Cavendish Brothers 01 - An Unintended Journey Read Free

baron, an older, greyer version of Daniel, passed him an indulgent smile. “I asked if you’ve been to Blacknall yet. Has Fordingham learned of your return?”
    “ Hardly. I thought about sending word ahead several times during my travels, about warning him of my impending arrival, but I never did.” He’d been too distrustful of his reception there to chance it.
    Lady Pritchard leaned forwards, and a line formed on her forehead between her eyebrows. “You think he’ll be displeased? Surely he will be glad of your return—the prodigal son, come home again. It’s Christmas, after all. And you’re his brother. I’m sure Fordingham can leave the past in the past.”
    But Lady Pritchard didn’t know the half of it. None of the Pritchard family did, for that matter—not even Daniel. They all thought Father had sent Wesley away after he’d drunkenly seduced a scullery maid at Blacknall Manor—well, seduced might be too kind a word. Forced himself upon might be more accurate to the line Father had told. That was the story he’d passed about, blackening Wesley’s name throughout society with mad tales of rape, thereby ensuring Abby’s father would deny his pursuit.
    If the Pritchards knew the truth—that something as simple as political beliefs had drawn a clear line through the middle of the Cavendish family and Wesley was firmly entrenched on the “wrong” side of it, since he not only held his beliefs but fought for them in the real world—they might understand his hesitation.
    How could he ever admit such a thing to them, though, and reveal his father for the conniving blackguard he was? Lord and Lady Pritchard had treated Wesley as a son his whole life. Even now, when the rest of the ton looked on him as the worst sort of villain, they accepted him into their home. They’d never believed Father’s lies, and they’ve never insisted that Wesley explain the heart of the matter to them. They simply welcomed him.
    All those years when Wesley had escaped the strict condescension at Blacknall—Father’s scornful treatment of anyone considered beneath his station and the general snobbery in regard to the servants—by running about with Daniel at Henley Green, the Pritchards had never expected he was as miserable as he was at home. For that matter, he doubted they knew Father’s view of them, and in particular their familiarity with their servants. Tristan—then Viscount Eddington, but now Earl of Fordingham—had always sided with Father and against Wesley on any disagreement between the two.
    He could only assume that would still be the case. Although, he hoped things might have changed now that Father had finally expired like the heartless, lofty bastard he was. Perhaps Tristan had only wanted to please Father while they were lads. Perhaps he wasn’t as supercilious and patronizing as he’d led Wesley to believe all of those years. Perhaps his brotherly love and holiday cheer might outweigh his superior, Tory ideas.
    It was a risk Wesley would have to take. But then again, any chance he might have with Abby seemed to already have been ruined, so what would it matter? Much had changed in three years—for both of them, it seemed.
    He let out a sigh. “You may be correct in your assumption, my lady, but I dare not hope for as much. Tristan and Father always seemed to share their beliefs. He may maintain the banishment, despite Father’s recent passing.” Even if his brother retracted that edict, Wesley doubted Tristan would do anything to rescind society’s black-balling against him or to welcome him back into the family with open arms.
    Without that, how would he ever convince Goddard to allow him near his daughter? Or perhaps more importantly, how could he convince Abby to grant him an opportunity to prove himself worthy? Certainly, neither Abby nor her father had believed the rumors of what he’d done—but what man would allow his daughter to suffer the scorn of an attachment with an alleged