His palm, gentle and warm, covered her cheek. “Anna,” he whispered. “None of it was your doing. None.”
Frustration bubbled through her. “And none of it was yours, either.” So why did he continue to speak so cruelly of himself for it? Why was his anger so self-directed, when the only proper target for it was his cousin?
“You are better than I deserve,” he murmured. “That, I know.”
His mouth found hers again, and he kissed her so deeply and thoroughly that the kiss began to feel like an answer somehow—an agreement that she was right, that he would find peace with himself. After a few moments, she forgot their surroundings—forgot everything but the heat and cleverness of his mouth and hands, and the pleasing heavy weight of him against her. It was a shock, then, to realize the coach had come to a stop. They were home—the footman was opening the door.
“Promise me,” she said as he pulled away. “Promise me you will try to look on yourself as I do.”
He kissed her inner wrist before helping her onto the curb. “Come to my bed tonight,” he said into her ear. “Come to where you belong.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
When Anna woke alone the next morning in her husband’s bedroom, she did not think much of his absence. Her thoughts were too filled by what had passed between them: long, leisurely, pleasure-swollen hours that still showed in the tangled sheets discarded on the floor. She sat up, blushing as she caught sight of her discarded clothing, now neatly folded and stacked on a nearby chair. The maids had come in without waking her, but they had certainly left with a tale to tell.
Happiness felt rather like a drug. It made her slow to rise, slower to dress; after finding the note from Liam explaining his appointment with Auburn at the club, she found herself mooning at the window seat in her bedroom, watching the breeze play through the nodding scarlet heads of the flowers in the window box. At last, finding her own lassitude rather ill-becoming, she bestirred herself to write a note inviting Moira to afternoon tea.
The reply came an hour later, as she paged through a copy of The British Farmer’s Magazine.
Coz,
I will gladly come to tea, if only to ask you about this mysterious investigation in which the Morning Herald claims your husband to be a central figure. I confess I am rather sore to be left out of such news, especially when it has now become gossip, of which you know I count myself a superior tradeswoman!
M.
Anna leapt to her feet and rang for a footman. The first to appear—Riley—did not know where the morning’s Herald had been laid. He went searching, only to return empty-handed, with Wilkins in tow. Wilkins informed her that his lordship had requested the household’s copy of the Morning Herald before leaving, and had carried it with him to the club.
Taking a newspaper to a club was rather like carrying coal to Newcastle. Anna could think of only one reason Liam would have done so. He’d not wanted her to see it.
“Find me a copy at once,” she said. “Go purchase one—or ask the neighbors, if that is quicker.”
Some women, delicate creatures, lost their appetites in anxious times. Her own roared. She sent to the kitchens for a full luncheon, and was digging her way through her second plate of boiled ham and beans when Riley returned with the newspaper.
The story was above the fold.
INQUIRY OPENED CONCERNING DISAPPEARED LORD SADLER
ONCE PRESUMED LOST AT SEA—NOW ALLEGED
MURDERED
LORD LOCKWOOD TO OFFER TESTIMONY
An astonishing report, confirmed by several personages highly placed in both government and society, comes to light this morning. Stuart Leslie, third Baron Sadler, presumed dead after the disappearance in January 1856 of the SS Pacific, on which he was understood to be traveling, now emerges as the victim of a more nefarious tragedy: MURDER. According to certain personages whose credentials amply substantiate the authority of their claims, Lord Sadler was abducted from the SS Pacific before departure, and cruelly butchered by none other than the late inventor Mr. Harold Marlowe—whose suicide last year now appears to have been driven by self-horror.
A spokesman for Baldwin & Sons, the insurance company that underwrote the SS Pacific’s fatal voyage, confirmed that a claim has been paid to Lord Sadler’s heirs, and that these allegations, if true, imperil its legitimacy. The company awaits a report from Scotland Yard, which has commenced a closed inquiry into Lord Sadler’s death. Their next deposition will take place tomorrow. Lord Lockwood, recently returned after several years’ travel abroad, is thought to have some intelligence of a confederate of Marlowe, which will prove useful to the inquiry.
