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The note Temperance had sent, dictated through Whitlow, that all further communication must go through him.

A lot of things could be explained if Whitlow was the one sabotaging his married life and his financial standing.

But why?

That was one thing he could not figure out.

Sutton rushed into his study and pulled out every ledger he owned from the shelf and spread them across the desk, the floor, the chair.

He began with last year and worked backward.

Once he knew what to look for, it was almost insulting how easy it was. A draft to Hexley. A draft to a tailor in Savile Row. Round sums, drawn on the estate account, filed under Sundries and Repairs, S.H. Each one initialed in the same neat, familiar hand.

There were still some inconsistencies. Scribbles that he could not understand. But those were smaller, something he would have usually overlooked.

Perhaps he was supplying Everly with something else. Or buying things for himself. It was difficult to tell.

He followed the thread back. Two years. Three.

How far did they go?

Did Whitlow get tired of skimming and decide to kill Sutton to—what?

The dukedom would have fallen to Everly, and that man would have squandered it in half a day.

The door banged open a little after one in the morning.

Hardwicke came through it with his fist in the back of Everly's coat, and Everly came after him in the manner of a man being towed. He smelled of poppy and cheap perfume. His pupils were pinpricks. His skin was gray and damp.

The duke dropped him into the nearest chair.

"Tell him what you told me," he said. "About the money."

"Cousin." Everly smiled. "You look dreadful."

"The money, Everly," Sutton growled.

"Oh. That." He waved a loose hand. "Whitlow supplied me with money."

The candle flame bent in the draft.

"Whitlow pays," Everly said, to the ceiling. "Whitlow feeds me. The medicine, God, the medicine. And he settles what I owe. Cards. The tailor. All of them. He has been at it for years."

Sutton's mouth had gone dry. "Why would he do that?"

Everly shrugged, a gesture so loose-limbed and so horribly easy that Sutton wanted to take him by the throat.

"I convinced him." A thin, wheezing giggle. "Told him you had no wife and no heir. That if you died, the dukedom would come to me. And he would have free rein with all of it. The rents, the Hall, the whole sorry lot." His eyes fluttered shut.

"Everly," Sutton barked, and the man started.

"He always went on and on about how the lazy noblemen didn't deserve their wealth, so I just said he could take it. As long as he fed me well."

Sutton did not want to believe it. He did not want to believe it on the word of an opium-sodden wastrel who would have said anything for another dose.

But too much evidence lined up against his trusted man of business.

"Why would he think I would have no wife or no heir?" he asked.