His friend grinned. “Not booking passage with me back to Boston then?”
“Not on your life.” Peter returned the grin, then sobered. He held out his hand. “I will miss you, my friend.”
Quincy took it in a bone-crushing grip. “No more than I will miss you.” His eyes glistened, and for a panicked moment, Peter feared he would cry. In the next instant, his grin was back in full force, the shimmer turning to wickedness. “But don’t think I won’t be visiting you, and often. I find I have a taste for English beauties and will not be able to stay away for long. You just may grow sick of me.”
“Never,” Peter managed through a tight throat. He threw an arm about Quincy’s shoulders. “Now, let’s see about finding the fastest horse Liverpool has to offer. For I’ve a proposal to make.”
Chapter 31
By the time Peter returned to the Isle of Synne, his momentary fever of hope and excitement was long gone. Nearly three full days of riding hell-bent for leather had effectively cured him of those foreign emotions, leaving only soul-sucking anxiety and a vague kind of panic. What the hell was he doing? He still wasn’t convinced he was good for Lenora, that she could be happy with him. And he sure as hell didn’t deserve her.
Regardless, here he was. Ready to be kicked in the groin by love for the chance to claim her for his own.
He pulled his horse up when he came to the crossroads between Danesford and Seacliff. She was so close, he could almost feel her in his arms. Every bit of him ached to close the distance between them and put himself out of his misery once and for all.
But for the first time since he was a lad, sneaking aboardThe Persistencein a desperate attempt to survive, fear reared up, almost choking him. This was nothing like the fear he had felt when Lenora had been lost in the rain. Then, it had only honed his focus and determination to find her and bring her home safe. No, this fear had him wanting to turn tail and run, to return to his old life, where everything was planned and prescribed. Where the only danger to him was to his bank account and there was no chance of having his heart dashed to pieces.
He frowned. No, that wasn’t right. For his heart wasn’t whole to begin with. Lenora had it, held in her small hands, with those talented, graceful fingers. And so there was nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Still he couldn’t urge his mount forward. There was something else holding him back, something unfinished. As his gaze swung to the left, and down the path to Danesford, he suddenly knew what it was. How could he possibly go to Lenora, asking her to make a life with him, when things were so unfinished with Dane?
For too long he had let hate and revenge abide in his soul, to drive him in every decision he made. He had to go to Lenora with no encumbrances, no anchors holding him back. Without giving himself time to think it through, he turned his horse’s head toward Danesford.
As he rode up the drive, he realized with a start that, though this place had been such a huge part of who he was now, this was only his third time traveling up the long, straight drive. The first time he had been a lad full of fear and a desperate hope. The second time he had been a furious man with a cold, hateful heart. Now he had come full circle, for he was once again filled with fear and desperate hope. He only prayed he came away this time free of the past.
He did not expect, however, to be turned away at the door.
“I am sorry, Mr. Ashford, but His Grace cannot see anyone.”
There was a quiet grief in the stoic man’s eyes that chilled Peter to the bone. “Is he…that is, has he…” He could not finish the thought. As much as he had hoped for the man’s demise, that he would end his days in fear over what Peter would do to all he held dear, now the very idea filled him with agony. No, it could not end like this.
The butler’s next words had him nearly collapsing in relief. “No, sir. But he is close.”
He should depart. The duke might even now be insensible to the world. Such had been the way his mother had passed, incoherent, not even able to return the pressure of his hand as he’d begged her to come back to him.
But he had to try.
“Please,” he rasped. “I have come all this way. I must see him.”
“I am sorry, Mr. Ashford—”
“I will take him to see Father.”
Peter looked up sharply and spied Lady Clara on the stairs. Her face was haggard, and thinner than it had been. The rosy blush that so often stained her cheeks was gone, and a dull pain suffused her gentle eyes. She nodded to him, and his heart ached from the coolness there, when before she had been all warmth and welcome. It was not only her father’s coming death that had put it there, he knew. He had done that, had put the wall up between them.
“Mr. Ashford,” she said now as the butler bowed and moved off in quiet respect, “if you will follow me, I shall show you to Father.”
He rushed after her as she made her way back up the stairs. Immediately upon passing the threshold, he sensed it, the still and hushed atmosphere of the house, heavy with the impending death of its master. It was cloying, seeping under his skin, bringing with it that same panic he had felt thirteen years ago. Once again he was that young boy, watching his mother pass into the next world. Once more hopelessness crashed through him.
He shook his head sharply and peered at Lady Clara’s back, her posture brittle and ramrod straight. He longed to tell her all would be well. Empty words, he knew, when her father was about to be ripped from her.
The family quarters were shrouded in silence. She brought him to the door at the far end. Once her hand was on the latch, however, she paused. She bowed her head, and he thought he saw a trembling in her limbs. In the next moment, however, she pushed open the door on silent hinges.
“Father, Peter Ashford is here to see you.”
There was a rasp of sound from the depths of the room, unintelligible to where Peter stood out in the hall. Lady Clara stepped aside and, keeping her eyes on the floor, indicated with a nod of her head that he was to enter.
Taking a deep breath, Peter moved past her and entered the Duke of Dane’s private apartments.
