Page 77 of My Secret Duke
Ivo leaned forward in his chair. “I’m sure he won’t refuse you permission without listening to you first. You can persuade him, Charles.”
“Perhaps. He is very protective of his sisters. This is a man who gave up his gambling club to take care of them. Even if he didn’t still think of me as the rake I oncewas, he’d hem and haw about it, ticking off all the pros and cons.”
Ivo considered his own situation. What would happen if he asked Gabriel for Olivia’s hand? He’d probably be shown the door quick smart and told never to darken it again. He suspected Gabriel had already warned her to stay away from him, and honestly, he couldn’t blame him.
Irritably, Charles pushed aside some of the papers on his desk. “Have you heard anything more from the Revenue Service?”
“Lieutenant Harrison is conspicuously absent, but that doesn’t mean he’s given up.”
“You have friends in high places,” Charles reminded him.
Ivo hoped that was true, but before he could answer, there was a perfunctory knock on the door, and Will Tremeer entered.
He stopped, gray eyes wide. “Oh, sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realize you were here, Northam. Have you come to check on your investment?”
Charles gave him a hard look. “Mind your manners, boy. Northam is just as much your boss as me. Do you want to return to Cornwall?”
Will shuddered at the thought but didn’t seem too worried by the threat. “Apologies,” he said, and gave Charles the information he had come to deliver.
Ivo stood up to leave. “I will see you tonight,” he told Charles.
“It is seven o’clock,” Charles reminded him, with an anxious look.
“On the dot.”
Will followed him out.
“You are enjoying your employment here then?” Ivoasked him, just for something to say. He did not know Will well, but he found him a pleasant young man. He was certainly dedicated to the club, and Charles had come to rely on him a great deal.
“It’s the best thing that’s happened to me,” Will confided. “Charles is the perfect employer. I miss Gabriel being in the office sometimes, but I still see him at home. And I’m grateful for both our sakes that he married Vivienne.”
“I think he made the right choice,” Ivo said.
Will beamed. “So do I!”
As he walked away, Ivo found himself mulling over Gabriel and Vivienne, and now Charles and Justina. He wished his own situation could end happily, but how was it possible when things were such a mess? He hadn’t spoken to Olivia since that awful night, and although he had picked up his pen a number of times, the words would not come to him. Should he apologize? Should he tell her again he was a better man? How could she believe him now?
The sobering consequences of his many reckless actions, of his foolish mistakes, had truly come home with a vengeance when he learned Jacob Rendall was behind his arrest. He had realized just how far-reaching the consequences of his unthinking decisions could be. He must keep Olivia well out of it.
Whatever hopes he had for a future with her, he must put them aside.
Ivo was a little late arriving at Ashton House. Before he left, he had made the hasty decision to tell his motherabout Charles, realizing that word might get out after the proposal. The truth was better coming from him than some malicious gossip. His revelation had brought on a bout of hysterics. Once his mother calmed down, and even seemed resigned to this fresh disclosure about her husband, Ivo left her in his sisters’ care.
The Ashtons’ butler informed him that Charles and Gabriel were together in the library, and Ivo hurried to join them. As soon as he walked in the door, he could see that Charles’s request had not gone down well. Gabriel was frowning in an intimidating manner, and Charles had lost his usual even temper. In fact, they were leaning into each other as if they were about to start shouting.
When Gabriel looked up and saw Ivo, he barked, “What do you want?”
Ivo raised his eyebrows. “Charles asked me to come.”
“You’re late,” Charles said quietly. “I told you seven.”
“And I’m sorry, but I had to tell my mother. I’m here now.”
Gabriel shot his friend a puzzled glare.
Charles ignored it. “I asked Northam to be present while I speak to you, Gabriel. In case you have any, eh, questions.”
“Questions about what? I think I know you well enough by now, Charles.”
