River of Fire: Book 6 in The Fallen Angels Series

by Mary Jo Putney

  "Do you think anything can mitigate your deceit?" she said in a low, furious voice.

  "Probably not, but I must try." Praying that he could make her understand, he continued, "I want you to believe that I didn't like coming here under false pretenses, but I had little choice. It was investigation or ruin. I've hated the deception more with every day that passed."

  "Which is why you seduced me—because you hate deception," she said bitterly.

  He caught her gaze. "I seduced you? Think back on what happened, then see if you can honestly say that."

  Her face turned a deep, humiliated red. "Very well, I seduced you. But no honorable man would lie with me when he was here to destroy my father's life."

  "I told myself that, repeatedly," he said quietly. "The simple truth, Rebecca, is that I couldn't help myself."

  Her mouth twisted. "What a convenient answer. You're a good enough actor to live a lie day and night for weeks, but lack the self-control to resist the pathetic advances of a spinster."

  "It was Bowden who made that stupid remark about aging heiresses. Believe me, you are not pathetic," he said wryly. "I think you are the most formidable woman I've ever met. And the most desirable."

  Again she looked as if she wanted to hit him. "Don't try to flatter your way out of this! Your mind was in control of your body, and it decided that I was rich and available."

  He experienced a flare of anger that equaled hers. With one step, he was beside her. He caught her shoulders in his hands and kissed her fiercely. Her mouth crushed under his. For an instant, she resisted violently.

  Then the passion that was anger's blood twin flared between them. She gasped and her mouth opened under his. As her body became pliant, he had a nearly overwhelming desire to continue, to seduce her in truth and let passion bridge the chasm between them. After they made love, she would be more open to reason.

  Then he recognized his insanity. Rebecca's body might be willing, but if he bedded her while she despised him, it would be emotional rape. She would hate him forever.

  He released her and stepped away. "Do you still think that the mind always controls the body?" he said hoarsely.

  She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, her eyes wide and stark. "You've made your point, Captain." She took a chair by the fire and wrapped the shawl tightly around her. "What the devil are you supposed to be investigating? My father is no criminal. He isn't interested enough in money to steal it."

  So she had not heard everything. Bluntly he replied, "Bowden believes your father murdered your mother."

  Her jaw dropped in utter shock. "That's insane. Either Bowden is mad or you're a liar. Probably both."

  "Bowden is obsessed, but I don't think he's mad." Tersely Kenneth explained the financial proposition that Bowden had made, and the thinking that lay behind it.

  When he finished, she said, "You've found nothing because there is nothing to find. It's inconceivable that my father would injure anyone."

  Kenneth arched his brows. "Have you forgotten his tantrums? His tendency to throw things when enraged?"

  She bit her lip. "That means nothing. He would never hurt any woman, much less my mother."

  "Can you really say that for certain?" He sank onto the familiar sofa, wishing fervently that he did not have to discuss such things with her. "I agree that Sir Anthony is unlikely to be a cold-blooded killer. But he could have caused your mother's death without intending it. By all reports, they both had fierce tempers. A fight, an angry shove, or a misstep as she tried to get way from him—it would explain a great deal."

  "No!" she cried in anguish. "That wouldn't have happened. Yes, they argued, but not violently. Why can't you accept that my mother's death was an accident?"

  "Accident is still the most likely explanation," he agreed. "Yet no one can come up with a good reason for her falling off a familiar cliff in broad daylight, and I find it damned suspicious that everyone close to your mother is evasive about her death. You, Lavinia, Frazier, Hampton, Tom Morley—every single one of you tightens up in a way that seems to be more than simple grief. It makes me suspect that there is something to hide. Do you all fear that Sir Anthony was involved?"

  "No!"

  "If not that, then what?" he said implacably.

  Rebecca got to her feet and paced across the room in agitation. Then, as if reaching a decision, she swung around to face him.

