Page 29 of A Lady’s Rules for Seaside Romance (The Harp & Thistle #3)

Freddy scoffed. “Of course it bothered me. Do you think he went off with my mother? Of course not. He went with the courtesans while she stayed behind. Even I know that .”

A mix of fury and disgust rippled through Victor. “Your father did that? You’re sure?”

Freddy nodded tightly. “After he died, I confronted my grandfather about it. I had heard rumors—when you’re a child, people think you don’t know what they’re talking about when they flap their lips about. But I heard it. Anyway, he confirmed it was true but told me to quit asking about it.”

“I’m sorry.” Victor meant it, too.

But Freddy responded by pushing his top hat forward slightly and made it known the discussion was over by going silent.

As the ladies slowed up ahead, Victor and Freddy followed suit and trotted along the beach.

Around them, the early morning, gray sky brightened with the sun as it rose higher.

Waves crashed ashore with a satisfying sound.

In a few hours, it would be too hot to be on the beach wearing a suit, but right now, the air, the sun, and the temperature were perfect.

“What was your father like?” Freddy asked, surprising Victor. Victor had never talked about his father to Freddy or Mary before.

Victor considered the question. “He was wild. Loud. His voice was loud, his demeanor was loud, the way he dressed was loud. Everything about him demanded attention.”

“Did he have mistresses?”

The question took him aback. “To be honest, I don’t know.”

“Would you have mistresses if you were married?” There was a sharpness to Freddy’s voice that grabbed Victor’s attention.

“No.”

“If you go to the masquerade, will you go off with courtesans?”

Victor looked Freddy square in the eye and noticed the lad’s jaw was set tight once again.

Something about the way Freddy asked these questions told Victor the young lad was quite serious about getting an honest answer, and that Victor’s answers mattered to him.

Did the young man look up to Victor more than he had thought, perhaps?

It was clear Freddy was comparing him to Winthrop.

“No,” Victor said with abject certainty.

Freddy held Victor’s gaze a beat longer, lifting his chin with warning reflecting in his eyes, then gave a single nod and looked away. “Do you miss him?” Freddy asked. “Or has it been too long?”

“I still miss him,” Victor admitted.

“I don’t miss Bernard.” Freddy kept his face straight forward, but his hold on the reins tightened.

Victor wasn’t sure when it had happened, but there was now so much of the former marquess in the young man, it was unsettling, like a dead man walking.

It didn’t help there was that familiar defiance in Freddy’s face that dared Victor to argue with him, or give the wrong answer to his questions.

He had seen that exact face—the slight press of the mouth, the narrowing of the same eyes, the furrow of the same brows—in Winthrop when he’d made his wagers against Dantes’s fights. The fights Dantes had always won.

All Victor knew was one day, Freddy, already a marquess, would be the Duke of Chalworth. And God help anyone who crossed him.

“I understand,” Victor replied carefully to Freddy’s admission. For all Victor knew, it was a heavy weight on the lad’s shoulders and likely had taken a lot of strength to admit to. “And I think it’s brave of you to admit that not only to me, but yourself.”

Freddy swallowed and tore his gaze away, putting it on his mother and sister up ahead. As his face softened upon seeing them, Victor finally saw a hint of Anne in his profile. “I’m glad Mama is not trying to get an exception for Mary go to the masquerade.”

Victor felt a pang of humor in his chest. “Why, because she wouldn’t get one for you?”

“No. Mary would just cause trouble.”

That response threw Victor off. What had Freddy meant by that?

But before Victor could ask, their horses slowed to a stop.

Anne and Mary had turned around to head back to Summerwood, which had caught the attention of Victor’s and Freddy’s horses.

Anne’s cheeks had color to them. Meanwhile, Mary pouted but did her best to hide it.

They had continued to argue about the masquerade, no doubt.

“That was good fun! But we should head back,” Anne said in a forced bright voice. After talking with Freddy, Victor appreciated how much Anne had been dealt with on her own, and his admiration for her only deepened.

“Is everything all right?” Victor asked, concerned by the tension in her face. She was forcing a smile, but it wasn’t reaching her eyes. Eyes that were filled with concern.

