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Benedict cared. Stupid, wretched sense of responsibility.

With a sigh that just skirted the edge of self-pity, he flipped back several pages through the ledger. Perhaps seeing what had gone right the previous year could help him understand what was going wrong this year.

The idea, he realized only a few minutes later, had considerable merit.

Unfortunately, that didn’t make him feel any better.

He checked the numbers twice more.

“Mother,” he huffed, frustrated already, “what are you up to?”

The ledgers told a confusing story; his mother was spending absurd amounts of money, far more than she ought to be spending. And yet…the bills didn’t seem to be coming out of Benedict’s coffers. The bills had come to the house, yes; that’s how they’d ended up in the book. And they’d been marked as paid.

But he wasn’t the one paying for them.

Which meant whatever money the Dowager Countess was spending, it wasn’t the money he had given her.

He scoured the numbers one final time in a vain hope that the books would yield more answers, but alas, none were forthcoming. He needed to discuss the issue with his mother, it seemed.

She was, unfortunately, far less likely to be honest than a book of numbers.

He shoved aside the ledger and got to his feet with a reluctance so marked, it practically weighed down his feet.

It was midafternoon. At this hour, the Dowager Countess was likely to be at home and awake; it was too late for her to still be abed, but too early for her to have gone out for the evening’s entertainments. This meant she was most likely to be found in the Countess’ drawing room.

Like most aristocratic London homes, Moore Manor had a parlor that was for the personal use of the lady of the house. When Benedict married—and on that note, he thought, he should send another posy or something to Miss Amanda Rutley—the parlor would become the domain of his wife. But until then, the Dowager Countess had no challenger for her preferred room in the house.

Benedict wasn’t sure if his mother liked the room itself or merely liked that it was the space in the manor over which she heldthe most definite claim. He could only imagine that asking her would not bring him peace.

“Mother?” he asked when he reached the door. It was slightly ajar.

No answer.

He rapped his knuckles lightly against the heavy oak door which swung inward at his touch.

“Mother?”

He looked inside; she wasn’t there.

Benedict was already half turned to leave, to search for her elsewhere, when the scattered papers on the table caught his eye. God help him, if these were further bills…

He pulled the topmost paper towards him.

Theodore,it read.

It’s been far too long since I’ve heard from you. You know you cannot leave me waiting like this?—

Benedict had already half recoiled—he didnotwish to see his mother’s love letters to a dead murderer, and he didnotwish toknow why his mother had left them out on this table—when the next phrase caught his eye.

--without consequences.

He blinked. What?

Meet me at our usual place, or else I shall have to have a conversation that I daresay you shall be less than pleased with. Don’t push me, dear Teddy. You know things are so much better when you behave. And you have not yet seen how poorly things can go when you do not.

Benedict’s head swam. This was… This was athreat. His mother had beenthreateningTheodore Dowling.

And Dowling, apparently, had not reacted well to it, if the scrawled response at the bottom of the parchment, carved in a man’s rough scratching, was any indication.