Page 16 of Jillian’s Wild Heart (Ladies of Munro #4)

“R ubbish!” roared Lord Bradford. “My son? Dead? That cannot be! He is as healthy as a horse! Why, I just saw him a few hours ago, hale and hearty as always. He wouldn’t just… He can’t have…”

“I’m afraid they were unnatural circumstances, my lord,” said the hapless constable.

“A robbery gone bad. He appears to have visited a gaming hell of—shall we say— lesser repute, where he won a rich sum. It would seem he was followed and attacked for his winnings. He must have resisted. He was… er… well, I’m so terribly sorry…

The wound to the head suggests he was hit with a hard, blunt object.

No help could render him repair. Death was swift. ”

“Oh! My son!” wailed Lady Bradford. “My precious boy!”

Miss Bradford slipped from her chair and threw her arms about her mother, who began to sob into her serviette.

“There must be some mistake.” Lord Bradford looked about him as if someone could explain the cause of such an error. “Philip would never enter a place like that. He could lay a wager at the gentleman’s club if he wanted. There was no need to defile himself in this way.”

“There are all sorts of entertainment at these holes, such as a young man might enjoy,” the constable said grimly.

“Are you saying my son would seek such entertainments ?” blustered the baron. “He is…” He swallowed. “ Was… a gentleman. He had money enough and was soon to be engaged. What could he want with such dross?”

The constable looked at his hands, which still clutched his cap tightly. “I cannot say, my lord.”

“Where is he?” Lady Bradford’s voice quavered. “I want to see him.”

“He was transported to the undertaker’s, milady.”

“We must bring him home, Walter. I want my boy here, with me, where I can watch over him.”

Lord Bradford said nothing, only staring ahead of him. Then, as if on a well-oiled axis, his head turned to Jillian and Lewis. As he spoke, bitterness dripped like acid from every word.

“How fortunate for you, Miss Kinsey, that I can no longer cut off my second-born. Lewis is now my heir.” His eyes locked on to those of his remaining son.

“You have new privileges. You have new responsibilities. Choose your actions wisely.” His gaze flicked to Jillian and back.

“More wisely than you have done thus far.”

Lord Bradford rose from his chair with a struggle, the footman stepping forward hurriedly to bring him his cane. His lordship leaned heavily upon it, breathing slowly. He seemed to have aged twenty years in a matter of minutes.

“Make arrangements for the body to be prepared and brought home,” he said as blandly as if he were tallying an invoice. “Spare no expense. We shall have the funeral on Sunday, our last family day together.” He rubbed his brow with the back of his thumb. “Now, you must excuse me. I am tired.”

A sob from his wife punctuated his departure. Her daughter stroked her hair and made soothing noises, but Penelope’s own eyes remained dry.

Lewis stood unmoving. He had not reacted at all to the terrible news. He neither mourned his brother nor acknowledged his new position. Jillian knew it to be the shock of it all.

“Lewis,” she said quietly into his ear, “let me arrange some tea. You could all use the comfort of something warm and sweet. And then, I think, I should go. Your family must process the loss together. If you need me, you know where to find me. But, for now, your attention should be here.”

Lewis nodded. “I will see you out.”

They walked, hands still intertwined, to where the butler stood. Jillian made the request for a tray of fresh tea to be brought at once, and the butler repeated the instruction to the footman, who disappeared to tell the kitchen staff.

Releasing Lewis for a moment, Jilly stepped across to his mother and hunched down before her so that she looked up into the sorrowful face. “I am so very sorry for the loss of your eldest,” she said, her voice tender. “Please let me know if there is anything I can do.”

A flash of fury burned in Lady Bradford’s face.

“You can leave my family alone for a start. Coming in here and ordering my staff about as if you are already lady of the house! That is never going to happen.” Her voice pitched sharply.

“Do you hear me? Never! I have already lost one son. I won’t lose the other to the likes of you! ”

“Mother,” Miss Bradford said urgently. “You are upset. But none of this is Miss Kinsey’s fault. Do not be unkind to her. Lewis will need her support.”

Lady Bradford only hardened her stance. “Lewis needs the support of a woman of quality. It will be hard for him to assume the role Philip alone was raised for. He should not have to teach his wife the intricacies of a life of privilege. She will be more burden than help.” She stopped and dabbed her eyes once more.

