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servants, because they have no other income and nowhere else to turn.” Shespeared him with quite a malicious look. “That is the reason I have kept them on even though you have shown no interest in Rawlston Hall. You have refused to answer my correspondence, and I could not let them go hungry, so I have paid them from a small inheritance I have from my mother.”
    Sara’s eyes glinted with anger. She looked ready to spit nails, actually. “’Tis a good thing my father married a woman with money, your grace, or your lack of responsibility would have had a much more desperate end.”
    Trevor crossed his arms over his chest and rubbed a thumb against his jaw. He usually shaved only once every few days and liked to rub his fingers and thumb against the stubble as he thought. Unfortunately, in his new role as a man of responsibility, he had shaved that very morning. He shoved his hand through his hair. “Stuart has sent you no money whatsoever?” He asked this quietly, afraid of the answer.
    “Absolutely nothing.”
    Trevor closed his eyes for a moment. He had hoped that he was wrong about Stu: that the man had gotten foxed someplace and would drag himself home, get Trevor’s note, and take off to join him at Rawlston.
    Trevor huffed a small, silent laugh. Stu was obviously not going to show up anytime soon. He had played the new Duke for quite a fool Trevor turned away from Sara and strode to the large fireplace. Masculine pieces of furniturefronted the hearth, big chairs covered in dark leather. Trevor stood staring at nothing for a moment.
    He could already feel himself drowning. If he’d been normal, he’d have been able to wrap up all the paperwork, set an honest man to keep on top of it, and run down the cheating Andrew Stuart. Unfortunately, Trevor was not normal. The paper on the old Duke’s desk made him greasy with sweat, and he knew that he would never be able to whip through it and run after Stuart also.
    “What of the estate?” he asked, without turning around. “You say it is at ends. What do you mean?”
    “Rawlston has not been a profitable estate since the conception of the title over three hundred years ago. John brought a bit of money to the title, but besides the small incomes he left to his children, there is nothing left. He kept Rawlston going with his own money, really. And the last few years there was not even much of that.”
    Trevor sighed, then realized Sara had said something about children. He turned and stared at her. “Do you have children?”
    Her face turned a light shade of pink, and she clasped her hands in front of her. “No.”
    “But. . .”
    “John had a daughter and a son with Rachel.”
    “Rachel?”
    Sara sighed heavily and turned away. “His mistress.”
    Trevor suddenly remembered Sara mentioning the woman and felt like a toad for prolonging the conversation about her.
    “Anyway, you should go through these things, your grace.” Sara busied herself at the desk, shuffling papers. “I have put out the books I kept. It will all explain itself, I am sure.”
    If it was in books or on paper, it would not just “explain itself.” Trevor took a deep stilling breath and stood a little straighter.
    “I have sorted it all through for you.” Sara smiled, her brows lifting in a beseeching manner. “I did not want you overwhelmed.”
    “Of course not.” Oh, if that wasn’t the most hilarious understatement. He wiped his hands discreetly against the sides of his jacket. Without looking at the printed words that seemed to move across each page, Trevor went and sat behind the desk. He had not sat at a desk since school. “Is it hot in here?”
    “No, actually, ’Tis a bit cool.” Sara took a stack of worn leatherbound ledgers and laid them neatly on the floor behind him. “You can go through those when you are done with these.” She gestured toward the paper on the desk.
    As if he would ever be done.
    “Now, these are bills that are current.” She patted a