This was bait.
It was bait placed by Lockwood himself—or else, Anna thought on a sharp breath, by the Duke of Auburn. For had not both the men’s moods been shifted to an extraordinary degree while she and Emma had been touring the house?
The men had agreed on a plan. And afterward, in the carriage, Liam had hinted at it: I am no longer constrained, he’d said.
But why hadn’t he told her outright?
God above, all those sweet words he had spoken to her—that she was sufficient unto herself, her ‘own light’—and everything that had come afterward, in the dark of his bed—all of it had been a provisional farewell.
Anger and panic entwined so closely she could not separate them. Her temper fueled her as she strode into the hallway and commanded Riley to assemble the male staff in the dining room.
After a brief excursion upstairs to her rooms, she returned to discover the whole lot waiting for her. Ordinarily, it might have been amusing to watch a group of hardened former prisoners crowd away as she swept past. They expected a scolding, perhaps.
But today she wanted them to forget who she was. She wanted honesty. Drawing up by the foot of the table, she looked them over. “Lockwood went out alone this morning?” she asked Henneage.
“Aye, that’s right.”
“You dropped him at the club?”
He shrugged. “Had me saddle the roan for him.”
That answered two questions: he’d not confided in any of these men, and it was very unlikely that he’d gone to the club.
“Listen to me closely,” she said. “I know I have harangued and cajoled you to restrain yourselves in my presence, but this once, I will ask that you speak from your hearts, without care for what I might think. Do you understand?”
“God save us,” she heard Danvers mutter. Some elbow nearby jammed into his ribs, and he jumped straight.
“Lockwood has found the man who paid for his transport to Elland,” she went on.
The men exchanged uneasy looks. “Aye,” said Henneage, “that’ll be his cousin.”
Of course they would know this. “He means to draw him out today.”
This was news. She studied the group’s poorly concealed reactions: a wide grin from Henneage, a certain frowning pallor that came over Wilkins, several crossed arms, and Cook’s grunting retort: “Long overdue, methinks.”
“Perhaps.” She placed her fingertips on the table, her weight on her steepled hands. “The catch, of course, is that he has no proof—so if it comes to a killing, he will be hanged as a murderer if he’s caught. On top of this, there is no guarantee that he will be the one to emerge alive.”
“Lock can handle himself,” Gibbs said stoutly.
“Could have asked our help,” Hanks muttered.
“Aww, your feelings hurt, Poodle?” This from Henneage, sneering.
“His cousin won’t play fair,” said Wilkins anxiously.
“He don’t want our help,” snapped Gibbs, “or else he’d have asked.”
“Do you need his permission to help?” Anna asked.
A startled silence. She looked over the group. “I don’t know where he’s gone, or where he intends this meeting to happen. Can any of you guess where he would go to meet his cousin?”
A low murmur of discussion broke out. She pulled out the chair and seated herself, her stomach groaning from the weight of her lunc
h.
“He won’t want to be caught at it,” Wilkins was saying. “So he wouldn’t go to the bloke’s house. Nor anywhere so public.”
“He’s stealthy,” said Riley. “Remember that guard he took out with a single twist of the neck? You was half hanged at the time, so you won’t recall—”
“We were all there,” Danvers put in. “No need to relive it.”
Anna, finding herself the object of several hasty and apologetic looks, forced a smile to cover the nauseated twist in her stomach. “Pretend I’m not here, if it suits you better.”
It evidently did. The men turned their backs on her, but did not bother to lower their voices.
“Remember that one tale he told?” This from Wilkins, excitedly. “The first time he realized his cousin did hate him. Where were they then? When his cousin shoved him, and he swore he saw murder in the bastard’s eyes.”
She leaned forward, biting her tongue to keep from prompting them, her hands twisting together into an aching knot.
“Somewhere private, it was,” said Riley. “I remember because he said nobody would have believed it lest they seen it. And then”—he started to chuckle—“he threw ink on the bastard’s head.”
