*
Alex did not go far after leaving Miss Mason’s room—and he forced himself to think of her thusly. To fall into the habit of thinking of her so familiarly that he should call her by her given name was a disaster waiting to happen. Already, she consumed too much of his time and his thoughts. Enough proprieties had already been sacrificed in his care of her without him taking additional liberties, even if they were only in his mind. She was not the type of woman to be a man’s mistress, and he was not a man in position to offer anything else. Alex cursed. He couldn’t even afford a mistress, after all, much less a wife. In all of Wolfhaven Hall, there were a grand total of four rooms, kitchen and servants quarters aside, that remained habitable. Everything else had been closed up, draped in Holland cloths and ignored. He’d even given up the master suite as it was too far removed from the great hall and the kitchens. With only the uncooperative Mrs. Epson to serve him, he’d have starved to death at such a distance. But even though the rooms were closed off and rarely used, they were still accessible and he found himself heading in the direction of one room in particular. He needed to ground himself, to remind himself of what was at stake.
The poor state of his home should have been enough to deter him from thinking of Miss Mason as anything other than an unexpected guest. Of course, it wasn’t simply his finances that precluded any relationship between them beyond that of temporary caregiver. It wasn’t even the scandal and his own honor. Everything about her indicated to him that she would make a very lucky man a most excellent wife. To give in to his own baser urges, to act on his attraction for her with the full knowledge that he could never offer her permanency, would be to ruin her chances of making a good match elsewhere. He wasn’t the murderer that society gossip purported him to be, but he wasn’t innocent either. A healthy share of misdeeds could be laid upon his head. He would not add the seduction of an innocent, if she was, to the list. Even if she was not entirely innocent, it was clear that she’d been in a very traumatic situation. He would not be the villain others painted him to be by taking advantage of her while she was clearly vulnerable. He would not destroy her future for his own selfish whims.
With all the reasons he should remain as aloof from her as possible whirling through his mind like the spokes on a wheel, he did something that he knew would only strengthen his resolve. Making his way down the dark and dusty corridor, he opened the heavy and intricately carved doors that led to the portrait gallery. He’d managed, only just, to avoid having to sell off the likenesses of his forebears, though they would hardly have brought much revenue. Bypassing the older portraits, all of them still shrouded with Holland covers to protect them from dust, he made his way unerringly to the lone portrait that hung near the end. It had been a wedding gift from his bride’s father-in-name-only.
Removing the cover from it, he stared at the lovely face of his late wife. It wasn’t grief that brought him there. She was a stranger to him, a woman he’d married but never truly known. He’d bedded her, and she hadn’t denied him, but neither of them had found any joy or pleasure in the act. It had been perfunctory at best and infrequent. Every attempt at seduction, at bringing her any sort of pleasure, every attempt to make their marriage something more than a hollow sham, had been met with coldness from her. He’d prayed for her to become with child so they could halt their physical intimacy once and for all. He was certain that if Helena prayed, she had asked for the same. But his wife had not been a very devout woman. Outside of their wedding, he’d never known her to step foot in church. And yet her body had been found only yards away from the ancient, ruined chapel on his property.
Neither given to long walks in nature, nor any particular interest in religious antiquities or architecture, the location had been as much a mystery to him as the true identity of her killer. It had made no sense. Nothing about her death had. She had been unrecognizable, her face battered and the bones beneath so fractured she’d no longer looked human, much less like the renowned beauty he had wed. The magistrate had asked him to identify any marks on her person and he’d been forced to admit, much to his humiliation, that he was ignorant of them. Their brief and very businesslike couplings had been accomplished in darkness. She’d refused light and any semblance of foreplay, urging him instead to simply get it over with.
Even with his need for an heir, he’d been utterly disgusted by it all and had not sought his husbandly rights in months prior to the murder. Which begged one final and haunting question… whose child, tiny and perfectly formed, had been expelled from the body of his wife at the moment of her death? Because there was not a chance in hell it had been his.
As it always did, visiting Helena’s portrait gave him a renewed sense of purpose, a renewed drive to find her killer and to clear his name once and for all. But as he turned to leave the portrait gallery, it wasn’t Helena who occupied his thoughts. It was the pale, lovely beauty who had taken over his own chamber. Mary Mason was a problem, and he hadn’t a clue what to do about her.
He would have to face her soon enough. She would need to inhale the herb smoke once more before retiring for the night but, for now, he needed a reprieve. So he sought out the one thing that always cleared his head—a bruising ride through the countryside would do him a world of good. If he were lucky, the bracing air would cure him of any wayward or heated thoughts.
*
Mary watched the rather ill-tempered housekeeper as she moved about the room and did the poorest job of tidying up that had ever been achieved. The dust was simply disturbed and left to settle again. “This is a lovely room,” Mary offered. “Are all the guest accommodations here furnished with such lovely antiques?”
“Guest accommodations!” the old woman snorted. “More like only accommodation. Don’t have money to keep body and soul together, much less heat this whole house! What a sight that would be! Might as well burn bank notes!” Under her breath she added, “If he had any.”
