need his valet to pack his things so that he could flee back to Downham Manor. He needed his sister.
“Come in?” Barbara’s voice sounded from the other side of the door.