  "Very well, if you must know," she said savagely. "The secret fear that no one will discuss is not foul play, but suicide. If my mother did not fall accidentally, she must have killed herself. If that became known, she would have been condemned by church and man, forbidden a grave in holy ground."

  She closed her eyes and said in a raw whisper, "Do you blame us for not wanting to talk about her death?"

  Chapter 28

  "Suicide!" Kenneth stared at her in shock. "I heard that Helen was emotional, but never that she was self-destructive."

  Taking bitter satisfaction in having managed to surprise him, Rebecca returned to her pacing. "Mother was usually so animated that most people would not have believed it. Only her intimates knew about her terrible spells of melancholia. Winter was the worst time. Sometimes in the darkest months she would stay in bed weeping for days. Papa and I never knew what to do. We both feared that if the melancholy became too deep, she would kill herself rather than endure the misery. Nothing seemed to help but time. As the days became longer, her mood improved. Summer was much easier for us all."

  "Yet she died in high summer." He frowned. "Had she ever made an attempt on her life?"

  "I... I'm not sure. There was an incident that made Papa and me wonder." She drew a shuddering breath. "And once at Ravensbeck, when the three of us were on a ridge trail, she got this odd expression and looked out across the valley, saying that it would be very easy to simply walk off a cliff."

  He considered. "You may be reading too much into a casual comment. I've had similar thoughts while standing on cliffs and high buildings, and I haven't a suicidal bone in my body."

  "I might agree it was casual, except for the fact that she died exactly that way," Rebecca said sharply.

  "But not necessarily by suicide. Was she in low spirits before her death?"

  "She seemed happy enough, but her moods were very volatile." Feeling chilled, Rebecca went to stand by the fire again. "If she was struck by a sudden spell of melancholia, she might have decided on impulse to... to end it all."

  "Perhaps," he agreed. "But it's pure supposition. From what you say, there's no evidence that her mood was self-destructive at the time of her fall."

  Rebecca hesitated. Discussing her mother's death was almost unbearably painful, but she needed to convince Kenneth that he was wrong about her father. Then he would go away and leave them alone. "There is one piece of evidence. I've never told anyone, even Papa, about this."

  She went to her desk and removed the golden ring from the drawer where she kept it. "Are you familiar with gimmal rings? Two or more separate bands are designed to fit together and form a whole. I believe that in medieval times a man and woman who were pledged would sometimes each keep a band, then combine them into a wedding ring at the ceremony."

  She gave Kenneth the ring. "This one is an antique that Papa found somewhere and bought as a curiosity. He gave it to my mother when they eloped. Later he got her a proper wedding band, but she continued to wear this ring from sentiment. It fascinated me when I was a child."

  He examined the ring, which showed two hands clasping, one larger, the other smaller and more feminine. She wondered if he would recognize what was wrong.

  He glanced up. "The two bands don't fit together very well. They seem too loose."

  He was observant. She supposed it was an essential skill for a spy. "This particular ring has three bands. When the clasping hands are separated, a heart is revealed underneath." She separated the bands and returned them. "When they brought my mother's body up from the bottom of the cliff, she was clutching the ring in her ha
nd instead of wearing it. It... it had to be pried loose. I kept the ring and didn't realize until later that the heart band was missing."

  He looked at the two empty golden hands. "And you decided that it was a message from her—that your mother had lost her heart for living."

  Again she was reluctantly impressed by his quick perception. "Exactly. She wore the ring always, so the heart couldn't have been lost by accident. It had to have been removed deliberately."

  He toyed with the gold bands, his expression abstracted. "Intelligence work is a matter of fitting odd pieces together and looking for patterns. What you're saying doesn't fit the pattern of a suicide."

  Her mouth twisted. "Perhaps not, but it was also difficult to believe her death was accidental."

  "I gather no suicide note was found, which would make sense if she didn't want to distress her loved ones. But in that case, it seems strange that she would leave any clue at all. Did you ever find the missing heart?"