Mary frowned, uncertain as to the housekeeper’s meaning. It surely couldn’t be the only room! “Are you saying that this is the only habitable room at… I’m sorry, I forget the name of this estate.”
“Wolfhaven! Ain’t much of a haven though, now is it? Poor as church mice! And yes, it’s the only habitable chamber, less I give up my own. I’ll not be doing that for the likes of you, missy!” The old woman wagged a finger at her in warning. “I seen the way he looks at you. Don’t go thinking to trap yourself a lord! You’ll regret it if you do! A pauper with a title more like… and a temper. You could ask my poor mistress about that, if you could manage to get yourself to the churchyard where she’s buried!”
Realization dawned on her. A slow, sinking feeling settled in the pit of her stomach as she considered the ramifications. “This is Lord Wolverton’s chamber?”
“Aye! Where’d you think you were? Carlton Place?” Mrs. Epson cackled at her own jest, prompting the tea cups and plates to rattle on the tray she carried as she exited the room.
She hadn’t just been alone in a bedchamber with him. She’d been alone in his bedchamber with him. Somehow, that made it far, far worse. Intimate. Scandalous. And if she were entirely honest, thrilling. What on earth did it say about the nature of her character that she was so drawn to a man who was reputed to be a killer? Perhaps she was more like her adoptive mother than she thought, attracted to men who were dangerous and unpredictable.
Thoughts racing to and fro, Mary seized on one thing. If it was his chamber, his things were there. Papers. A journal or diary perhaps. She might be able to suss out the truth about him and about the death of his wife. At the very least, she might get some inkling about what sort of man he truly was and whether or not she could trust him. Her own judgement was clouded by how handsome he was, by her own foolish romanticism. Benedict had often warned her against reading the ridiculous novels, as he called them, of Mrs. Radcliffe.
Getting out of bed, Mary crossed the room to the same panel she’d seen him come through earlier. Each step was an agony
, but she had to know. Initially, she’d assumed it was a passage that connected rooms. But now, armed with more knowledge and a clearer picture of her surroundings, she understood that it was, in fact, his dressing room. Surely, if evidence was to be found, it would be uncovered there.
It wasn’t her finest moment, Mary reasoned, as she flipped the small latch that would open the panel in the wall that led to what she assumed was his dressing room. No sooner had the thought crossed her mind than she dismissed any notion of guilt. She was entitled to know more about him. It was paramount to her own safety and wellbeing to ascertain the truth of his character while she was so completely vulnerable to him. And she was a dirty, little snoop.
Stepping into the small room, she was immediately assailed by the scent of pine and sandalwood. Following her nose, she found a bit of shaving soap on the washstand. He had no valet, so he’d stood there in that very spot, scraping the whiskers from his strong and chiseled jaw. What had he been wearing? Had he stood there in his shirtsleeves, or had he completed the task bare chested? Or, heaven forbid, entirely nude?
Feeling warmer than was likely good for her given the tentative nature of her recovery, Mary moved away from the washstand and her own wayward thoughts. She could not allow herself to be distracted or swayed by how handsome he was or by the deep sadness she sensed within him. She focused instead on the heavy and intricately carved chest in the far corner. Comprised of a mixture of drawers and cabinets, it was a treasure trove of hiding spots. She meant to search every last one.
Easing the first drawer open, she found only cravats and neckcloths. She couldn’t imagine that Mrs. Epson had folded them so carefully. Who took care of such simple and mundane tasks for him? It was too farfetched to believe a gentleman, even one in such dire financial straits as Wolverton likely was, would stoop to doing such chores. Was there a woman who tended to him then? A lover, perhaps? The thought filled her with unnatural and unwelcome jealousy.
After going through them one by one and finding nothing but shockingly clean and elegantly starched neckcloths, she replaced them carefully. The next drawer was filled with smallclothes. Mary quickly shut that one back. She wouldn’t search every drawer, after all. It was too impossibly intimate. Her cheeks flamed at the thought of it.
Opening one of the cabinets, she found a small box that contained cravat pins and watch fobs. They were simple and few in number, most of them gold or silver, and hardly any containing jewels at all. He must have sold the rest of them off, she realized. Replacing that box, she moved it aside and behind it found a small, leather pouch. It was surprisingly heavy as she lifted it.
“That contains my mother’s pearls.”
Mary screamed, nearly dropped the pouch and caught it at the last second before it tumbled to the floor. Turning, red-faced and equally red-handed, she met the mildly amused face of the very man she’d been spying on. “You must think me terribly impertinent.”
He stepped into the room, retrieved the pouch from her hand, and rather than replacing it in the cabinet, opened it and showed her strands of perfectly matched pearls in a lovely shade of cream. “Only pearls. There are a few other pieces of her jewelry left, under lock and key in the home of a trusted friend. The debt collectors could take a lot of things, but I drew the line at these and some of her other more prized possessions.”
“I’m terribly sorry,” Mary stammered. “I shouldn’t have been snooping—”
“Why ever not? I am a stranger to you, a man reported by all accounts to be guilty of murder. If you didn’t snoop when given the opportunity, I would, quite frankly, be forced to question your intelligence,” he said.
“Then you aren’t angry?”
