Chapter Text
Steven’s mother died holding his hand, grip soft while she faded into the sheets. Leaving her distraught son and a mountain of debt behind her.
Steven had sat with the corpse all day, until his valet Sam had called the funeral parlour and they had sent people around to collet Sarah Roger’s body and funeral clothing. Steven hadn’t said a word. He had just watched, motionless, gripping his mother’s hand tightly when they had tried to take her away. Her wedding ring was tucked safely in his breast pocket after a teary goodbye the night before she had slipped away.
All he wanted was a few last moments with his mother.
Not allowed to cry, he had waited until they had had cleared out of his home, he waited while the debt collectors had leered around, sneering and threatening, and he had waited until the priest had come in to bless the house lest Sarah’s soul remained.
He cried when they left. Sobbing into his bed sheets, the mansion echoing his pain back to him. Eyes stained red and puffy. Thoughts of debts and souls leaving his mind as he cried for his mother. He cried for the memories they had shared and the ones that had been lost, for the ones they would never have. He didn’t move, eat or sleep for four days.
Steven himself didn’t care for the debt, and was more hurt over his mother dying. But there were people that cared, people who thought that the repossession of the few items in the Rogers empty mansion was the only solution. However, Sam Wilson, the only member of staff employed by the Rogers, thought otherwise.
“Steve, there are other options.” He draws the curtains of his master’s room. Letting the light fall onto the small lump in the bed. Steve was a sickly young man, and at 23 had already had so mainly ailments that even going outside, was occasionally not an option. The sunlight would, however, do him the world of good. Even if his groaning said otherwise.
“What options? Homelessness? Death?”
“Stop being so melodramatic, now get up. I have letters to write and you need to make us some brunch”
“Is it really that late?” A tufty blonde head of hair peaks from under the covers and Sam nods before disappearing to go and contact some people about a certain blonde, hopeless man.
Steve lets things happen around him. He missed his mother terribly, as they were very close. They were each other’s reason for living and his future looked bleak without her wisdom and love. He goes through the motions, having taken to helping Sam around the mansion. Since his father’s death four years prior, most of the staff had been let go of. Apart from Sam. Sam was everything to the family, even if that family had whittled its way down to just Steve. So he makes a light breakfast of porridge and tea and sets the small table in the kitchen. Letting Sam get on with his schemes. Steve trusted Sam with his life, this time was no different.
//
The pressure on James was getting heavier. It was the annual dinner, his home filled with people he didn’t like but had to impress. Those from the nearest down, well to do people who thought his mysteriousness was a cover for an enormous wealth. They were delusional of course, the Barnes inheritance was quite large but it was nothing of grandeur. And the parties had started before James was even born, so tradition had to be upheld. He still hated it.
The pressure of marriage was a large one. At the age of 25, it was expected of him to have a lady on his arm and possibly a child. He had, nor cared for either. His reclusive lifestyle was down to the fact that he had no desire for either after the accident that left him without parents, or a left arm.
Bustling crowds that shifted with the music left him constantly talking, as the host it was his job. But again, that didn’t mean he had to like it. It was tolerable, but completely vile. None of the conversation was interesting, just nosy women and rich old men who wanted to do nothing more than gossip or gawk at his pinned sleeve.
He stays in his spot at the head of the room, letting the crowd shift around, seeing no point in doing any more work that he had to. It was getting late, and his suit was starting to become restricting around the collar.
“Lord Barnes” He refrains from pulling at said collar, smiling queasily at a short, balding man who was looking rather expectantly at him
“Lord Henry, how are you this evening?”
“Very well, I just came over to see how you were getting on” James bit on his tongue. Another reason to ask if he was traumatized or getting married, more often both. This was the seventh time he had heard those exact words in one evening
“Oh I’m perfectly fine Lord Henry. Keeping the estate and whatnot” James makes himself smile again
“Ah, the arm not giving you trouble?” This was bold, others had danced around it
“None at all. I’m perfectly healthy”
“And what about a woman?” The whisky on the Lords breath was hitting James now. So that must be the reason for the boldness.
“Nothing I’m afraid. Now I must be doing the last rounds Sir” He bows his head, escaping to the other side of the room. Smiling in relief as some people start filing out.
Later that evening, Romanov, his housekeeper, knocks on his door, smirking as she sees his weary expression
“You could just get married James, Take some of the weight off”
“Don’t tease Natasha” He sighs, untucking his shirt and undoing his top buttons, letting himself breathe again. “You know my stance”
“I do. But I have a friend, a friend who has a ward that’s in a similar situation”
“What do you mean?” He pours himself a drink, water as drinking gave him an awful headache
“A friends ward needs someone to marry to pay off a debt. Lovely little blonde from what I’ve heard.”
“Are they pleasant?”
“An artist type, their mother has just died”
“Hence the money”
“They have quite a nervous disposition but wouldn’t be opposed” It sounded ideal. They wouldn’t have to do anything, just signed papers and money swapped. There was enough room in his halls to not bother each other if needs be. It seemed perfect.
“Could you get them to write me then?”
“I’ll have a reply by morning Sir”.