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A child who would not be.
But he or she could...
That enticing thought whispered around his mind, and he clung to it, entertaining the possibility.
Why couldn't they begin again? With the past now laid bare between them and the secrets explained, they could renew the friendship they'd once cherished and start anew as husband and wife.
Elizabeth had left to save him. She'd spoken of their friendship. She'd not ever indicated there was anything more between them. Not even last evening. But her kiss had hinted at more.
"You empty-headed arse." The shout cut through the din of the tavern and his own musings. Crispin sharpened his gaze and found the innkeeper hovering over the bookish boy. "Enough with those books." He brought a hand up and thumped the boy on the back of his head.
Fury pumped through him, bringing Crispin to his feet. "You there," he barked.
The room fell silent as several serving girls stepped aside, allowing Crispin a wide berth.
His brow wrinkled with confusion, the innkeeper glanced around. The rail-thin lad behind him dropped his gaze to the floor.
"What is this about?" Crispin demanded, stopping in front of the pair.
The balding proprietor shoved the boy between the shoulder blades. His cheeks blanched of color, but then, he quickly found his footing. "Nothing to worry after here, your lordship," he assured, before directing his annoyance again at the child. "Off with you," he mumbled, swiping up the forgotten leather book. Its pages yellow, its bindings fraying, the book had been well-read and showed its age. "I don't tolerate idle ones about." He slapped the small tome against the back of the child's head.
Crimson rage descended over Crispin's vision.
Shoulders hunched, the child made to step around him.
"That will be all," Crispin commanded on a frosty whisper.
The innkeeper's enormous Adam's apple moved.
Settling a gentle hand on the boy's small, narrow shoulder, Crispin guided him to a stop. "Is this the manner in which you treat your children?" he demanded of the proprietor.
"He i-isn't my boy, your l-lordship," he stammered. Doffing his hat, he dusted it along his damp brow. "He's my wife's nephew. We took him in. He's a mouth to feed, and he'll do his part. Everyone who wants a bed and place to rest does. He'll not have a--"
Crispin raised a silencing hand, effectively cutting off the other man's ramblings.
He trained all his attention on the young boy. Except now, up close, he recognized his earlier assessment had been off. There was the hint of fuzz on the boy's upper lip, hinting that he was on the cusp of manhood.
"Look at his lordship," the proprietor barked.
Crispin shot him a hard look, and the other man instantly fell back. Shoulders slumped, the child lifted his eyes.
Tired. Downtrodden. Fearful.
They were Crispin's eyes... but long ago.
"A duke's son, are you? If you're so powerful, then this shouldn't hurt."
Crispin's gut clenched in remembered pain from the fists that had pummeled the breath from his lungs. He'd cried in a corner when everyone at Eton had slept on. Longing for home. For family. For Elizabeth. "What is your name?" he asked quietly.
"Neville Barlow, Your Grace."
The innkeeper's brows shot to his receding hairline. "A duke?" Spreading his arms wide, he dropped a deferential bow suited for the king.
Ignoring him, Crispin focused on Neville's latter words. "How did you ascertain I am a duke?" Unlike his mother, who insisted on displaying her status in her travels, Crispin had always preferred the anonymity afforded a simple "lord," to the fawning and pomp and circumstance that met a duke's every movement.
Neville lifted his thin shoulders in a shrug. "Your driver, Your Grace, referred to you as such earlier."
The lad was clever and perceptive... and his spirit and soul would be as crushed as Crispin's had been at Eton if he remained here with his uncle.
"Give Mr. Barlow his book." He issued the directive without so much as a glance for the innkeeper. When it was passed back to the boy's hands, Crispin motioned to it. "May I?"
Neville hesitated and then gave it over.
Crispin examined the gilded title.
"The Present Practice of Justices of the Peace and a Complete Parish Library," the boy murmured, his voice cracking.
"His Grace can read it for himself," the proprietor snapped.
"That will be all," Crispin clipped out.
