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Chapter Thirty-Five
Nicholas braced himself for Ernest’s blow but it didn’t come. The man towered over him, his demeanor that of intense bewilderment.
“I am ostensibly married to Vanessa Whittaker,” Nicholas said. “If you are going to hit me, go ahead. And if you are not, then sit down.”
“How could you do this to Jenny?” Ernest’s rage was on Jenny’s behalf and Nicholas did not find any fault in it. The man was taking his self-appointed role of being her brother rather seriously. He raised his fist in the air. “Tell me it is not true,” he ground out.
“I did not know. I was drunk when I signed this in Versailles. I knew nothing of this until the fire at Heartsbay.”
Slowly, Ernest lowered his arm and returned to his seat. “Go on.”
Ernest was already aware of the relationship he’d had with Vanessa and the life they had led at Versailles, thus, Nicholas went on to tell him about the letters he had received and his meeting with both Lady Digby and Vanessa. “How could you be so reckless as to get that drunk?”
“That was years ago, Ernest, and you are the last person to judge me because you are no better,” Nicholas defended.
“Very well. What are you going to do now?”
“Lady Digby all but blackmailed me. If I don’t choose Vanessa, she’d go to the gossip mongers. I wrote to an old friend and business associate Versailles, giving him all the information he needs to start an investigation.”
Ernest examined the document again. "I don’t know how the French deal with the legalities of marriage but this is your signature, Nicholas. Do you need any other proof?”
“I don’t know if I can face the truth yet I want nothing more than the truth. What if I am truly married to her?"
Ernest reached for the bottle between them and poured some liquor into his glass then Nicholas’. "Now I understand why you needed me to drink. Since you haven't consummated the marriage, I should think that your union with Jenny holds the upper hand here."
Nicholas scoffed in self-derision. "I would say it is something of an even battlefield."
Ernest's eyes searched his face for a moment, then, "You cannot be serious, Nicholas!"
"I thought things were..." He cleared his throat. "I suppose I have been denying some truths all this while." He had been denying and running away from loving Jenny.
“You need to do everything you can to contain this and the public must not know.” Ernest looked greatly disturbed by what Nicholas had shared with him.
"I might be faced with no other option but an annulment," Nicholas admitted.
"And which marriage are you going to annul?"
Nicholas did not answer this, for giving voice to the words was something he could not bear. Everything he touched, he destroyed.
I wish…Jenny would have been happier without me.
"Find a way out of this, Nicholas," Ernest said, the warning in his voice crystal clear. "You may be my blood but as I have told you earlier, anyone that hurts Jenny will meet me."
* * *
The following morning saw Nicholas in his study endeavoring to reconcile some accounts and barely able to process the figures before him. His conversation with the day before kept replaying in his mind.
He still had not been able to reach a decision about his marriages but he was certain that one of them had to be annulled. He was not the sort of man to take people’s threats lightly and when Lady Digby had threatened to expose him, he took it very seriously. When a knock sounded on his study door, he released a long sigh that had been lodged in his chest and granted the visitor permission to enter, thankful for the distraction.
"Your Grace," Bentley began as he walked in but before he could get another word in, his grandmother and her cane appeared in the doorway.
"You never listen," she said to Bentley before waving for him to leave them alone. Then she proceeded to make herself comfortable in one of the wingback chairs before the hearth.
"He is doing his job, Grandmother," Nicholas drawled, leaning back in his chair and slowly swiveling it from side to side. "What brings you here this early?"
"It is not early since I did not wake you up, Nicholas," she returned and he signed again.
He had been thankful for the distraction but that was before he knew he was going to suffer his grandmother’s company and he was not in the mood to put up with her this morning.
