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Bellona’s father sat, holding a cane, gnarled fingers grasping it, a birdlike flutter to his movements. It felt as if someone had left a raptor in the room and it had flown from place to place, leaving feathers and droppings about. A chair had been moved a bit. A tea cup sat half-empty with crumbs scattered. Rhys examined Hawkins’s face, looking for a resemblance to Bellona. He saw none, except perhaps a bit of the chin. And they both tilted their head to the side when showing displeasure.
Hawkins stood. ‘Rolleston.’ His bow was more the semblance of movement than anything else. ‘I have wasted near a day waiting on you.’
‘Greetings to you as well, Lord Hawkins. I am going to make you pay for what you did to Bellona. It is nothing personal, you understand. It is justice. You left your daughters to fend alone. You left a family without funds to live in little more than a shack on an island while you lolled about here.’
‘I did no such thing.’ His lips twisted. ‘My only family has always been in England.’
He thumped his walking stick on the floor. ‘I hate Warrington for giving refuge to those women when he should have packed them back on the ships they arrived on.’
‘They’re your daughters, no matter how much you deny it. You know it and I know it.’
‘I know no such thing.’ He chuckled. ‘It’s possible I spent some time with their mother while I was away from home. So I can understand how they might be under the impression I am their father. Ridiculous as it is.’
‘You make this easier for me.’
‘You let her gull you. You couldn’t keep your hands off her.’ He frowned and looked to the ceiling. His voice softened. ‘Not that I don’t understand. I had the same problem with her mother. Couldn’t leave the woman alone. I’d sail from Melos thinking I’d never see her again and then I’d go back. I couldn’t stay away.’
‘You were a married man.’
He chuckled, shrugging. ‘Only slightly.’
‘You are going to only slightly pay for deserting your daughters.’
Hawkins raised a pointed finger and softly shook it in the air. ‘Oh, no, no, no. You cannot do a thing to me or I will remind everyone how you soiled her. I am no different from other men. I even kept my number of visits to the island to a reasonable amount.’
A flush of intensity blasted Rhys’s body.
‘You would do well to follow my example.’ The voice hit Rhys’s ears with a clatter that rang on and on.
Rhys’s stomach churned cold.
Hawkins strode past Rhys. The walking stick brushed Rhys’s leg. Hawkins looked back over his shoulder. ‘She’s been nothing but trouble since she arrived. Calling on my wife. Not settling into suitable English society as her sister did. She’s nothing to me. My children—she let my real children see her. My daughter cried. Un...for...giv...able.’ He dragged out the syllables as if he spoke four words.
Hawkins stopped in the doorway. ‘And you...’ He pointed the cane at the painting over the mantel. A work by Lawrence. ‘Wouldn’t know a good painting if you fell over it.’
Rhys didn’t speak. He didn’t want to give the man even the smallest response, afraid of what his voice might reveal.
Hawkins’s walking stick crashed against the door frame. ‘You lie to yourself, Rolleston. You think you’re better than me, but you’re not. Your brother was born to be duke—not you. If he’d been wise enough to wed and sire a son before he died, you’d be living off your nephew’s whims. Now you toss crumbs about instead of scrabbling for them. Your dead brother’s crumbs. I bet every morning you say a prayer of thanks that he died.’
Hawkins left, pulling the walking stick up and putting it under his arm.
Rhys didn’t move.
The foundation of his life cracked, turning into rubble.
Chapter Twenty
Rhys went to a soirée. Louisa was there. She turned her shoulder to him when he walked near and relief surged along with guilt. The relief won when she danced twice with someone else and her eyes shone on her partner. Watching her, it was as if he’d never seen her before. This woman he’d hoped to marry, but had never really seen for who she was—because, he now realised, he’d never truly loved her.
He forced his attention to the man who was speaking to him, Lord Andrews.
Lord Andrews leaned closer, winking and smiling. ‘So what of the bit of muslin you—?’
‘Stop.’ Thoughts pummelled Rhys from the inside, causing him to need a moment to sort through even half of them. ‘I asked her to marry me. She refused.’
