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you were a recluse?’
He laughed aloud. ‘Is that what they’re saying in Whitby about me, that I’m sitting in a dark room wallowing in my own misery? Well, I’ve done my fair share of that, too, as you observed last night, but I like to do a bit more with my time. I want to improve the estate, not just for me, but for everyone who lives here. The mine is just the first step.’
‘So that’s why you want my inheritance?’
‘Yes.’ He bent his head closer, lowering his voice to a sardonic undertone. ‘Or did you think I intended to spend it all on brandy?’
‘Not all of it.’ Her expression didn’t falter. ‘I expected some to go on whisky as well.’
He straightened up again, smiling appreciatively. ‘Was that a joke, Miss Harper? You wound me, though I suppose I deserve it.’
‘You do.’ She turned around and leaned back against the desk, gazing up at the bookshelves that covered two of the walls. ‘It’s a beautiful room—what I can see of it anyway.’
‘No expense spared.’ He leaned against the table beside her, taking the weight off his legs for a moment. ‘My father didn’t care what my mother did to the place as long as she paid for it.’
‘You sound as if you didn’t like him.’
‘Sometimes I didn’t, though I loved him all the same. But he didn’t make her happy. He only married her for her money and, yes, I do appreciate the irony.’
‘Did she know that was why he married her?’
‘I don’t know. She was an intelligent woman so maybe she knew what she was doing. I hope so. I hope that she wasn’t deceived.’ He glanced sideways at her. ‘For what it’s worth, I never intended to be a fortune hunter myself.’
‘Our fathers were the fortune hunters. At least you’re honest.’
‘To a fault. It’s what gets me in trouble.’
‘I doubt that’s the only reason.’ She gave him a pointed look. ‘But I do appreciate the truth.’
‘Then I promise always to give it.’
‘Thank you.’ She pushed herself upright again. ‘Can we see the ballroom now?’
His rising spirits plummeted. ‘If you wish.’
He led her back to the hall and along a corridor towards a pair of vast double doors. The ballroom occupied the whole east wing of the house, though he’d hoped to avoid this part of the tour. Somehow he’d assumed that she’d want to as well, though perhaps she was braver than he was.
‘Here we are.’ He pushed the doors open reluctantly.
She appeared to take a deep breath as she stepped inside, her expression pensive. ‘It’s bigger than I remember.’
‘It was full of people that night.’
‘I suppose so. It all felt so overwhelming at the time.’ She walked slowly into the middle of the floor, then gestured towards the far corner of the room. ‘That’s where it happened.’
He felt a tightening sensation in his chest. There was no need to ask what it referred to. She meant the spot where they’d argued, where he’d last seen his father and brother. It was the reason he never came in here—why, even now, he refused to go any further than the doorway. The whole room was full of ghosts. If he went any further he was afraid he might be overwhelmed by them. She really was braver than him.
‘Did you ever reconcile with your father?’ She glanced back over her shoulder.
‘No.’ His voice sounded rougher somehow. ‘We were far too alike. While my mother was alive she was a kind of buffer between us, but after she died, we did nothing but argue. We were both far too pig-headed to back down. That evening was the last time we ever spoke. Neither of us wrote. When I got shot, I thought perhaps it might be a means to reconcile, but then they told me about his collapse. You know, it all happened in the same week.’
‘You mean you and your brother and father...all in the same week?’
‘Last August wasn’t the best month for us Ambertons. I’m the only one who survived. The wrong one, as it turns out.’
‘You shouldn’t say that.’
‘Why not? Ask anyone and they’ll tell you. Arthur was the only decent one among us. You would have been far better off marrying him.’
