The Viscount Made Me Do It by Diana Quincy

“Griffin. You came.” Dorcas rushed into the drawing room. Her cheeks were bright, her expression expectant. “When my butler announced you, I could scarcely believe it.”

Griff absorbed this new version of his sister. Before their chance encounter at Hanna’s dispensary, he’d last seen Dorcas fourteen years ago, when she was nineteen and newly married, the last of his sisters to leave home. The image of her as a radiant young bride remained entrenched in Griff’s mind all these years. The Dorcas before him now was a woman of thirty-three. Her face had filled out. Her figure was more rounded. But she was still the sister he once knew.

“Please sit.” Dorcas settled in a French chair with rounded edges and tapestry fabric. Griff took the matching chair opposite her. They were by a large window that overlooked the back garden where Dorcas’s son William rolled in the grass with a fluffy white Pomeranian.

“How is his finger?” he asked as he watched. His nephew. It hardly seemed real.

“It’s a tad sore. But otherwise he can use it and has no real pain. Your bonesetter is remarkable.”

“Yes, she is.”

“I’m so pleased you’ve come. Tea will be along shortly.”

“This is not exactly a social call.” Griff struggled to keep an even tone. Seeing Dorcas in the flesh after all these years rekindled his frustration with his sisters, stoked the feelings of betrayal and abandonment embedded in the marrow of his bones. “In all honesty, if I didn’t need something from you, I would have avoided this encounter.”

Her face fell. He registered the hurt in her pale blue eyes. Instead of feeling triumphant, guilt panged through him.

“It was never your way to be cruel,” she said softly.

“How would you know?” he said stiffly. “We never knew each other, not really.”

“That’s not true.” She shook her head, her eyes catching the light. Like him, she had their mother’s eyes. She also shared Griff’s distinct nose and dark hair, a legacy from their father. An observer might say he and his sister resembled each other. Even though they’d been worlds apart for almost half his life.

“I knew you very well.” Amusement lined Dorcas’s forehead. “I knew all of your hiding places. I knew you used to sneak a cheroot with that footman . . . what was his name?” She considered for a moment then snapped her fingers. “Felix, that’s it. And I also knew that you used to steal away to see Selina. Although I confess I had no idea that you two were—”

“I am not here to reminisce about our childhood.” He couldn’t bear to summon any happy memories. To share any confidences. To remember anything about the time before it all went wrong.

“Whatever your reason for coming, I cannot tell you how happy I am to see you.”

The footman came in with an elaborate tea tray. They quieted while he set the plates out and Dorcas scooted forward to pour the tea.

“I seem to recall you were partial to lemon tarts,” Dorcas remarked as she added them to a plate she made for him. She included his favorite sandwiches as well before setting the plate and tea before him. Griff didn’t touch them. His stomach churned. He couldn’t eat.

She settled back with her cup. “You were going to tell me why you’ve come. What can I do for you?”

“I’m here about Miss Zaydan.”

Curiosity blazed in her face. “The bonesetter?”

“Miss Zaydan is to face a commission soon. If they rule against her, she will lose her right to practice bonesetting in London.”

Dorcas examined him closely. Griff shifted in his chair and stared out the window. His sister always did see too much. “I gather you do not wish to see Miss Zaydan leave London? Isn’t she a Levantine?”

“How does that signify?” His head snapped back to focus on his sister.

“It doesn’t. I had heard she was an Arab. I thought that was curious.” She sipped her tea. “I have never met an Arab person before. One conjures up all sorts of images. However, I found her to be very agreeable. And quite capable.”

“She has many positive qualities,” he said gruffly. “I am asking you to attend the commission hearing and give testimony in support of Miss Zaydan.”

“You’d like me to tell them that a bonesetter cured William’s finger when one of the ton’s finest doctors could not? And an immigrant female healer, at that?” Her eyes twinkled. “Imagine the scandal. The ton’s doctors will be in an uproar.”

“She’s not an immigrant. She was born here. Will you do it?”

William bounded in. “I heard the tea was served.” He skidded to a stop by the tea table and snatched up a sandwich. The Pomeranian came in yapping behind him. “Mama, can I have some?” he asked around a bite of food.

She gazed adoringly at her son as she reached down to scratch the dog’s head. “Make your hellos to your Uncle Thomas, and then you may fill your plate.”

