“I can’t help you, Harry.” Neal had to force the words out.
“You must.” Bucking and rolling his body, Harry twisted against the knots holding him down. Rowan and the footman were almost thrown off the bed with the force of his surge. He was wild and seemed to have the brute strength of three men. “I have to have something, Neal. Imusthave it.”
Neal took a step forward. “I can’t.”
“You can’t? Youwon’t.”
“I won’t help you kill yourself,” Neal said. “Please, Harry, I’ll stay beside you, but I can’t let you continue to do this.”
“Youfear death?” Harry answered. “Then why did you marry, Neal? Why did you give in to the curse? Why do you want me to watchyoudie?”
“Is that what this is?” Neal demanded, moving to the foot of the bed. “You are doing this because of my marriage? Then stop it. I don’t want your death on my conscience.”
Harry burst out into a delirious laugh. “We are all dying, brother. You, me, Margaret. We’redoomed. But I need help,” he went on, his voice suddenly taking that pleading note again. “I can’t stand being in my own skin. I feel like I’m being eaten alive—” His voice broke off in a shuddering gasp before he tried heaving his body to and fro and pulling once again on the bonds that held him.
From behind Neal came a voice of strength. “Untie him.”
Neal turned to see Thea in the doorway. She still wore her bonnet and gloves. Her gaze on Harry, she walked into the room.
Harry honed in on her with the sharpness of a hawk spotting its prey. “It’s you that will kill Neal,” he said, his hoarse voice sounding possessed. He tried to lunge at her, to kick out.“You will kill him.”
The words rang around the room, but Thea showed no fear. She pulled off her gloves and looked to Neal. “What is his weakness?”
He answered, almost unnerved by the force of his brother’s anger. “Laudanum. An old war injury. His leg, it pains him.”
She nodded, but he sensed she knew he wasn’t speaking the complete truth, so he added, “And spirits. He likes the bottle. Gin, port, wine, even Madeira if there is nothing else.”
“We need more of all of it,” she replied. “Will you have someone fetch bottles for me now?”
“Thea, I can’t give him more. I won’t. Margaret is right. This must stop,” Neal said, his voice shaking with emotion.
“It can’t stop until he wants it to, Neal,” Thea said. “You can’t make the decision for him or protect him from the world.”
“Margaret and I want him to be sane enough that he realizes he must change,” Neal argued. “If he doesn’t, he will die.”
“You are right,” Thea answered. “He will die. But having all of it taken away from him before he is ready can also kill him. The man is ill. I know this is difficult to understand, Neal, but we must give him a bit of the laudanum.”
“She’s right,” Harry said before he started coughing. A beat later, his body was heaving. Quick as a blink, Rowan was off him and picking up a bucket by the bed.
Neal watched his brother be sick. He looked to Thea. “He’s a good man. A strong soldier.”
“I know,” Thea said. She reached out and placed her hand on Neal’s arm. “This is hard. I went through this with Boyd. He liked the opium as well. But you must believe me, Neal, your brother is the only one who can stop this. If you force him,he will never change, not truly. He’ll just hide it better.”
Neal looked at his brother, who rolled back on the bed, his eyes closed, his breathing heavy, as if he was exhausted, his body slick with sweat.
“This is my fault,” Neal said.
Thea gave his arm a squeeze, a gentle reminder that he was not alone. “He makes his own choices.”
She was right. Neal had done everything in his power to stop Harry, even having servants serve as guards to keep him at home and spies to follow him when he was out. He evaded them. He always managed to have his own way.
Neal looked at his wife. “You can help him?”
“Boyd taught me a thing or two. I do not want your brother to be like this either, Neal.”
Neal looked to Rowan. “Fetch some laudanum.”
The valet walked over to Harry’s clothes press and took out a bottle from a secret compartment.
