Lord Rayleigh swallowed, mumbled something under his breath, then undid his cravat and handed it to him. Nicholas held it up with two fingers. The edges of the linen were yellowed, and the material limp. There was no circumstance under which Nicholas would be putting it around his neck.
“The next time I speak in Parliament, you won’t be interrupting me unless it is to voice support for my ideas. Do you understand?” But Lord Rayleigh simply looked at his cravat with confusion and nodded. “Answer me, you low-living piece of filth,or I will speak to the Queen about your insolence.”
Lord Rayleigh furrowed his eyebrows but nodded. “I understand.”
“Good. I don’t care what your views are. You are welcome to go to the devil because of your lack of sympathy to the suffering and dying, but I will not have you impeding my work any longer. Iammy father’s son, and the title of Harrington is mine now. It is time you started treating me with the same deference you treated him.”
Lord Rayleigh nodded again, but it seemed to pain him.
“Good. Now then.” Nicholas pasted on the broadest and most becoming smile he could muster. “Give my regards to your wife. I’ll have my mother send her an invitation for a morning visit, if you think she would enjoy it.”
The furrows in Lord Rayleigh forehead smoothed out. Nicholas knew Lady Rayleigh’s wife only in passing, but she was definitely the type who would love to drink tea with a duchess. “She would.”
“Tell her to look forward to it.” Nicholas threw Lord Rayleigh’s cravat back at him. “And tell your valet to use more starch.”
Chapter 29
Spring in Brushbend was asight to behold. Nicholas had spent far too much time in London since Father died, and the massive gardens here had remained well kept but unexplored. Patience stood beside him on a path overlooking the lake.
“A house party was a good idea, Nicholas.” Patience smiled. She seemed at rest here; it was hard not to be. “It has been too long since I’ve boated in the lake or felt the cool damp air in the grotto. We should come more often. You were a different person while growing up. I’ve always thought it was because of your time in the army, but maybe London has been the problem all along.”
“Patience.” The tone in his voice must have shown his emotion. Patience tipped her head to one side and put a hand on his arm. He’d been so ashamed of what had happened between him and Lady Plymton that he’d never told Patience. “It wasn’t the army. It was what happened before the army. You were young then, so Mother and Father protected you, but I was sent there for a reason.”
“Father wanted you to become more serious, like him.”
Nicholas shook his head. “No. I’d made a mistake, a foolish one, and I needed to gain some perspective on life in order to see that. Father saved me from myself by buying me a commission.”
Patience’s fingers tightened on his arm. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
So he told her. Everything. All about Lady Plymton, her fiancé, his heartbreak, and the realization about how naive he’d been. Four months ago, he would have done anything to keep this secret from her, but he was tired of always trying to portray himself as upstanding, and of all the people in the world, Patience should be able to see him as the imperfect man he was and still love him despite it. “I thought I was protecting you by not telling you this at the time. But I see now I was only tryingto protect myself. I built walls around us, and when you made mistakes, I allowed you to think we were different. But we aren’t. We’ve both been fools for love.”
Over the course of his story, Patience’s expressive face had shown rage, sorrow, frustration, and understanding. She reached for his other arm and clamped both of her hands tightly on him. “Don’t disparage yourself. You were young, and I’m sorry I didn’t know. I was so angry at you.”
“You’d lost the carefree brother you grew up with. I don’t blame you for that, not one bit.”
“And I never blamed you either. I knew you had to grow up quickly after Papa died. I missed you though. I think we were both lost. But I never saw you as a fool, and I don’t think what you had with Lady Plymton could be classified as love.”
This was the terrible part, the truth that burned and raged inside him, more painfully than his secrets about Lady Plymton. “I wasn’t talking about Lady Plymton.”
Patience stilled, but she didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. They both knew exactly what he meant.
“I know I’ve been more serious, and honestly, I miss the boy I was when we lived here too. But he had to grow up and face the world as it is, not a romanticized version of it.”
Patience pulled him closer and wrapped her arms around him. He took a deep breath and allowed himself to sink into her embrace. He felt more whole in this moment than he had in three years. When Patience finally released him, she put both of her hands on his shoulders. “The world is still beautiful, Nicholas, even if it disappoints us sometimes.”
Later, when he was alone again, he would have to fight to trust her on that, but for the moment, with the late sun shining over the lake and his carefully crafted walls demolished, he believed it.
Patience pulled him back toward the house. “The guests shouldbe gathering in the music room, and I’m not certain that is the type of social gathering we should leave Mama to host on her own.”
Nicholas chuckled. Definitely not. They strode arm in arm down the path. “Thank you for handling all the invitations and coordinating travel. It is good to have the house opened up for guests again. I’ve been alone so long, I’m even looking forward to Mother’s singing.”
“Perhaps you shouldn’t thank me just yet.” Patience’s voice held an odd quality, one he was all too familiar with. She’d done something.
“What do you mean?”
“I was considering surprising you. However, after our talk, I’ve reconsidered the idea.”
“Patience . . .”
