Chapter 9 #2
The study was more modest than the public areas of the house, though still luxuriously appointed with leather-bound books, comfortable chairs arranged before a crackling fireplace, and a well-stocked sideboard.
Alexander moved immediately to pour two generous measures of whiskey, noting how Jack's eyes tracked every detail of the room with the careful assessment of someone who had learned to quickly evaluate any new environment.
"Here," Alexander said, handing Jack a crystal tumbler. "I think you will find this more palatable than the rum we used to share aboard the Serpent's Kiss."
Jack accepted the drink gratefully, settling into one of the leather chairs with a sigh of genuine comfort. "Much as I enjoyed our seafaring days, I will not pretend these accommodations are not an improvement."
They drank in comfortable silence for a moment. Then Jack chuckled to himself. "Do you remember Bekker? The night he married that Cape girl — Anneke?"
Alexander's face changed, a genuine smile breaking through. "I remember you wept into your cup and swore it was the sea air."
"It was the sea air."
"We were three days inland."
"Then it was the dust." Jack laughed, low and warm.
"God, she was twice the sailor he was. Out-drank the lot of you at the feast and out-sailed half the crew home the next morning.
" His smile gentled into something quieter.
"Funny, that. The blood, the running, the nights I would give an arm to forget — all of that fades.
But I can still see Bekker's face the moment she said yes.
The years are kind enough to keep a few good things, at least."
"They are," Alexander said softly. For a moment neither man spoke, both of them somewhere warmer and far away.
Then Jack set down his glass and met Alexander's gaze directly.
"Alex, I need you to know—after you left us two years ago, things went from bad to worse in Cape Town.
The British Royal Navy had us cornered, hunting us relentlessly.
Too many close calls, too many good men lost." His voice grew heavier.
"The crew disbanded a few months ago. Some went to ground in the colonies, others tried their luck in the Caribbean.
But I..." He paused, his scarred hands clenching slightly.
"I came back to England to find you, hoping you would honor that promise you made before you left my ship. "
Alexander leaned forward, his expression immediately serious. "I promised you that if you ever needed help, I would gladly provide it. I meant every word, Jack."
"Even now?" Jack asked, gesturing to the luxurious surroundings. "Now that you are a proper Duke with a reputation to maintain?"
"Especially now," Alexander replied firmly. "You and your crew saved my life when the Valiant went down. More than that—you taught me truths about the world that I never would have learned in London's drawing rooms. I owe you everything."
Jack's weathered face broke into a genuine smile, the tension in his shoulders visibly easing. "Then I accept your offer, Your Grace," he said with mock formality, raising his glass. "To old friendships and new beginnings."
"To keeping promises," Alexander replied, clinking his tumbler against Jack's.
They drank deeply, and Jack settled back in his chair with obvious relief. "So what is the plan, then? I assume you are not just offering me charity out of the goodness of your ducal heart."
Alexander smiled grimly. "You cannot exactly walk around London freely—there are still warrants out for Captain Jack Morrison, after all.
But you are safe here, within the estate grounds.
And I remember how many times you managed to repair the Serpent's Kiss with nothing but scrap metal and ingenuity.
You always did have a gift for fixing things. "
"True enough," Jack agreed. "What did you have in mind?"
"For now, I need you to help renovate the stables," Alexander said. "They have been neglected since my father's illness, and having a proper reason for your presence here will avoid unwanted questions from the staff."
Jack's eyebrows rose. "The stables? Alex, I came all this way hoping for adventure, and you are telling me about horse accommodations?"
Alexander's expression grew more serious, and Jack caught a glimpse of the calculating mind that had made their partnership so effective during their privateering days. "There is more, of course. Much more. But I need time to set things in motion properly."
"Now you are talking," Jack said, leaning forward with interest. "I am listening."
"You were with me all those years, Jack. You remember the work we began — what we tracked, what we intercepted, what we found in those ledgers." Alexander's voice dropped to barely above a whisper. "I did not leave that work unfinished when I returned to London."
Jack went very still. He did not need it spelled out. He had stood in the same places, seen the same things — the things neither of them had ever found words for, because there were none — and the knowledge settled between them now, unspoken and entire, colder than anything the fire could touch.
"You are still hunting them," he said quietly.
"The men we could never reach from the deck of a ship," Alexander confirmed, "the ones who sat too high and too far for us to touch — they are here, Jack.
They dine in the houses I am now welcomed into.
" Something moved behind his eyes, very steady and very cold.
"And they are careless with it, Jack — that is the gift of it.
They have been untouchable so long they have forgotten the word has an opposite.
They boast. They grow loose at the table when they believe themselves among their own kind.
A man who cannot conceive of being caught stops troubling to hide.
" He turned the tumbler slowly. "Their arrogance is the one weakness no amount of money can mend. And I intend to make full use of it."
Jack watched him. "And these weeks? What have you been doing?"
"Playing the part they expect. The grateful prodigal — charming, harmless, glad only to be home.
" Alexander's mouth curved, but there was nothing soft in it.
