‘I have it under control, Father. It was my investment, my labour and I am of age. I will speak to Declan.’
The Earl puffed out his cheeks. ‘Don’t let him run roughshod—’
‘I have whipped men. I have beaten them into submission, and I have faced the coldest, cruelest storm it has ever been my misfortune to endure. Never fear, Father. I will speak with Declan.’ Then his tone softened. As frustrated as he was with the man, the Earl was still his father. He still needed to make an offer even knowing the man might never take it. ‘Let’s both of us go home soon. We can see…’ He almost saidyour grandson, but that wasn’t his secret to tell. Nor could he mention the books that Lilianna had published or the children that Rose taught. ‘Um, let’s see what Cora has done with the place. She’s a remarkable woman, you know. They all are. There’s good food there and—’
‘Pigs, Cedric. Just pigs and crops. Nothing else.’
‘Your family is there, Father. The people who love you.’
His father shook his head. ‘Ah, but I haven’t any gifts to bring them, you know. They like that kind of thing, and I can’t show up without it. You know that.’
Cedric looked at his father, feeling a thought struggling to be born. Something important, but he couldn’t quite grab hold of it yet. ‘They—we—don’t care about that. We don’t expect it. We want to see you.’
His father rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t be childish. Of course they expect it. I can’t go home until I’ve got the presents in hand.’
Cedric looked at his father, seeing the man’s absolute certainty that he couldn’t visit without some sort of show of wealth. That money was all his children cared about. Which, of course, was ridiculous. They wanted a father, not his coin.
‘They don’t want your money. They want you.’
‘See how little you know your sisters. All they talk about is the repairs that are needed, the roof that has collapsed. That’s all they think about.’
Maybe he’d thought the same, too. But that’s not what he’d seen when he’d gone home. He’d seen a happy family, one where he was included.
‘Maybe they want to show you what they’ve accomplished,’ he offered.
‘All the more reason I can’t go empty-handed.’
They stared at each other in silence, each seeming to take a new measure of the other. Cedric felt himself strengthen as he realised how wrong his father was about his family. But the man wouldn’t see it, and Cedric now understood why.
His father tied money and love together. He could not have the latter without the former. And so had Cedric. But they were both wrong! Love and money had nothing to do with one another. They might both be necessary, but they were not intertwined. Indeed, they should never be intertwined!
‘They want love, Father. Not money.’
‘Don’t be a child, boy,’ the Earl said, standing up. ‘I’ll come back to visit you in a couple days. See what you’ve worked out.’
‘As you wish,’ he said, his mind still on this new revelation. And from it came a new feeling. A wonderful feeling.
Hope.
He could have what he needed. He could have love; he could give love and it had absolutely nothing to do with how much money he had. Certainly, he still wanted to support Lucy. He wanted to help his sisters and build for the next generation. But that had nothing to do with what he felt for Lucy.
And it should have nothing to do with how he expressed his love to her or how they shared what was between them.
Meanwhile, his father was headed for the door, but there was one more thing he had to make clear to the man. One more thing before he could lay his heart out before the woman he adored.
‘Father,’ he called, then waited until the Earl looked at him. ‘If I ever hear you saying one rude comment, one hateful word about Miss Richards or her sister, you will not see a penny from me.’ Since his father equated love and money, then he would have to meet the man where he was. Whether or not there was coin to be shared, the rules needed to be absolutely clear.
His father’s face crinkled in confusion. ‘The foreign girls?’
‘The Duchess of Byrning and her sister, Miss Lucy Richards. One word, Father, and I will whip you before I give you a penny.’ Then he dismissed his father in the exact way the Earl had done to him for so many years. ‘I believe we understand each other.’
He saw emotions chase across his father’s face. There was a moment when the man thought to defy him. Several moments, in fact, but Cedric had learned how to stand strong against any defiance. And his father must have seen it.
The Earl left without another word. Which left Cedric alone to ponder the huge shift—the excellent shift—in his relationship with his father.