Cort swore and tossed the arrow into the copse of azaleas at his side. “Low blow, Dame. I’m over my infatuation. Alex is merely a family friend of long standing, a girl I once knew. Isn’t there a ballad about that?” He kicked an oak branch from his path, strode two steps forward, then one back. The frown he shot Damien was positively feral. “A hundred times or more, I’ve told you and Knox that it’s over. Done. One kiss, years ago, an awkward attempt that was soundly rebuffed. Now, I’m finished, the stars struck from my eyes, although I’m proud of myself for giving it a go with the girl when I was merely a gangly lad. On to greener pastures, easier campaigns and such.”
“Greener pastures, indeed,” Damien murmured, not believing a word. Except the part about women and Cortland DeWitt being easy pairings. Such were the dreams of men who could actually talk to women.
Cort wrestled with his cravat, making a mess of his valet’s pristine effort. “Alex is dancing attendance at the Marriage Mart and will soon be wed, while I’m out and about, enjoying the choices being offered the depraved, arrived-three-minutes-too-late second son of a duke. I’m squiring Widow Belle-Hawkins to the opera next week, in fact, and everyone knows how that will go.”
Damien hummed, beginning to enjoy the conversation, despite his discomfort. His brother was mad for Alexandra Mountbatten and everyone but Alexandra Mountbatten knew it. “Brilliant. Because she’s too old for you, too tall for you. And, she only cares for horses.”
Cort halted so suddenly, he kicked up an earthen clump with the toe of his Hessian. “Five years isn’t so much. And I shot up half a foot last summer, if you’d care to notice!”
A notion came to Damien, one that kept him up nights. “You always said you’d seek out a commission if she married. You were joking, weren’t you? What son of a duke enters the military, am I right?”
“Of course, I was joking.” But he scrubbed his hand across his jaw, his gaze dancing away in a manner that sent Damien’s belly pitching to his knees. His brothers meant everything to him, and since he’d likely not have his own family due to his eccentricities, they always would.
Cort dug in his coat pocket and came out with a scrap of paper. He fiddled with the crumpled edge before reluctantly extending it to Damien. “I found this by the hedge. It’s yours, so I suppose you should have it.”
“Mine?”
Cort stretched his shoulders and released a pent-up breath. “It’s you, I should say.”
Damien’s hand shook as he brought the sketch close to his face. It was a wonder he could hit the archery target with such poor vision. His spectacles were in his bedchamber, hidden beneath a handkerchief in the top drawer of his escritoire. The sight of them resting on his nose made his father angrier than a medical device one needed to see should.
It was simply another in a long line of traits his father hated about him.
The drawing was delicately rendered, a rough, seemingly impulsive study. Moments ago, the bow clutched in his fist, his face turned to the heavens. She’d captured him appearing reflective and powerful when nothing could be further from the truth. “This is who I wish I were,” he whispered.
Cort tugged his hand through his hair, leaving the overlong strands in disarray. “It’s exactly how I see you. It’s what you can’t see that’s the problem.”
Damien folded the sketch and tucked it carefully in his trouser pocket. He winced as his wrist gave a painful twinge, realizing too late that Cort had seen the reaction.
“If he touches you again, I’ll kill him,” Cort vowed, his voice as harsh as Damien had ever heard it.
Damien laughed, hoping to shatter the bleakness overtaking them. “That will wreck our already-sullied reputation—the Duke of Herschel dying by his son’s hand. I can see the headlines in the scandal sheets.”
“Never again, Dame, do you understand me? The first time, that split on your lip, I let it go. This time, I can’t. I won’t. Father can bully me, he can even bully Knox—we’re finally bigger than he is—but he cannot bully you. I’ll leave it be when you’ve had the chance to grow into a man who can best him.” He held up his hand, his fingers closing in an angry fist. “You’re already there in mind. But it won’t all come down to what’s in bloody books.”
Damien wiped his fist across his upper lip, the scar pulsing when it was months old. Now, the pain was only in his mind. The time he saw Mercy Ainsworth rushing from the mercantile, he’d come from a monstrous encounter with his father. His inability to sit through a musicale, a dinner, or a literary reading had finally taken its toll. He didn’t know what was wrong with him, and his father didn’t care.
And he hated to tell his brother, but he’d probably never be physically able enough to best anyone.
“Go back, Cort. I’ll be in soon.” Damien glanced to the horizon and the threads of crimson and gold lighting the sky. He would go to the stables and ride to the lake and back in a fury the second Cort left him. That usually helped. “Mrs. Camden will be vexed if no one shows for dinner. Father made it through an entire bottle of brandy, so he won’t be in attendance.”
Damien watched Cort trudge through the side garden, across the veranda, and into the house, his brother’s shoulders weighed down by concern. His own heart heavy, Damien snaked the sketch from his pocket and gazed at the vision an utterly guileless young woman had of him.
Would he ever be this fearless?
Damien swallowed past a surge of emotion, palming his stomach to hold back the sensation. It was illogical, but someone outside his family seeing what was deep inside him gave him hope.
And courage.
CHAPTER ONE
WHERE A SECOND CHANCE PRESENTS ITSELF
A rainy afternoon in Mayfair ~ 1817
The theatrical poster in the millinery window stopped Damien in his tracks.
Raindrops trailed down the lead glass, distorting the image of a maid standing before a forest cottage, her expression forlorn. Lady of the Scullery, the title announced in bold, black lettering. Something about the technique of the drawing struck a chord, a remembrance long buried.
