Prologue
1807
The Earl of Bramwell didn’t even bother to look up from his papers as Nicholas Gillingham entered his office for their appointment. Nicholas shifted in the doorway, uncomfortable, just as he was always uncomfortable, in the earl’s company. The man reminded him of his father.
Not the man who’d raised him. No…his real father.
Cold, calculating, all too aware of his power and willing to wield it in the cruelest of manners. That’s what men of title could do. What many did do. Those beneath them were often powerless.
“Gillingham.”
The earl sounded out every syllable of the name and Nicholas shook from his thoughts to take a long step into the room. “My lord.”
Bramwell sniffed as he looked Nicholas up and down, taking in the slightly ill-fitting jacket, the nervous way he clenched his fingers before him. Nicholas forced himself to separate his hands and smoothed his jacket, but he still felt out of place.
“You asked for this meeting, Gillingham,” Bramwell snapped. “Most irregular for the son of a servant, but out of respect for your father, I agreed. What do you want?”
This wasn’t going to go well. Nicholas felt it in the air, crackling like a whip every time Bramwell spoke. A part of him wanted to simply apologize and walk away. His plans, after all, didn’t have to include this man. He could do as he wished and deal with the consequences later. And there would be consequences.
Only he wasn’t in this plan alone, was he? For her…for her he would face any demon, any lion, any earl with a cruel twist to his smirk.
“I wanted to speak with you about Aurora,” Nicholas burst out, the words falling from his lips in a crushed-together jumble.
Despite that, Bramwell understood them. He leaned back in his chair and drummed his fingertips along his desktop. “The day has come at last,” he murmured. Nicholas thought it was more to himself than to him.
“Being raised in this household, I’ve had the privilege to be a friend to your children—” Nicholas began, clinging to the way he’d planned to say these words.
Bramwell jumped to his feet, his cheeks darkening red and spittle flying from his mouth as he shouted, “You aren’t a friend to my children, boy! Your father is my man of affairs—you are a servant’s child! If my wife and I were too kind and let you pretend to be the equal of my son and daughter, that was clearly our error. And now you want to speak to me about Aurora, do you? Confession on your mind, is it? Fancy yourself in love with her after all those mooning stares and stolen brushes of the hand?”
Nicholas drew back, his heart throbbing hard and loud in his ears. “You…you…”
“Knew about your tendre toward my daughter?” The earl rolled his eyes. “Yes. Of course I knew. She may not be the spare I required, but she is an asset. I watch my assets.”
Nicholas’s mind flew to Aurora. The earl’s daughter was three years younger than he was, and he’d only considered her a friend until about a year ago. He’d been standing with his father in a parlor, upset about…it didn’t matter what. It had felt like the world was falling apart, and then Aurora entered the room and everything had screeched to a halt. Everything had focused in on her. Aurora with her dark blonde hair, Aurora with her chocolate eyes that were so easy to lose oneself in. She was all soft, lush curves and bright smiles and easy laughter. A light in the darkness.
The most shocking thing was that she seemed to return his feelings. Shy smiles across the room had turned to secret conversations that could last for hours. The first time he’d dared to take her hand…he would remember the feel of her fingers folding across his until the day he took his last breath. And when he’d gotten up the nerve to finally kiss her?
It was like every romantic poem and story finally made sense to him. It was like he was complete and whole.
“She is not an asset, my lord,” he ground out. “I may not have a title, but I do have a future. For her, I will make sure of it. And I will protect your daughter with my life. I want to marry her.”
“Yes, I know what you want,” Bramwell snarled with a shake of his head. “Even if I didn’t have two perfectly good eyes, I have ears all over this house. I know you two have been sneaking around, whispering in corners. It hasn’t gone too far—that is the only reason I haven’t stopped it before today.”
“Sir!” Nicholas gasped as he realized the earl was talking about sex. A subject he pondered a great deal every time he was around Aurora, but certainly he would not disrespect her by ruining her! “I would never—”
“If you wanted to secure her and her fortune, perhaps you should have,” Bramwell interrupted. “If it were any girl but my daughter, I might even congratulate you. You are reaching above your station and trying to make something of yourself through marrying a better.”
“No,” Nicholas said, taking a long step forward. “It isn’t for a mercenary purpose. I love Aurora!”
“Love.” Bramwell pursed his lips and sniffed. “Love is for fools and the poor. Men of my ilk cannot afford such silly notions. My daughter will marry someone who will further my desires, that is the end of it. In fact, the marriage contracts have been signed just today. She will be Viscountess Lovell within a month.”
Nicholas stared. If his blood had rushed like a roaring river in his ears before, now everything in the room had gone curiously silent. Like he’d been shoved under the water and now he had to fight to swim to the surface. Difficult with this man’s boot on his neck.
“Marry…marry Lord Lovell,” he repeated. “No. N-No.”
“Oh yes,” Bramwell said with a tiny smile. “Indeed, it is true.”
Nicholas glared at the man. He’d always feared Bramwell. His entire life he’d known this man held his family’s fortunes on the blade of a knife. One mercurial decision and they would be ruined. But in that moment, he hated the earl more than he feared him.
“She loves me. I will stop this marriage.”
Nicholas expected an outburst at his words. Bramwell was well known for those. His father had been at the receiving end of them many a time. But to his surprise, Bramwell only nodded. “She told you she wanted you, did she? The girl is more like me than I ever thought. She lied, boy. Understand that. She has known about the arrangement with Lovell for months. And she is looking forward to the life she was always meant to have. You were never good enough for her.”
“No,” Nicholas said, but there was a kernel of doubt in the back of his mind that he hated.
How many times had he pondered himself that their positions were so disparate? How many times had he wondered if he would be able to keep Aurora happy when she was without her pin money and her gowns and jewels and parties?
Now Bramwell was drawing those doubts to the surface, picking them open and exposing them to the light.
“You still believe she loves you?” Bramwell said with a sniff. “Then I suppose I must be cruel to be kind. Who wrote that?”
“The Bard,” Nicholas choked. “Hamlet. Act three.”
“You’re educated, at least.” Bramwell shrugged. “Come along.”