Henneage cleared his throat. “I reckon we shouldn’t interfere in Lock’s business lest he wants it. But he’s gone to Lawdon.”
Anna rose. “Are you certain?”
“Aye, just about.” He shuffled, then sighed. “I asked him where he was heading. He said he’d be there and back by dark.”
She started for the door, but Gibbs blocked it, his arms crossed and his chin jutting mutinously. “This ain’t right! If Lock wanted us there, he’d have asked.”
“He’s our brother,” Wilkins burst out. “It’s our duty—”
“He won’t like it, is all I’m saying.”
“He doesn’t need to know,” Hanks said. “Does he? That we followed him.”
All eyes now turned to Anna.
“All he’ll know,” she said coolly, “is that I decided to move the household to Lawdon for the week. Step aside, Gibbs.”
“Now, wait a second, you ain’t going—”
“That would blow his top off for sure.”
“We can manage it, m’lady, wouldn’t ever let a thing happen to him—”
“Ain’t a lady’s place—”
“Gentlemen.” She spun back to face them, putting on her best steely look—the very look she’d used on the first morning of their acquaintance with her to evaluate their continued employment in the house.
It took a long moment for silence to fall, but once she had their full attention, she continued: “Do you imagine I love him less than you do?”
“Oof,” groaned Henneage. “Now with the waterworks—”
“My eyes are quite dry.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out her sgian-dubh.
Gibbs snorted. “That’d cut a piece of fruit, maybe—”
He fell silent when she pulled out her pistol.
“I’m an excellent shot,” she said. “And a man’s flanks, you’ll find, pierce as easily as a melon. I invite you to keep behind me for safety, if you like.” With that, she shoved past Gibbs and out the door.
• • •
The schoolroom stood apart from the main house, in a small limestone building that Liam’s great-grandfather had built as a miniature palace for the amusement of his children. The gilt and mirrored interiors, though now chipped and fading, offered a whimsical contrast to the plain wooden floor, the rude desks, and unadorned, child-sized chairs.
On entering, Liam had found himself seized by the uncanny feeling of having stepped back in time. Rows of workbooks still sat on the shelves, thick with the dust of decades. A faded line of Latin could be read on the chalkboard: Bis vincit qui se vincit in victoria.
The phrase kept his attention for a long moment. He conquers twice who, at the moment of victory, conquers himself.
The ceiling briefly creaked overhead. For a moment, Liam could almost imagine it was the footfall of his old tutor, who had slept in the upstairs apartment. The cunning bat had drilled spy holes in the ceiling so he could nap comfortably while turning an occasional eye on his pupils’ industry below.
Liam took a seat at the desk in the corner, which gave him a clear view of the door. Out the windows, a glorious spring day was unfolding, the clear sunlight shining through the green leaves of apple trees. The windows stood closed, but the birdsong penetrated, raucous and cheerful.
At first, at Elland, he had found it difficult to bear such mundane beauty. That the entire world did not suffer alongside him had seemed a sign of God’s indifference, or else proof that he mattered not at all. But later, in the hole, he had glimpsed a bird’s flight overhead, and had found himself suspended in wonder. Freedom yet existed. He could see it. By seeing it, he could feel it himself. After all, was Rembrandt’s work less extraordinary because Liam could not create similar? In the observing, one became a part of what one observed. In the hole, Liam had discovered a kind of freedom within himself, which no man could wrest from him.
It was after he’d left the hole, after he’d won back his objective freedom, that he’d forgotten this lesson. He had become mired then in the trap of his own memories. Claustrophobic, hunted, unable to escape himself.
But if the prison lay within, so, too, did freedom. He sat in this schoolroom where he had first encountered his enemy and breathed deeply, feeling exquisitely calm. Even the rattle of the doorknob, the creak as the door eased open, could not cause his heart to leap.
“I expected you earlier,” he said.
