Husband Wanted (HC #1)

20: The Answers to their Questions

Beth was exhausted by the time she retired for the evening, dragging herself out of the library with a tear-stained face and hooded eyes. Her brothers watched her go, relieved her maid was there to escort her, and then fell into heavy silence as she left.

"We'll kill him, yes?" The question, from Matt, was deadly serious.

Thomas, the only outsider left in the Humphrey household, raised both brows, but wisely said nothing. He just took a long sip of his drink.

Simon sighed, a noise that seemed to carry the weight of the world, and raked his hair out of his face. "We cannot kill him Matt. It's illegal."

The younger man leant on the back of the armchair he was too agitated to occupy, his fingers putting deep indents in the upholstery. "He assaulted our sister, Simon. We must do something!" He pushed too forcefully on the chair and it squeaked its protest.

"That is not in doubt!" Simon's eyes flickered up to meet his brother's in a glare, setting aside any uncertainty that the man was anything less than irate at what had happened that evening. "But Beth has been through enough and we will not put her through more by tying the nooses around our necks ourselves."

Matthew let out a groan of frustration but turned away from his brother; it was not Simon he was angry at. Beth's confession had begun in the carriage ride home, filling the cabin with the vague outline of an awful tale. Simon and Vincent had listened, and then escorted her directly to the study upon their return, haranguing each brother into a seat before they could protest. Then they all listened as Beth recounted her misadventure in detail.

They had not doubted her for a moment. For starters, she was in tatters, physically and emotionally. A quick look at her back had Simon calling for the doctor against her protests, hoping the man could cut off any infection before it began in the scratches. The skin across her throat was already turning a nasty yellow brown. And her heart, well... none of her brothers needed to be a doctor to see that it was shattered.

Each brother had offered her their support the best way they knew how. Simon had held her, letting her cry into his collar and he gently rocked her back and forth. Bart had moved closer, prepared to rock her if Simon grew tired, and told her that no one would suspect a thing, thanks to David's quick lie when they had arrived. The story of the attack of David and Beth had already circled the wedding twice over within the half hour it had taken them to depart.

The younger brothers also helped. Matthew was enraged at her recounting but poured her a very short sip of whisky to settle her nerves, and then hid his anger behind smiles and raised eyebrows. A few times she caught his antagonistic smirk and he watched her spine straighten slightly. He was helping and no one could convince him otherwise. Vincent strolled immediately to his shelf of books of the law, pulling one free and beginning an exhaustive search of the ways they could prosecute the man who had attacked their sister.

What none of them had acknowledged yet was the guilt.

Simon was the first, looking away from Matt and catching his head in his hands. "We introduced them."

Bart was slouching in a chair, holding a cup of dark liquor to his forehead as if he hoped it might absorb faster. The man was not quick to drink, but after the evening's events they had all poured a glass. "We didn't know."

The eldest brother grunted. "We don't even know what we didn't know!" He sat up suddenly. "Was he in his cups? Does madness run in his family? Why would he attack her and demand marriage? And how did we not know he was the type to do so?"

"We cannot know everything."

"For our sister we should at least try!"

None disagreed with the statement.