“Hullo, Uncle Thomas.” His gaze dropped to Griff’s untouched plate. “Why aren’t you eating?”

“You may have my plate if you’d like,” Griff said.

The boy looked at his mother, who dipped her chin. He reached for Griff’s plate. “I have to go. I’m going to dig up worms in the garden.”

Griff watched the boy leave. “He doesn’t resemble you.”

“He takes after his father. The Rutland blood is very strong.”

“I wonder,” he said.

“What do you wonder?”

“If you would desert him as readily as you deserted me.”

She paled. “You didn’t want to come live with me.” She set her tea down with trembling hands. “What would you have me do?”

“You and my other sisters wanted nothing to do with me after the murders.”

Her eyes went wide. “That’s a lie,” she said hotly. “I was eager to have you live with me. I hounded Cousin Norman for months.”

“Norman said you were newly married and wanted to concentrate on your new family.”

Dorcas’s nostrils flared. “Is that what he told you? He told us that you were too vulnerable to see us. We wanted you to come with us to go through Mother’s and Father’s things at Haven House a few weeks after the burial. Cousin Norman said you would come. But on the day we were supposed to meet, he sent word that you’d had a very bad day and he didn’t want to further upset you.”

He blinked. “That cannot be true.”

“It most certainly is. We all wanted to get you away from Cousin Norman. But Father appointed him guardian in the will. There was nothing we could do.” Her face darkened. “I was also very young. I should have leveraged the influence of my husband’s family to rescue you from that beastly man.”

“I didn’t know anything about meeting you, Maria and Wini at Haven House.” His breastbone ached. “Nothing would have made me happier than to be with the three of you.”

“You know what this means?” Anger glinted in her gaze. “Cousin Norman lied to you. We were desperate to see you in those early days after the funeral. But Norman said you were too fragile.”

“He told me that the three of you abandoned me because you believed I killed our parents.”

“Never!” she said fiercely. “We never believed that. Ever. We told you as much in our letters. The letters to which you never replied.”

“I received no letters.” Griff lurched to his feet and paced away, wiping a hand down over his mouth and chin. “Is it possible? I don’t know what to believe.”

“Yes, you do. You are just having a difficult time acknowledging the truth. Our cousin lied to you. He’s been dishonest with you since the moment he took you into his care.”

“But why? What would he have to gain from keeping us apart?”

“I have no idea. You’ve spent all these years with him. You know him better than any of us.”

“I don’t know about that.” His chest jerked with each harsh breath. “I might not know him at all.” Could Norman have perpetuated a lie so massive, so destructive, so devastating?

“Has he spent your fortune?”

“No. He can’t touch it. He never could.”

“What else could it be?” she asked.

“I don’t know.” He strode from the room. “But there is one person who does.”

“Is it true?”

“Is what true?” Norman asked.

Uncertainty flickered in the older man’s face. Griff had come directly to the hospital from Dorcas’s house. Registering Griff’s agitated state, Norman pulled him into the nearest storeroom, where blankets, linens and other hospital supplies lined the shelves.

“Did my sisters send me letters?” Griff asked after Norman closed the door. The narrow room was dim. The scent of fresh laundry saturated the air. “Did you hide my sisters’ letters from me?”

“Yes.” Norman’s words were calm and matter-of-fact. “I did it to protect you.”

“Protect me?” Griff flattened a hand against his chest. “From what? From my own sisters? From what family I had left?”

“I am your family, too.”

Griff gave an incredulous laugh. “I wonder about that. You kept me from my sisters. You destroyed what was left of my family.”

“No.” The older man’s face firmed. “The person who killed your parents destroyed your family. I picked up the pieces and put you back together.”

“By keeping me from my sisters? By letting me think that they believed I killed my parents?”

“I had a responsibility to you. Not to your sisters. My role as your guardian was to make certain that you grew into a strong and stable man. To prepare you for your role as viscount and to continue the family line. That was my duty to your father, and I fulfilled it. Look at you.” He gestured toward Griff. “You are strong and capable. You are a worthy man. I truly believed isolating you from the tragedy was for the best.”

“Shielding me from the tragedy is comprehensible, perhaps, but to cut my sisters completely out of my life?”

