Chapter 6
Chapter Six
“Well, what do we have here?” Daniel muttered to himself.
A part of him wondered at that moment if Valentine St. Clair was right and if he was too snobbish to be fighting thugs who lived for danger. He would also stick out like a sore thumb, although not as much as Theo would.
In his study, he felt comfortable—perhaps too comfortable—because it was his lair. He was surrounded by old parchment and choice mahogany furniture. Everything he owned contrasted sharply with everything the underworld stood for, with its stench of stale ale and rotting wood.
On his table, he had a map of Shoreditch laid out. He followed the networking veins of the slums. His index finger stopped on an unmarked square near the docks.
Mmm.
He mentally calculated where he could enter and how many men would have to be bypassed.
He admitted that he had no idea how these thugs would operate, noting that he should ask Adrian for more particulars.
His brother-in-law had given him some necessary details, but one could never be too prepared for something like this.
While he was pondering ways in which he, a duke, could enter such a dangerous territory without his throat getting slit at the first turn, a soft knock sounded at the door.
He was about to growl, since the sound had broken his concentration, when the butler announced,
“Her Grace, the Duchess of Oakmere.”
“Marianne,” Daniel muttered, suddenly feeling like a little boy at the mention of his older sister’s name.
“Enter,” he mumbled.
Marianne entered with the grace and self-possession she always had as the firstborn child of the deceased Lord Grisham.
She had always been the protector of all the siblings, and Daniel appreciated it.
It also reminded him, as he grew older and more mature, that he could have done better.
Being a son, even though their father had considered him the cause of his mother’s death, had saved him from most of the punishments his sisters had to endure.
Guilt still wracked him these days. The deaths of Uncle Algernon and his cousin Kenneth reminded him of how fragile life could be. He could not just be complacent, even though his sisters were all happily married now.
Marianne went straight to him and wrapped him in a warm embrace. His chest tightened with emotion.
“I heard that you’ve been in this room for hours, Daniel,” she murmured. Her voice was like a melancholy reproof. She alone was capable of doing that. “The sun will be setting soon—”
“It is not,” he interrupted, anxiously watching the sky through his window.
“Well, it does feel like it. You have been here for hours, and that is accurate. Are you trying to turn into a statue?”
“I am fine, dear sister,” Daniel insisted, sighing.
He placed a hand on the nape of his neck and massaged it a little. There was no sense hiding it. She knew him well.
“There are matters I must attend to urgently. It is, after all, my duty to manage the duchy. It was enough of a shock that I had to do it for a marquisate, but at least there had always been a possibility it would happen. I did not expect to become a duke, but I don’t want to be the one to drive the estates into ruin. ”
Marianne’s eyes swept over his desk, squinting at the marks and scribbled notes. Her fingers hovered close to the name Moses Gordon.
Daniel held his breath. What if she found out what he was planning to do? Would she stop him or help him? While the Duchess of Oakmere hated hunting because of her love for animals, she had no qualms about hunting terrible humans.
“Daniel, I don’t know what you are planning to do.
Some of these don’t look related to your duchy, but even if they are, think about it.
Your duchy is thriving. I’ve heard many good things about Stonewynn and how you have continued on our uncle’s and cousin’s good practices while continuing to improve the processes and results.
However, you are withering. You’re the one who is not thriving.
Everyone deserves a break, including you.
You need a moment to breathe without having to carry the weight of the world on your weary shoulders. ”
Daniel didn’t reply. His head dipped as he focused on his ledgers and maps once more. He clenched his jaw. There were things he wanted to tell his sister, but they were better kept secret. She didn’t deserve to be ignored or kept secrets from.
“I guess you are right, Marianne,” he murmured.
“I’ve missed you,” she said, with a sigh.
That drew his attention back to her. “Elizabeth, Wilhelmina, and the twins feel the same way. Just because we have married dukes and have children, does not mean we have forgotten our brother. We would like to see you from time to time, and we don’t want an appointment with the Duke.
We want to see you as our brother. Simply you. ”
Daniel finally met her probing, worried eyes. He didn’t know what she could see in his own, but he felt bone-tired at only thirty-one years old.