His lips firmed. “I am not angry at you, Miss Mason. I am angry at a situation that makes you feel as if you must search through my things in order to ascertain your own safety. I am assuming it was that and not simply idle curiosity that lured you from your sickbed?”
Mary frowned. “You are the strangest of men.”
He smiled in a self-deprecating manner, not at all arguing the point. “What were you looking for?”
“Nothing, really!”
“Tell me, Mary Mason, what were you looking for?” He was insistent, his voice firm, but not angry. It wasn’t a request, but a command. She heard it in his voice.
“Fine,” she acquiesced. “I was looking for a journal or diary. I thought if I found such, I would have better insight into your character and my own safety while residing under your roof.”
“And whether or not I murdered my wife,” he added.
Mary said nothing, simply ducked her head as a blush stained her cheeks. She felt like such a terrible woman in that moment. He wasn’t angry, but he was offended. And yet, he reacted to it the same as she had reacted to beatings as a child, as if they were commonplace. Every day of his life, he was insulted and maligned, and she had just participated in it, albeit unwittingly.
He moved past her, reached into the very bottom drawer of the chest and retrieved two slim, leather-bound volumes. “This one,” he held up the first, “was from my adolescence. Unless you have an unquenchable thirst for reading terrible poetry written at great length about my obsession with the baker’s daughter, I’d advise skipping it altogether or skimming only briefly.”
Mary shook her head. “I was wrong to do this. I was wrong to go through your things. You have been all that is kind and gracious to me, my lord, and I must beg your forgiveness.”
“This,” he held up the second book and continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “is from the few months leading up to my marriage and it stops short of the month when Helena was found murdered only yards from here. You’re welcome to read it at your leisure. But it will not answer your question. I told you once, I did not kill her. I can say it again, but—”
“I believe you,” she said in a rush. “I believe that you didn’t kill her. And I don’t think I’m in any danger here. Not from you.”
Somehow, in the course of imploring him to stop, to halt acting as if he were some sort of criminal who had to justify everything about himself, she’d stepped closer to him. They were so close, in fact, that she could smell the same spicy scent of shaving soap on him that she’d noted earlier upon entering the dressing room. But it was different: warmed by his skin and mingled with his natural scent, it became far more heady and, if she were to admit it, far more tempting.
Mary’s breath caught as he moved closer still. Anticipation bubbled within her as she waited with bated breath for his lips to touch hers. But he made no move to kiss her. They stood there for the longest time, an indecipherable tension building between them. The only sound in the small room was that of their mingled breaths, naturally in sync with one another’s. When at last he moved, Mary thought that it would happen—a kiss. The touch of his lips on hers seemed so inevitable. Instead, he simply reached past her, placed the items back in the open drawer of the wardrobe and then stepped back from her. Mary frowned, as confused by his actions as she was by the severity of her own disappointment.
“Since you are well enough to be up and about, we’ll see about getting something more appropriate for you to wear. I’ll go now and speak to Mrs. Epson about locating and airing out some of Helena’s dresses that are surely still here,” he said as he pushed the drawer closed, and abruptly turned on his heel and left.
She felt strangely bereft when he was gone. The room had been dwarfed by his presence and, now, alone in that dressing chamber, the space felt hollow and empty. It echoed her own feelings too closely for comfort. Mary started to leave but, as an afterthought, reached back and withdrew the two journals from the drawer. She would read them. She would read them—not because she required peace of mind about whether or not he was the killer others claimed him to be, but because she selfishly wished to know him.
Chapter Five
Alex had spoken with Mrs. Epson. The housekeeper had protested at first, refusing to do anything more for Miss Mason than she alre
ady had, which by his estimation was, in fact, very little. But after he’d insisted that it was comply or seek her sister’s mercy, the woman had relented. Very shortly, Miss Mason would be properly clothed and, he hoped, sufficiently less tempting. That aching moment in his dressing chamber, when he’d come so dangerously close to giving in and kissing her delectable lips, had been a narrowly averted disaster. Mary Mason was too lovely for his peace of mind and far too innocent for his very carnal inclinations toward her. Her character, by turns emboldened and then painfully shy, was intriguing to him, as was her independent nature. Had he ever known a woman who would take off on her own to investigate her brother’s identity or origins? No, he certainly had not. She’d defied convention and risked everything for someone she cared for. He’d hardly ever encountered such bravery in his life.
It was unfair to compare Mary to Helena. Helena would never compare favorably, after all. Cold, avaricious and, despite what he’d been led to believe prior to their marriage, not an innocent. The rumors of her affair with Albert Hamilton had been confirmed, and her continued coldness toward him had confirmed something else—she would only ever love the man that the world believed to be her half-brother. He’d overheard a conversation once between Helena and her maid about her having ended a pregnancy. When he’d questioned Helena about it, furiously thinking that it was his own child she’d so callously discarded, she’d waved her hand, dismissing it entirely. A youthful foible, she’d said, years ago. Her lack of feeling for the child had shocked him, so much so that he’d asked her how she could be so cold. It was a mistake he had never repeated. Her reply had left him utterly disgusted.
The Mystery of Miss Mason (The Lost Lords Book 5) Page 6
