“I know how to kill a man with a letter opener and make it look like an accident,” his brother said coolly. “I meant it wouldn’t be fair to you.”
Rafe rolled his eyes. “You’re so damned predictable. For as long as I could remember, I lived in your shadow. Always failing. Always envious. Fighting was the one thing I could do better than the perfect, upstanding Piers. But no. You had to go and one-up me on that score, too.”
“Of course I did. You weren’t the only one with envy.”
“Why the devil would you envy me?”
“For a hundred reasons. You did as you pleased. Said what you liked. You had more fun. With considerably more girls. You had that roguish air they all like, and your hair does that thing.”
“My hair does a thing?” Rafe made a face. “What thing?”
His brother declined to explain. “I took assignments I wouldn’t have chosen otherwise. Dangerous work. Because even though you were a continent away and the truth of what I was doing must be kept secret from everyone, I couldn’t help but feel I was still in competition with my little brother. As it turns out, we were in competition. In one way, at least. And there, it seems I lost.”
So, it would seem he had gathered the truth about Clio. Rafe had won that round, hadn’t he?
About damn time.
“I don’t feel guilty about it,” he said. “I’m far from perfect, but I am better at loving that woman than you could ever hope to be. I know her in ways you don’t. I need her in ways you’d never understand. And I’d fight to be with her, to my last breath.” He took a deep breath to calm himself. “But she doesn’t want us fighting. She wants us to be friends.”
“Friends? I don’t think we’ll ever be friends,” Piers said.
“You’re right. It would be stupid to try.”
Damn. Rafe was doing it again. Speaking words in reckless anger. Words he didn’t mean.
He faced down that vague, ill-formed cloud of resentment that had been roaming through his chest ever since he left Twill Castle. It was an anger born of self-loathing and all that wasted time. If only he’d been man enough eight years ago, he could have offered to marry Clio first.
But that would have been a disaster. They would have married too young. He would have had no means of supporting her. Perhaps his father would have given him some kind of living, and Rafe surely would have failed in spectacular fashion. Clio would have been isolated, pregnant by the time she turned eighteen, still suffering under the dangerous strictures her mother had placed on her.
If he had any chance of making her happy, it was only because they’d been forced to wait. In that respect, perhaps he should be grateful to his father, and to Piers.
The time was only wasted if he didn’t learn from it.
“I didn’t mean what I said just now.” Rafe faced his brother. “I’m sorry. We should try.”
“To be friends? I don’t see how—”
“Just hear me out. I’m no great speechmaker, but I do have things to say every once in a while. If my fighting career has taught me anything, it’s that friends are easy to come by. True opponents—the rivals who force you to work harder, think faster, be better than you knew you could be—those are rare. If that’s what we are to each other, why change it?”
His brother looked out over the fields. “Perhaps you’re right. So we won’t be friends. We’ll leave it at ‘resentfully affectionate lifelong adversaries.’ ”
Rafe shook his head. Whatever mysterious special duties his brother had been given, Piers was a diplomat at heart. No one else would reach for four lofty words where a simple, single one would do.
“We could call it that,” Rafe said, mounting his horse. “Or we could just say ‘brothers’ to save time.”
“Very well. Brothers it is.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
Eight years, four months, and sixteen days after first accepting Lord Piers Brandon’s proposal of marriage, Clio paid the man a visit at his new offices in the House of Lords.
“Why, Ellingworth.” Upon entering, she greeted the ancient bulldog with a pat. “You’re looking fit as a pup.”
“Come in,” Piers said. “Do have a seat.”
Clio settled herself in an armchair and pulled a velvet pouch from her pocket. “This first. I don’t want to risk forgetting it.” She shook its glittering contents onto his desk blotter.
“I don’t need the ring back,” Piers said. “You should keep it.”
“Keep it?”
Clio glanced at the gold-and-ruby band. And then she glanced at the dog.
“A magnanimous gesture, my lord. But one I couldn’t accept.”
He began to object.
“I insist.” She warded him off with an open hand. “I really . . . truly . . . sincerely . . . could not possibly accept.”
“Very well, then.” With a shrug, he placed the ring in a locked drawer of his desk and withdrew a sheaf of papers. “I’m sorry I had to ask you to come all the way into London for this.”
“It’s no trouble. I know you’re busy, and I had business in London anyway.”
Clio had a look at his office. Papers piled high, volumes of law and parliamentary records stacked neatly for his review. He was throwing himself into his new role with typical Granville dedication and attention to detail. And the mantle of authority became him, she had to admit. Even with the stray thread of silver in his hair, he was more handsome than he’d ever been.