  "No, though I did look." Rebecca tried not to think of how close she had come to breaking when she searched her mother's jewelry case and vanity table. "I wanted the ring to be intact in case my father ever asked about it. If he saw the heart was missing, he would think the same as I did. He didn't need that extra grief. But he never asked."

  Kenneth fitted the gold hands together. "Let's assume that she didn't kill herself and that she didn't die by accident. That would mean someone else was involved in her death."

  Rebecca's eyes narrowed. "Not my father!"

  "I'm inclined to agree." His hand tightened over the gimmal ring. "There's something chilling about a person who would leave such an oblique, mocking message. I can imagine Sir Anthony hurting someone in a rage, but not cold-bloodedly taking the ring apart and throwing his wife off a cliff."

  She shuddered, wishing he had used less graphic words. "You're relying on logic to explain an illogical situation. There's no more evidence of murder than for accident or suicide."

  "There are hints. For example, the signs of struggle at the top of the cliff. That tends to rule out the possibility of suicide. And the missing heart doesn't fit with an accident."

  She bit her lip. "Maybe that band wore through and broke."

  "One would think the middle band of three would be the last to wear out." He held up the two remaining bands. "Nor is there any significant wear on these."

  He was right about the ring, but she was still unconvinced. "Who would want to kill my mother? Everyone liked her."

  "Perhaps not everyone. Over the past weeks, I've thought about the possibilities. Perhaps your mother decided to end her affair with Hampton and he became violent."

  "Not Uncle George," she protested. "I think that Mother loved him because of his kind, steady disposition. He would be the last person to turn murderous from obsessive love."

  "Lady Seaton seemed to inspire intense feelings," Kenneth pointed out. "Almost thirty years after their broken betrothal, Bowden cares enough about her death to spend a fortune trying to determine how she died. Your father's last secretary, Morley, was in love with her even though she was old enough to be his mother. Having seen the portrait in the study, I can understand why. Who knows what other men have become obsessed with her?"

  She rubbed her temple. "I've sometimes wondered if she might be the reason Lord Frazier never married. Mr. Turner and Sir Thomas Lawrence are other painters who claimed half seriously that they would never take a wife since 'the beauteous Helen' was unavailable. I could easily name a dozen other men who admired her intensely. But I can't imagine any of them murdering her."

  He shrugged. "An army officer is often a de facto judge for what happens among his men. I learned that most crimes are motivated by passion or a desire for gain. In your mother's case, passion is the most likely since the only person to gain financially from her death was you."

  Outraged, Rebecca interrupted, "You can't possibly think I injured her!"

  "Of course not," he said dryly. "You see why I prefer passion over gain as a motive? Although a possibility that combines both would be if your father's mistress of the time wanted to eliminate Helen to clear the way for a second wife. Do you know who he was sleeping with then?"

  She shook her head. "I never wanted to know such things. However, I think his mistresses were always women he had painted. I've also suspected that they usually pursued him rather than vice versa."

  "He becomes enamored of their beauty, and they become intoxicated by the fact that he sees them as beautiful," Kenneth said meditatively. "The bond between artist and subject is an interesting one, isn't it?"

  Under other circumstances, she would have enjoyed discussing his comment. This time, she said only, "I don't know about the philosophical implications, but a good way to identify possible mistresses would be to look at my father's daybook for that spring and see who his clients were."

  "That particular daybook got left at Ravensbeck in the confusion of your mother's death and the early return to London." He considered. "Would Lavinia know who he was bedding then?"

  "Ask her if you wish. I wouldn't want to." Rebecca hesitated, then added, "Despite Lavinia's lurid reputation, I don't think she ever lay with my father while my mother was alive. She mentioned once that she didn't believe in sleeping with the husbands of her friends."

  "An interesting woman, Lavinia."

  Seeing his expression, Rebecca said forcefully, "She's not a murderer, either. The idea that someone killed my mother is bizarre. Why can't we all let her rest in peace?"

