The Devereaux Affair by Adele Clee
Chapter 6
HadGiselle de Lacy faked her death? Had she returned to Witherdeen to punish Bennet for his father’s sins? Those were the questions dominating Bennet’s thoughts as he listened to Mrs Hendrie’s confession.
Logic pushed through the chaos.
“Mrs Hendrie, what happened to Giselle de Lacy’s possessions when she fled Witherdeen? She left with nothing but a valise.” Not just a valise—she’d taken something infinitely more precious.
In the aftermath, he’d watched his enraged father hurl a mountain of gowns over the balustrade. Amid the turmoil, Julianna’s clothes were left folded neatly in the armoire, the silver bangle given as a Christmas gift, one too big for her to wear, abandoned on the nightstand.
“They’re in the attic, my lord. Your father wished to keep them.”
Julianna glanced at him, for she must have arrived at the same conclusion. No, not that his father’s obsession with Giselle had lasted long after she’d left, but that anyone might have stolen a gown from the attic.
Not anyone.
Isabella Winters.
Though their parting had seemed amicable, had she followed Bennet from town, intent on causing mischief?
“Who has access to the attic?”
Mrs Hendrie stiffened. “All the staff, my lord.”
“And you have every faith Giselle de Lacy’s clothes are there?”
His housekeeper hesitated. “No, my lord. During your house party last summer, you permitted your friends to root through the trunks. They took clothes for the masquerade. I presume they returned them.”
Mr Branner coughed into his fist. “My lord, if you recall, Miss Winters wore a gold silk gown while in the guise of Cleopatra. After consuming too much champagne, she made the servants kneel at her feet and threatened them with her homemade asp.”
“Indeed.” Bennet swallowed deeply to curb his embarrassment. He glanced at Julianna, convinced she must think him thoroughly dissolute. “Miss Winters behaved appallingly and was forced to make a grovelling apology.”
Julianna’s gaze remained fixed on her plate as she sliced the venison. “Your father hosted similar parties. I remember watching the guests’ outrageous behaviour through the balusters.”
The implication that he was anything like his father left a sour taste in Bennet’s mouth. Nothing horrified a man more than realising he’d inherited traits he despised.
“Maybe they’ll not be so rowdy this time,” Mrs Hendrie chirped.
This time?
Julianna raised her head. “His lordship is expecting guests?”
“Yes.” Mrs Hendrie frowned. “You have remembered your friends are arriving from town tomorrow, my lord?”
Tomorrow!
Hellfire!
What with the threats and ghostly sightings, it had slipped his mind. “They usually visit at the end of the month.”
“Miss Winters suggested coming a week early.” Mrs Hendrie sounded panicked. “We spoke about it this morning, my lord, when we discussed the dinner menu.”
This morning he’d been going through the motions while consumed with thoughts of Julianna’s arrival. Having her at Witherdeen required his undivided attention.
“It’s not too late to postpone their visit. I’ll have a man ride to town with a note for Lord Roxburgh. He’ll inform the others.”
Julianna sat quietly, her thoughts a complete mystery, though she looked in some discomfort.
Then she straightened and gave a resigned sigh. “Please, don’t cancel your party on my account. Tomorrow, I shall visit the tenant farmers with Mr Branner and spend the rest of the day studying the ruins.”
Damnation. He’d hoped to spend the day with her, examining the evidence, discovering more about her life with Edward Eden.
“I shall call at the cottage at ten o’clock, Mrs Eden.” Branner grinned like a cat who’d found the cream. “If anyone knows about the hauntings and ancient curses, it’s the tenants. Some families have farmed the land for generations.”
“Ancient curses?” Julianna’s countenance brightened. “Do the tenants believe the land is cursed? It would make an interesting addition to my book.”
Branner shrugged. “I have no notion, but I’ve heard whispers that anyone desecrating the abbey brings about a curse that lasts for a hundred years.”
A curse that lasts for a hundred years!
Bennet had never heard anything so ridiculous.
It was another story to impress Julianna.
“Such threats shouldn’t be dismissed,” she said, pandering to the fool. “But if you believe that, Mr Branner, one wonders why you smashed a gravestone on consecrated ground.”
The muscle in Branner’s cheek twitched. “Sometimes anger takes precedence over logic, Mrs Eden. In hindsight, it was foolish. Not because of any supposed curse but because an examination might have helped find the devil who buried it there.”
“Were you aggrieved on his lordship’s behalf?”
“Naturally.”
Julianna pursed her lips. Clearly she had more questions for the steward but chose to focus on her meal rather than bombard him again.
