Once Upon a Marquess (The Worth Saga 1)

“I thought…” Benedict swallowed. “I thought, maybe, if I never told you there was money… Maybe you’d come up with a new plan, and I wouldn’t have to go back.”

“Oh, Benny.” Judith put her arm around him. Sometimes she forgot. He had old eyes and an old smile. But that didn’t make him old. He was still a little boy.

“I won’t go back,” he said passionately. “I still won’t. I hated everything about it. The people. Learning. Sitting still and memorizing Latin when nobody even speaks it anymore. I would have hated it even if I wasn’t being pummeled. I know everyone is depending on me. Even Anthony said so. But I can’t do it.”

“Sweetheart.” She held him. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I put all that on your shoulders. It’s too much. But you should have…”

Told her, she had been going to say. But he had told her. He’d said he wasn’t going back over and over. She just hadn’t believed him.

“You should have told me Anthony was alive,” Judith said. “And that you knew about it.”

“But he said…” He trailed off. “No, you’re right. He’s not here. You are. I should have told you.” He looked up at her. “Are you angry?”

“Shaking with rage,” Judith said. “But I still love you.”

“Please tell me,” Theresa said, “that he’s getting punishment bread for this.”

She looked at her brother. He looked up at her with big, brown eyes. The same eyes she’d looked into when he was a baby. The same eyes, old eyes, that he’d had when he was five and he’d said that they just needed to add salt and it would be a proper turnip sandwich.

She looked at Theresa. “He is going to be making so much bread.”

Mr. Ennis crossed the room and opened a file. He removed a small, folded square and held it out to Judith. “Here,” he said. “Your elder brother asked me to give you this, if ever you found out.”

Judith took the note and shoved it in her pocket.

“Don’t worry,” Theresa was saying to Benedict. “I’ll explain how to make Theresa’s Kindly Elf Bread. It’s not that bad.”

“Benedict?” Judith shook her head at Theresa. “I wasn’t talking about Benedict. I meant Anthony. If I ever see him again, he will make bread for the rest of his life. Which will be unnaturally short.”

“It’s not fair.” Theresa stomped her foot. “Benedict never gets in trouble for anything!”

“Benedict can’t make bread,” Judith said. “You’re still on bread for another month and a half. Benedict is going to be washing bedsheets.”

“Sheets!” Benedict looked at her. He gave her his best puppy-dog eyes. “Washing? But…”

“Ha!” Theresa smiled. “Punishment laundering! It’s the only thing worse than bread.”

“And,” Judith said, “he’s going to spend the rest of his time figuring out what he’ll be doing. Now that he’s not going back to Eton, he’ll need another plan.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

The river was dark and gray, a slow-moving mass of clouded water. Judith held on to the railing and watched little oil patterns swirl by.

She had brought her brother and sister home and, after assigning bread and laundry, had left. She’d needed to think. But wandering around the city couldn’t calm her soul.

Anthony was alive. She’d let herself dream of it for too long when they’d first found themselves set adrift. She’d imagined her brother found living too many times. She’d created a fantasy in which he was discovered on some palm-shrouded isle in the Indian Ocean, where he’d been washed ashore. He would have come home. They would have sorted out all the unpleasantness surrounding his conviction. His name would be cleared.

And he would have saved her.

But Anthony was alive and he was a traitor. He’d betrayed her not just once, eight years ago, when he’d acted without concern for her wellbeing, not twice, when he’d stayed away, but a third time when he’d put her twelve-year-old brother in charge.

He’d left all the weight on her shoulders and given her none of the ability to make choices. She hated him so much for that.

She ducked into a church, found a coin, and lit a candle. Light flared, pushing back darkness.

“Why?” she asked. “Why, Anthony? Why?”

The candle flickered with her breath.

She took the hard lump of folded paper from her pocket.

“I hate you,” she said. And then, because she missed him, she kissed it. “I love you.”

She unfolded the letter.

Dear Judith, he had written. I am sorry. I am so desperately, damnably sorry for everything I have done. The truth is, I don’t expect that I will survive very long here.

