Page 37 of A Sporting Chance (The Chances #8)

My future wife.

Leopold had barely been able to utter the words. For a few short hours, he’d had Kathleen’s word that she would marry him. And now…

His father sighed heavily. “This is why I have always striven for perfection—for correctness. One false move, one incorrect rumor—”

“I know,” Leopold cut across him curtly. “I know, Father. We all know.”

It was a challenge to say the words without bitterness. All his siblings knew precisely what expectations their father had for them. Expectations that could not be disobeyed.

Unless your name was Alexander, he supposed.

“I liked her,” said the dowager duke softly.

It was all Leopold could do not to point out that he was rather fond of her, too. “I know.”

“Miss Andilet had a very pleasing manner, and she was kind, polite, well dressed,” listed his father on one hand, as though those were the only requirements for a suitable wife.

“Not from a respected family, however. No dowry. Her father has no title. And twice, at least, in my presence, she had no chaperone when she ought to have. Young ladies should not be so bold.”

Leopold’s pulse jumped. He would not comment on what he knew some of his cousins got up to—what his father’s own daughter sometimes got up to. “Well, that will no longer matter, Father.”

The dowager duke frowned. “Perhaps… Perhaps I have been too harsh. On the whole, such things should not prevent a man from seeking happiness. If the gentleman takes that step to make it right, no one will comment on the lack of propriety.”

“I proposed, Father.” It was agony to admit it, but an agony that he had to confess. Perhaps the confession would purge him of the pain. “I proposed, and she accepted, and then we—we argued.”

It had been on the tip of his tongue to admit that he had lain with her. That there could be a grandchild planted in Kathleen right in this moment.

The thought made Leopold’s head spin.

“You do know of her sister’s scandal, obviously.”

Leopold’s head jerked up. His father had not asked a question, more given a statement, and it was with a serious expression that he looked at his son.

Swallowing, he said quietly, “I know there is one. Precisely what happened…the nature of which I think does not need to be guessed at.”

“And yet you invited her here? Knowing that?”

Leopold knew there would be a reprimand in the conversation somewhere, and in a way it was almost a relief to reach it so swiftly. “Yes.”

“Knowing her sister’s reputation was stained?”

“Yes.”

“Knowing that introducing her to Maude—”

“Maude would not have cared, even if she had known,” Leopold pointed out sharply.

His father’s gaze was just as sharp. “Yet you did not give your sister the opportunity to make that decision for herself. You made it for her, by bringing that woman—”

“ That woman is the woman I love, and I will not—”

“And yet you are no longer engaged!”

Perhaps his father had not intended to shout. Leopold certainly had not, and he could feel the fire of obstinate embarrassment boiling through him.

They should not have shouted. They were not a family that often did—yet the desperate anger, the self-loathing, the pity: it all had to go somewhere. There was nothing so bad as hating oneself to make one shout.

A flickering pulse jumped in his father’s jaw. Then he said, “You know, things weren’t always perfect with myself and your mother.”

Leopold stared through the darkness. Was this truly the time for some trite family history? Here he was, unburdening his heart to his father in a situation and conversation that was most uncomfortable, and all he could think about was how much he loved his wife?

To be sure, Leopold had always appreciated how his parents were blatant with their affection, but—

“She left me,” his father said in a rush.

If Leopold had not been seated, he would have fallen. “What did you say?”

“Your mother left me,” said the dowager duke heavily. “When I say that things were not always perfect, I say so advisedly. She kept a secret from me, and when I discovered that secret, I…I shouted at her.”

It was hard to believe, hard to imagine. William Chance was a softly spoken, quiet, reserved gentleman. He was a nobleman who believed that the things one did not say were at times just as important as the things one did say.

And now he was asking Leopold to picture him shouting?

“And I shouted at Maude.”

Leopold stiffened. “I beg your pardon?”

“It was not my finest moment, particularly when you recall just how small Maudy was,” said his father wretchedly, slipping into the family nickname she still hated. “I was angry. I felt betrayed. I felt confused. I felt like a fool.”

“But… But she did lie to you,” Leopold pointed out, feeling a tad uncomfortable that he was saying such a thing about his own mother, truth or not. “It was about Maudy, I presume. Maude.”

His half-sister. The daughter Alice Chance had had from her first marriage. A first marriage that she had, Leopold knew, not told William about before their wedding.

His father exhaled slowly. “She kept the truth from me because she knew what my reaction would be. She didn’t believe I would have married her had I known.

” He grew quiet. “And I’m not sure I would have, though I’d have regretted it my whole life.