Neville turned to go.
"I was speaking to your uncle."
Splotches of red suffused the innkeeper's cheeks. Then, with a bow, he shuffled off.
The other man forgotten, Crispin lifted the book. "You are interested in law?"
"My father was a barrister," he explained, his voice threadbare.
Crispin perched his hip on the edge of the table and examined the brown leather copy. "The book belonged to him, then."
Neville shuffled back and forth on his feet. "He insisted I read it."
"Is that why you're doing so now?" He waved the book lightly. "Because you were expected to do what your father did? Or is it because you enjoy the topic?" Such had served as the basis of Crispin's own existence. It had been broken up into his eventual ascension to the Huntington title... and everything else. Elizabeth had fallen into that hated latter category, when she'd deserved so much more... including a husband who would have cherished her and fought for her, if need be, in ways that Crispin had not.
"The former, Your Grace," Neville said.
"Is there a specialty you enjoy more than another?" he pressed, returning the book.
The boy's shoulders straightened, and for the first time since he'd observed him in the corner, his eyes glimmered, showing something other than the earlier misery. "I enjoy it all. Tort law. Public law. I, however, rather prefer land law." He fell silent, a blush staining his cheeks.
"Peculiar ninny-hammer is what you are. Born to a dukedom, and you'd rather be reading than having yourself any real fun."
He stared at the child's bent head.
That was me. I was Neville. Conditioned to feel shame for his scholarly interests. His mother had lamented those pursuits. His father had tolerated them. Only Elizabeth had fully celebrated Crispin's interests--and reveled in them alongside him.
"There's no shame to be had in academic interests." Crispin echoed the long-ago utterance that Elizabeth had shot back at two nasty boys in Oxfordshire who'd taunted her for her studies. How much braver and prouder she'd been than he. Elizabeth had taught him to find pride and power in his love of knowledge. "Would you wish to pursue a career as a barrister?"
"I had hoped to follow in my father's footsteps, Your Grace," Neville said automatically.
Crispin smiled. "I wasn't speaking hypothetically. My solicitor is getting on in years." Old Chadwick had served the previous duke and been only ever married to his position. The faithful servant had at least a decade more of service before he put down his quill. "If you are interested in pursuing work as a barrister, I will arrange an apprenticeship with him. And from there, you might continue on to Oxford. If that is something you wish."
The boy's mouth worked. "Are you funning me, Your Grace?" he whispered.
Crispin's lips quirked up at the corners. He didn't mention that a sense of comedic humor was an attribute he was sorely lacking. "If you wish for the post"--he slapped him on the back--"it is yours. And if you do not--"
"I want it," the boy croaked. "I do. I want the post."
"Gather your things. We leave this place shortly."
As if he feared Crispin would change his mind and renege on the offer he'd just made, Neville bolted off, knocking into several patrons as he went.
Several shouts went up.
Then Neville stopped. Slightly out of breath, he rushed back. "Forgive me, Your Grace." He sketched a deep bow.
Crispin waved a hand. "There's no need for that. See to your possessions."
With a wide grin, Nevi
lle darted off once more. There was a speed and determination to his steps that had matched Crispin's when he'd been freed from the hells of Eton.
He made to look away when his gaze caught on the willowy figure several paces away.
And, just like it always had when she was near, the world melted away so that only they remained.
Except, in light of the day's revelations and unlike the past, when words had always flowed freely, he was left with--nothing. No adequate apologies or words, or even coherent thought.
Abandoning his spot, Crispin joined her. "Good morning," he greeted quietly. "You are--"
"I heard what you did for that child," she blurted.
*
His ears turned red, just as they'd done when he was a boy of nine bested by her in matches of spillikins. She'd unnerved him. That, however, had not been her intention.
He'd come to the boy's aid. Nay, he'd not only offered his ducal assistance, he'd pledged the child a future, should he desire it.