“Where is here?” she demanded. The candle didn’t answer.

I know. You want to kill me a second time. You’re shouting at me now—why Benedict?

It’s simple: Benedict was four when I left.

You were at my trial. You heard the evidence. You were old enough to understand. I was convicted because the evidence showed I knew what our father was doing, and I allowed it to happen. From experience, I can tell you that the less you know, the better.

Benedict was the safest choice. Someone in the family had to know I was alive, and he was the least likely to understand the political implications and be punished for it.

Oh, that he had a reasonable response. She still wanted to punch him in the kidneys.

I grapple with it every day. I know I’ve wronged you. I know I’ve wronged Camilla and Theresa and Benedict. But we’ve wronged a great many others a great deal worse. I know you. You’ve no doubt found a way to undo half the harm I caused. I could not have put my family in more capable hands. You hold things together.

I won’t explain what I’m doing. I won’t justify myself. That, too, would be dangerous. The less you know, the safer you are.

I can imagine what you must think of me, and I’m sure I deserve your worst insults. But I dream every night of standing before my Maker and hearing him ask, “Did you do all you could?”

I hope that when that time comes, my answer will be yes.

Don’t look for me. Don’t write to me. Don’t acknowledge me. When I’m dead, I’ll make certain you are all informed. When she’s old enough to understand, tell Tee-spoon that I send her all my love, and that Pri is well.

God. He’d always encouraged Theresa too much as it was. Judith had almost forgotten about Theresa’s imaginary sister. It was just like Anthony to remember after all these years. Judith wiped tears from her face. “She’s not a baby any longer, Anthony.”

But then, Anthony had never taken the easy way. When they could have escaped all punishment by claiming a cat broke the vase, he’d always chosen to do what he believed was right, no matter whom it hurt.

He’d given up wealth, respect, and comfort. And he didn’t need to tell her why; Christian already had.

She didn’t wish she had a different brother; she wanted this one. He would never again stand near enough to hold, to yell at. She held a hand over the candle, close enough that the heat of the flame tickled her palm.

It had been a painful thing to admit that her brother was a traitor. It was even more painful to let herself believe that he’d betrayed his country for a good reason. A necessary one, even. And it was most painful of all to understand that he’d chosen his principles yet again—and that she could choose to either hold her anger close…or let it go altogether.

Slowly, painfully, she let go of the last of her resentment. “I’m proud of you,” she whispered. “I wouldn’t want a brother who put rules ahead of human misery.”

She had a missing sister, an absent brother hell-bent on his own death, a younger brother who needed a new life, and a sister who would never be normal, no matter how much bread Judith made her bake. There were no knights, no castles, no magic. But there was laughter and there was love, and while Judith still had breath in her body, she would make sure they had enough.

Her life was already

its own once-upon-a-time. There was enough joy in the story, enough sorrow mixed in. It might not be the sort of tale that mothers told their children, but it was still a good one. Not everything hurt. It would all turn out.

Benedict had given Mr. Ennis permission to share information about her sisters’ trusts; the money was intact. He was going to decide what to do instead of returning to Eton. And Judith had been working on an idea for a bit of clockwork—something simple for a change. She had everything she wanted.

Almost everything.

There was one last thing she had to think about. She stared into the flame. Christian had ruined her brother once, and he’d said he would do it again. The point had seemed rather moot.

It wasn’t moot any longer. If she were married to Christian, he would find out about Anthony. He would do what he always did—he would ask questions. He’d ask why Benedict was not declared the earl. He would ask what she’d heard from her solicitor. He would figure it out, and once he knew that Anthony was alive?

Her brother didn’t stand a chance. Whatever he was doing, he obviously didn’t want Judith to know. Christian would be a thousand times worse. The only way to keep Christian from asking questions was…

Judith stood in front of the candle and watched it flicker. The only way to keep Christian from asking questions was to not be around for him to ask. She ached, thinking of it. She trusted Christian with her soul.

But she couldn’t trust him with her brother.