“Philip had chosen well.” She sniffed woefully.

“Miss Sangford understands the duties of a lady. And she stands on her own merit. She doesn’t have to rely on the reputation of her friend to be accepted in good society. ”

Lewis rushed forward and pulled Jillian up to her feet.

“Do not make yourself small before such narrowminded hostility. You are worth ten Miss Sangfords, but my parents will not see what is right before their eyes. As for you, Mother, I hold my tongue for now, for you have experienced a loss no parent should have to bear, and I will not add to your misery. But I will say this. You will refrain from insulting Miss Kinsey. Carry whatever skewed views you have toward her in silence. Or you will have lost not one son, but two.”

He grabbed Jillian’s arm and ushered her from the room, while she looked over her shoulder at the broken scene they left behind.

“I’m so sorry, Lewis,” she said. “My presence seems to have made a frightful situation so much worse.”

“What are you apologizing for?” he snapped. “Have you done something wrong? Did you murder Philip? Did you teach my parents to be so outrageously arrogant? Of course not! They should be apologizing to you!”

“They are broken-hearted, Lewis. They say what they would otherwise have left unsaid.”

“But not unthought,” he replied, his lips drawn back in a snarl. “They had already crossed the line before the constables arrived. They did not have the decency to temper their speech for your sake or mine. And now”—he snorted his disgust—“they would remake me in Philip’s image.”

“Give them time. They may yet soften their approach. Especially when the reality of Philip’s absence hits home more fully. They will not want to ruin their relationship with their remaining son.”

“‘Their remaining son.’” Lewis twisted his mouth into a display of disgust. “Ah, yes, the spare. How useful of me to exist.”

Jillian drew the back of her fingers softly across his cheek. “Try not to think of yourself in that way, my darling. It does you no good. Besides, you know it isn’t true.”

“Isn’t it?” Lewis huffed wryly.

“You know your worth. In court. Among your friends. With me. It is only your parents who have left this sour taste in your mouth. Why should their opinion outweigh those of so many others?”

“Because they are my family. And they should have loved me more.”

Jilly grew quiet. There was not much she could say to counter such depth of pain. Instead, she leaned her head against his chest, curling her hands around his back, and gave him a little of the love he could not get from his parents.

“You know,” she said, her head still upon his heart, “I think they love you very much, indeed. That is why I frighten them.”

“They don’t sound particularly frightened,” grumbled Lewis.

“People who are confident in what they have do not need to protect their treasure with such vitriol. They are afraid to lose you. They think I will change you. They don’t realize that this is who you’ve always been.

They are close-minded and particular in their expectations, but they love you the best they know how.

It’s all wrong, I agree. But I am convinced their animosity toward me is borne of the realization that, if forced to choose, you would choose me. ”

Lewis wrapped his arms tightly around her. “And so I would.”

“People who are afraid of losing someone are people who love. It is an insecure, possessive kind of love, and I have mercifully been spared such a miserable form of it. But I have seen it in our village. Even a seemingly tranquil place like Ermenbrough has its darker corners.”

Jillian grew quiet, as if recalling these places and the ugliness that such relationships brought to them.

Then she drew a breath and said, “The point is, you are not merely ‘another son.’ They were upset even before we heard the awful news. They are misguided in their approach, certainly. But you are valued nevertheless. Just as they sigh at Penelope for refusing any talk of marriage, yet they leave her be. Give them time. Our engagement has been a shock, followed by an even greater and irreparable wound. Let things settle. I can be patient.”

Lewis nuzzled his face into her hair. “I wish they knew you as I did.”

They stood in this way, two hearts united, until Miss Bradford found them.

“Mother is asking for you, Lew. I cannot console her. I fear it will be a while before anyone can.”

“You are both so brave,” Jillian said, squeezing Miss Bradford’s hand.

The siblings looked at each other and said nothing.

“You do not have to be brave with me,” Jilly tried to reassure them.

“It is not bravery, Miss Kinsey,” said Miss Bradford.

“It is an absence of connection. Certainly, we are sad. But Philip was not an endearing sort of brother. There was very little relationship to mourn the loss of. Our parents, on the other hand, had pinned all their hopes upon him. For them, it is a very real tragedy. Lewis and I, however, have always lived more along the periphery of Philip’s orbit. ”

“I see,” answered Jilly.

“I hope I do not shock you with my bluntness.”