Mending Him (16 page)

And then Robbie and Honoria, breathless and pink-cheeked, joined them, and Charles stopped worrying about what Samuel might be up to. Perhaps the boy was simply sneaking off to nip a more potent drink than the punch provided at the party.

Charles smiled up at Robbie, whose forehead shone with perspiration. “Well done. See, I knew you could dance.”

“Hardly. More of a shuffle really.” But Robbie appeared pleased and happy.

Honoria sat beside her sister, and the two chattered and giggled like young girls rather than spinsters in their fifties. Robbie sat near Charles, and they spoke of this and that, including the success of the harvest ball and Robbie’s dramatic color scheme. Lenore had given credit where credit was due, telling everyone that her nephew Robert was the architect of the event. Several people had come to him to compliment him on his artistry.

It was turning out to be an altogether pleasant night, Charles thought, rewarding in unexpected ways. But it seemed the moment a person began to feel too pleased with life, something must happen to tear down the thin veil between happiness and disaster, for no sooner had he thought this than Stewart approached them, weaving his way between the guests and heading straight for Robbie. He leaned down and whispered something in Robbie’s ear.

Charles sat up straighter, the hairs on his neck rising.

Robbie nodded and rose with the aid of his cane. He gave a brief bow. “Misses Honoria…Celeste, please excuse me. My aunt needs my aid with something. I don’t know if I shall be able to return before you leave, so I must bid you good-bye and place you in Charles’s capable hands.”

“Oh dear.” Honoria frowned, clearly distressed at the idea of losing her evening’s companion. “I do hope everything is all right. A kitchen disaster perhaps?”

“Something like that. Not to worry. It’s nothing serious.”

Robbie’s expression said otherwise, though. He exchanged a quick glance with Charles before turning and heading off with Stewart.

Charles wanted to bolt up and go after them, but it appeared he was now the sole proprietor of the Brown sisters. Christ, what could he do to hurry them along home?

But it turned out he didn’t have to offer the excuse he was inventing about his legs giving him pain—which wasn’t actually a falsehood—for Celeste read the situation and noted his impatience.

“Well, Sister, I believe it is time we were off home. It has been a lovely evening in every way, Mr. Worthington, and we thank you and your cousin for entertaining us.”

“Oh, must we?” Honoria cast a sad eye on the dancing couples still swaying and circling around the floor. “Could we not remain a little longer?”

“I think not. The hour is very late, and we do have Mr. Bracht coming early in the morning to assess the roof.” She stood, effectively putting an end to any more protests from her more submissive sister.

Charles rose too and, despite his worsening limp, escorted the sisters to the door of their coach. He bowed over each gloved hand, one rather plump, the other as light as a twig, and bid each of the ladies good night.

As soon as the door closed behind them, he rushed as quickly as he was able toward the rear of the house. He wasn’t quite certain where he would find Robbie but guessed it would be far from any place a guest might wander.

He didn’t have to check many rooms before he heard raised voices, which led him directly to Phillip’s office. Charles pushed open the door to observe a strained family tableau. Samuel stood before his father while Phillip, apoplectic with rage, jabbed the air in front of his face with one finger. Robbie had a hand on his uncle’s arm, clearly trying to calm him down. Lenore hovered nearby, holding her head in both hands as if she could barely keep it from blowing apart. Tears streamed down her cheeks.

A further study showed Charles the painting had been taken down from the wall and leaned against a chair. He recognized it as one of the few valuable art pieces the Chesters possessed. A satchel sat on the floor beside it, a sable wrap spilling out from the open case. Immediately Charles understood. Samuel had been in the process of stealing from the guests as well as his family.

“How could you? What sort of person have you become? My own son, a thief!” Phillip thundered.

“Shh. Our guests might overhear.” Lenore moved at last, approaching her husband and touching his other arm. “We must return these things before their owners realize they are missing, and then we must return to our guests before they are aware their
hosts
are missing!”

Suddenly all her flightiness had disappeared, and Lenore appeared a far sterner, more authoritative figure than the woman Charles had come to know.

“We will keep our family’s reputation intact at all costs,” she continued, staring first into Phillip’s eyes and then her son’s. “Later we will sort this out and come to some resolution.”

She looked over at Charles, including him in her level gaze. “Mr. Worthington, will you kindly call in Stewart and ask him to aid my son in returning these items? You might also implore him to keep quiet about what he witnessed tonight. His position might depend on it.” She cleared her throat. “And of course he should know we reward loyalty.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll make sure he understands.”