“Oh, everything is just fine,” Mary said in a haughty voice, her spine needle-straight. “Mama still won’t ask for an exception for me to attend Lord and Lady Bell’s masquerade and frankly, I find that unfair. Why can I go to every other ball except that one?”

“Mary…” Anne let out a sigh of exasperation. “I’ve already explained to you. It’s not an appropriate event for a young lady not yet out. Our friends don’t mind you attending intimate, small balls. The masquerade is…not that.”

Victor stared unblinking at Anne as she said this and couldn’t help but drink her in.

Her green riding habit fit snugly, and he admired the inward curve of her waist, flared by her wide hips as she perched atop Onyx.

He imagined some faceless, white-faced cad in a powdered wig and eighteenth-century garb grabbing the cinch of her waist, winning a flirtatious giggle, that grin topped by a white eye mask.

Jealousy reared and ran like an untamed horse, and he mentally cursed at himself.

As if hearing his thoughts, Anne lifted her eyes to his and when she realized he was watching her, she quickly looked away, her face more flushed than it had been before. She pressed her hands to her cheeks. “I think the temperature is rising along with tempers. Shall we?”

Mary made a harrumph sound, shouted out a command to Pancake, and she and her mare bolted back down the beach, mane and tail and habit skirt billowing with the wind. After a brief hesitation, Freddy nudged his horse after her.

“Children! Mary! Freddy!” Anne cried after them with a panicked shout. Victor could see she was preparing to gallop after them as well.

“Wait.” Victor reached out and pressed a halting hand to Anne’s forearm. As Onyx snorted, she stared down at it and then her eyes flew up to his, wide.

“You better not be about to tell me how to parent them.” Frustration ground at her voice. Maybe Freddy had gotten his defiance from her.

“Have I ever done that, unless you explicitly asked for my opinion?” He made a point not to move his hand away, to linger his touch.

Anne looked down at it again, then back up to his face, her pale eyes searching his.

But once again, she didn’t tell him to move or back off. This sent a jolt of hope through him.

“No, you haven’t,” she conceded.

“Do you trust them to ride back safely on their own?”

She huffed. “Of course I do.”

“Do you want to know what I think right now? I will keep my thoughts to myself if you wish me to.”

Her eyes narrowed a tad, but she eventually nodded.

“Let them go. Give Mary space to get her frustration out the way she wants to.”

Anne inhaled deeply though her nose and closed her eyes as if this pained her. “Very well.”

With regret, he moved his hand off of her and they began trotting back to the house. “A minute ago, I was thinking about how much I admire you.”

Anne frowned and gave him a suspicious onceover. “Admire me? Why?”

“Because you raised Mary and Freddy on your own, both before and after your husband’s death. They’re growing up to be good people and are well-behaved. That is no small feat.”

She turned her face forward. “Frankly, I don’t know how true that is anymore.”

“It remains true.” Victor wasn’t a father, of course, but he’d been the stand-in for his brothers for a long time.

“I don’t know exactly what it’s like, but I do know how it is to worry about people who rely on you.

Always questioning yourself, if you’re making the right decision, if you’re raising them right or destroying them in the process.

Look at my situation. I was responsible for Dantes and Ollie while living in the slums. I was not someone to admire or look up to.

I’ve broken many laws, did many shameful things, and should have been sent to prison several times over for it.

But fortunately, I wasn’t. And I think all three of us turned out relatively well. I hope, anyway.”

“You did,” Anne replied.

“You were put into a difficult situation and I think you’ve come out the other side stronger for it.”

Anne was quiet for a moment as their horses gently cantered along the beach.

“I do worry about them. I was once a young lady like Mary, eager to become an adult, frustrated to still be treated like a child. I understand that frustration and I feel like it’s easier for me to face because I’ve been there myself. But Freddy…” She trailed off.

“What about Freddy?”

Anne sighed. “Please don’t judge me for what I’m about to say, but I worry most about him. I worry about him…becoming Bernard.” She turned her face toward the watery horizon, her mouth pressed tight.

“He does look a lot like him,” Victor said, recalling his earlier thoughts about the young lad’s resemblance to his father.

“It’s uncanny. When he came home from school this year, I walked downstairs to greet him and swore I was seeing Bernard’s ghost. And if he looks just like Bernard, somewhere inside of him Bernard’s demeanor lurks as well.”