"I did not do anything." Adjusting the knot of his cravat, Crispin started for the door with Elizabeth falling quickly into step beside him, easily keeping up.
And refusing to abandon her observation. "Why did you do that?"
"Do you take me for an ogre now?" he asked dryly as he drew the door open. Cheerful sunlight spilled into the tavern.
Elizabeth made no move to leave. "Of course not." She angled her head, studying him the way she once had the albino butterfly that had fluttered for several short days in her mother's gardens. "But neither do dukes go about and simply offer posts or an education at Oxford to strangers."
A patron started up the cobbled walk, springing them into movement. Elizabeth stepped outside.
Crispin paused to hold the door for the patron before joining her.
"You know very many dukes, do you?" he countered.
"I know a duke's daughter." A soft breeze caught her hem and whipped it lightly about her ankles. "And through that, her father." The Duke of Ravenscourt had left his miserable daughter, forgotten, at Mrs. Belden's. And according to the not-so-discreet whispers that had filled the halls, the distinguished duke had also littered the whole of England with his bastards. "I've also had enough interactions with noblemen through the years to know they do not simply do anything without expecting something in return."
She registered his silence and looked over. At the frosty set to his features, a chill scraped her spine.
"Did someone... harm you in any way?" There was a lethal edge to his query that promised death to any person who had.
And then the implications of what he'd asked registered. "No," she said quickly. Her cheeks warmed. Of all the worries she'd faced over the years as a woman living on her own, fending off unwanted advances had fortunately never been one of them.
Some of the tension eased from Crispin's broad shoulders.
They reached the gated fence, and Elizabeth stopped. "You didn't answer my question," she pointed out, staying his hand.
Crispin let his arm fall back to his side. "Sometimes, a person requires some help. It's important to offer that when one can and to accept that when one needs it."
She'd have to be deaf as the post before them to fail to hear the recrimination there. Elizabeth frowned. "I've never been too proud to accept assistance." Their marriage was proof enough of that.
A smile ghosted his lips. "I didn't refer to you, Elizabeth." He unlatched the gate and waited for her before falling once again into step beside her. As they walked the remaining length to the carriage, he kept his gaze trained on the gleaming black conveyance. "My years at Eton weren't kind ones." He spoke the way a skilled lecturer imparted essential facts to his charges, rather than the way a man would speak about an experience that had so shaped him. "I was regularly mocked, pummeled, and spoken about because of my singular interests in pursuits."
Of their own volition, Elizabeth's feet drew to a slow stop. "What?" she whispered as he continued on toward the carriage.
Moments ago, he'd not disparaged her, but rather--himself. He'd been speaking about his own experiences.
Crispin continued walking and then turned back. Reaching into his jacket, he drew out brown leather gloves and proceeded to draw them on. "My father had such hopes for my time at Eton and then Oxford. Above all, I didn't wish to disappoint him." Because he'd always striven to please everyone. It had been an impossible feat that, to this date, he likely could not realize, still. "One of my instructors took the liberty of writing the duke to share about my"--his lips pulled--"experience. He arrived himself and escorted me off." And Crispin had never returned.
All these years, she'd built him up as one who was larger than life in every way. The sun had risen and set to the mere thought of Crispin Ferguson. As such, she could have never contemplated a world in which he wasn't revered for the brilliant mind and kind friend he was. "Oh, Crispin," she managed, her heart aching.
He held her gaze. "My father was wrong in failing to accept our marriage, but he wasn't a complete failure as a father." The incident also highlighted a greater reason for his devotion to the late duke.
No, any other lord would have left his son to suffer through the horror of his schooling, a rite of passage of sorts for all future noblemen. After all, how many young ladies had been sent to Mrs. Belden's and had their spirits and souls crushed, with the blessing and permission of their respective families?
She stuffed her hands inside the pockets of her cloak to hide the faint tremble. "Why didn't you tell me?" As a friend, she should have known.