Charles went to do her bidding. One had to admire a woman who knew how to apply the stick and the carrot so ably.

But his amusement was quickly subsumed by sympathy for Phillip and Lenore’s agony at learning their son was a thief as well as a wastrel. He wondered if they knew the reason Samuel had felt compelled to steal. Had the idiot told them the extent of his gaming debts?

Beneath those whirling thoughts lay worry. He couldn’t help but wonder what the discovery meant for him and Robbie. Now that their quid pro quo was over, what would stop Samuel from telling Phillip what he knew about their relationship? On the other hand, what would Samuel gain from telling? For Robbie’s sake, Charles prayed he would simply keep mum.

But the nagging feeling that the night’s dramatic events were only beginning wouldn’t let Charles breathe properly. A small voice inside him warned that the brief time of respite from pain and problems was over. Trouble knocked at his door, and refusing to answer couldn’t make it go away.

Chapter Seventeen

Robbie moved like an automaton through the ballroom, a smile fixed on his mouth and all the right pleasantries coming from his lips, but underneath, anxiety boiled. Why couldn’t these people sense the tension and realize it was time to leave or retire to their rooms? They needed to end this event so the next act of the Chester family drama could play out. He’d avoided so much as thinking about Samuel for days, but now that the truth was coming out, he wanted it over and done. The violinist caught his eye and raised his gray eyebrows—one o’clock had arrived, and the musicians had been commissioned until that hour. Robbie signaled to the man to continue playing. The musicians must perform until he got word that the possessions had been restored.

Stupid, stupid Samuel. The boy may have been university educated, but he was an idiot. Did he think no one would notice their valuables missing when they got home? Did he not care that a servant would probably be blamed? Not to mention the Chesters’ reputation would be permanently tarnished. Samuel gave no thought to anyone but himself. That had always been his trouble, even when they were boys. He took the largest piece, made sure he was first in any queue, and threw a tantrum when he lost a game.

Robbie’s anger grew, and it was all he could do to keep smiling as he bid good night to the Holloways, an elderly couple who couldn’t take their leave without talking for twenty minutes.

Now that he had a good head of steam built up, Robbie’s ire began to spill over onto other people. Namely Charles. If he’d let Robbie go to Phillip when they first discovered Samuel’s gambling debts, none of this might have happened. They could have helped the young fool find a solution that didn’t involve petty crime.

But then Samuel would have told your secret,
an inner voice reminded him.

Also Charles’s fault. He wouldn’t have
had
a secret if Charles hadn’t pushed him toward the very thing he was trying to avoid.

Robbie knew that wasn’t true. He’d taken an equal part in choosing to have a physical relationship with Charles, and he didn’t regret it. Not really. Not at all, in fact. But right now he was angry, and it was hard to remember that he cared for Charles.

Jarrod Watersmith, one of the young men who’d dragged Samuel into this mess, and his visiting friends still danced and flirted. They hadn’t a care in the world and looked fresh, though it was past one in the morning. And as long as those eligible bachelors remained, the few families with marriageable girls would hold out too. At least they weren’t in the card room fleecing other idiots like Samuel.

The guests had begun to notice that the hosts of the event weren’t present. One older gentleman, Colonel Fletcher, peppered Robbie with questions about their disappearance. That eager expression of interest on his thin face told Robbie that he wasn’t going to take his leave until he knew the answer. If word got out, the neighborhood would dine out on it for weeks.

He must drag Aunt Lenore back to face the guests.

Stewart appeared at his elbow. “The items are restored, Master Robert.”

He sagged in relief. With a few terse words, he gave Stewart a message to deliver to Aunt Lenore: she must show her face soon. The host and son could be absent—people would assume they’d stepped out or were taking their turn at the card tables in the drawing room. But when all of them vanished, talk grew sharp.

A few minutes later, Lenore reappeared. Her smile seemed tense, her back a little straighter and her face paler than usual, but otherwise she gave the impression of a calm, even welcoming, hostess.

She stopped to speak to Robbie, a smile plastered to her round, pleasant face as she murmured, “Did you know? Did Samuel tell you about his debts?”

“He does not confide in me, Aunt.”

“No, and I wish to heaven he did.” She stopped surveying the room to shoot a glance at Robbie, and for a moment, her smile seemed real. “I’m grateful to you for all of your help, dear boy. I’m selfishly glad to have you here with us. I don’t say it often enough, I know.”

The avid colonel spotted her then and beamed at them both. He began to make his way across the room, easier now that most of the dancers had retired for the night.

