And all because of a bit of laughter. No, not just a bit of laughter, a history of it. Henrietta’s story of their father’s reaction to his son’s dreams, Mrs. Piedmont’s foolish trivializing of his sound plans. Tobias had chosen the wrong people to open himself up to. And so he’d hidden himself away.
She wanted to tear his disguise from him and reveal the man she knew and loved inside—talented, ambitious, clever, and kind. What if his armor had been wrapped to him so tightly for so long, it had sunk into his very skin, making it impossible to rip away and free the man beneath? She could not watch everything that made him the man she loved fade away. She would have to rip off his mask before his facade of foolery consumed him, even if it meant revealing a few of his secrets. Or threatening to. She’d failed at blackmailing a bad man, but perhaps she’d succeed at blackmailing a good one.
Chapter 24
Tobias all but ran toward his club. Specifically, his favorite chair in a forgotten corner of his club where he could pretend he’d never let another person into his life. Before Maggie, he’d kept to himself, not even shared his true thoughts with his best friend and sister. It had been better that way! It had been … his steps slowed … it had been … he stopped altogether. “Bloody hell.” It had been lonely. Letting Maggie see his true self left him feeling raw and revealed, but his loneliness was all but forgotten. No, never forgotten. In fact, the memory of that hollow state left him grateful he was no longer at its mercy.
He hadn’t always felt that way. Until the day his father had laughed him out of the house, in fact, he’d been quite happy and confident in who he was and what he wanted out of life.
He changed direction from his club to this parents’ house, walking faster than before. He let himself in and strode straight for his father’s study. It would be empty, but—he checked the clock on the mantel—in less than half an hour or so, his father would stride through the door calling for luncheon, which would already be on its way to the study.
Tobias plopped into a chair. Nothing had changed since he’d last been here as a green lad of two and twenty. Seven years had passed since he’d stepped over that threshold. Same massive desk. Same stately wallpaper. Same clock. Same … yes, even the same bust of Shakespeare in the corner. Tobias allowed himself a smile as he saluted the statue. “Hello, old friend.” Before Sebastian the Bear, Tobias had had Shakespeare, the one nod to something other than industry and uniformity in his father’s study. “How have you been?”
Shakespeare did not answer.
“I’ve been better, Shakes. It would have been nice had you asked, though.” He sighed. What was he even doing here? He hated being wrong. But he hated hurting Maggie even more. She had a right to be upset. He had extracted, one by one, each of her secrets and not allowed her the same courtesy. Celia had not mattered to him, but Celia obviously mattered to Maggie.
And Celia herself had proven a damned nuisance in more ways than one. When he’d thought himself in love with her, he’d thought she saw him, knew him for exactly who he was and accepted him. He’d felt he could be his true self around her, but he’d been wrong. She’d laughed just like his father had before. And he’d run and hid. Again.
But today he’d faced Celia, Maggie by his side, and even if she would have laughed again, he’d have stayed right next to Maggie. Maggie made it so he couldn’t run. And now Maggie demanded that he no longer hide.
With the story of Celia out in the open, Maggie now knew every inch of him like no one else on earth. He waited for the awful discomfort and mortification to descend. It did not.
The door to the study swung open and his father strode in. “My luncheon is late!” He stopped, spying Tobias in the chair. “What are you doing here?” He strode across the room and sat behind his desk.
“I came here to yell at you.”
His father raised a brow. “And what will you achieve by that?”
“It will make me feel damned good.”
“Yell away. You have”—he looked at the clock—“thirty-five minutes. And then I return to work.”
“I don’t particularly want to yell at you anymore. Capricious of me, I know, but alas, so am I ever.”
His father grunted.
A servant flew into the study with a cart and populated his father’s desk with covered trays and cups then bowed himself out of the room.
Tobias stood and walked across the room. “No, I don’t feel like pretending anymore. Instead, I’m going to talk quite seriously, and you are going to listen.” And Tobias would not be afraid, even if his father laughed him out of London. Maggie deserved a man as brave as she was. She’d not been scared to face down the Mathematical Baron to save her family; Tobias would not be scared to stand up for himself. “I am setting up my own silk business.”
A fork clattered onto a porcelain plate. His father looked up at him, eyes wide with shock.
Tobias looked to Shakespeare for strength. “I have three families, master weavers, and a roomful of gorgeous, top-quality silk to sell. I’ve made my own fortune in France. I designed a block print, several actually, still in circulation. It is, in fact, the house’s top-selling print.”
His father blinked at him then pushed food around his plate with a fork. “A few weavers and a few prints in France. You need more than that, boy.”
“You started with less, old man.”
His father grunted and plopped what looked to be a potato in his mouth. He chewed, eying Tobias all the while. He swallowed and took a swig of ale. “True. But what do you plan to do now? Do you have a factory? An automatic loom?” He pointed his fork at Tobias. “It’s the only way you’ll make a true fortune. And then the weavers will come after your loom and smash it to pieces.” He shook his head and speared another potato. “Blasted Luddites.”
“No automatic loom. Just families plying their trade. Their art.”
“It’ll never work.” His father leaned back in his chair. “I admire your grit, though. Join me at Blake Textiles. You were always meant to do so.”
Tobias shook his head and paced across the room and back. “You are not shocked? You are not disbelieving? You have spent years calling me a fool and a fop, and I—”
“Because you acted like one! And because I knew you had more in you. Now that you’ve come to your senses—”
