Chapter 21
Twenty-One
The morning light filtered weakly through the tall windows of Wharton House, casting long slashes of pale gold across the stone floor. Outside, the guests had already begun their relentless stir—the clatter of hooves, the creak of wheels, the loud laughter that seemed to come from the gardens.
Inside his studio, however, silence reigned. It was a silence Norman had come to savor—it answered only to him.
He stood before the hearth, his back to the room, sleeves rolled to the forearm, a black waistcoat stretched taut over his broad frame. The fire had burned low, but he had not asked for more wood.
He had preferred the chill this morning. The cold bit at the edges of his skin, reminding him he was awake. Alive. Present.
The memory of what had happened last night between him and Kitty consumed him with burning fire—the silk of her skin beneath his hands, the crush of her rosy lips, the way her body had trembled under his.
The images played behind his eyelids on relentless repeat, seared into his mind.
No matter how he tried, he couldn’t purge the ghost of her touch.
“Your Grace.” Norman turned slightly at the weak voice behind him, breaking him from his thoughts.
Rutledge, ever grave, stood in the doorway, chin inclined. “You have a visitor,” he continued. “He did not send a card.”
Norman’s brow lifted in confusion. Who else could it be? Surely no more visitors were coming—he’d already received everyone expected.
“Name?” he asked, his voice raspy.
“Brown, Your Grace. A Mr. Brown.”
Ah. Of course. It was inevitable. Brown had the persistence of a bloodhound and the patience of a spider—always waiting, always finding him, no matter where he fled.
Norman turned back to the fire, his jaw hardening.
“Send him in.”
Rutledge’s expression betrayed nothing, but Norman did not miss the brief pause before he inclined his head and disappeared down the hall. The butler clearly disliked Brown. Well, that made two of them.
Norman did not move as footsteps echoed faintly against the marble floor, then grew louder. He knew the cadence of Brown’s walk—short, hurried steps, like a man always chasing something just out of reach. Money, mostly.
“Your Grace,” came the oily voice. “A pleasure to see you again. May I congratulate you on your most recent... success?”
Norman turned slowly, letting his gaze settle on the man now standing at the threshold like a rat who’d found a way into the pantry. Brown was dressed like a man who had only recently discovered tailoring, and his smile was thin and stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread.
“Success?” Norman asked coolly, not moving from the hearth, studying him.
Brown stepped forward, emboldened. “Why, the engagement, of course. The lovely Miss McGowan. Or should I say the Duchess of Wharton now?”
“Not yet. The wedding is in two days.” Norman replied, voice low. “But what she is or will be is no concern of yours.”
“Ah, but see—there you’re mistaken, Your Grace,” Brown said, placing both gloved hands on the back of the nearest chair, leaning in slightly as though confiding in an old friend. “Because her fortune, which now intersects rather neatly with yours, is of concern to me. Or shall we say... interest.”
Norman did not respond. He let silence speak for him. It did a better job than any words.
Brown’s smirk faltered but did not fade. “I’ve come, Your Grace, as a reasonable man. I know what you owe me. And I understand things change when one is soon to be married into wealth.”
“Do they, Mr. Brown?”
“Come now,” Brown chortled, but his voice lacked mirth.
“A woman like that comes with an impressive dowry. More than enough, I’d wager, to settle our little matter.
In fact... I dare say I ought to be compensated for the delay in payment.
A duke dragging his heels—shocking business.
I believe double the sum would be just enough. ”
Norman’s gaze narrowed, cold and hard as flint.
How dare he? The sheer audacity of the man—to think he could manipulate Norman so brazenly.
“You’re here to blackmail me.”
Brown tutted. “Such an ugly word, Your Grace. I prefer... negotiation. A fair one at that, I’d say.”
“You prefer to overstep. And extortion, by the way, remains a crime. A serious one. The sort that can land a man in prison, or worse—on a ship to the colonies.”
Brown straightened, smoothing his lapel.
“Surely, you would not resort to dragging this into court, Your Grace. That would cause quite the stir. A duke, entangled in debt with the likes of me? Think of the scandal. Your name, her name—her father’s name—all dragged through the mud.
You wouldn’t risk your reputation, not so early in this marriage. ”
Norman slowly stepped away from the hearth.