“The girls were a blathering mess for months after your parents’ demise. Anytime I saw them, they would cry and carry on.”

“They were grieving!”

“Being subjected to all of their caterwauling would have destroyed you. I needed to protect you from that.” Norman adjusted his spectacles. “You were so young, so hurt, so vulnerable. I had to keep you safe. All your sisters wanted to do in the months after the burials was to talk about your parents’ murders and finding their killer.”

“It is natural to want to avenge our parents’ deaths.”

“Perhaps. But I feared you’d get it into your head that it was your duty to find the killer. What if it became an obsession that dominated, and ultimately destroyed, your life? I couldn’t let that happen.”

“I cannot believe this.” Fists on his hips, Griff turned away. “You separated me from everything I held dear. My sisters. Haven House. They were all I had left.”

“I did what I thought was right. I don’t have children, and my only brother perished when I was so young that I don’t remember him. Maybe I know nothing about family bonds.” He paused, dismay filling his face. “Maybe I was wrong to do what I did.”

“Maybe?” Griff raised his voice. “All you’ve ever done is lie to me.”

“All I know is that your father entrusted you to my care.” Norman removed his spectacles and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I did what I had to to keep you sound in the midst of unspeakable horror. The murders could have destroyed you. Keeping you stable and on course with your schooling was my primary focus.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me the truth after I was grown? Why did you let me continue to believe that my sisters wanted nothing whatsoever to do with me?”

“I tried.” Norman faltered. “But I didn’t know how. I feared you wouldn’t understand.”

“Well, you had the right of it. Because I certainly do not understand. What you did was cruel.”

“But look at you now.” Pride filled Norman’s gaze. “You are strong and able. Your parents’ killings didn’t ruin you. Maybe I made mistakes, but I see the fine man you are today and know I fulfilled my duty.”

“The end justifies the means? No matter what the cost? Is that really how you view the world, Norman?”

“Most people are not willing to make difficult decisions for the greater good, but I did what I had to.”

Griff stared at him. “I don’t even know who you are.”

“Once you’ve had time to reflect, you will come to see that I honestly tried to do the right thing for everyone involved.”

“Wrong. I will never accept that what you did was right.” He pulled the door open, eager to escape. He was suffocating. “Never.”

Hanna turned the key in the lock as she and Evan closed the dispensary for the evening.

“What happened to your shadow?” Evan asked.

“Who? Lucy? She had to run an errand for Citi.”

They turned in the direction of her house. Evan had taken to escorting her and Lucy home before walking on to his neighborhood. “Your grandmother trusts you alone with me?”

“I wouldn’t go as far as to say that. She needs Lucy at home. We need to consider engaging an assistant for the dispensary.”

Looking ahead, Evan’s face twisted. “What’s he doing here?”

Hanna followed his gaze. She caught sight of Griff up ahead and brightened. “Good afternoon,” she called out. “Were you coming to the dispensary?”

“Where else?” Evan muttered. “The man seems to have a lot of time on his hands.”

“Of course he does. That is the very definition of a gentleman. Unlike you and I, they do not engage in work for their living.”

“Imagine being able to devote your days and nights solely to leisurely pursuits. And having the money to do it.” He grimaced. “Life is very unfair.”

“That it is,” she agreed. As they drew nearer, the expression on Griff’s face made Hanna’s skin prickle. Had the commission reached a decision? “What is it? What’s happened?”

“Do you have a moment?” he asked, his voice raw.

“I’ll be on my way.” Evan moved past Griff. “I’ll see you in the morning, Hanna.”

“What’s happened?” she asked Griff once Evan was gone.

“Can we go somewhere?”

“Of course. Come back to the clinic.”

He followed her and stood by silently as she unlocked the door. They entered the dispensary. The late-afternoon shadows fell across the floor. But the space was illuminated enough that she didn’t bother to light a lamp.

He sat on one of the examining tables. “Everything about my life is a lie.”

“What is wrong?”

His face was stark. “All of these years I believed my sisters abandoned me because they thought I killed our parents.”

“Did you visit Mrs. Rutland today?”

He nodded. “They wanted me to live with them, but Norman wouldn’t allow it. He decided it was best that I didn’t see my sisters.”

“What? Why?” she exclaimed. “Shu hayee!”