  "I'm sure she is at peace," he said softly. "But if someone murdered her, he is still at large. Do you want that?"

  She took a deep, calming breath. "Of course I would want to see justice done—if she was murdered, which I don't believe."

  "Justice was part of the reason I accepted Bowden's proposition," Kenneth said dispassionately. "Yes, I wanted to save myself from bankruptcy. But it was also true that finding a murderer seemed like a worthy mission."

  She turned away, not wanting his words to soften her anger. "You don't seem to have had much success."

  "True. But it wasn't until tonight that I've come to believe there really was a murder." He got up to put more coal on the fire. "Something you said earlier interested me—that there had been an incident that made you and your father fear that Lady Seaton was suicidal. What happened?"

  Rebecca sighed. "Toward the end of the winter before she died, she fell into a kind of coma. The physician said she had taken a massive dose of laudanum. When she finally awoke, she didn't remember clearly what had happened, but thought she'd mixed a sleeping draft incorrectly. She was very convincing when she said it was an accident, but... Papa and I had our doubts."

  Not that they had ever discussed it. For the whole of Rebecca's life, there had been a tacit conspiracy of silence about Helen's problems.

  Kenneth's eyes narrowed. "Interesting. Like the fall that killed her, a drug overdose could be an accident, attempted suicide, or a murder attempt."

  She stared at him, chilled. "But if someone tried to kill her with laudanum, the person must have been in our household."

  "Many people wander through here," he replied. "For someone who knew where medications were kept, it wouldn't be hard to make a quick substitution. And I gather that a large part of your father's circle goes to the Lake District every year. A killer who failed in winter could have made another attempt in the summer."

  "Perhaps... perhaps you're right," she said with deep reluctance. She went to the window and gazed into the dark street. The idea of murder was distant, shadowy, compared to the terrible reality of her mother's absence. A mother was the glue that held a family together. Without Helen, Rebecca and her father were not a family but two isolated individuals, living under one roof and separated by pain.

  An ugly thought insinuated itself into her mind. Was it possible that her father, in a moment of anger, really had...

  No! She rejected the thought violently. Her father would not have been able to co
nceal his guilt from her. What she did feel in him was a terrible regret, a belief that he had failed his wife by not preventing her from killing herself. She recognized that guilt because it echoed her own.

  In the silence, the clatter of a carriage could be heard pulling up in front of the house. Her father was home.

  Kenneth said, "Shall I go down and confess to Sir Anthony?"

  She turned from the window and regarded Kenneth gravely. Her father would be deeply distressed to learn that a man he liked had betrayed his trust, and even more infuriated by the suggestion that he had killed his wife. She hated to think that his pleasure at the prospect of becoming the next president of the Royal Academy would be spoiled so quickly.

  Almost as if he read her mind, Kenneth said, "If you think it would upset him unnecessarily, I could simply say that my financial situation has changed and I am needed at my estate."

  In a matter of moments he would walk out of her life forever. It was exactly what she wanted. Wasn't it?

  Lips dry, she said, "That might be the best solution."

  "What about the possibility that your mother was murdered?"

  She rubbed her temple again, feeling a headache coming on. "Perhaps I'll hire a Bow Street Runner to investigate further."

  "Bowden did. The Runner learned nothing. That is why I was enlisted—because as a secretary I would have better access to the household than an outsider."

  She frowned at him. "You have something in mind. What?"

  "If there is any evidence of what really happened, it is likely to be in the Lake District, where she died," Kenneth said soberly. "Perhaps a clue in your father's daybook, or something that a local person might have seen. Since an accident was assumed, no inquiries were made then."

  "You're saying you want to carry on as if nothing happened and go to the Lakes with us," she said flatly.

  His mouth curved without humor. "Pretending nothing happened will be impossible, but the rest is true. I'd like to see this investigation through to the end."