A Gentleman Never Tells(20)

Brent drained his glass and put it on the table in front of the settee. “So your minds are made up? There’s no talking you out of it?”

“Not a chance in hell. We’re going to London tomorrow to find places to live and to start the process of moving the entire operations of Brentwood’s Sea Coast Ship Building.”

“Since you both insist on settling in London, there’s something I must tell you before you go. Something our parents never wanted you to know.”

Matson laughed and set his glass beside Brent’s. “Why are you sounding so somber, Brent? It’s like you don’t want us to move back.”

“Yes, why are you trying so hard to talk us out of it?” Iverson said. “We’d think you’d be glad to have us nearby. We’re not children anymore, you know. Out with whatever it is you want to tell us.”

“All right, there’s really no other way to tell you than directly, anyway. The man you always thought of as your father is not.”

“What did you say?” Matson asked.

“There is a man in London, and the two of you look just like him.”

“So?” Iverson said, swirling the last of his brandy in his glass, looking as if he couldn’t be less interested in what Brent was saying.

“What exactly are you saying, Brent?” Matson asked, seeming a little more intrigued than Iverson.

“When I say you look like him, I’m telling you the man is your birth father—not Judson Henry Brentwood, sixth Viscount Brentwood.”

Matson leaned forward and froze his gaze on Brent. “What the hell do you mean?”

“And it better not be what I’m thinking right now,” Iverson added in a cold voice and then drained his glass.

“I’m afraid it is. This isn’t some slight favoring with the same color of eyes and hair. It’s your build, the structure of your faces, the way you carry yourselves. You look just like the man, because he is your father. Mama admitted it to me ten years ago.”

“You lie.” Iverson rose and glared at him.

Brent remained calm. “No. And why would I?”

“If this is true,” Matson said, “Why did she tell you and not us?”

“Isn’t it obvious? She didn’t want you to ever know. That one son had found out about her indiscretion was enough of a blow to her. She wanted to spare herself the shame and you two the shock of finding out, as well.”

“Sit down, Iverson,” Matson said. “This needs an explanation and, obviously, Brent’s the only one who can give it.”

Brent sucked in a deep breath. It wasn’t natural for a son to talk with his mother about her affair, and he’d hated every moment of it, but so had she. And it wasn’t any easier telling his brothers about it.

“The summer Papa took you to Baltimore to set up the business, I went to London. While there, I went to a ball, and that is where I saw the man. His name is Sir Randolph Gibson. I was stunned at how much you two look like him. Naturally, I came home and told Mama I had seen him. She admitted to a brief affair with the man one spring while she was in London for the Season. She had no way of knowing until years later, when you grew up, that you had been fathered by Sir Randolph. She admitted the affair to our father, and that’s when he went to Baltimore to set up the shipping business for you there. His hope was you would never have reason to set foot in London. He never wanted you to hear about or to meet Sir Randolph.”

“We’re almost thirty, blast it, we should have been told before now,” Iverson said.

“No, I’m almost thirty, and you are almost twenty-nine. And I should have never had to live with this knowledge these past ten years, but I have. Take my word for it, if I could have persuaded you to stay away from London, I would have, but I couldn’t let you go and not be aware of your connection to Sir Randolph. If you two weren’t insisting on going to London tomorrow, I would have kept my bloody mouth shut until doomsday rather than have you find this out.”

Matson looked at Iverson. “So what do you have to say about all this?”

Iverson shrugged, picked up the decanter, and refilled the three glasses. He looked from Matson to Brent. “I say we’re going to London, and to hell with whoever this man is or the fact that we might look like him.”

Matson looked at Brent and smiled. “Well, then, Brother, we’re going to London.”

And they had.

Brent looked at the two strapping men and said, “Please don’t stand on polite ceremony, Brothers, when you can barge in with such tantalizing fanfare.”