“And here you stand, in my house,” Norman said, his voice dripping with contempt, “presuming I give a damn about the ton’s opinion. The only thing I care about is my betrothed. No threat coming from you would change that.”
“Oh, but you must, Your Grace.” Brown’s words oozed with delight, his voice thick with barely restrained amusement. “Your father certainly did. And unless I’m mistaken... the apple rarely falls far from the tree. Or am I wrong?”
That smirking bastard. Norman’s fingers twitched with the urge to seize Brown by his collar and haul him through the studio, down the stairs, and out into the street—to purge every trace of him from his home.
He stopped just before Brown, gaze level, unreadable.
“My father,” he said evenly, “may have chosen to turn the other cheek. He may have thought it better to yield than confront vermin. But I am not my father.”
He closed the distance between them in one measured step, his voice dropping to a dangerous murmur. “You’ll learn that soon enough.”
Brown swallowed, his false smile growing brittle.
“I do not flinch at scandal. I do not fear dirt. And I certainly do not negotiate with thieves.” Norman’s voice rose with each word, the heat of his anger licking at his temples like flames.
A muscle jumped in Brown’s jaw as he swallowed, yet his gaze burned with unyielding conviction. “You owe me.” Each word landed like a hammer blow.
Norman’s expression did not shift. “I owe you nothing. You were paid what was agreed. And if you believe fabricating records or whispering threats will change that, you’ve misjudged the man before you. You’ll get precisely what my father owed you—not a penny more.”
Brown’s eyes glittered. “You think I don’t have the documents? I’ve kept everything. Signatures, letters. If I show them to the right people—”
“Then do it.”
That stopped him.
Norman leaned forward, close enough to see the way Brown’s pupils twitched. “But understand this—if you choose to open that door, I will walk through it with a torch. And when I do, I will make certain you burn as I stand by and watch.”
Brown stepped back, fingers curling into the fabric of his pants.
“You’re bluffing.”
“Try me.”
They stared at one another, the air between them heavy, thick with unspoken violence. Norman did not move. Did not blink.
“You came here thinking I would be weak. That this marriage makes me vulnerable. That I might yield to avoid embarrassment.” Norman’s voice dropped lower, more intimate now—deadly.
“But let me be clear, Mr. Brown. I would sooner see this house burn to ash than allow a coward like you to profit from my wife’s name. ”
Brown licked his lips. He had the look of a man calculating his odds and not liking the result.
“You think yourself untouchable now,” he muttered.
“I know what I am. You seem to forget who you are.”
Norman turned from him then, as though the matter were done. As though Brown no longer merited his attention.
“You may leave. I’ll not have your stench in this house longer than necessary.”
But Brown lingered. Of course he did. Parasites rarely left willingly.
“One way or another, Your Grace, you will pay. Whether it’s in coin or consequence is up to you.”
Norman did not look back. He reached for the glass of scotch on the sideboard, poured with steady hands, and spoke as though discussing the weather.
“Rutledge.”
The butler appeared so swiftly, one might think he had been waiting.
“See Mr. Brown out.”
“With pleasure, Your Grace.”
Brown’s footsteps retreated, louder than before, like an echo running from its own sound. The door clicked shut a moment later.
Norman stared into his glass. The liquid caught the light, amber and still. He brought it to his lips, letting the fire lick down his throat.
He’d known it would come to this eventually. Men like Brown didn’t vanish. They circled. They waited. They fed on weakness, the way wolves stalked the wounded.
But Norman was no wounded heir. He had been forged differently.
Let the bastard come with papers, threats, whispers in the dark. Norman would meet them all the same way—with teeth.
He thought of Kitty then. Her clear, unflinching gaze. The quiet way she carried her grief. There was something about her that settled beneath his skin—an echo of pain he recognized far too well. She was not what he had expected.
But the girl had steel. And steel recognized its kind.
If Brown thought marrying her had softened him, he had sorely miscalculated.
Norman raised his glass in a silent toast to the flames crackling in the hearth.
Kitty was not one to linger idly, but she had promised herself she would find Norman before luncheon. They needed to rehearse their scene again—the turning point of the second act—and she had practiced her lines all morning in her room, waiting for an appropriate moment to approach him.
She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him after the previous night. She had even imagined him smiling at her, perhaps teasing her softly the way he had after...