"You think I neglect my estate."
"I think you manage Whitmore from papers delivered to your study by people who know which papers you expect to see."
His gaze sharpened. "That is dangerously close to accusing my staff of theft."
"No. It is dangerously close to suggesting you look."
Alexander rose and crossed to the bell. Ellie stood, too.
"If I have overstepped—"
"You crossed that boundary when you confiscated my brandy." He pulled the bell once. "Sit down."
20 minutes later, ledgers covered the table where prospective duchesses had displayed embroidery and watercolor paintings. Aunt May stood beside Ellie looking increasingly horrified while Alexander compared household invoices.
"March," he said, "chimney repairs, west corridor, 32 pounds."
Aunt May nodded slowly. "Yes, your grace."
Ellie opened another ledger. "January, same rooms, 30 pounds."
Alexander held out his hand. Ellie passed him the book. Their fingers brushed. It was nothing, a fraction of a second, but Alexander's hand paused before closing around the leather. Ellie withdrew hers first.
"Who approves these?" he asked.
Aunt May swallowed. "Mr. Hardgrove, your grace. Your estate secretary."
Alexander's face hardened. "Bring him to me tomorrow morning."
"He left for London yesterday."
Alexander looked up. "For what purpose?"
"He said you authorized it."
"I did not."
The room went quiet again. Ellie watched the fatigue return to Alexander's face, but now something else accompanied it. Anger directed less at the missing secretary than at himself.
"How long?" he asked.
Ellie understood. "I don't know."
He walked to the window. "Everyone calls me controlling. Perhaps you control the wrong things." His head turned slightly. "Do you always speak this freely?"
"Only after being ordered to stay."
Alexander gave a low breath that might have been laughter. Then his gaze dropped to the rain-darkened grounds. "My father nearly lost Whitmore through gambling. My brother inherited his talent for trusting charming men. When both were gone, I inherited their debts with the title."
Ellie said nothing.
"I spent 10 years repairing what they left." His voice was quieter now. "Apparently, I became so concerned with keeping the walls standing that I stopped seeing what happened inside them."
Ellie looked at the ledgers between them. "Then start seeing."
Alexander turned. For several seconds, neither spoke. He seemed to be studying her in the same way he had studied the accounts, not as decoration, but as something whose meaning he had overlooked.
"Tomorrow," he said, "you will help me examine every household account for the last 2 years."
Ellie stared. "Your Grace, I pour tea. Today you also discovered what six well-bred ladies and one duke failed to notice. That hardly qualifies me as an accountant."
"No." His eyes settled on hers. "But honestly, you might."
Aunt May made a faint protesting sound. Alexander ignored it.
Ellie folded her arms. "And if I find something you don't like, you will tell me. Even if it is your fault."
A longer pause followed. "Especially then."
Ellie considered him, then nodded once. "Very well."
Alexander reached for the tea she had poured earlier. It had gone cold. He drank it anyway. Ellie almost laughed. Then Aunt May, still holding the January ledger, made a small sound.
"Your Grace." She turned the book toward them. A narrow column of payments ran down the page, each authorized by Hargrove. At the bottom was a recurring transfer Ellie had never noticed before. Alexander read the recipient's name and went motionless.
"Who is it?" Ellie asked.
He closed the ledger. "Someone who was supposed to have died 3 years ago."
Alexander kept one hand over the ledger as if closing the page might somehow contain what was written there. Aunt May looked between him and Ellie.
"Your Grace, Edmund Whitmore." Alexander said at last.
Ellie knew the name. Everyone at Whitmore Hall did. Alexander's older brother, dead after a carriage overturned on an icy road three winters earlier.
"Payments were made to your brother?" she asked carefully.
"Not to him." Alexander reopened the ledger. Beside Edmund's name was a London banking reference and a repeated sum of 40 pounds. "In his name."
Aunt May lowered herself into a chair. "Could Mr. Hardgrove have been settling an old account? Every month for 28 months."
Alexander's voice was controlled, which somehow made his anger more visible. His thumb pressed hard against the paper. Ellie leaned closer.
"The amounts change."
Alexander looked at her. "What?"
"40 pounds here. 38 the month before. 42 here." She traced the column without touching it. "If it were a fixed debt, why would it change?"
Alexander pulled another ledger toward him. For the next hour they searched in near silence. Pages turned. Rain softened against the windows. The fire settled lower until Aunt May quietly added coal. Eventually Ellie found the pattern.
"These aren't payments."
Alexander moved beside her. "Explain."
"Look at the dates." She pointed. "Each transfer appears 3 days after money is collected from the northern tenant farms."
Alexander's shoulder nearly touched hers. "Hardgrove has been taking a percentage. And hiding it beneath your dead brother's name because no one would question an old family obligation."
Alexander stared at the figures. The muscle beneath his scar tightened. "I should have seen this."