Waiting for a Scot Like You (Union of the Rakes #3) - Eva Leigh Page 0,3
his hand. “Mr. Gregory will be stepping down as estate manager so he might spend more time with his grandchildren, and as Carriford is the favorite of my holdings, it stands to reason I need someone with a nauseating amount of competency to run the place.”
“Mr. Gregory will leave big boots to fill—”
“Ah, they say that the size of the boots isn’t as important as the size of one’s gloves.” Rotherby crossed the room to Duncan and glanced at his hands. “Surprised you could load a rifle with those bangers you call fingers.”
“They’re still good with the delicate work. Never had a lady complain about them.”
Well, that wasn’t so. Susannah used to sigh with exasperation because he had large, coarse hands that did not belong to an earl’s son. She’d kept giving him gloves in the hope that would make them—and him—a little more elegant.
He forcibly shoved thoughts of her away. That was long ago. It didn’t matter anymore.
“But they’ll do the job at Carriford,” he pressed on. “Been thinking you ought to give me a review in six months, make certain I’m exceeding expectations.”
“That’s not necessary—”
“It is necessary.” It was a measure of the durability of Duncan and Rotherby’s friendship that he could interrupt a duke without a word of rebuke. “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, but whatever I receive I earn. This position’s no different, even if one of my oldest friends is giving it to me.”
“Your father did buy you a commission,” Rotherby pointed out.
“Because he told me I’d be cut off if I enlisted, so I’d no choice. But I didn’t get to be a major by merely screaming at my batman to polish my boots.” Duncan propped his elbow on the mantel. “Mark me, Rotherby, I mean what I say. I must be employed on a conditional basis contingent on my performance.”
He’d been wrestling with this ever since Rotherby had offered him the position. A small voice in the back of his mind had been whispering terrible, insidious thoughts. That his friend was only acting out of charity—even as he hoped this work would give him the focus he’d lacked.
Were Duncan to write up an itemized list of all the activities his life in peacetime ought to include, he had followed that list to the letter. And yet for all his adherence to prescribed behavior, restlessness pushed him from one end of London to the other. The fault had to be something within him, surely.
He needed something. Something to occupy his body, and even more so his mind. Nothing seemed to hold his attention anymore, and it was nigh impossible to derive pleasure from any of the things that used to satisfy him.
Rotherby had married four weeks ago, and Holloway had done the same a handful of months before that. With two members of the Union of the Rakes spending more time at home than before, the group had met with less frequency. Yet even before this, when his four friends would spend evenings out on the town, traversing from gaming hell to theater boxes to private parties, Duncan’s restlessness grew. He’d keep looking toward the door as if something or someone would walk through it, someone who would hold in their hands the missing piece to Duncan’s sense of unease.
The past months had seen him rigorously adhering to schedules. Up at six every morning for a solid two hours taking exercise, then a bath and a light breakfast, followed by work wherein he supplemented his income by reviewing friends’ and acquaintances’ accounting ledgers. At precisely four o’clock, he rode to Hampstead Heath and back—the crowds at Rotten Row were too thick to permit getting a decent gallop—and a subsequent quick wash before heading out for the evening’s revels with his friends. Regardless of what time he went to sleep, he always rose at the appointed hour of six.
Day after day after day.
He’d followed the correct path of a gentleman in peacetime—and should have been satisfied.
Instead, he felt his temper always on the verge of fraying, and when he laughed with his friends, the sound was forced out of him as if he hadn’t the necessary chemicals to create the alchemy of laughter.
Perhaps the work as Rotherby’s estate manager would be the answer. It had to be.
His friend looked like he wanted to argue against a six-month review, but he must have known the futility of arguing with a Scot, because he eventually threw up his hands. “As you wish, you donkey.”