“Did you?” Stephen’s pale gaze swept the room as he stepped inside. “What a Gothic choice, Liam! The alley behind the club would have served just as well.”
“No,” Liam said. “Not for a killing.”
They locked eyes. Liam felt mild surprise at how relaxed his cousin looked, his pale light eyes steady and focused, his thin lips relaxed. Stephen’s courage had never been physical, but the prospect of violence did not frighten him today.
“This is long overdue,” Stephen said. He closed the door and leaned against it. He had a hand tucked inside his coat, no doubt gripping a weapon. “I should have done it myself—on your wedding day, when I had the chance.”
Liam considered it. “A bullet might have served you better,” he said. “But you’d have found it too quick to satisfy. Revenge is better served in portions—slowly, to make the man suffer.”
Stephen assessed him with a cold, measuring stare. “Yes, true enough. And you did suffer, didn’t you?” His smile spread, slow and ugly. “The grand lordling learned at last what it’s like to live as the common folk do.”
Liam’s own smile felt amazed and very fleeting. “Is that what I learned?”
Stephen’s glance broke away to rove the room. He shook his head, made a little grunt. “Amazing.” His palm ran across the nearest desktop, his index finger pausing over his own initials scratched into the wood. “I’d imagined this place given over to kindling.”
“My father was sentimental.”
“Yes. I remember.”
“You should. You were under his care for five years.” Hearing the sharpness in his own voice, his anger on his father’s behalf, Liam took a deep breath. “He looked on you as another son.”
“A second son,” Stephen snapped. “A very great distance from there to the first.”
Was that the root of his hatred, then? “There is no time in my memory in which he favored me over you. Every gift we received was equal. Every tutor we had, every trip we took—”
“Oh, he knew the difference.” Stephen pulled his gun into the open, held it loosely at his side. “ ‘Stewardship of the land is our highest calling, lads.’ ” Quoting Liam’s father, his voice soured. “So he would prate, as though he hadn’t mortgaged his acres to hell and back. And then, cursing the bankers who wanted only their due—disdaining the money-grubbers, while telling me all the while what a succor I w
ould be to you once I joined their ranks—as though I had been bred to play the mule, the beast of burden who would haul the Lockwood fortunes back to greatness!”
Some distant part of Liam marveled at this twisted version of his own memories. “He thought your father a visionary. He was given full custody of your wealth—but never once did he reach into those accounts to ease his own burdens.”
“How honorable. He refrained from stealing from his ward!”
“A pity his example did not take,” Liam said. “You stole a good deal more than wealth from me.”
Stephen’s eyes rolled. “Poor, put-upon Liam! What a noble victim you paint yourself. Tell me, was familial loyalty always such a virtue to you? Did you ever look to my comfort? At Eton, while you were off carousing with your friends, did you ever give a thought to me, left behind in the dormitories? And later—”
Liam rose, and his cousin made a nervous retreat, lifting the gun to take aim. “You disdained my friends. You called Auburn a—”
“I had no choice,” Stephen blazed. “You think we all could prove so tenderhearted? They called you Viscount Sayers. And I? The son of a moneybag!”
Liam stared. “So, childhood taunts drove you to it. Is that what you mean?”
“Taunts? You painted me as weak! Telling Darnley to pick on someone his own size—you advertised me as a deficient, something less than a man!”
Stephen had been smaller as a boy. An easy target for bullies at school. “You would rather have gotten thrashed?”
“Yes! Better to be beaten black-and-blue than to receive your charity. And later—at university, when you told the Bullingdon Club to invite me to join in your stead—another hand-me-down. It was your favorite game—exposing me to the mockery of addled twits!”
Liam felt suddenly awash in exhausted irritation. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s get on with it.”
But Stephen was beside himself now, his pistol sagging as he frothed with rage. “And then, your introduction to Arbuthnot! Who should rightly have favored me all along, for God knows I’ve more brains in my pinky than you’ve got in your entire skull. But that sycophant had no interest in real intellect. He was too dazzled by titles to know genius when he saw it!”