Page 81 of How to Tempt a Duke

“Yes, well...what I anticipated only taking several months took several years.” He gave a mirthless chuckle. “It would appear that our fathers told rather grandiose tales of their travels without recounting the liberties they took when obtaining their treasures.”

Charles lifted a brow.

“What do you mean?” Eleanor asked.

“They were not moral,” Evander scoffed. “Were I as unscrupulous, my task would have been over in six months’ time and I would have been home with those I love.”

He nodded to Eleanor before claiming a glass of amber liquid from a nearby table.

Eleanor shook her head, not comprehending. “But if you were here—” Her throat tightened around her words and cut them off.

“I have only recently returned, Eleanor. I confess that I was so focused on selling the goods I had accumulated to rebuild our wealth that I did not wish interruption. And I did not send correspondence until I had reestablished our wealth. I assumed the letters I sent were enough to allay your concerns. I realize now how very wrong I was.”

Confusion and anger and...yes, hurt—mostly hurt—blazed like a glowing coal in her chest. “Why did you not come to London to sell the items?”

Evander took a sip of his drink. “We all know how gossip spreads through London like fire. As no one visits Comlongon anymore I expected it to be safe to come here without rattling hope and inciting rumor. I did this to protect you and Mother.” He lifted his glass to Charles. “Would you like one?”

“Dear God, yes,” Charles replied promptly.

Eleanor followed her brother to the small table of cut-crystal decanters. “I think I would like one as well.”

She wrestled with the power of her emotions as he poured two glasses, handing one first to Eleanor and then to Charles.

Eleanor cradled the cool glass against her palms and took a shuddering breath. “Evander, we thought...” Her throat clenched tight around the words. “We thought you were dead. Do you think we value fortune over love?”

“Everyone values fortune over love,” Evander said simply.

Was that what he thought? That she and her mother were so keen on an abundant fortune that they would rather wealth than him?

“That isn’t true,” she protested. “We would rather have had you with us in London. Mother is overwrought at your loss, and I...” Tears blurred the room and a sob choked from her throat. “I tried to push aside my memories of you, but when we arrived here, when I recalled all those summers when we played together—Evander, you have broken my heart.”

And it was true. He had indeed left her heart broken.

“Eleanor...”

There was a catch to Evander’s voice, and it snagged at a deep, wounded part of her. Without saying more he rushed to her, his arms open, and pulled her into a solid embrace. It was the way he’d done when they were children and she was upset. Before he’d gone to school—before the emotion had been strapped out of them all.

She curled into the embrace and let the truth of it all wash over her. Evander was alive. He had tried to let them know he was safe. He had tried and he had done all this for them. The tears came in a flood: relief that he was alive, happiness to be having this incredible reunion, and sorrow for the years they had lost.

“I only wanted to help...” Evander’s voice rumbled around her. “I never expected it to be like this.”

Eleanor took a shuddering breath. Evander smelled different. When he was a boy, he had smelled of wet grass and sweat—now, as an adult, he smelled of shaving soap and Scotch.

“Will you forgive me, Eleanor?” he asked softly.

She looked up, gazing into a face she had often thought never to see again. How could she not, after all he had done for her and Mother?

“Yes, of course,” Eleanor replied, and tightened her grip on him, never wanting to let him go again.

Charles had slipped from the room to give Eleanor and the Earl of Westix privacy in order to discuss whatever it was siblings discussed after a reunion in which one had been presumed dead. He didn’t imagine it would be an easy conversation to have, let alone in the presence of one’s enemy.

Except he did not consider the new Earl of Westix an enemy—not in the way he once would have. If Charles had had a sister, wouldn’t he have done something similar to see her well cared-for?

He took a long draught of Scotch. It was good-quality, and the burn in his stomach was smooth and pleasant.

Westix being alive added complications—and Charles could not help but consider the impact of such a change.

He now understood that Eleanor’s reason for offering her original request had been financial necessity. Now, with Westix returned, with their fortune restored, she had no need of this marriage.