Page 103 of Duke of Iron
“Ah,” said Larson, riffling the top page, “the library. She lingered there. I believe there was mention of the built-in globes. And the north-facing parlor. She was…” He paused, his eyes darting. “She was especially animated when viewing the nursery.”
A tightness caught in Logan’s chest. “Was she?”
“Yes, Your Grace. She said it reminded her of her own, growing up, but it is very small.”
Logan did not recall her saying that as they viewed the house, but he knew it was no place to raise a family. “And the Duke of Somerdale—has he been made aware of the sale? I recall he was interested.”
Larson colored. “He inquired after the property, but Your Grace was already in talks with the owner. I sent his man away with a polite note.”
Logan nodded. “That will do. Leave the documents. I will review them before signing.”
The solicitor’s disappointment was evident, but he masked it with a bow. “As you wish, Your Grace.” Larson stood, gathering his hat and gloves. “Will you require further services this week?”
Logan shook his head. “No.” He waited until the door had closed behind the man, then pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes, hard enough to see stars.
A home,he thought,is a house that fills itself from the inside.He tried to imagine the Grosvenor house filled with anything but echo. He could not.
He had watched his father buy house after house, fill each with objects, drive out the ghosts with expense and excess, only to be left alone in the same armchair, year after year, with only the clatter of empty rooms for company. He had vowed, at thirteen, never to become his father.
He had failed.
Logan’s hand shook as he reached for the quill again. He gripped it tighter. What did it matter where you lived if no one would ever call it home? What did it matter if you could fill every bedroom with servants and every parlor with flowers, but the laughter that was meant to animate it never came?
The memory that rose was not even his own, and perhaps it belonged to May—a sun-drenched room, voices calling up from the garden, a child’s shriek of delight as she learned to walk across the grass, the feel of a warm hand taking his, pulling him out into the light.
He set the quill down and did not sign.
The streets blurred into themselves on the ride home, as if London had decided to collapse all its afternoons into one long, unbroken smear of carriages and chimney smoke. Logan kept his eyes forward, and did not notice anything, not even when he was walking up the stairs in his own house, and the soundof laughter—real laughter, not the brittle parody of it—broke through the hush like a stone through glass.
He paused on the landing with one hand on the banister. The drawing room door was ajar, and the voices within were high and bright, weaving over each other like the music of a chamber trio tuning before a concert.
Logan edged closer, compelled.
He saw them in a scene so perfect it seared—May, on her knees, her spectacles askew, arms stretched to catch Rydal as he crawled across the rug; June, lying on her stomach and banging the floor with both fists, urging the child onward; April, holding up a slice of orange as a lure and chanting, “One crawl, just crawl, darling, you can do it?—”
Rydal took a hesitant lurch, then a second. He fell on his belly, and the three women dissolved into giggles so honest and so loud it rattled him.
Logan’s chest felt crushed by an iron band.
May looked up, then, her face flushed and alive, and for a moment their eyes met. Logan wanted to flee, or to shout, or to stride into the room and pull her up into his arms and never let her go. Instead, he stood, frozen, every muscle refusing to move.
I could fill a hundred houses with this and never want for more. I could give up every estate, every ounce of power, for one more minute of this.
Logan backed away and found himself in the hallway, unable to breathe.
The walls pressed in, the carpet was too thick, the air too close. He strode down the hall and out the door, past Bexley, who opened his mouth to say something but thought better of it.
Logan was halfway to the stables before he realized what he was doing. He did not care. He needed to be away, to put air between himself and the drawing room, between himself and the sight of what he wanted so badly he could taste it in his mouth.
You are alone.
May let the butler take her pelisse and gloves, but held Rydal herself, perched on one arm like a slightly overripe melon as she walked into the drawing room.
She found her mother and father both present, and the sight of her mother cheerful and her father looking healthier was so rare that May almost left on principle, lest she disturb a moment of cosmic balance. But Rydal, drooling and arching in her arms, made retreat impossible.
“May!” Dorothy’s cry could have been heard in Hyde Park. She sprang up, nearly knocking her teacup onto the Persian carpet. “And little William! Oh, let me see him, let me see.”
She snatched Rydal from May’s arms with the same energy she’d used to snatch May’s fan when she used it too vigorously at the start of the Season. “Who’s the cleverest child? Who’s the very image of a Vestiere? Look at those cheeks—like little buns, fresh from the oven!”