As much as she loved his sister, looking at her reminded him of his failures.
She was the eldest, and she had taken the brunt of their father’s violent rage.
He was a male heir, so he had often escaped from the constant fear.
Not only that, he had traveled to the Continent as a much younger man and had a life away from their father’s glares and the tip of his cane.
He owed his sister so much, and that debt would never be truly paid, no matter what he did.
“I—I had been preoccupied, but you are right. I will make a better effort to visit everyone more often. I promise,” he rasped.
Marianne smiled, which made her whole face light up.
If there was one thing he could be thankful for about being with family, it was how genuine they were and how truly united they were.
He knew it was never a given with families.
Some might be related by blood, but they still competed or fought over money or property. It had never been like that with them.
“Good. Now that you’ve said that, I am holding you to your word.
I am planning to host a ball in a fortnight.
You know what I feel about such things. People find me too different, not quite to their liking.
The only thing they like about me is my title.
But I will host a ball at the townhouse for you.
It will be a grand thing, and I’d very much like to see you there, enjoying yourself. ”
Daniel groaned, not even hiding his dislike for such affairs.
“A ball, Marianne? Of all things? I loathe them. Our dear sister just hosted one, and I was not there. It always suffocates me. The heat of several bodies in one place. The small talk we all had to live through. Mothers pushing their daughters at me, like prizes. Some of those daughters would come to me only because of my title or only because their mothers had forced them to. It’s tedious. ”
“Mhm. It is only tedious if you refuse to dance,” Marianne retorted with a shrug.
She placed her hand over his. Somehow, he felt safe and secure. Daniel had never met their mother, and Marianne was the closest to a mother figure he’d ever have. His stepmother, Lady Grisham, was far too cruel to feel like one.
“Look at me, Daniel.”
Daniel didn’t even realize that his eyes had lowered again. He always met people’s gazes; they were the ones who lowered theirs.
“You have spent enough years running away,” Marianne continued.
“You’ve devoted yourself to working hard not only for your estate, but also for your family.
Whenever our younger sisters needed help or guidance, you were there for them.
It’s time to focus on showing them the man I am deeply proud of.
I want to see you illuminated by chandeliers, and not just by the moonlight, where you may be off investigating. Oh yes, I know.”
Her eyes shone with a silent plea. Those eyes cornered him more than any words could.
Daniel was about to open his mouth to decline the invitation, but nothing came out. Instead, he exhaled. Defeated, but at the same time relieved, as if he had been freed from a prison of his own making.
“Fine. I will attend one ball. I also can’t promise to stay for long,” he said grudgingly.
Marianne looked delighted, clapping her hands together. For a moment, she sounded like a girl and not his sister, who was three years his senior.
“Thank you, Daniel! I will tell the others about it. You will not regret it, dear brother. It will be the event of the Season!”
Perhaps that was what he was afraid of—that it would be the event of the Season. He watched his sister glide toward the door, looking more buoyant than when she had arrived. She stopped just when her hand hovered on the knob and then turned toward him.
Of course.
Her face had softened. One could say it was tender. Very few people would use that word to describe Marianne.
“I want you to know, Daniel, that even though you’ve become a marquess and then a duke, you are still my little brother. Even though we are now more than three decades older, I still remember you as that playful little boy who wanted to explore the world beyond the gates. You do know that. Right?”
“Of course, I do,” he said gruffly.
Looking satisfied, Marianne blew him a playful kiss and left.
Daniel was again left in the silence of his study and with the constant noise in his head. He turned his attention back to the map of Shoreditch. Perhaps it was fatigue, but somehow the lines looked blurry.
He constantly felt like an impostor and not the real Duke. He would not have inherited the title if not for the tragedy. He also didn’t deserve Marianne’s kindness. He was always on the edge of a precipice. He was in greater danger than being exposed to fawning mamas at a ball.
Strangely enough, it was not Moses Gordon and the man who had possibly paid him to burn his family alive that concerned him at that moment.
The ball?
It made him think of a woman in a dark alley. He wondered whether he’d see her again under the lights of chandeliers or by the moonlight.