Chapter Text
Anthony already felt exhausted when his boots hit the cobblestones. He tugged off his gloves as he stared up at the facade of the house that had once been his home and ignored that bustle of carriages on the road behind him. It was still his home he supposed. But it certainly didn’t;t feel that way. He took a deep breath.
Perhaps he shouldn’t have been in such a hurry. Perhaps he should have waited and traveled with with his luggage instead. But he knew that truly it wouldn’t do any good. He was never ready to return to town. Was never ready for the slew of memories that had haunted him for the five years since he’d stood on that dock with his shoulders heaving, moments too late.
The front door opened and a footman stumbled out, his features lit with surprise. Anthony cleared his throat and moved forward briskly, taking off his hat as though he was in a hurry to sweep back into the house that would give life to some of his very best and worst moments.
“Lord Bridgerton, I apologise sir. Lady Bridgerton had told us not to expect you for several hours.”
Anthony took his hat off and tossed his riding gloves inside, handing it to the footman. He smoothed his hand over his beard and checked the watch that served only to tell him what a disappointment he had become. The chance to be otherwise had sailed away long ago now. But it was good to pretend. “No matter. I grew restless and rode ahead. The luggage will arrive on schedule. Let’s give my horse a little treat, yes?”
“Of course, my lord.” The poor young man scrambled after him as Anthony began to stride through the front door. He didn’t want to pause in the entrance hall and remember how his arms had held her and how her laugh had nearly been pressed against his neck as they’d spun around the room together.
Even so her laughter echoed through the hallway, chasing him from the room.
“My study has been opened for the season I trust?”
“Yes sir.”
Anthony kept moving down the hall towards solitude once again. “And Lady Bridgerton and the children?”
“Visiting the Duchess. She arrived from Clyvedon yesterday.”
“And my brothers?”
“Both in town with their wives already, I believe. Lady Bridgerton is planning dinner for tomorrow night but I believe them all to be in attendance at Lady Danbury’s this evening.”
Anthony threw open the door to his study, ignoring the slight stale smell that the maids had tried to air out. Anthony found he didn’t mind it, truly. It seemed to be very matching with the rest of his life. “Very good.”
The footman hovered, “Lady Bridgerton planned to have luncheon with the Duchess, sir but I could ask the cook to-”
“Not necessary, thank you. I shall manage just fine.”
The footman bowed, seemingly all too desperate to run away from the reclusive Lord Bridgerton who made his appearance once a year. Dragged to the country by his mother to spend time with the other people.
Anthony let the door click shut behind him and sighed as he collapsed into the chair behind the desk. He stared across the room, letting his eyes slide off his father’s portrait. He stared at the small sofa on the opposite wall, and even that memory came flooding back. He remembered the relief and tears burning his throat as though it were yesterday. The resolve to do better form then on. He’d failed at that as well. Or maybe by that point he had gone too far. There was no undoing it. God, he hated coming here. it was as though there was a reminder of how much he’d failed.
This would pass. Isn’t that what she’d said all those years ago? These feelings between them would pass. For her maybe they had. Maybe she was living her life with a husband who doted on her the way she deserved and children with dark ringlets and mischievous smiles. Anthony didn’t know.
All he knew was that he woke every morning, alone at Aubrey Hall and thought of her.
His mother hadn’t bothered to cover her shock when he’d announced his intentions just the morning after he’d run all the way to the docks and not returned until long after dark. When he’d stood in front of her with his valet already packing his belongings.
“And when will you be back in town?”
He’d checked his watch then as well. Busy. Far too busy to live the life he wanted. “I don’t know. Not for some months at least.”
“You’ll come for Christmas.”
“I may not be able to. I will of course continue manage our affairs from there but moving forward I see little reason to be in town.”
His mother had given him the same look she had when he was a tiny boy and he’d hidden a frog in Daphne’s dollhouse and declared later that he had no idea how the poor fellow had made his way inside. Perhaps he mistook the dolls house for a pond? These things were bound to happen surely.
“I see.” She had said finally and Anthony was sure she did. “Perhaps you could ask Lady Mary where-”
“Mother.” He had said, more sharply than he had meant. “Whatever happened between…” He swallowed her name the knife he’d stabbed into his own chest still twisting sharply. “Miss Sharma and I is at an end.”
“But I really think-”
“You can call for me if you have need of me. Any of you, of course.”
He had left that afternoon and not looked back. He’d stood on the drive of Aubrey Hall for a every long time before he’d gone inside and wondered where they’d be now if he had been a better, braver man. If he had been able to be a man worthy of her. There was a strange sort of irony in the fact that the place he had hidden from for some many years, afraid of the ghosts that haunted it was now where he ran to. Chasing after a different ghost. She was everywhere there, it seemed. Despite the few days she spent there the two seemed linked in his mind. Her laughter carried across the lawn on the spring time when his siblings brought their families to visit him. And when he went riding in the mornings he could almost hear the hooves of another horse falling into step beside him.
Sometimes it felt as though no time at all had passed.
It certainly felt that way now when he dragged himself to town to stand at his mother’s side.
