“I’m not speaking of Miss Goodnight. I’m speaking of the late duchess.”
Ransom steeled himself against the sharp pain of the mention. “Yet another woman who would have been better off if I’d never been born.”
“I was just a young footman, hired on when you were in the womb. Everyone in the house walked on eggshells. There’d been a stillborn child the prior year, they told me. Rumor in the serving quarters was, the doctors had warned that the duchess might not survive another birth.”
A stillborn child, the previous year?
Ransom had never known this.
“But she wanted to take the risk,” Duncan continued. “She wanted you so much. Once the birthing was over, I was sent in to remove the doctor’s case from the room. She reached out, and her hand caught my arm.” The old valet cleared emotion from his throat. “ ‘Promise,’ she said. ‘Promise you’ll show him love.’ ”
Ransom couldn’t move.
“She was delirious,” Duncan said. “Already slipping away. I knew she’d mistaken me for the duke. But I couldn’t tell her so, and there wasn’t time to summon him. The duke wouldn’t have told her what she yearned to hear, anyway.”
Damn right he wouldn’t have. His father had remained a cold, unforgiving bastard until the day he died.
“But I couldn’t let the young duchess die uneasy. So I told her, I promise. I promise to show him love. And for thirty years, I’ve done my best to honor that.”
Jesus. Where was another ewer of freezing water when he needed one, to mask all these other droplets on his face?
Sinking down into the tub, Ransom drew his knees to his chest and scrubbed his face with both hands. His nursemaids and tutors had been forbidden to show him kindness. But who had been there for him? Cleaned him up after every night of debauchery, stitched his wounds, slipped him into immaculate tailcoats made tighter than a mother’s hug?
Who had stayed by him these seven months, as he crawled and fumbled his way back from the brink of death?
Duncan.
Duncan, all this time.
“Now,” he scraped out. “You’re just telling me this now.”
“I never thought you were ready to hear it before. And I was right.”
“But . . . why? There’s no pension in the world worth thirty years of serving me. It’s not as though I gave you any reason for devotion.”
“Of course you didn’t. I kept that promise for thirty years because it gave my work meaning. It gave me honor. A small, domestic kind of honor, but honor nonetheless.
“But apparently, in your view, I’ve wasted my whole life. Just another of those shite-filled vows and bollocks oaths. Now that you’ve released me from it . . .” The valet heaved a deep breath. “I believe I’ll retire to a little seaside cottage in Ireland. I’m rather looking forward to that.”
Ransom groped about for a towel or his clothing. Nothing.
“Where’s my shirt?”
“I wouldn’t know, Your Grace. That’s not my job anymore. But if I might offer you one bit of parting advice . . . You’re not in a position to be selective. If someone offers you love or friendship, take it. Even if it comes dressed in a tea tray. Also, stay away from stripes. Unflattering.”
Ransom was left blind, naked, wet, and shivering. And completely alone, just as the day he was born.
There was nothing to do but start over.
And try to get everything back.
Izzy paced her bedchamber by the light of a single candle.
She checked the clock again. Half past two in the morning. Only nine minutes since the last time she’d checked.
Where on earth could Ransom have gone? In the dark of night, on his own? At her insistence, Duncan had gone out searching for him. They should have returned hours ago. Now, Izzy was worried for them both.
She alternated between anger at his desertion and the fear that something horrid had happened. He was a grown man, she told herself. Magnus was a faithful guide. But none of that was a guarantee against accidents or injury. What if he’d gotten lost? What if he’d fallen in the stream?
What if he’d gone to Scotland with one of the handmaidens instead? She didn’t know that she would blame him, after some of the angry things she’d said.
Lord. The uncertainty was killing her. Maybe she should venture out herself. She could take a lamp and rouse Snowdrop from her bed of wood shavings.
That was it. Izzy reached for her cloak and boots. She couldn’t just sit here and do nothing.
Her fingers trembled as she worked at unknotting the laces of her boots. Why she never unlaced them when she took her boots off at the end of the day, Izzy didn’t know. It was a lazy habit, and she’d never regretted it more than she did this moment.
Now that she’d made the decision to go out in search of him, her anxiety had intensified. And unlike her usual heart-pounding terror in the dark, this fear had a defined shape and edges she could grasp on to.
Because this wasn’t imagined fear. Not anymore. This was genuine terror for the safety of someone she cared about. Someone she loved. She loved him, and it didn’t matter that he’d sabotaged all their hard work and future happiness today. If he was out there somewhere, hurting in the dark, she had to help.
And then—just as she’d finally worked loose the knot on her second boot—she heard noises in the courtyard. She ran to the window.
Oh, thank heaven.
He was home.
He was home, his arm slung over Duncan’s shoulder, and he was . . . laughing.
Laughing?
Her fear was gone. In its place, she knew a rush of pure fury.
Izzy stormed down the staircase and into the great hall, just in time to greet the returning men.
She wrapped her arms about herself to stop her trembling. “Ransom. I’ve been worried sick. Where have you been?”
Duncan seemed to know his cue to clear out. “I have some . . .” He gestured vaguely toward the ceiling. Then turned his head to look over his shoulder. “The laundry. Need to . . .”
“Just go,” Izzy pleaded.
He went, and gratefully.
“My thanks,” Ransom called after him. “For all of it.”
Duncan paused and bowed. “It was my honor.”
“So?” She hugged herself tight. “Where have you been?”
“I’ve been . . .” He gestured expansively. “Making friends.”
Making friends? She couldn’t have been more astonished if he’d answered, Chasing unicorns.