They all ate in silence—lost in their thoughts.
Tension thrummed in the air. More from Bennet’s frustrations at having to entertain guests tomorrow. He didn’t want them at Witherdeen, but in all likelihood, it was too late to postpone.
“Is there a particular goal you wish to achieve during your visit, Mrs Eden?” Branner said. “It strikes me it would take months to complete a full inspection of the site. Take days to read through the documents in the library.”
Julianna seemed unnerved at the prospect of staying at Witherdeen for any length of time. “Tomorrow, I shall focus on the refectory, look for evidence of an undercroft. Do a quick pencil sketch if I can.”
“No doubt your colleague will visit soon.”
“My colleague?” Julianna frowned.
“The artist.”
“Oh, yes. Mr Cole may accompany me on my return.”
Branner continued discussing the ruined abbey. He questioned Julianna about the precepts of monastic life. Thankfully, she knew enough about the monks’ rigid rules to appease the steward. Bennet listened intently, grateful for an opportunity to study the woman he hadn’t seen for seventeen years.
A deep sadness lingered behind her magnificent blue eyes. Lord knows what horrors she’d witnessed over the years. He’d need to penetrate her steely reserve if he had any hope of rescuing their friendship, and there was no time like the present.
“When you’re ready, Mrs Eden, I shall escort you back to the cottage.” Bennet offered before his steward charged ahead like the gallant hero. “Until we’ve captured the devil responsible, it’s not safe to wander the estate alone.”
She made no protest. “I’m ready to leave now, my lord. I have notes to write before I retire, and I can talk to Mr Branner tomorrow.”
Perhaps she wished to discuss aspects of the case privately.
Indeed, his theory proved correct. She bid his staff good night, promised to take tea with Mrs Hendrie, who had barely closed the servants’ door behind them when Julianna asked her burning question.
“Were your friends in attendance when you found the smashed gargoyle on the front steps?” She stopped walking, fastened her pelisse to the neck and shivered as the chilly night air set her teeth chattering. “I p-presume they were still here when Grimley found the gravestone.”
“No, they were in town when the first incident occurred.”
“But you don’t know that for sure. You can only testify to the fact they were not staying at Witherdeen.”
“Then let me rephrase. To my knowledge, they were in town.”
She muttered something about speaking to the local innkeepers.
“You suspect one of my friends might be involved?”
Bennet had known Roxburgh and Lowbridge since school and trusted them implicitly. Both men had brought their mistresses to Witherdeen to celebrate the new year. Hell, he’d not informed them he’d severed his attachment to Isabella, and the ladies were to accompany them again.
“Everyone is a suspect until proven innocent.” She rubbed her bare hands together to chase away the cold. “The fact they’re visiting days after you received the third note may not be a coincidence.”
Bennet found himself in reluctant agreement. “You mean one of them had ample opportunity to bury the gravestone in the abbey.” She meant one of them might attempt to raze Witherdeen to the ground, as proclaimed in the third obituary.
“We cannot rule it out.” She came to an abrupt halt on the gravel path and faced him. “Don’t send word to Lord Roxburgh. Let your friends come. But we must be vigilant. Perhaps have two footmen guard the corridors at night. And Mr Bower can help, of course.”
Bennet inwardly seethed. The thought that a friend had sent the threats, had inflicted such torment, sent blood surging through his veins. He might have released the raging tempest had Julianna not shivered and taken to rubbing her upper arms briskly.
“We should keep walking,” he said, yet placed the lantern on the ground. “First, let me warm your hands. You should have worn gloves. Have you no pockets in that pelisse?”
“Bennet, there’s no—”
He snatched her hand, cocooned it in his and rubbed gently back and forth, generating heat. Heat journeyed up his arms, flooded his chest, spread south to his groin. Strange how a simple act of kindness stirred his desire. Strange how his childhood infatuation had quickly become a grown man’s obsession.
He captured her other hand and continued his ministrations.
Julianna glanced up but struggled to hold his gaze.
“The cold wind sweeps in from the north,” he said, hoping idle conversation would banish all amorous thoughts. “And it’s mostly open ground here.”
“I don’t usually feel the cold.” She glanced up at the array of stars twinkling in an inky sky. “Having spent many nights sleeping beneath the heavens, I thought myself hardened to the elements.”
A heaviness settled in his chest as he imagined a young girl made homeless by her mother’s selfish actions.
“Could your mother not have sold her jewels to provide a home, security?” Giselle had died penniless. A pauper. Surely she hadn’t spent all her money on laudanum.