He cocked his head. “Translation?”

“He’s nothing but a snake. A backstabber.” Anger pulsed through her veins. “Why would he keep you from your sisters? They are your blood. Family is everything. We are nothing without our family.”

“Norman says my sisters suffered bouts of hysteria after my parents died. He wanted to shield me from the emotional upset.”

“When you lose someone you love, of course you get emotional. When Papa died, Mama and Citi wailed and carried on as if the world was ending. Citi would have crawled into the grave with Baba if we hadn’t stopped her.”

“My sisters sent me letters. Norman never gave them to me.”

“Oh, Griff. I am sorry.”

“He apologized when I confronted him. But he still believes he did the right thing. That he fulfilled his duty to raise me to be a strong man who would live up to the title.”

“You are a good man in spite of Dr. Pratt,” she said heatedly. “Not because of him.”

“Am I a good man?” He massaged his temples. “I don’t know anything anymore. My sisters are strangers to me. My former guardian, a man I believed I could trust above all others, deceived me for years. Society used to think that I was a murderer. Now they believe that I despoil innocent women.”

“Now that you know the truth, you have the opportunity to become reacquainted with your sisters. You can reclaim your life.”

“I suppose.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Thank you for listening to me. I’m sorry to trouble you. I know I shouldn’t have come.”

“I am happy you did. We are friends.”

He shot her a skeptical look. “Do you really believe we can be friends?”

“I am your friend for as long as you need me.” Soon Griff would rekindle his relationship with his sisters. And he would have a wife and perhaps children. Her heart ached at the thought. “I shall be your friend until you return to your aristocratic world with your beautiful aristocratic wife and forget about the bonesetter on Red Lion Square.”

His eyes held hers. “As if I could ever forget the incomparable woman who saved me from a life of pain and misery.”

The air between them tightened. She moved closer until she stood between his legs. “I won’t forget you, either.”

“This is quite a mess.”

She stepped even closer. “I agree.”

“We should not.” His voice was strained. “It isn’t fair to you.”

She put her hands on his strong thighs. “You said yourself that you are not officially bound to Lady Winters yet.”

“No. I am not.”

He pulled her into his arms. She went willingly. An intense longing propelled her forward against her better judgment. When it came to Griff, Hanna’s body constantly mutinied against reason.

“Hanna.” He held her so tightly as if to meld her to him. “My love.”

“Hayati.” My life.

“What does that mean?”

She shook her head, embarrassed to tell him. “Later.”

He kissed her. Deeply. Intimately. With everything in him. She put her arms around his neck and pressed herself against the hardness of his chest. His warmth and masculine scent enveloped her. The intensity of his ardor took her breath away. The kiss went on and on until the room was swirling and her legs dissolved beneath her.

“We should stop,” he whispered against her lips.

“We should,” she agreed before pressing her lips to his again. “I feel cheated.”

He pulled back, alarm in his face. “Why?”

“Because you have seen me practically disrobed, and I have not had the same pleasure.”

“What are you talking about? I took off my shirt many times when you examined me.”

“That was as a healer. I could not touch you the way I wanted. Put my mouth on you as you did with me.”

“Hanna.” His eyes darkened.

For a moment, she pictured it. Removing their clothes and making love right there. What would the most intimate of acts be like? How would it feel to have part of Griff inside of her?

Alarm flickered in Griff’s face. As if he could see her thoughts. He came up off the table. “I must go. Now. Before we do something that we’ll regret.”

“I am not so sure I would regret it,” she said. “But, yes, you are right. You should go.”

“I’ll escort you home.”

She nodded as she followed him to the door, keenly feeling the loss of him. “At least in public we should manage to control ourselves.”

“Just barely,” he murmured as he shut the door behind them and waited for her to lock up.

They started in the direction of Hanna’s house, walking in silence, quietly enjoying each other’s company.

“I am going to Ashby Manor,” Griff said abruptly.

“When did you decide to make the journey?” She knew how much he dreaded it.

“Just now. Norman has told me his version of events regarding my father’s last days, but I can no longer believe anything he tells me.”

“Don’t go alone.” She hated to imagine him confronting his past by himself. “Take someone with you.”

“I wish you could be there with me.”

“As do I.” She released a breath. “But we both know that isn’t possible.”