Page 10 of The Bastard's Iberian Bride
James Everly, Viscount Bakeley, eldest legitimate son and heir of the Earl of Shaldon, nodded back at him. A grin split his face, quickly squashed into a somber expression. “Hello, brother,” he said.
That flashing grin was the Bakeley he’d known the summer he’d spent at Cransdall so many years ago.
Bakeley, the man, had grown into his mother’s son—stable, a good steward of the vast family holdings and wealth, a conventional lord. Not a sneaking, swindling, lying spy. Boring, almost. They’d run into each other in London months earlier, re-establishing the thin fraternal tie. Not so thin that Bakeley hadn’t hinted at some frustration with Shaldon since the Earl’s return to Cransdall.
Bakeley had managed the estate since his mother’s untimely death years earlier, and he’d done a damn fine job of it from what Bink could see. During their chats, Bakeley had mentioned some investments that had soured, some bad years due to weather. And of course, the troubles of the post-war economy. Shaldon, who’d spent his life letting others manage his riches while he managed the world, thought the estate should be doing better.
Of the many emotions roiling in Bakeley right now, one had to be relief that the badgering would soon end.
He pounded Bink’s shoulder. “You’re still bigger than me.”
“And I can still take you, if you keep pounding on me.”
He launched a soft jab at Bink’s other shoulder. “We’ll have a mill when this is over, what say you?”
A murmur of voices in the background brought Bakeley up. “Right then. This is a dreadful business. Shall we go in?”
Bink’s empty stomach churned. “I’ve come this far.”
Bakeley ushered him through a dressing room and into a bedroom with its grand canopied tester and ornate hangings. A thin, soberly-dressed man—a physician probably—hovered nearby. On the other side of the bed a solidly built manservant fussed with the bedclothes. The window curtains were drawn against the dusk, and candles spread uncertain circles of light.
Nerves rebelling, Bink fought for a breath, the air in the room thick from the warmth of an unnecessary fire and the tension of slow dying.
He stepped up to the bed.
A pair of dark eyes under grizzled hair followed his movements. Nothing else in the man moved—well, except for the upturn of his lips.
Bedclothes rustled and a hand emerged, yellowing flesh clinging to big bones. He still managed an aura of strength and command.
“Come closer.”
The voice was firmer than Bink would have expected. Even in his dying this man radiated power.
Bink’s feet seemed frozen in place, his spine locked upright.
“Edward,” the sick man said.
Edward.Edward Bink Gibson was the name on his baptismal register, yet it was like some other man being summoned.
He took in another deep breath. This was something to be got through, like the death of an anonymous soldier a man stumbled across in the smoke, the survivor tied to the dying, invisibly, intimately, even without the knowing that came with fighting shoulder to shoulder, or swilling from the same rum pot, or sharing a meal.
Bink moved closer. The man held his gaze, intelligence shining through the fog of what must be pain. His sallow skin had been freshly shaved, his hair combed.
“You summoned me,” Bink said.
“Indeed. Blast this bed.” Those words slurred, and the laugh that followed ended on a spluttering cough. “You’re a fine fellow.”
“A fine fellow you had to meet before you died?”
He rattled out another laugh. “No. A fine son. And we’ve met, boy. On the Peninsula.” The fingers lifted. “I had to see Addy’s boy for myself. Took off and enlisted. Too stubborn to ask me to buy a commission. You made me proud, boy.”
A coughing fit brought the manservant to his side and gave Bink time to sort through the pictures careening around in his jumbled brain. No Earl of Shaldon had crossed his path—or that of his commander, Major Beauverde, the current Lord Hackwell—he was sure.
The man was lying, like all spies lied; just like he’d lied when Bink was a boy, promising to meet him that long ago summer.
“He needs to rest,” the physician whispered.
“Damn you, I’ll have an eternity of that.” The garbled cry came with another cough. “I could not tell you, Edward.” He lifted his head a fraction. “Don’t you remember? You took apadreacross themontanhas,” he said, adopting a heavy accent.
