Page 83 of Raising the Duke’s Unexpected Twins

They spoke a little bit longer about the children, and then he took his leave, his mind confused. He was fearful about taking too big of a step, for it could turn out very poorly for him in the end, and he could lose everything.

I may not have had anything in the first place.

But there was something between him and Cordelia; he was sure of it, even if he frustrated her, and even if she tried to shy away from him every time he too shied away.

His mind was too preoccupied with his own thoughts that he hardly noticed when he’d arrived at the club until his door was hastily pulled open.

“Your Grace! A fire!” his coachman yelled.

Jumping out, Nicholas looked on in horror as his gambling den, his beautiful, hard-won, lucrative gambling den was going up in flames. Smoke billowed out of the windows, and it filled his nose with the acrid scent.

“Call for the constables, Morton!” he cried to his coachman and then coughing, he hurried forward to the door.

“Is anyone in there?” he cried out, but before he could reach it, someone yanked him back and shoved him down to the ground.

“You can’t go in!”

Swearing, Nicholas looked up to see his cousin, Leonard, looking over him, his eyes wide with fear.

“Leonard, what in God’s name? Is anyone in there?” he asked. “Were you here when the fire began?” he jumped to his feet.

“No one is in there,” Leonard replied in a gravelly voice. “I checked first.” He coughed, and Nicholas frowned as they moved away from the building, watching bits of the roof cave in.

His heart clenched. Everything – this building had been everything to him after his father had passed and he could use what power he had a as a duke to make a new start. So much blood, sweat, and tears had gone into the making of this place.

And now it crumbles before me.

He finally comprehended Leonard’s words and turned slowly to look at his cousin. “What do you mean, you checked first?” he asked, a cold dread threading through him.

Leonard swallowed and backed up, looking as weak as he always had. Nicholas frowned, things being pieced together slowly.

“You never cared that I should go home and enjoy my new wife and new family. That I should finally find happiness in domestic life? You wanted me out of the way.”

“I didn’t want this, to burn it to the ground. I –” Leonard stammered. “I needed the money, Nicholas. I have nothing, and you have everything. You did not wish to share. It needed to be taken back.”

“Taken back? As if I have taken what I’ve earned from someone? I built it myself, which you could have done too, you fool.” He spat on the ground. “You started this fire?”

“He – made me,” Leonard said, and just like that, as if appearing out of the smoke, stepped the Duke of Wexford.

He stood calmly, assessing the fire, both hands on his walking stick. “You’d be surprised at what a man will do for the sake of a little money. Even family will betray family.”

A slow smile grew on Wexford's face, and Nicholas felt sick. “You did this? Told him to burn the place down?”

“After he took the money that was in your safe, yes.”

Nicholas’s fists clenched at his sides, a stormy rage blooming within him that he knew would never be quenched.

“Why?” he asked, the word practically hissing out of him.

“You know why, you fool. You’ve always been a reptile, Meinster,” the duke said loftily. “Your father saw your weakness as did I. Noble blood, certainly, and yet trash. You would never amount to anything, and my son was tainted by you.”

Nicholas had heard this so many times before, and it had always angered him, had always saddened the little boy who still lived inside of him. But now, the words merely brushed against him like rain against metal.

“Yes, well, this is nothing new, Wexford. Why did you burn my gambling hall down now?”

He stepped closer, afraid that his rage would result in two murders. Leonard was pale and sweating, his eyes darting between the two men.

“You know why, as I said. You have taken my son’s legacy from me both in body and financially. I have lost a son and yet I am to have nothing? It isn’t right for you and that whore to benefit from their deaths.”