"It is exhausting work, wearing a face all day that is not your own.
" He looked at his old friend, and for the first time something in him eased.
"But you are here now. And with you under this roof, I find I can afford to let a little of the real man show again.
London has not yet met that part of me."
Jack was silent a moment, the firelight shifting across the old scar at his jaw. "Some of what we saw out there," he said at last, "I have never spoken of to a living soul. Not once."
"Nor I," said Alexander. "We will not have to. We will simply make them pay for it."
"And you want my help."
"I need your help," Alexander corrected. "But not yet. First, I need you to become part of the household, to blend in as much as a former pirate can blend into ducal society. Renovate the stables, learn the rhythms of the estate, let people get used to seeing you around."
Jack nodded slowly, his expression thoughtful. "How long are we talking?"
"A few weeks, perhaps a month. I will know more after I have had time to assess some... new developments in my investigation." Alexander's thoughts briefly turned to Catherine and the possibilities her connections might offer.
"Very well," Jack said, raising his glass again. "To patient revenge and well-maintained stables."
"To justice," Alexander corrected quietly. "And to the hope that we can achieve it without becoming the very thing we are fighting against."
Jack studied his old friend's face, noting the weight of responsibility that had settled on Alexander's shoulders since inheriting his title. "You have changed, Alex. The aristocratic life has made you... philosophical."
"The aristocratic life has given me power," Alexander replied. "And I have learned that power without conscience is the most dangerous weapon of all."
◆◆◆
The following morning brought Anthony to Harrington House earlier than was strictly fashionable for social calls, but he had long ago abandoned strict adherence to such rules where family was concerned.
Anthony found Alexander in his study, surrounded by papers and ledgers spread across the large mahogany desk.
What struck Anthony immediately was not the work itself but his cousin's demeanor — there was an energy about him, a barely contained current beneath the usual control.
Alexander looked visibly tired, shadows beneath his eyes suggesting he had slept little, and yet seemed more alive than Anthony had seen him in weeks.
"You look terrible," Anthony observed cheerfully, settling into a chair without invitation. "And yet somehow pleased about it. An interesting combination."
Alexander glanced up with a slight smile. "Good morning to you as well, cousin."
"Working through the night again. You will make yourself ill at this pace." Anthony's tone was light, but his eyes moved over the desk with their usual shrewdness before he set the matter aside. "However, I have not come to lecture you on your habits. I have come from your mother."
Something in Alexander stilled. "Is she well?"
"Perfectly well. Which is not the same as content.
" Anthony let that sit a moment. "I sat with her this morning, Alex.
She worries for you — though she would sooner be drawn and quartered than tell you so directly.
You vanish into this room for hours. You take your meals over correspondence.
You came back to her from the dead, and she finds she still scarcely sees you.
" He leaned forward, the levity thinning.
"She did not ask me to say any of this. That is rather the point.
She will never ask you for an evening of your time.
She believes she has no right to, after all your years away — as though she were the one who ought to feel grateful. "
Alexander's jaw tightened. He set down his pen.
"There is a new production at the Royal Theatre," Anthony went on, gentler now.
"A historical drama, very well reviewed.
Your mother would dearly love to attend it with her son.
Nothing more sinister than that — an evening, the three of us, like a family that has the luxury of being ordinary.
" He spread his hands. "I am asking you to give her that.
The work will still be here when you return. It is always here."
For a long moment Alexander said nothing. Anthony watched the familiar war play across his cousin's face — duty set against something quieter and harder to refuse.
"Very well. When is the play?" Alexander said at last.
"Thursday." Anthony's face lit with triumph. "Excellent. I shall arrange the carriage—"
"No carriage." Alexander's voice was mild but final. "I will ride."
Anthony's eyebrows rose. "You wish to ride. To the theatre. Through the heart of Mayfair." A slow grin. "You truly mean to give the gossips a Duke arriving on horseback like some highwayman out of a penny dreadful."
"I do not do it for the gossips." Alexander rose and crossed to the window, looking down at the grey morning.
"I cannot abide those carriages, Anthony.
Closed boxes, rolling through streets I am not permitted to properly see.
I have spent too many years under open sky to be shut in a velvet box and called comfortable.
" He glanced back. "If London wishes to make a scandal of a man preferring his own horse, London is welcome to the trouble. "
Anthony studied him, and understanding settled over his features.
"Ride, then, if it suits you. I confess I am rather looking forward to the faces.
" He rose, recovering his good humor entirely.
"I shall tell your mother you have agreed.
You may consider it the single kindest thing you have done since your return — and I include surviving a shipwreck in that accounting. "
"Get out, Anthony."
"Going." He paused at the door, warmer now. "She will be very happy, Alex. That is all."
When he had gone, Alexander remained at the window a while longer, the work on his desk forgotten behind him. He had agreed for his mother's sake, and meant it.
But it was not his mother he found himself thinking of, standing there in the morning light. It was a pair of clear blue eyes across a reading-room table, and the sound of her laughter, and the way she had watched his mouth when he spoke to her in a language she could not understand.