You are a weak, fool… The sneering, snarling visage slipped in, as it often did, and he thrust back the memory of his father. When he looked up, he blinked several times and registered Alex in the seat opposite him, staring expectantly back at him. “Er, yes, right,” he began and took a long sip of brandy.
“I didn’t yet speak,” Alex said with the same droll humor he’d always adopted.
He set his drink down hard and launched into the reason for his brother’s presence. “I expect you know why you’re here. I had also expected you earlier this morn.” There was, after all, his meeting with the duke.
A hard, humorless grin turned Alex’s lips and he leaned forward. The office resounded with the soft thunk of his snifter settling on the surface of Gabriel’s desk. “You do realize it is you who is responsible for this latest scandal,” he drawled. He rested his palms on the edge of his chair and drummed the arms in a grating rhythm. “Would you not say you are the one in dire need of a lecture on proper behavior and responsibility?” This time.
The truth of Alex’s accusation ran through him. Gabriel took a deep breath and rubbed his palm along his forehead. “You are indeed correct,” he said, tiredly. With last night’s scandal, he’d jeopardized Chloe’s name and fueled gossip about a woman who’d already been scorned since birth.
“Feeling something does not make you weak, Gabriel,” his brother said quietly, all dry mirth gone from his expression and words. “It makes you human.”
Human. To be human meant to be weak and broken and battered. It meant one hurt and he wanted no part of any of it. “Regardless,” he infused an edge of steel to his words. “My actions with Ja…” His brother gave him a pointed look. “With Mrs. Munroe, last evening were unpardonable.”
“I daresay you are permitted the use of Christian names with last evening’s…” Gabriel’s lips twitched. “Er, activities.”
Annoyance stirred. How could the other man be so casual and amused by the muck Gabriel had made of the Edgerton name…and Jane?
Alex leaned forward once more and rested his palms on his knees. “I have never, in the course of my life, known you to be anything but devoted and loyal to the Edgerton name.”
Recently, those words would have been a stinging accusation from the younger brother who’d blamed him for failing their siblings. And rightly so. Now, however, with a recent understanding reached between them, they’d moved into an easier peace. Oh, their friendship would never be fully restored to the uncomplicated, wholly loving one they’d known before their father’s influence. But they had rekindled a friendship and, in a world where Gabriel was remarkably without anyone but Lord Waterson, he’d have his brother’s friendship.
Gabriel swiped his glass and took another sip. “Regardless, I’ve dishonored the Edgerton name.” He didn’t give a jot about the name that could burn in hell with his father’s vile soul for all he cared.
“Do you truly expect me to believe you care so very much about the marquisate?” There was a gentle prodding there that hinted at accusing Gabriel of being the liar he was.
He gave a brusque shake of his head. “No, you are correct.” Alex had proven correct about far more than he’d ever credited through the years. He drew in a breath. “I care about Chloe’s opportunity to make a match.”
Alex frowned. “And what of your Mrs. Munroe?”
“She is not my Mrs. Munroe.” He would have had her as his wife to do the honorable thing and right his wrong. But the lady had been abundantly clear in her feelings of that prospective state. He’d never before met another soul who disavowed marriage in quite the same manner—perhaps they suited better than he’d ever credited.
His brother snorted and leaned back in his chair. “I daresay a woman who makes you forget yourself, in the midst of an opera hall, before all Society, is at the very least something to you.” He looped an ankle across his knee.
“Do not be preposterous,” he scoffed. “It is not possible.”