Andrew

245 Pages·2016·1.52 MB·English

by  Grace Burrowes

Andrew; Lord Of Despair
Lonely Lords [7]
Grace Burrowes
Sourcebooks Casablanca (2012)

Rating: ***
Tags: Romance, Historical Romance, Regency Romance, Love Story,
England
Andrew Alexander will do anything to protect those he loves...
After a tragic yachting accident leaves him wracked with guilt and
despair, Andrew Alexander becomes certain he doesn't deserve to be
around his own family, let alone the beautiful, forthright Astrid
Worthington. He wanders for years, only allowing himself respite
from his self-imposed exile when he thinks Astrid safely married. He
returns home to find instead that the only woman he's ever loved has
been recently - and mysteriously - widowed.
...especially from himself
When Andrew leaves, Astrid refuses to pine. She finds an amiable
husband and contents herself with a cordial if unexciting marriage.
But her husband's sudden death and Andrew's reappearance threaten
to break her heart all over again. When Astrid's life is threatened, she
finds Andrew will do anything to protect her not only from her
enemies, but also from the truth of his dark past.

Copyright © 2013 by Grace Burrowes
Cover and internal design © 2013 by Sourcebooks, Inc.
Cover design by The Killion Group
Cover image © Nyul/Dreamstime.com
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval
systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or
reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used
fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental
and not intended by the author.
Published by Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc.
P. O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
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Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Lonely Lords Family Tree II
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-one
Acknowledgments
Excerpt from Douglas, Lord of Heartache
Lonely Lords Family Tree I
About the Author
Back Cover
To Delray the Wonder Pony,
and all the Wonder Ponies.

One
I will not run from the sight of my brother’s front door—I hope.
Andrew Alexander’s composure felt as tentative as if he were facing another
Channel crossing under stormy skies, though he nonetheless rapped the lion’s
head knocker stoutly three times against its brass fitting.
“Have you a card, sir?” The butler posed his question with that precise blend
of hauteur and deference appropriate in the household of an English marquess.
“I’m afraid you have me at a loss,” Andrew replied. “My cards went missing
somewhere between the Levant and Gibraltar.” He’d pitched them overboard at
a point in his wanderings when he’d been so homesick that, despite all his
misgivings, despite the sea voyages involved, and despite the prospect of
renewed proximity to Astrid Worthington, he’d turned his sights for England.
Not Astrid Worthington. Astrid Allen, Viscountess Amery.
Andrew had something better than calling cards, however. He had a pair of
dark eyebrows, which when lifted at a certain angle over eyes of a particularly
brilliant blue, proclaimed him—to those possessed of a modicum of perspicacity
—the younger sibling of the marquess.
The butler apparently numbered among such noticing souls. “My apologies,
my lord. I will see if the family is receiv—Lord Andrew?”
Andrew assayed a smile, though he did not recognize this man.
“It’s Hodges, your lordship. I was the newly hired underbutler when you left
on your travels four years ago. Welcome home! Welcome home, my lord!” The
fellow—whom Andrew still did not recognize—was bowing so enthusiastically
his wig nearly came down over his ginger brows.
“Thank you, Hodges. It’s good to be home.” Andrew had rehearsed that very
line, and thought it came out rather well.
To be on dry land was always good. Always.
“Lord Heathgate has been on a tear ever since we got your letter, my lord,”
Hodges declared as he divested Andrew of hat and gloves. “Her ladyship, too.
Please do come along. The master is in his library.”
Hodges bustled down the hallway, while Andrew sustained a sensory blow
that had to do with the scent of beeswax and lemon oil, the sight of red roses in a
silver bowl on the side table, and the jingle of a passing carriage.
He was as much at home as he was ever going to be.
Hodges tapped three times on the library door, a small sound that guaranteed
for a while, at least, Andrew would remain at home.
“We’ll surprise him, eh, your lordship? And I’ll let the marchioness know the
happy news.” Hodges was fair to bursting out of his silver and blue livery to tell
Heathgate’s lady that the prodigal was home, while Andrew felt a sense of frigid
waves closing over his head and brine filling his belly.
Though beneath those reactions also dwelled a stubborn joy. Andrew seized
the joy with both hands as Hodges announced, “a visitor,” then promptly
dropped it when he found himself standing in his brother’s library.
“You’ll have him to yourself,” Hodges whispered with a cheeky wink.
Which was exactly what Andrew did not want.
Will he, nil he, the door clicked quietly shut. Andrew’s only surviving brother
stood in quarter profile by a set of French doors that led out to the back gardens.
Gareth looked the same, no gray in his sable hair, no age creeping into his face,
no dimming of his icy blue eyes. If anything, the man looked… younger, and the
sight of him hale and whole comforted unbearably.
Gareth shot across the room and enveloped Andrew in a silent embrace, as a
queer feeling suffused Andrew’s chest, then his whole body, a kind of chill and
heat that left him weak-kneed and resting his forehead against Gareth’s shoulder.
He did not deserve this unseemly display, but he held fiercely to his brother a
moment longer.
“Squeeze me any harder and you will make me cry,” he said, stepping back
when Gareth’s hold eased. A boyhood taunt between brothers was nothing less
than the God’s honest truth now. Andrew tried for a smile—and mostly failed.
“You have damned near made your brother cry,” Gareth growled. “God’s
balls, you’re skinny. Between Felicity and Mother, you will soon be fat as a
market hog.” He went to the sideboard and gestured with a decanter. “A
celebratory tot?”
Andrew avoided strong drink as a matter of course, particularly whiskey,
because it—along with sea voyages and introductions to any woman named Julia
—seemed to fuel the nightmares.
“Of course,” Andrew said, still feeling strangely weak. “Brandy will do. I
have missed your cellar.” He had missed his brother far more. He propped
himself against Gareth’s huge desk in what he hoped was a nonchalant pose.