What Happens in Piccadilly - Chasity Bowlin Page 0,103

I don’t offer you my friendship. I offer you my love. We are family, after all. And acceptance is simply part of that. As to your character, well, time will tell. But there’s something remarkable that happens to us all, Averston, when someone loves us unconditionally. It makes us better, whether we wish it to not.”

Averston had no notion of what she was doing as she walked around the desk. By the time he realized that she meant to embrace him, to hug and comfort him as if he were some sort of wounded child, it was too late to stop her. “Sweet heavens, woman! Get hold of yourself!”

She went on hugging him as if she hadn’t heard a word he said. It was, in spite of his protests, strangely comforting to him. When at last, she stepped back, she smiled up at him in a manner that could only be described as beatific. “For better or worse, Gerald, we are the only blood relations either of us shall have. At least for a time. I won’t stand on ceremony and allow you to be hurt and alone… not when I can help it.”

“I’m not one of your charges. You don’t get to governess me,” he said.

“You’ll come to dinner on Friday?” she asked.

“Will you promise not to hug me?”

“I shall promise to refrain from hugging you unless I feel you need to be hugged,” she said, still smiling. “It is the best I can do.”

He sighed. “Fine. I’ll see you at dinner. But I’m having a talk with your husband. You can’t just go around hugging men! Good lord. How have you survived this long?”

“But you’re my cousin,” she protested, even as she picked up her reticule and made for the door. “I will see you on Friday.”

She exited the library and Averston was alone again. Alone, but perhaps for the first time in a very long time, he did not feel lonely. And for that, he had Calliope to thank. And Montgomery, Highcliff and Effie Darrow for that matter. Regardless of what they knew about him and his lifestyle, they’d welcomed him openly into their little circle. He wasn’t foolish enough to think the entire world would be so understanding, but he was beginning to see that perhaps his grandmother had used that against him, as well, mocking him and making him believe that no one would ever tolerate him.

Opening the top drawer of the desk, Averston moved several items until he found the letter buried underneath. He’d hidden it there, tucked it away so that he wouldn’t have to look at it. So that he wouldn’t have to face what had occurred.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he broke the seal and read the neatly penned note.

Your grace,

I do hope this letter finds you well. I wanted to tell you that, following the tragedy of my brother’s death, I found some entries in his journal that made particular reference to you. I’ve hidden these away. It would be a lie to say that I was shocked by these things. The truth is, my brother thought he was hiding things from everyone. But he could never hide things from me. Regardless, there is nothing that my brother could ever have done that would damage my deep and abiding affection for him.

My mother, however, would be quite scandalized by them. But I did want you to know that Charles held you in very high regard. I didn’t need his journals to tell me that. I could see it in the way he looked at you. I daresay that his feelings for you were quite beyond what you might have expected. I’ve no wish to make assumptions, but I thought perhaps you might wish to have these books. They could be damaging in the wrong hands and I can’t keep them here for fear my mother would find them. Please send word and I shall have them delivered to you.

Also, I must thank you for attending the ball. It meant the world to my brother and to me.

Sincerely,

Miss Amelia Burney

Averston sighed, folded the letter and tucked it once more into the drawer. It was too late to call on her. But the following day, he’d go to see Miss Amelia Burney. He owed the memory of her brother that.

*

Calliope stepped outside the residence of the Duke of Averston and smiled. Directly across the street, she could see her husband walking in the park with Claudia, Charlotte clinging to