” He swallowed. “She expected harshness from me and then was rewarded with that harshness when she believed that she could finally trust me. I lashed out.”

Lashed out?

It was so antithetical to the father he knew that for a moment, Leopold wondered if his father was exaggerating for effect. Attempting to make his son feel better.

And then he looked at the pain etched in the wrinkles around his father’s eyes, saw the agony and regret still harbored in his father’s brow, and realized that despite the many intervening years, William Chance had not entirely forgiven himself.

“She forgave me. I do not know why, to this day, but she did,” said Leopold’s father with a dark smile. “She was always the most forgiving woman, your mother. Still is.”

“Still has to be,” Leopold could not help but say with a soft nod. “Alexander.”

His father muttered something that could have been a curse before saying, “Yes. My point is, I believed the worst of her without all the information. And I lashed out because in my pain, it was easier to direct the hurt at her than at myself.”

Leopold stiffened.

It was all too similar. Was it possible his father had heard what had happened at the London Archery Club?

Surely, the news would travel swiftly, and though London was full of gossip and nonsense, it was only a matter of time before that particular bit of scandal was whispered into the ear of someone who would whisper it into the ear of the head of the family.

Because was that not precisely what Kathleen had done? Presumed the worst, lashed out, run off rather than face the possibility that someone had made an innocent mistake?

Leopold had been pained by the instant harshness of Kathleen’s reaction, but now, speaking with his father…was that not perhaps the most obvious and instinctive response?

“I regretted it,” continued the dowager duke. “She probably did, too.”

Ah, so it was a pointed reference.

“Perfection in a relationship does not come immediately. In fact, I sometimes wonder whether I will ever reach it,” continued Leopold’s father with a wry smile.

It was hard to let that go. “But you and Mama, you are perfect.”

Leopold hated how the statement made him sound like a child, but he could not help it.

They were perfect. Their adoration for each other, the kindness they showed every day, the care and attention, the affection.

He had never seen it so strong in any other pairing.

He had always wanted that for himself one day.

“Besides, I have always tried to be perfect, for you,” Leopold could not help but add, feeling piqued. “And now you tell me that all this time, you have not been perfect.”

It was not accusatory. Not quite. The tone certainly had not been, and the words had not been completely directed at his father.

That did not make Leopold feel any better when his father flinched. “You truly feel so?”

The tension hanging in the air between them was of a different sort than before.

This was, perhaps, one of the first times they had had such a conversation, not just father to son, but man to man.

Leopold was not sure how, but he had grown up the last few years and felt a distance with his father, an uncertainty about how he should be around him.

No longer a child looking up to a man, no longer a son looking up to a duke, so much had changed and yet they still they did not speak directly.

Not until now.

“I thought I had learned that lesson with my brothers,” the dowager duke said.

Leopold blinked. “What lesson?”

“The lesson that being sanctimonious and pretending that perfection is the only requirement of a good life are not very good attributes at all,” his father said with a dark laugh. “The lesson that holding the people I love to a ridiculous standard is never going to end well. For them, or for me.”

Just about managing to keep his jaw from dropping, Leopold stared.

He had never heard his father speak like this. Never realized that the pressure Leopold had felt, that all his siblings had felt, had been already felt a generation before them.

Did anything ever change? Did progress ever get made? Did the bounds of frustration and difficulty ever truly change, or—

But then Leopold recalled the memories of his grandfather. How harsh he had been. How his own father, despite that upbringing, had never been harsh. Direct, yes. But never harsh.

Some chains could be broken. Some cycles could end. And it could end with them.

“I will learn that lesson again and again, for as long as I need to,” said William Chance softly. “I never intended to pass that pressure onto you, and I will do my utmost to change that. Son.”

It was absolutely ridiculous that tears were prickling in the corners of his eyes again, but Leopold did not attempt to hold them back. No, the time for pretending he did not feel what he did was coming to an end. No man should hold back the tide.

“Thank you, Papa,” he said quietly.

His father leaned forward, clasped Leopold’s arm with his hand, and squeezed it. Just for a moment, they were connected.

Then the clasp was over and his father was leaning back, coughing awkwardly and looking at his boots.

Leopold tried not to smile. They had a little way to go. But they were learning.

“So,” William said bracingly. “What are you going to do about your woman?”

The bottom fell out of Leopold’s stomach.

For a glorious few minutes, he had managed to forget about Kathleen, though the tension around his chest had been an ever-present reminder just on the edge of his thoughts.

Now he could not ignore the gnawing ache within him.

The knowledge that he was without her. The woman he needed. The woman he loved.

“I have no idea,” he said aloud. “But I don’t think she’s my woman anymore.”