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Gerard was quiet for a long moment. Thomas hoped his brother would follow up his silence by rising from the bed and leaving the room, so that this conversation might be had when Thomas was in a better state overall. The only problem with that desire was that Thomas seemed to have forgotten what it was like to be in a ‘better state’ altogether. It seemed, here and now, as though all he had ever known was misery.
Though perhaps that was just the dramatics again.
“I’m sorry,” Gerard said at last.
It was enough to make Thomas’ eyes open one final time. He hadn’t expected that from Gerard. He’d expected something much more along the lines of an ‘I told you so.’
Instead, Gerard was looking at him with what seemed like very real concern. And…regret?
“What do you have to be sorry about?” Thomas asked.
“Despite the situation, I know you had strong feelings for Lady Evelina. I feel I did not properly warn you against going to see her again.” Gerard gnawed at his lower lip, an old habit he’d been forced to break in early childhood that was beginning to resurface. “Beyond that…I fear that if the Duke of Alderleaf gets word of your conversation, he is likely to make yet another attempt on your life.”
Thomas’ body felt as though it weighed ten tons. He wanted to sink into the mattress and be swallowed whole by blankets.
“It seems as though we keep having the same conversation,” Thomas muttered, staring, bleary eyed, at the ceiling.
“Oh?”
“We still have no concrete proof of the Duke of Alderleaf. And now Lady Evelina has muddied the waters further by showing me her Father’s books from January, since ours were taken.”
Gerard went very still. “What did those books show?”
“That our families did good business together.” Thomas shook his head. His neck felt hot against the cloth of the pillow. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Not unless the ledger was falsified for exactly such an occasion,” Gerard said lowly, almost as though he was speaking to himself.
Thomas’ heart, if possible, sank even further. That had been his thought as well, but he’d worried he was just being paranoid.
“Do you think…?” Thomas began, then stopped himself. He could feel Gerard’s eyes on him, compelling him to press on. He swallowed. “Do you think it’s possible that Lady Evelina could be in league with her Father?”
Thomas knew as soon as the question was out of his mouth that Gerard would say yes. He was nothing but suspicious of all of the Talbots at this point. And he did not know Lady Evelina like Thomas did…or thought he did.
“I don’t know,” Gerard said at last, albeit reluctantly. “I don’t know enough about her relationship with her Father. But…it would be unwise to rule it out.”
Thomas’ mind flashed back to the previous night, when he’d asked Lady Evelina to run away with him.
He could not help but yet think of what she would look like with the sea breeze in her hair. How her face would light up at the bright colors and savory food of the Far East. He pictured her as a part of his old life; the life he’d loved, and the life he’d left.
“I don’t know where I’m to go from here, Brother,” Thomas admitted.
Gerard nodded solemnly. “Perhaps…”
“Perhaps?”
“Perhaps the time has come to reconsider returning to the country. Or even, if need be, leaving Britain altogether.”