He quirked a black eyebrow up. "Tell you what? That I was a scared, bullied boy who ran away from Eton because I'd tired of finding myself beat up day in and day out?"
Pain lanced through her. For all the ways in which she had known him, there were so many more ways in which she had not. "Did you believe I'd find you somehow less?"
Crispin clasped his hands behind his back and stared out at the rolling expanse of hills in the distance. "It was enough that I found myself lacking, Elizabeth," he murmured.
She stared at him. With his back presented to her, he was an immobile, proud figure. And shame filled her. As children, she'd been the one whispered about and mocked around Oxfordshire for being an oddity. Her world had been small, and never having set foot outside of it, she'd been unaware that life for Crispin, revered in the village as the ducal heir, could have been different from what she'd assumed. She could never have foreseen that he too would have been ridiculed for that which set him apart.
"I didn't know." She spoke the sad truth aloud.
"No." He sighed. "And you wouldn't have. I didn't want you to see that."
Elizabeth took a lurching step toward him. "But I wanted to. You were my best friend."
He'd remained a mystery. And I want all his stories. I want his secrets and the pain he knew, and...
The ground lurched under her feet.
I love him.
She'd loved him first as a friend and now, all these years later, as the intellective boy who'd grown into a man. A man who wanted her to pursue her studies as she once had, and still, even though he'd been named a duke, didn't give a jot about balls or soirees and found them as tedious as she did.
Crispin lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. "It is of no matter." A door slammed in the near distance, and they looked over at the boy sprinting down the cobbled path. "And if I can help prevent someone from feeling that same shame that I myself did, then I'll do so." The boy skidded to a stop. His gaunt chest heaved from his run. "Neville," Crispin said. "May I present Her Grace, the Duchess of Huntington."
Neville bowed. "Your Grace," he panted.
She smiled gently at the bespectacled boy with curly red hair. "I am so very happy you are accompanying us to London."
Us.
How right that felt. And yet, with the past at last laid open and their secrets spread out, there'd never been mention of anything... more.
Her smile froze on her lips, straining the muscle
s of her cheeks.
And as Neville scrambled onto the box to sit alongside the driver, Elizabeth entered the carriage. Crispin reached up to shut the door.
She shot a hand out. "You are not... riding with me?" she asked, regret pulling the question out. Her cheeks flamed. "That is..." She cleared her throat and finished lamely, "Your mount? I trust the journey would still be arduous for him."
"Indeed." Crispin touched his gaze on every corner of her face. "I have several horses stabled along the route."
Belatedly, she took in the servant standing off to the side, the reins of an unfamiliar mount in his fingers.
Of course Crispin would have horses stabled along the traveled roadways. It had been too easy to forget over the years that he was wealthier than Croesus and a future duke atop it.
"Oh," she said as she settled onto the bench.
He paused, and her body arched forward, waiting for whatever words were on his lips.
"Elizabeth."
With that parting, nothing more than her name, Crispin closed the door behind her, stealing the sunlight that had bathed the carriage.
She sat back against the comfortable squabs, and her eyes snagged a pile of books on the opposite bench.
Wetting her lips, she leaned forward.
Her heart quickened.
Elizabeth gently reached for the pile, neatly tied with a long velvet ribbon. Loosening the tie, she freed the article, until the leather tomes stared back.
Emotion threatened to overwhelm her.
Essay on the Vedas, A Guide Through the District of the Lakes, Conversations on Chemistry, an Anonymous Work.
Tears blurred her eyes.
He'd left the books here for her.
The carriage lurched into motion, and she hurriedly caught the pile close, cradling it lovingly against her chest.
She'd been so determined to forget Crispin Ferguson, the Duke of Huntington. She had set up barriers to keep herself from hurting again, but with every exchange, he made it impossible.
It was easy to keep walls up against the rogue who'd left scores of broken hearts about London. But this Crispin? The tender, considerate gentleman who'd hand over treasured texts to her?
Elizabeth closed her eyes.
She loved him.
And she always would.
