Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
The walk to the townhouse was slow and agonizing. No step had ever cost him more until the next. His body and soul were both broken beyond repair.
Benedict understood his knock to be a perfunctory effort, fully expecting to be left to sit on the stoop until morning—the butler certainly wouldn’t wake to the sound.
To his astonishment, the door swung open, and West’s frame filled the doorway.
“Ben, thank God!” he cried, and wrapped his arm around Benedict’s shoulders.
Benedict couldn’t restrain his surprised cry of pain.
“Christ, what happened?” West asked, shooing him inside the house. “Are you bleeding?”
“Most likely,” Benedict muttered as he shrugged off his coat with a wince.
“Damn, it is blood. Bella, fetch some hot water,” West called, taking in the sight of his back.
“Lady Arabella,” she corrected sharply. “Who was it?”
Benedict’s sister slipped into the hall, answering her own question. “Benedict, good lord!
“Lady Arabella, would you please do me the very great honor of fetching some damned hot water before your brother bleeds out on these ugly carpets?”
She pursed her lips in disapproval before she disappeared down the hall without another word. Meanwhile, West urged him forward toward the drawing room, his palm an inch or two behind Benedict’s back. “Where are you hurt?”
“Everywhere,” Benedict groaned.
West cleared the settee of the threadbare decorative pillows, allowing Benedict to flop across it on his belly. His feet hung awkwardly off the end.
“I’ll cut it off. It’s done for anyway,” West said, gesturing to his shirt.
Benedict’s only reply was a grunt.
West must have retrieved a knife from somewhere on his person, because he pulled the collar back before slicing carefully at the fabric around Benedict’s neck. A ripping sound followed. The linen pulled at his wounds where the dried blood had fixed it to his skin.
“Oh, Benedict…” Bella whispered. He hadn’t noticed her return, but there was a pot of water on the floor. “Did Father—”
“Obviously. No one else hates me enough to do this. Well, Eliza, but she’s not capable of it.”
Beside him, West ripped another piece off his shirt—from the cleaner front portion—and dipped it into the water. “You’ll wish for the devil after I do this.”
“Nothing is ever going to hurt again,” he grumbled. Still, Benedict hissed when the cloth brushed along his broken skin.
“You’re morose when you’re bleeding like a speared hog,” West commented. “Most elegant, Lady Arabella, if you could find it within yourself to bring a flagon of your finest cordial over to your half-dead brother, I would be ever so appreciative.”
“Oh, for the love of… I didn’t know Ben was injured.”
“No, no, it is of the utmost importance that, as a mere peasant, I address your ladyship by her most esteemed title.”
“Could you two save the bickering until after I’m dead?” Benedict shifted an arm free when Bella returned with the quarter bottle of scotch he’d abandoned days ago.
“Afraid not, my friend. You know your sister and me, oil and water.”
Benedict took an appreciative swig, savoring the burn in his throat as it distracted from the flames licking at his back. “Speaking of—surprised to find you here.”
“I wasn’t certain what to do,” Bella said. Benedict blinked one eye open to see her twisting her fingers in knots at West’s side. “I couldn’t let them… and I didn’t know how long it would take you to… so I sent for West.”
“Lucky to be alive, you are,” West mused. “Was he trying to kill you?”
“Unclear. Though I imagine I’d be dead if he wished it. This was an education.”
“Ben, I—” Bella broke off, voice thick.
Benedict hissed as West pressed too hard into a wound. “The road here was smooth, I take it?”
“More or less.”
“Your Miss Eliza is unharmed,” West said.
“I think she might disagree with that assessment. But I suppose you are correct, physically in any regard.”
“You’ve already been to see her?” Bella asked, tone shrill.
“Yes.”
“And she left you like this?”
“She didn’t see, Bell. It wasn’t as though I could show her my back and ask her to play nursemaid while she was laying my sins at my feet.” Benedict took another swig of scotch.
“She did not appreciate all that you’ve done for her?”
“What have I done for her? Seduced and humiliated her? Brought danger to her doorstep? She’d have been better off if I’d never set eyes on her.”
Bella opened her mouth to retort, but West interrupted. “Whoever your father sent is in the wind. But I’ve men on it.”
“Men?”
“Prizefighters always know the goings-on in the lower gaming hells. I already sent word to the saloons. Someone starts asking questions, I’ll know it.”
“Thank you,” Benedict said. “Don’t suppose my things were dropped off earlier?”
“No…”
“Damn,” Benedict sighed. “That driver is going to be thoroughly disappointed when he opens the case and discovers how utterly uninspiring the contents are.”
“You can have one of my shirts,” West offered. He rose, making for the staircase.
“You’re staying here?”
“I’ll not leave your sister here alone. Not with whoever your father sent lurking about,” he called back as he strode up the creaking steps.
“I should order you two wed,” Benedict threatened half-heartedly.
“If that threat is meant to deter me, you’ll have to try harder!”
“As if any force on earth could tempt me into matrimony with you! There is no greater hell in this life or the next,” Bella shouted.
“So charming!” West yelled from the landing. “Give me five minutes, and you’ll sing a different tune.”
“You couldn’t manage it if you had five years!” Bella rebutted.