“Go to your uncle,” she said quickly before the colonel reached them.

“Might I excuse the musicians now?” he said.

“Yes, yes, please. Then go to Phillip.”

He wondered if his presence would help, but he was grateful to be able to escape the ballroom. With a bow to her and a good night to the colonel, he withdrew.

Charles sat on a chair just outside Phillip’s office, his eyes closed. He started awake when Robbie called his name. Stifling a yawn, he stretched and pulled himself up slowly.

“Are you well?” Robbie asked, forgetting his annoyance at Charles. The man who’d been starched perfection at the start of the evening looked rumpled and a trifle dusty. His crumpled gloves lay on the floor next to the chair. Robbie leaned down and fetched them for Charles, who took them with a nod of thanks and drew them back on.

“Stewart and I scrambled about many of the unoccupied rooms—as much as I can scramble that is. Phillip had us search every inch of Samuel’s room. We found more loot under the mattress and in the wardrobe. I delivered the odds and ends, including a packet of gambling vowels—that dolt is in trouble—and left father and son to sort that out.”

“Why are you here?”

“Guarding the fortress while the attack occurs inside.” He gestured at the chair, a sturdy wooden one from his uncle’s study. “You sit for a while, Robbie. You look done in. You’re not used to these late nights.”

“Nor are you anymore.” Robbie didn’t argue but gratefully sank onto the chair.

Almost inaudible yet clearly angry voices came from the office while music and laughter floated down the corridor.

Charles jerked his head toward the office door. “It’s the drama that wears a man down. I expect that Phillip will give Samuel the money he needs. I only hope that he’ll make sure there are lasting consequences to the folly.”

Robbie felt he had to protest. “He is a good father.”

Charles leaned against the dark wood of the wall, shifting to fit his back between two carved panels. “Yes, and I would guess if he had a fault, it would be a tendency toward unyielding rather than too liberal. Now you, Robbie, would take the middle path between lax loving and hard-edged discipline.”

“But I shall never be a father.” In the past, he’d sometimes contemplated that fact with some sorrow. At the moment, hearing the muffled voices of Phillip and Samuel, he didn’t feel the same measure of loss.

“You should have said something to Phillip,” Robbie said, recalling his earlier surge of annoyance.

“You think so? But you didn’t speak out either.” Charles gave him a haughty look.

“I wasn’t a true witness. It would have been hearsay on my part. You saw him take the objects, and you didn’t speak up.”

“No, I didn’t. I am fond of Phillip. I’m grateful to him for giving me a home. But I am not bound up in this family. At least not with any member other than you. And don’t forget that Samuel knows our—” But then he fell silent because the door to the office opened.

Phillip stood in the doorway and looked down at Robbie in the chair, and his brow wrinkled. “I thought you’d be— Oh, there you are, Charles.” He twisted to peer up the corridor toward the stairs and the sound of the ball. He lowered his voice. “I need you to come in and tell me where you found these letters in Samuel’s room. Robbie, you might come in as well. I have no interest in going over this nonsense with anyone else, and perhaps you might relate the details to Lenore.”

Samuel stood in front of the desk, watching them, a dark scowl on his face. “Not him. Not Perfect Prefect Robbie. I don’t want him carrying tales to Mother.”

Phillip, moving to the seat behind his desk, didn’t look up from the dingy scraps of papers he held in his hand. “I do not recall asking your opinion on the matter.”

Charles gave Robbie a comical grimace and ambled into the room, leaning on his cane. Robbie followed and closed the door.

“You may sit,” Phillip said.

Samuel went to a chair by the window, and Phillip barked, “Not you, sir. You will stand, and you will listen.”

“But I say, Guv’nor—”

“And you will not address me by that absurd sobriquet. I am Father or Sir. Do you understand?”

Robbie was beginning to feel sorry for Samuel. He was not interested in watching his cousin’s humiliation, so he levered himself up. “Perhaps I’ll see if Aunt Lenore requires my help. The musicians will soon finish, but there are still a number of guests, and they might begin to wonder where we are.”

Samuel’s friends, for instance. Now that the music was ending, they might wander off looking for him.

Phillip finally looked at Samuel. “Now that is the sort of thoughtfulness I would hope a man would give to his family. Some awareness of the well-being of people other than himself. I’ve never seen Robbie act as anything other than considerate of other people.”

Robbie closed his eyes for a long moment rather than face the burning fury he knew was on Samuel’s face. Perhaps he could explain, tell his uncle that he was only trying to weasel his way out of the room. He had no desire to impress Phillip, just escape. Perhaps for once he might come right out and say the words…

“He’s not such a blasted paragon, Father.”

