Page 81 of Unraveled By the Duke
“She will not be joining us. She will remain at Finsbury,” Alexander said firmly. “And I will rest later. I have work I must attend to in my study.”
“Oh boo. Why must Celia remain all the way across London in that gloomy place? You are married, after all.”
Alexander was at a loss. He didn’t have the words to explain the situation to someone he had never lied to.
“That is more complicated than I have time to explain to you, dear one,” he said. “Suffice to say that her presence here would be welcome to you and… problematic to me. Now, if you will excuse me, I will see you at dinner.”
He kissed her head and then ruffled her hair, as he had done since she was barely old enough to walk. She smiled.
“If this continues on much longer, I will go to Finsbury and bring her back here with me,” she declared.
Alexander forced a laugh to disguise the eagerness that soared within him at the notion.
If Hyacinth actually did that, I think I would be angry. But it would bring Celia here, and by no action of mine. The choice would be taken out of my hands.
“Do not do that, I beg you,” he said fondly. “One day soon, I will explain everything to you concerning the events of the last few weeks. Then, you will understand.”
Hyacinth looked at him skeptically, tilting her head to the side and narrowing her eyes. “Do you promise, or are you just saying that because you do not believe you will ever need to prove it?”
Alexander began ascending the stairs, feeling as though every step was against twice his weight. He threw back his head and laughed.
“When did you become so cynical?” he asked.
“When I had my seventeenth birthday, I think, and danced my first dance with a handsome young man.”
Her answer was so coquettish that he looked back at her questioningly.
“Do not let your mother hear you say that, young lady. You will find yourself enrolled at a convent in the north before you can blink. Go, be innocent for a while longer.”
She tittered and skipped away.
Before she was out of sight, though, Alexander called out, “If I find out the name of any handsome young man who has been dancing with you, I will make him wish he had never been born.”
Laughter was her answer.
Alexander found himself smiling and shaking his head. He continued to his study, tossing his coat on an armchair and sitting down behind his desk. It was covered in ledgers and accounts, copies of those accounts his solicitor had readied for Celia to inspect. If she ever allowed that event to take place.
A letter sat atop them, left there by the servants with the morning post. He used a paper knife to open the envelope and unfolded the paper within.
To His Grace the Duke of Cheverton,
It is with the greatest regret that the Grimaire Bank of London and Paris informs Your Grace that with immediate effect, the monies loaned to Your Grace, which are itemized in the attached appendices, must be repaid without delay. No further lines of credit can be extended, and no further extensions on credit granted can be given. We regret to inform you that allbusiness between Grimaire and Cheverton will cease from the date of this missive.
Sincerely and with regret,
Sir Nathaniel Grimaire.
Alexander read the letter again, but the meaning was clear and expressed in a brutally simple way. Grimaire was calling in the debts owed by Cheverton. Debts his father had accrued with no means of repaying them. Debts that exposed his family to disgrace and ruin.
Alexander had been forced to grievously offend the Grimaire family by defending Aurelia Frid, and this was the consequence.
Ruination. He could not pay off those debts if they were all called in at once. He certainly would not be able to secure the debut Hyacinth deserved. Even Celia’s dowry would not be enough.
He sat back in his chair, the letter falling from his fingers. A terrible fatigue sank into his bones. He wanted to give up, to stop fighting and let the world spin on around him.
No, I will not give up. I will not stop.
As his shoulders slumped and his head fell, he forced himself upright. His hand rested on the desk, and his arm straightened, holding his body up. He looked ahead, clear-eyed and determined.