“Be a pleasant five years, though.”
“Oh, good, the bickering. West, I’ll need you to knock me out. I cannot listen to more of this.”
West returned with a bundle of clothing. “I know you mean that in jest, but you might wish it. I’ll need to disinfect your wounds.”
“Tempting.” Benedict took another swig of his scotch before handing the bottle back to West.
The man handed him a strip of cloth to bite down on, and Benedict took it gratefully.
Fire flooded his veins, burning him from the inside out as West poured the spirit across his back. The flames of hell licked at his skin. This, this was his eternal torment for his sins.
Eons later, when the pain subsided, his face was damp with tears and mucus.
“Sorry, sorry.” West pulled the cloth from his mouth and offered him a clean handkerchief.
“I knew what was coming.”
Benedict glanced toward Bella, who was uncharacteristically silent. He found her standing beside him, one arm wrapped around her waist, the other at her lips, teeth gnashing at her cuticles.
“Would you give us a moment, West?” Benedict asked.
West’s gaze flicked to Bella before he nodded. “The apothecary should have something. Might help with the pain.”
“Your mother sent a tincture with some laudanum… which is now my driver’s to enjoy. Perhaps something similar.”
West nodded before slipping out the door.
“Ben…” Bella began, voice soft. “I had no idea… I mean, I knew, but it’s been years. I didn’t think him physically capable of it.”
“He had help,” Benedict said. “I challenged him. It was inevitable. Nothing you did.”
“No, Ben. I… This is all my fault. If I hadn’t written that letter…”
“Our father is his own man. He makes his own choices. You’re not responsible for any of them.”
“But…”
“No. You never should have been involved in any of this. I’m your brother. It was my role to protect you. Not involve you in pigheaded schemes.”
“You’re certain then? That we were wrong—that Father lied? Wayland never cheated?”
“Yes— I… yes. He—Wayland—he’s not what we thought. I expected some mythical monster. But he’s only a man, a man who loves his children. And a man who played a better game than Father.”
“What are we going to do?”
“I don’t rightly know. I thought to warn Eliza, but she would hear none of it. Nor can I blame her. And Wayland ordered me out of the city. While he chose not to detail the consequences of my return, I cannot think he will be so generous as to let me flee a second time.”
“I have not slept a wink since I received the letter. We cannot allow Father’s man to—”
“I’ll die first,” Benedict asserted, pressing himself up. He was careful to keep his back off the worn fabric of the settee.
“So dramatic. You’re half dead as it is. How do you propose to stop them?”
“If West cannot root him out, I’ll simply have to be there when he strikes.”
“You intend to do what? Haunt the woman?”
“Precisely.”
“You bleed every time you so much as breathe. How do you intend to do that without drawing Wayland’s notice?”
“I’ll figure something out. Just as soon as I recover from the blood loss.”
“Do you want to rest? Or I could attempt to help you into West’s shirt… Though I imagine that may be a struggle at the best of times—your arms are much too long and thin to fit comfortably in his sleeves.”
Benedict rolled his eyes, then stood. He swayed for a moment as one of Bella’s hands fluttered uselessly about him, the other clutching a lit candle tightly.
“Stop fussing. I’ll be fine.”
“You’ve never been less fine.”
They reached the steps. Benedict wrapped his hand tightly around the warped railing with a silent prayer that this wouldn’t be the moment it forsook its purpose.
“Well, I’m too stubborn to die until I’m certain our father will not have the woman I have feelings for assaulted. So you needn’t fret.”
“So you love her then?” Bella asked.
“I don’t know—as near to it as I am capable of, I suppose. You knew before I did.”
“I was baiting you, as you well know,” she teased.
“Of course, I’ve met you before. You do not have a sincere bone in your body.”
“Quite right.” She hesitated for a moment, seeming to waffle over her next words. “Why her?”
At last, Benedict reached the top of the steps.
He paused there, hand braced against the wall.
“She’s… She looks—looked—at me like I matter.
I felt safe around her, to be soft, tender.
I never once worried she would meet my vulnerability with anything other than sincerity and kindness.
The way she trusted me, foolish though it may have been, it makes me want to be better for her.
To prove her faith wasn’t entirely misplaced.
And she possesses all the usual qualities that attract a man to a woman—to magnificent effect.
In the end, it was her head, her heart, her soul, everything she is.
Those are the things that made me fall for her. ”
Bella considered him thoughtfully. “You know I cannot abide such sincerity.”
Benedict finally managed the ten steps to his bed. “I know, you would not be you if you could.”
“Benedict?” Bella asked as he fumbled about on the bed coverings for a sturdy hold to lower himself.
“Yes?” Benedict collapsed face first on top of the bed, his back protesting in the cool air.
“I am sincerely so very sorry. You have no idea how sorry.”
“I do, Bella. And I’m sorry too.”
She nodded, her curls brushing her temple. “I’ll send West up when he returns. You rest for now.”
“Thank you, Bella. For involving West. I know how much you dislike him, but I am glad you were not alone.”
She swallowed. “I’m stubborn. Not a fool.”
“Goodnight, Bell.”
“Ben,” she whispered, then closed the door.