Julianna blinked in surprise. “My mother was never short of options, not until her latter years. There was always a gentleman willing to give us a room for a while.”
“Then why sleep outdoors?” Was her husband a bully, a mean devil of a man who’d tortured the woman he’d bought? Did he treat her like a slave?
She flinched, though he suspected it was from a past memory, not the cold. “I would rather hear the soft hum of the night than the tormenting sounds indoors.”
“You speak of life with Edward Eden?”
“It was no life.”
“Daventry said your husband treated you well.”
She stared at the ground, her shoulders sagging.
Bennet captured her chin and forced her to look at him. “Did he mistreat you?”
“Not in the conventional way.”
What the hell did that mean?
“Julianna, I shall go out of my mind if you don’t tell me what he did.” Though he would be fit for Bedlam if he discovered she’d been beaten while he’d been indulging every vice. “Did he hurt you physically? Was he a rake who flaunted his conquests?”
“Edward was never violent.”
“Then what in blazes did he do?”
She shook her head repeatedly, her silken curls whipping about her face. “I swore I’d never tell a soul, and I’ve kept that vow. More out of shame than loyalty.”
Bennet recalled her bitter tone when she’d spoken about her husband. “Does it have anything to do with his colleague?” Had the man discovered Julianna’s history and thought her free with her affections? “Did he make advances?”
“Lord, no!” Pain flickered across her face. “Justin had a distaste for women. He preferred men, preferred men in every regard.”
“Men?” That shed light on the problem. “As did your husband.” For it all slotted into place.
“Yes.” A single tear trickled down her cheek, and Bennet wiped it away with his thumb. “Edward told his parents we were in love. But he married me so they would not learn of his relationship with Justin.”
She exhaled—long and heavy—as if she had been holding the secret since her wedding night.
“Did Giselle know of his predilection for men?”
“Yes, but in some warped way, she thought it a good thing.”
Probably because Edward Eden needed to play the dutiful husband to secure his wife’s silence. And Giselle had always been tempted by a man with a bulging purse.
“Why the hell did you agree?”
“At first, I refused to be a part of her scheme to find me a husband, but her constant complaining wore me down. I hated watching her suffer.” She dashed her hand across her face as more tears tumbled down her cheeks. “Edward was so kind to me, so attentive in the beginning. I truly thought he cared. And marriage was my only means of escape.”
Bennet drew her into an embrace. Sod restraint. Lucius Daventry could go to hell. Could a man not console a friend who’d suffered? But it wasn’t her tears or the way she nestled close to his chest that made his heart swell. It was the feeling that she was exactly where she belonged.
“Did you hope you might learn to love your husband?” He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, inhaling the intoxicating apple scent of her hair. “Did you hope he might return your affections?”
“I sought freedom, respect, a little tenderness. But it was so awful.” Her shoulders shook as she sobbed. “Night after night, I had to listen to them in the chamber next door. Day after day, I had to witness the outpouring of love, love I’ve been denied my entire life. It was pure torture.”
He wanted to say that he cared about her, but that would make him a damn hypocrite. If he’d cared that much, would he not have moved heaven and earth to find her? Would he not have ignored his father’s vile threats and words of warning?
“People have manipulated me my whole life,” she continued. “It cut deep to know I married a man who wished to exploit me, too. Having me in the house meant no one questioned his relationship with our lodger.”
“Lodger? Justin lived with you and your husband?”
“They were barely apart.”
Good Lord. It must have been unbearable.
The sudden crunching of gravel on the path behind forced Julianna to dart back. Bennet felt the loss instantly. He suspected Branner had left the house not long after their departure, and he’d not have the man jumping to the wrong conclusions.
Indeed, the steward gave a polite cough as he appeared from the shadows. He doffed his hat and bid them both good night. From his knowing smile, it was evident he’d witnessed the intimate clinch.
Julianna mumbled her frustration as soon as Branner was out of earshot. “Now he’ll think I’m here to explore more than the ruins.”
“I shall speak to him tomorrow. Explain how fond you were of the place. How it’s overwhelming to be back.” Bennet didn’t want his staff thinking Julianna was anything like her mother.
“Make it clear I am not here to replace Miss Winters.”
“Of course.” He gestured to the path. “We should continue before the chill settles into your bones.”
She nodded and fell in beside him as they walked.
“You seemed suspicious of Branner during dinner. Your comment about the curse and him destroying the gravestone was particularly clever.”
