Page 29 of Lessons for Marquesses
“It’s mine, Oliver. She has no right to love it.”
“She’ll burn the damn place with her in it before she’ll give it to you.”
“I’m not asking her to give. I’ll pay for it. And you will find out who bought that desk. Henry VIII sat at it during a progress.”
“You are a sensible man, a kind man. You know Georgiana had no part in your loss.”
Oliver knew so little of him now to think he was sensible or kind. “You know what happened to me. You know the injustice done. You know St. Clair killed my brother.”
How had William St. Clair overtaken his brother, who had been twenty years younger?
“You don’t know that,” Oliver asserted.
Grabbing the bottle, Nicholas headed to the rear door. A march through the small wood was in order, where he would find peace to revel in his coming victory.
Oliver chased after him. “I am not finished!”
“Go back before you twist an ankle,” Nicholas barked over his shoulder. He shoved a branch aside and let it fly as he passed through.
Thwack.
An oomph rent the marshy afternoon air. “Nick! Will you stop? I’ve twisted my ankle.”
“You wanted me to regain Farendon,” Nicholas said. “And yet you defend her. Feel sympathy for her.” He kept marching to the end of the wood, wishing his breath to be challenged, something to concentrate on besides his rage.
He had been raised to honor his family, been naive to think that aristocratic parents, if they didn’t love their children, they had at least a semblance of compassion for them. At minimum, a desire to continue the line within the family.
Nicholas’s father, uncaring sot, had had no minimum. Not for the straight arrow who resembled his mother where Edmund favored his father. Not for Nicholas who he’d once alleged was another’s man’s son.
An uneven step rustled the underbrush behind him. “She is my blood. She is?—”
“Do not say it.” Nicholas couldn’t bear it.
“She is a good person. She had nothing to do with this. Acquaint yourself with her. Get to know her. Find a compromise.”
“I know you formed and executed the scheme to save me. There was no satisfying my father. He did not care for my fate.”
Silence ensued. That Oliver, who had a rejoinder for everything, said nothing was damning.
“My father believed I killed Edmund. If I’d had his support, it would have been a mishap between brothers. You drew up the contract to save me. You presented it to my mother. She had my father give away Farendon in a drunken stupor.”
“Not all true, I?—”
“Does Georgiana know what her father did? What he stole from me?”
“What good would it do? Do you think she would believe you? Now? After you’ve trampled her dreams?”
Back at the start. With Oliver, one could go round and round and never reach the point. It was a talent. “You put the terms of resale in the agreement with St. Clair. You wished for me to regain my home and you question my tactics. I followed the path provided. I offered honestly. For more than its worth in gold, and she refused. If she will not concede, if she does not have the sense to save her own skin, then so be it.”
Oliver limped in front of him, having lost a shoe and favoring an ankle. “How far will you go to regain Farendon? How far must she fall, how much will she suffer for you?”
“Is that rhetorical? I’ve no need for it. Never have.”
“No, blast it. It’s not.”
“I will do whatever is needed. Without regard to her suffering.”
“The hell you will!”
