Page 62 of Destined to be a Duchess
“I should be beholden to men I have never known and never will?” Anthony scoffed. “I suppose you count yourself among them. I owe you nothing. I owe Eliana nothing.”
“Despite what she saw?” Warren tilted his head to the side, mockingly. “Before you think her a most duplicitous little thing, she kept your dirty secret long enough until a friend of mine heard you were going to London. We soon deduced the reason for your hasty departure. It did not take long to discover the time of Marianne’s hearing. And you’re to attend a summons of your own this afternoon.”
“What is it you’re seeking from me? What did you comehereseeking?” Anthony snarled in disgust, leaning forward. “My mere compliance? A betrothal for your daughter? How could you want that life for her?” He leaned back, thinking hard.
“No, it cannot be about Eliana. Flawed as you are, I do not believe you would make a sacrificial lamb of her unless you felt you had no other choice. What is the Westden friendship worth to you? The Westden silence ...?”
Warren fell silent, staring at Anthony with dark, soulless eyes. This was water he did not want to tread. Which meant Anthony needed to press forward.
“I know many things that you do not,” Anthony said.
“I have no doubt you think you do.” Warren laughed, raising his cup to his lips. “Like virtue and honour? Like true love?”
“No ...” Anthony frowned. He could not believethiswas the man he had looked up to for his entire life. “Like your visits to Doctor De Laurier.”
Warren’s cup clattered against the saucer, and Anthony jerked back at the sound, knowing he was on the right path. Vindication was far from his mind. Because if his suspicions were correct, Warren and his father were involved in something dreadful.
“I visited him,” Anthony continued, watching Warren unravel. “And I found his notes. You and Father were his patients, which meant you lied to me when you said you had no idea who DeLaurier was. You lied about the painting, too—the Velasquez hanging in your gallery.
You lied about Father’s wish to see me marry Eliana. I do not believe you have ever fed me anything but lies my entire life. Was my father the same way, or did you genuinely love him—”
“You know nothing of what you speak!” Warren shot into a stand, clattering the service. His fist came down on the table. “Edward was a brother to me. And I will not stand to be accused of betraying him by you.You, who has done nothing in your fleeting existence to justify your arrogance.”
“Arrogance did not lead me down this path.” Anthony rose, pointing at Warren. “You did. What did De Laurier do to my father?”
“Everything he did was at your father’s bequest! And I am as sorry as you are that it killed him, but—”
“Killed him ...?”
Anthony reeled back like he’d been punched in the gut. He had been right all along. His father’s death had not been natural. He couldn’t breathe, trying to preserve his fragile hold on his emotions as Warren kept talking and would not stop—defending what remained of his own innocence.
“He found the doctor through his own means, desperate to cling on to his youth. A friend of a friend introduced them, and of course, he told me. No matter what you may think of me, my loyalty to your father was true and unwavering.” Warren looked out the window beside them, his fist unfurling on the table.
“The treatments De Laurier gave him were all supposed to be harmless. Cutting-edge medicine to bolster one’s mental and physical faculties. Edward wanted more, and his pride fed into De Laurier’s pride, and before long, the treatments made him sicker than he would have been without them.”
“I don’t believe this.” Anthony shook his head, pushing down his rising nausea. “All of this is farcical. You’re lying. You’restilllying.”
“Would that I was.” Warren slumped into his seat, and it ground against the floor. “He introduced me to De Laurier a few months into his own treatment. I accepted for a time, but I could not meet the cost as long as Edward. I made excuses and pled with him to abandon De Laurier like I had. Edward was too far gone. I told you. His only sin was his pride.”
That part, at least, was credible. Anthony had heard as much from his mother, and she had no reason to deceive him. He tried to picture his father—level-headed, pragmatic, honourable Edward Colline—being seduced by the prospect of a longer lifeby a mad physician. Had he not seen De Laurier’s notes with his own eyes, he might not have believed it.
“But the painting?” Anthony asked. “What you said about my father wishing me to marry Eliana? Thosewerelies. You used my father’s death as a means of advancement. How can you have done all that and still present yourself as his fiercest ally?”
He watched Warren carefully for a response. The marquess remained silent. He had said many things about his father’s pride, but Warren was just as much a slave to his own ego.
“The cost ...” Anthony thought back on Warren’s words. “Was this all for money? You wanted me to marry Eliana because you wanted access to my father’s wealth?”
Again, Warren said nothing, only proving to Anthony that he was right. The Webbs were not nearly as affluent as the Colline family, and perhaps that had been a cause of underlying tension between them. Warren was proud to a fault. He might have loved Edward like a brother, all while being deathly jealous of him.
These men that Anthony had looked up to for his entire life had spent years chasing honour and glory—only running further from all that was good in the process. And with that knowledge, there was nothing more Anthony could learn from Warren or his father. He supposed he should be glad. He felt only resentment instead. And that, too, was liberating.
“What do you plan to do with all this new knowledge?” Warren’s tone was damning, still smug after everything Anthony had discovered. “It changes nothing.”
“You may not be so confident in that belief once thetonlearns of your association with De Laurier. I will bring the man to justice. Whether my father’s death was the result of his own hubris or not, his blood is still partly on De Laurier’s hands. And the other things I saw, the sketches of bodies ...”
Anthony inhaled sharply. “None of this was done above board. If it had been, you would not have been so reluctant to tell me the reason for my father’s death when I first asked. Use my mistake at Hagram Park to blackmail me, and I will see that you are buried in a shallow grave with your own secrets.”
“An eye for an eye?” Warren laughed. “Where was the honour you were touting earlier?”
