Chapter One
June 4, 1817
London, England
What the deuceam I doing with my life?
Not for the first time had Andrew James Storme, the Eighth Earl of Hadleigh asked himself that same question. One of the logs in the grate popped as the fire burned low, but it had kept the spring chill out of the study that even now he didn’t find comfort in, for the room would always remind him of his father. No, he had no bloody idea what he was about; he only knew the title, his family, the ton expected much from him, and that pressed upon his chest so tight it stole his ability to breathe at times.
The knowledge that he had no blessed clue about how to conduct himself—both professionally or personally—nagged at him day and night, but there was no reason to examine the whys or even wherefores, and little time to do so if he’d wished for it.
Nothing would change. Nothing ever changed except the pressure placed upon his shoulders. There had been no guidance, no words of encouragement, no preparation, for even though his father’s last illness had been the lingering sort, when they spoke it hadn’t been about the title. Mostly his father had wished to converse over memories and things nearly forgotten in the past—happier times perhaps, that hadn’t been nearly so for Drew when they’d happened due to the ever-present expectations.
With a sigh, Drew glanced at the letter he’d been attempting to write for the last half hour. Why the devil couldn’t he concentrate today? When his brother received the missive, it wouldn’t matter after everything that had happened between them, but the weight of responsibility demanded he do something, and this note was two years past due. It was time for everyone to gather at home and fit all the pieces of their shattered lives back together.
If it was possible.
Once more his pen drooped from his lax fingers. Two years. Damn and blast how life had changed in such a short time. For all of them. His hand shook, and a few tiny drops of black ink spattered upon the letter. No, life wouldn’t be the same, but would it ever be settled? Would there come a time when he didn’t feel like such an abject failure?
The rustle of taffeta preceded his mother’s arrival, and he welcomed the distraction, though the task at hand would need completing, and soon. It was the least he could do. He couldn’t put his house in order, so to speak, until his brothers had been accounted for and settled. The tightness in his chest went up a notch and he winced while trying to breathe through the pressure.
Yet even that wouldn’t erase the scars war—death—had wrought.
Then why is it me who is drowning?
“Good morning, Mother.” Drew had seen her at breakfast some hours ago, but when she’d made an attempt to start a serious conversation with him, he’d fled, for he couldn’t add another worry to the already precarious pile placed upon his head. It seemed running away was how he handled all the decisions in life, presently, and that stirred the anger that always brewed beneath the surface more than anything else.
Why the devil couldn’t he screw his courage to the sticking point and be an earl as his father had been? Poised, confident, nonplussed, congenial had been his sire’s outward appearance. All the things he was not.
“We need to talk, Andrew.” Her tone brooked no argument even though the words had been couched in a quiet voice with a smile. She crossed the room, the picture of elegant grace, and then sat in one of the leather chairs that face his desk. How many times did he recall sitting in that exact spot waiting for his father’s notice? “And when we do, I’d like for you to listen this time.” Concern brewed in her hazel eyes and creased her brow. “It’s imperative, actually. We can’t keep avoiding this.” She smoothed a hand over her moss green skirts. There had never been a time when his mother hadn’t been the calm rock of the Storme family and though he desperately needed that safe harbor, the storms raging inside him couldn’t be soothed with maternal words of affection.
In this, he was quite alone and lost.
God, I’m a failure in every way that matters.
A tendril of cold terror snaked through his gut, but he shoved the thought and the fear away for a later time. Drew rested the pen in its holder. “What is so damned important you’ve tracked me to earth here? Have I not done enough?” For it was always something that apparently only he could attend to or fix.
Who will take care of me when I finally fall apart?
“Language, dear.” She wasted no time in getting to the meat of it. “Your brother arrives home today.”
Panic twisted through his gut to mingle with the fear, and he took tiny, panting breaths to stave off an attack of anxiety. They’d come more frequently in the last six months, but he’d not wished to burden anyone with that fact. For what good would it do? Wasn’t that what came with being a peer? So, he’d hidden his distress as best he could. “Which one?” he finally managed to ask through a tight throat.
“Phineas. I had a letter from him several days ago.” She frowned as she looked at him despite the unabashed excitement in her voice. “I expect you to behave around him.”
Bloody hell.“Please, Mother.” His brother’s imminent arrival made the letter he currently wrote moot. He rolled his eyes heavenward. “Behave? Yes, by all means, let us coddle both of my brothers when they return.” He couldn’t help his words or the bitterness that propelled them into the air, but he also couldn’t stop them. “The heroes of the wars, regardless of the hell I’ve gone through, and still do.”
Why was it that no one cared about the men who hadn’t been to the front lines, who’d been left behind due to necessity and responsibility? Why were such men of less importance than the ones who’d seen battle and had the scars to prove it?
“Andrew, not now.” The exhaustion in his mother’s voice spoke of weary days arguing with him about that very thing.
“When, then? This needs saying, I’ll wager.” He shook his head and counted to five in his head to stave off an explosion of temper. “I don’t matter, for a man who didn’t fight has no right to complain. Isn’t that correct?” Despite his attempts to ward off the inevitable, anger rose in a hot tide to fill his chest until it threatened to choke him. He fairly shook from it.
“That’s not what I meant.” A hint of disappointment clouded her eyes, gone with her next blink.
But he’d glimpsed it all the same. “It’s implied. It always is.” Drew waved a hand. “What’s more, I know you blame me for what happened to the boys. How could you not?” His two younger brothers, both returning home from their military careers and both sporting some type of life-changing injury. “I didn’t try hard enough to deny their commissions.”
I wasn’t there to keep them safe.