“I doubt Grimley wanders the grounds with a sledgehammer. Mr Branner must have left the abbey, hunted for the tool, and then smashed the stone. It couldn’t have been committed in a fit of rage and was premeditated.”
It was Branner’s job to prevent trespassers. He saw it as a blatant attack on his character, or so he’d said when he burst into Bennet’s study and gave an angry explanation.
“Branner prides himself on doing an excellent job and took it as a personal insult. While he pretends he acted in my stead, he confessed to being annoyed at the intruder’s arrogance.”
Julianna thought for a moment. “Bower can speak to Grimley. Determine exactly what happened that night.”
They fell into a companionable silence, though Bennet’s mind whirled with suspicion. In all likelihood, someone he trusted had betrayed him. The burning question was, why?
Julianna cast him a sidelong glance. “How many guests are arriving tomorrow?”
“Five, I believe. Lowbridge asked to bring his cousin who’s visiting from Brighton. Roxburgh will bring his mistress. There’s a chance Lowbridge will too.”
Julianna raised a disapproving brow. “Then I doubt I shall see you before I leave.”
“You’re leaving?” He couldn’t disguise the mild panic in his voice. “But there’s so much to do. Did you not say we should be on our guard tomorrow?”
“I shall stay tomorrow night. Once I’ve spoken to the tenants and examined the remains of the gravestone, my investigation will take me back to town.”
“Why town?”
“There are so many lines of enquiry, I need the help of the Order.”
“Daventry is investigating Mullholland.”
She pursed her lips as if reluctant to speak.
He drew the obvious conclusion. “You mean to investigate my friends.”
“I must delve into the backgrounds of those in attendance the night someone laid the gravestone in the ruins. I’ll need their names, Bennet.”
He hesitated. “And what if they discover you’re prying into their affairs, learn I’m the one who hired you?” He’d not skulk in the shadows like a damn coward. “I’d prefer to question them directly.”
“You’re missing the point. Devious people hide behind masks. They create convincing facades. Working covertly is the only way to gain the truth. At least until we have solid evidence.”
Again, she spoke logically while he was ready to throw Roxburgh in the pillory and pelt him with rotten apples.
“Then I should return to town, too.”
A twitch of alarm marred her pretty face. “How can I befriend Miss Winters if you’re hovering in the background? I must make her think she has an ally, convince her I detest you, too.”
“You’ll not find that so difficult,” he teased.
But she didn’t smile. “I could never detest you, Bennet. Childhood friends remain in one’s heart forever. But you’re a marquess who must marry well. I’m the notorious Giselle de Lacy’s daughter and must work to earn a living. The reality is we can never be friends, not publicly.”
“We are friends. I’ll not dance about in secret. The ton can go to hell.”
She made no reply but probably doubted his word.
They arrived at the cottage. Seeing the house shrouded in darkness set Bennet’s nerves on edge. What if the devious blackguard lurked amid the shadows? What if the scoundrel wished to punish Bennet by hurting the one person he cared about?
“Perhaps I should find you a room in the house.”
She glanced at the thatched cottage. “Why? I like it here.”
“I don’t like the thought of you being here alone.”
She laughed. “I’ve spent most of my life alone. My mother left me in some wretched places while gallivanting about town with her lovers.”
“Then at least let me come inside and light the fire.”
Bennet stepped forward, but she placed a staying hand on his chest. “I shall go straight to bed and begin reading your father’s journals. I trust you have the key to the trunk.”
He did, but her fingers flexed against his fine silk waistcoat in a gentle caress. Moving would break the enchanting spell that left their breathing shallow, their mouths slightly parted. The desire to lower his head and taste her plump lips proved overwhelming.
“The key?” She swallowed repeatedly and snatched back her hand. “Don’t say we have to walk to the house.”
Bennet reached inside his coat and removed the ornate brass key. Their fingers touched as she gripped the metal, and with it came the profound spark of recognition.
“Thank you. I shall stay out of sight tomorrow and will have Bower bring news should there be any developments.”
He considered inviting her to dine with his friends, but what if they noticed her likeness to Giselle? Curious, they’d make the wrong assumptions, presume Bennet had inherited his father’s obsession. And he’d not have them think so little of Julianna.
“I shall visit the cottage to discover what you’ve learnt.”
She nodded. “Good night, Bennet.”
“Good night.”
He waited until she’d closed the door and drawn the bolt, stood staring for a while longer. When he eventually walked away, he found the irony of his situation amusing. His mansion house afforded every luxury, yet he would sell his soul to spend a night in that cottage.
