She meant his drunkenness. His claim that he preferred water to spirits hadn’t fooled her for a moment.
His father had managed to threaten and bully into silence most of the witnesses from those years of petty dissipation. Nightingale might not know about that particular skeleton in Alex’s cupboard but perhaps it didn’t matter since Alex didn’t mind overmuch if people found out. Many men of his class had a wild past and few people cared.
“What else?”
The specter of the séance, and the message he’d received from beyond the grave, loomed between them. Faint resentment stirred when he’d thought he’d long forgiven her. Perhaps she sensed this because she clasped her hands in her lap and kept her gaze fixed on them as she spoke. “Your interest in spiritualism began in those years. You joined the Spiritualist Association and, a few years later, you uncovered your first fraud. You hardly saw your father even though you both continued to live in London year round. That alone suggested an estrangement but then…”
“Go on.”
“In 1882, you had him declared of unsound mind. There were no rumors of erratic behavior prior to that time, but you somehow seized control of his affairs and installed a doctor, one with a reputation for incompetence, at Harcastle House. Your father was never seen in public again.”
Nightingale had been thorough. The bare recitation of his past acts was sobering.
“Monstrous,” he murmured, and he meant the man she described, not Nightingale.
At last, she raised her head and returned his gaze. “I suppose it would be. If it were true.”
“Oh, I assure you, every word is true.”
She leaned back in her seat. Not, he suspected, for comfort, but out of an unconscious desire to put more distance between them. For several seconds, her mouth hung open. “Why?”
“You tell me. What do you know of my sister’s past?”
He saw the moment she made the connection. “No one knew where she was for the first sixteen years of her life but after that she lived in Yorkshire. In an insane asylum. Did…did your father put her there?”
“He put her there and kept her there for ten years. I never even knew she existed. I only found out because Dr. Carter, who you met earlier, threatened to raise a scandal and my father needed me to quash it for him.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No. He was my father. He helped give me life. I even loved him after a fashion. But, no, I did not help him imprison a perfectly sane woman for the sake of his reputation. I would never do that no matter what I felt I owed him.”
His words hit their target. “Oh.”
“And just so there are no misunderstandings, you are more, far more, than Nightingale’s creation.”
“Oh.” She looked down again but not before he caught the sheen in her eyes. Her rigid spine, the clench of her jaw, the very fact that she refused to look at him, told him she was struggling to keep her emotions in check. He clenched his hands into fists to keep from reaching for her. “You don’t really know me—” she began and her voice trembled.
To hell with this. He yanked her across the sofa and into his arms. She stiffened for a moment until she realized he meant only to comfort her, then she settled awkwardly beside him.
“I know you well enough,” he said, his tone terse. “I know you lie for a living, but I also know you to be kind.”
“Kind?” She shook her head. “I think you’re confused.”
“When you thought I meant to attack you through Miss Carmichael, you defended her to the hilt. You even broke character to do it.”
“She’s my friend.”
“To whom should you be kind if not a friend?”
“That’s loyalty.”
He smiled. “So you admit you’re loyal?”
“Not to Captain, it would seem.”
He’d felt similar guilt when he’d taken Helen’s side over his father’s, but he’d make the same choice a thousand times over before he allowed his sister to suffer. “Perhaps it’s a matter of deciding where your loyalties lie then.”
“I made that decision before I came to you.”
The tension in his shoulders eased. Talk all he liked about logic and his sense of self-preservation, he couldn’t deny the effect her words had on him.
“You’re protecting me.” He heard the wonder in his own voice. No one protected him. No one thought he needed it.
“Don’t sound so smug,” she said, misreading him. “I still won’t be your mistress.”
He laughed softly into her hair. “You and I were doomed from the start.”
“Star-crossed,” she murmured.
As she sank a little deeper against his side, he realized she could be a comfortable companion despite her prickles. This woman was a person he could have loved if circumstances allowed. He had never loved anyone before, unless he counted his nurse from when he was a child and now Helen.
When he’d first met his sister, he’d doubted he was capable of actually loving her. The most he’d hoped for was the quiet fondness he felt for his few friends. Strong emotion was beyond him. Years of living with his father had taught him to distance himself from his own feelings until he’d almost believed coldness was in his blood. Ice in his veins like the duke.
And, like his sire, he was destined to atrophy as he aged. So he’d thought until Helen, but though their warm relationship had taken him by surprise, it was nothing compared to the shock he experienced now.
The lust he’d felt for the woman in his arms had shaken him. More unexpected still was this creeping tenderness stealing past his innate distrust.
“Is it true you plan to marry?” Her words had begun to slur with tiredness. He ought to leave and let her sleep.
The meaning of her words penetrated. “Where did you hear that?”
“Your cousin, Mr. Ellis, has been conducting discreet inquiries.”
“Obviously not discreet enough.”
“Is it true?”
He almost denied it. All week, he’d refused to think about the mess his affairs were in beyond selling off a painting or two. He and Ellis had discussed possible solutions, but really there had been only one long-term answer to his problem. He needed to marry a fortune.
“Yes, it’s true. I need to choose a bride soon.”
“You don’t sound very happy about it. Too busy propositioning your social inferiors?”
“Only the one.”