The pang of hurt that comment caused was profound. The last time he’d seen Christopher, the man had looked at him with frank adoration—as though he’d hung the moon in the sky. Now Henry had fallen so far in his estimation that Christopher all but called him liar to his face.
Henry, hoping his distress did not show, tried to keep his voice steady and calm. “I am generally reasonably diligent about my affairs, but I had no reason to doubt Parkinson’s loyalty. He had been my father’s private secretary for many years, and I trusted him implicitly. Besides, at the time I was preoccupied with Caroline.”
“Caroline?” Christopher’s frown made Henry’s stomach sink. “Why were you preoccupied with Caroline?”
“You don’t know?” Henry asked faintly.
“Know what?”
This was what he had feared.
“Did Parkinson give you my letter?” Henry said hoarsely.
Christopher’s blank look was all the answer he needed. A wrenching ache near split his heart into two, and for the first time ever, Henry wished Parkinson was alive again, just so he could punish him for his reckless, selfish actions.
Christopher had been so young and trusting back then, despite his worldly ways—it was unbearable to imagine how he must have felt when Parkinson had arrived at the little house to turn him out. Without so much as even a note from Henry.
Henry said huskily, “I had to leave London with Caroline and the children quite suddenly. Caroline was very ill—cancer of the breast.” He rubbed at his chest with the heel of his hand. “I got home early one morning—after our last night together—and she was waiting for me with the news. She asked me to take her back to Wiltshire straightaway.” He paused, swallowing hard before he added, “And she asked me to give you up.”
He glanced back at Christopher who was staring at him with a stunned expression.
“I had no idea,” Christopher said faintly. “I heard she’d passed away a few years ago, but I had no notion it was so soon after you left town.”
“She died only a few months after we returned to Wiltshire. I’ve never come back to town to live since then. I only visit from time to time.”
Christopher looked stricken. “Christ, Henry. That must have been awful.”
Henry blinked, unsure how to respond. “It was… sudden,” he said. “She found the tumour in her breast, and it grew very quickly. We knew how things would likely go. Her mother had died of the same disease.” He came to a halt, a shard of old grief piercing his heart.
“I’m sorry,” Christopher said, his eyes soft with sympathy. “I know how much you loved her.”
He had loved her, but somehow, those words from Christopher’s lips filled him with another old pain. An old pain that threw up memories of Christopher; how he used to look when Henry arrived at the little house in Paddington Green, eyes shining with happiness and anticipation. The old pain of losing that. Of losing Christopher.
The pain of Caroline asking him to give Christopher up.
“It is time to put your toys away. We must think of the children now.”
In the months—hell, the years—that followed, Henry had felt like a selfish cur every time he’d thought of Christopher. Every time he’d missed him. Every time he’d longed for him.
“Take lovers by all means—but don’t lose your head over them, Henry.”
Love was only for his family. For his wife and children.
But the truth was, he had loved Christopher too. And what did that say about him? What did it say about him that he’d still longed for Christopher, when his wife and children needed him so?
He hadn’t even had the decency to walk away without looking back. He’d written that letter for Parkinson to deliver, practically begging Christopher not to forget him. Even as he’d promised Caroline to leave his lover behind, he’d still wanted to keep some tiny flame of hope alive for himself.
And now it turned out that Christopher had never received the letter. That he’d never even known how grieved Henry was over leaving him.
“So,” Christopher said into the silence. “Caroline asked you to give me up?”
“Yes,” Henry said, his voice raw now. “I’d promised her I would, you see, if she asked.”
Christopher didn’t say anything, only watched Henry with his clear, green gaze.
Henry continued, “I told Parkinson to make the house over to you and pass you a bank draft for three hundred pounds, just as we’d agreed. And—I gave him a letter for you.” He took a