The first year she had looked at him with a slightly hopeful expression across the tea table. “Darling, Lady Appleton’s eldest daughter is-”
He’d put down his newspaper. “Going to find an excellent match, I am sure. But it will most certainly not be with me. I have no intention to marry, mother. I think I have proven that I am not well suited to the position.”
“I see.”
She really did seem to see because she had never brought it up again. Nor had anybody.
Sometimes he wished it would pass. He wished he could wake up tomorrow and feeling nothing. Sometimes he wished he was brave enough to ride four streets over and knock on her sister, now Mrs Matthew Bagwell’s, front door and beg for news of her. But he wasn’t, and he never did feel nothing.
The door opened suddenly and Anthony snatched a quill up quickly, too busy to be a father. Only ever an uncle. That was his place.
“Darling, you’re very early.”
He rose from his seat and kissed his mother’s cheek as she made her way towards him, plastering a careless smile on his face. “And here I thought you’d congratulate me on not missing the party.”
“Cheeky.” His mother patted his cheek, “I wish you would shave, Darling.”
Anthony smoothed his hands over his beard. “I think it looks very devil may care.”
Truly he had no idea. He never looked in the mirror. When he did he was almost startled by the man who looked back. Hollow and greying. Dark circles under his eyes from the nights spent pacing the grounds.
“You mean you think the Mamas will leave you alone.”
Well, that can’t hurt.”
“It’s a little optimistic I think.” She waited for Anthony to pull out the chair across from his before she settled in it. “How have you been keeping?”
“Well enough.” He settled into his own chair.
She was studying him, tilting her head as she took him in. He had last seen her at Christmas, the family’s new tradition was to join him in Kent, knowing he wouldn’t travel himself. “You look thinner.”
“And yet, still so handsome.” He said glibly, feeling the old mask slide into place little by little.
His mother said nothing but continued to stare at him.
“If you have something to add I wish you would say it, Mama.”
She paused, leaning back in her chair, suddenly nervous. “I heard a rumour today. Well, gossip might be closer to the truth.”
Anthony gave her a wry smile, “The Duchess is already abreast of the flutterings of the Ton I see.”
His mother rolled her eyes, “Play nicely with your sister, Anthony.”
How many times had he heard that as a boy?
“Well, out with it then. Who has stolen staff from whom?”
“I’m not sure I should say. Simon hadn’t had time to verify it with Lady Danbury.”
“Well, you had better keep it to yourself then.” He stood, not wanting to be alone with his mother for very much longer. The longer they were alone together the Greater chance his mask would slip. “Come, we should stop Hyacinth from strangling Gregory. I can hear them arguing already.”
Anthony tried not to clench the fist at his side as he held his hand out to help his mother down from the carriage. Already the music floating out of the ballroom behind them was making his spine prickle. He clenched his teeth and squeezed his eyes closed for a moment, holding himself against the wave of memories one of these parties always brought on. The wind almost carried her voice back to him for a moment. He could have sworn he heard her derisive laugh before she cut his ego down to size, carried back to him on the wind.
“At least try to look as though this isn’t extremely painful, Darling.”
Anthony gave his mother a smile that was half a grimace as he tucked her hand into the crook of his arm. “I’ll try for you, Mama.”
She sighed, patting his cheek. “You’re a sweet boy.”
Anthony laughed, most of it genuine, almost none of it filled with bitterness. “I don’t think you would have said that in years gone by.”
“Perhaps not.”
Every year, as they stood here waiting to be announced he felt as though he was going to itch out of his skin with he urge to run away, back to the country with all of the other ghosts. It had dulled since that first year when it felt as though everyone’s eyes were on him as he’d moved quietly to the corner to stand by his mother, daring the other Mamas to come near him and introduce their daughters. Eventually the pointed suggestions that he might make his way to the dance floor had dwindled until only the bravest attempted it at all anymore. A bachelor confirmed now. Far too set in his ways. Once a rake, now a recluse.
He hardly noticed they’d moved to the corner, his eyes fixed on a spot on the ceiling while he waited for Benedict and Sophie to arrive, the small moment of joy they would bring with them and the news of his nephew. He’d go tomorrow to visit Charlie, bring him a new toy, Anthony decided absently.
“Darling,” His mother’s voice said urgently in his ear.
Anthony let his eyes wander around the room, in no hurry to meet his mother’s. He let them slide over the faces, realising how much had changed in the landscape of the Ton.
“I know you didn’t want to hear this before but I really think you-“
His heart stuttered in his chest and the world seemed to dull around him, matching the echo of himself that he truly was now.
It couldn’t be her. He was imagining it surely. It was someone else and his traitorous mind was filling in the gaps, trying to set him at ease.
He noticed the flicker of shock in the eyes that met his across the room and it felt as though the wind had been knocked out of him as he stared back at her. After all this time.
“Mrs Bagwell’s sister is in London for the season.”
Anthony barely had time to let his mother’s words sink in. Barely had time to hear them at all before Kate Sharma turned her head and broke their gaze.