Charles cleared his throat loudly, interrupting Samuel. “You asked me where I found the items in Samuel’s room. The papers were in the small desk in the corner of his bedroom along with the earrings, but I think I recognize the earrings as garnets belonging to Lenore, so we don’t need to worry that a guest might be missing them.”

Samuel snarled, “The earrings are Mother’s. They’re broken, and I promised to repair them.” He pointed at the earrings on the desktop with a shaking finger. “See? The backing is cracked. I would repair them, dammit. Not everything I do is selfish. I’m not the worst person in this house, Father.”

“Luckily, it is not a competition. But if it were, and if I were a betting man as you are, I’d put the money on you.” The casual sneering unpleasantness was so unlike Phillip, Robbie wondered if his uncle had reached some sort of limit to his temper.

“The worst isn’t me, it’s your precious, precious Robbie.” Samuel’s voice came out in a cracked sob.

“Oh no, Samuel. Don’t allow your jealousy of your cousin to make you ugly.” Now Uncle Phillip only sounded bone weary.

The tears ran freely down Samuel’s flushed cheeks. “He is! He is! He’s in league with that other parasite.”

“Samuel, stop,” Charles said, his voice low and urgent. But Robbie knew there was no point. Once Samuel had reached that edge of anger, he couldn’t be stopped.

Robbie’s earliest memory in the family was of Aunt Lenore trying to soothe the wailing Samuel as he flailed through a tantrum.

If he hadn’t been so afraid of what was about to come out of Samuel’s mouth next, he would have been sorry for him, because he knew how much Samuel hated the loss of control he felt with those angry tears.

“You know what they are, Father! You just close your eyes to what they do because you love your pretend son too much. You love him more than you love me, your real son.”

“Do not enact a scene, Samuel. You are a grown man, not a child.”

“Yes, I’m an adult, so I know what sort of illegal filth is going on here. Under your roof and with my little brother and sister only a few rooms away.” His crying convulsed him so much it was difficult to understand his words. Difficult but not impossible. He yanked something from his pocket.

“Proof.” Samuel threw it on the desk. “You wrote about desire and Charles Worthington on the same page.”

Oh Christ. Robbie had started a new notebook and entirely abandoned the old one in a drawer of his desk where Samuel worked as well. Shame and indignation warred in his belly. He’d been such a fool to write that vow, and a bigger one not to rip out the page and burn it. But what right had anyone to read his book? None. He must hold tight to the outrage.

Samuel had no right. Even his uncle had none.

“That’s mine,” Robbie said, managing to keep his voice calm.

“Let my father see what you wrote. He should read the filth you wrote.”

“No.” Robbie reached for it and tucked it into his pocket. “This book is mine.”

Phillip had been reaching for the notebook, but now he shifted his gaze to Robbie, who stared back, unwilling to drop his eyes.

“The words are so awful you won’t let me see it?” Phillip sounded amazed and hurt.

“The words are private, sir.”

“Do you understand Samuel’s accusation?” Phillip asked.

Robbie considered protesting ignorance, going through a long, stupid charade of feigning innocence. But then he recalled all he and Charles had done in that hotel room. He wasn’t much of a liar. “Yes, I understand.”

“Is Samuel right? Did you indulge in…in this criminal activity? Under my roof? God, if it wasn’t bad enough that my son is a thief, you might be a sodom—”

“No. Not under your roof, Uncle Phillip.”

“But elsewhere? And you
wrote
of it?” Phillip’s cheeks burned as red as Samuel’s. For the first time, Robbie completely understood his cousin wasn’t the only one with that fierce temperament. Phillip simply had learned to control his version.

Robbie decided not to answer.

“Tell me, dammit. Have you…did you and…Worthington…” The words seemed to choke his throat. Philip slammed his hand down hard on the desk. “I took you and him in. I had pity on you…two…”

Charles was done listening to this. “Phillip, stop.” He raised his voice to be heard over the sputtering anger. “Robbie is a good man, and that’s enough.”

“You! You’re a corrupting drunkard.”

Charles considered arguing, but the man had a point. He only shrugged instead.

Phillip rose to his feet. “And you dragged a fine young man into the filth and…”

Charles also got up, only more slowly. “Your son is yours to discipline and control. I am not your son.” He couldn’t help adding, “If we were to continue this conversation, which we shall not, I’d point out any actions I’ve taken have hurt no one.”