Page 61 of A Widow for the Earl
“I must have the final say in my sister’s future, Beatrice,” he rasped. “I have done everything for them. I have given my whole life to ensure that they are safe and they are happy, and I cannot fall at the last hurdle. I cannot leave it in her hands.”
Beatrice expelled a sigh. “But she is not happy, Vincent. She is not safe. Society will gossip because they cannot help themselves.”
“Do not suppose to tell me how best to arrange things for my family,” he retorted, his hand grasping his napkin. “Since I was practically a boy, I have been fixing things, setting out a plan to ensure the longevity of the Wilds’. It has never been easy, it has often demanded sacrifices and difficult decisions, but that is what has seen us flourish. I will not stop now, because Prudence is chagrined.”
“Fixing what sort of things?” Beatrice asked mildly, but he was already in the current of his anger, swept along.
He got up from his seat, pacing. “When my father died, we were on the verge of bankruptcy. Our coffers were all but empty. Can you imagine learning that when you have just lost the man you respected most in the world? Can you imagine being so young, having no idea what to do with the mess that had just been poured on you?
“No, I do not expect you can,” he grumbled, coming around to her side of the table. “But I had to work tirelessly, day and night, to restore our frittered fortune. I had to conduct business that was completely foreign to me. I had to learn so quickly it made my head hurt. I had to make new associates, beg and borrow for investments, plead for more time to pay back debts, while having to act as a substitute father to my sisters, and a staunch pillar for my mother to lean on. Keeping that blasted secret so they would not worry that their home was about to be taken from them, too.”
Beatrice gazed at him, wide-eyed. He had not realized he had wandered so close to her, but there was only a chair’s length between them. It was as if his fevered mind had made him think that being nearer to her would make her understand better.
And hewantedher to understand, more than anyone.
I am not strict and stern and grumpy because I want to be. It is how I was shaped.
“How old were you?” she asked quietly.
He swallowed, his temper cooling. “Fifteen. I was at Eton when I received word that my father had been injured. I told my friends I would be back soon, but… I never had the option to return.”
“You must have been so lost,” she said, a gleam of moisture in her eyes. “You are right; I cannot imagine that sort of hardship. I was tossed into society at fifteen by parents who resented myexistence, and thought that was bad enough, but that is nothing in comparison.”
Resented your existence?His mind faltered, thinking back to another heated conversation.
“To add insult to injury, my father has forbidden me from returning to the one place where I felt safe.”He had assumed her father did not want her back at his residence because of the shame and infamy surrounding her after three marriages. He had not realized that it ran deeper than that, stemming from something as horrible as parents who hated their only child. Perhaps, always.
“What was your father like?” she asked, before he could muster the words to offer his returned sympathies.
Vincent took another step closer, resting his hand on the back of the empty chair. “He was… kind. He adored the girls. Whenever he went to London, he would purchase trinkets for them, just to make them smile.” His voice caught in his throat. “He was different with me. Not sterner, but… he treated me more as his equal than his child. We would always hunt and fish and walk together, and he would speak to me as if I were a gentleman instead of a boy.”
“Those sound like difficult shoes to fill.” Beatrice smiled up at him sadly. “You must have been so angry to discover that all was not as well as it appeared. Angrier still that he was gone, so he was not there to guide you through it. Indeed, it must have beenhard to love him, grieve him, miss him, and be so furious with him, all at once.”
A small gasp whispered from the back of his throat, for she had just explained it all in a way he had spent thirteen years trying—and failing—to do.
“I was so bitter,” he wheezed, his chest tightening. “And every challenge, every struggle, every obstacle, just made me even more embittered. I had to become cold, or I would have floundered. Saving us from destitution demanded that I be strict, with myself as well as my sisters.”
She reached out for him, his breath lodging in his throat as her fingertips brushed his hand. A soft caress of sympathy, his own hand longing to take hold of hers. To kiss it. To thank her for listening to a story he had never told anyone, to feelings he had kept hidden for years.
What am I doing? I should not be saying any of this to her.
“I am sorry,” she said gently. “For all you have suffered, I am sorry.”
He gave into his longing, taking her hand into his, sliding his fingers between hers. She smiled up at him, offering one of the true, radiant smiles that he had coveted. The sight of it made him bend toward her, while she sat taller in her chair, as if she could read his mind.
I cannot help it. I am bewitched, and I do not care.
A moment away from kissing her, her full lips parting slightly, his strict mind overwhelmed his wilder heart. Like a schoolmaster with a cane, he snapped out of his determination to kiss her with a jolt. Unable to think of anything else that would explain why he had been bending toward her, he blew lightly against her rosy cheek.
“An eyelash,” he murmured.
“Oh…” she whispered, nodding.
Slowly, he withdrew his hand from hers. “I trust we understand one another better?”
“You have my word that I will not involve myself,” she replied, her voice strange. “But, in return, at least heed my advice and be a bit more lenient with Prudence. It is the last thing I shall say on the matter.”
He found himself nodding in reply, now understanding the value of her advice. “I will try.”
