Celeste Bradley - [The Liar's Club 01]

by The Pretender

  The old fellow wasn’t about yet—Jackham’s aching bones didn’t rise from bed as well these days—but Simon didn’t mind. He had some reading to do.

  He settled onto Jackham’s spring-ridden old sofa and pulled Feebles’s gift from his pocket.

  It was today’s news, folded to display a page of Announcements. Someone had married, or birthed a child, or died. Someone of interest to the Liar’s Club.

  Simon scanned the names, trailing one finger down the page. When he found it, his mouth actually dropped open for a moment. Then his jaw clenched tight with anger, along with his fist. The paper in his hand was reduced to a crumpled ball.

  Someone had died all right.

  He had.

  Agatha had killed off Mortimer Applequist.

  * * *

  “That rat didn’t deserve to live!”

  “I know, but, Aggie—”

  James rubbed his face with both hands. Not a good sign. He only did that when he was about to lose his patience. Agatha firmed herself against his disapproval. No one would tell her what to do with her life. Not even her beloved brother.

  He took a deep breath and smiled at her across the small table in his room where they shared breakfast. Agatha narrowed her eyes and pointed an egg-laden fork at him.

  “Don’t charm me, Jamie. It won’t work.”

  “I only wish you had consulted me before running off to the news with this outrageous story. Declaring a man dead who is all too obviously still breathing is bad enough. But to claim … what was it again?”

  He glanced down at the news-sheet in his hands and quoted, “‘Mr. Applequist met his end yesterday evening in a tragic incident with his masculine unmentionables. Apparently he was strangled to his death—’”

  Agatha toyed with her fork. Perhaps she had gone a bit too far. But it had seemed such a lovely vengeance at the time. “He ought to be strangled for telling me such lies!”

  “But, Aggie, to call such attention to yourself? You aren’t in any shape to stand up to scrutiny right now. Should it be discovered that your marriage was a sham and that you have been living with a man for weeks unmarried, you’ll be past ruined!”

  “I see no reason why I should be revealed now. I shall simply be the Widow Applequist, and have even more freedom than before.”

  “But you have no license, no legal proof at all.”

  “Pish-posh, Jamie. Do you go up to all widows of your acquaintance and demand legal proof? Of course not, because people believe what they are told.”

  “Because they can’t believe anyone would be so twist-minded to lie about such a thing! It’s wrong!”

  “Oh, are you lecturing me on my morals now, Mr. Spy? Your life is a lie, just as Simon’s is! You told me you were a soldier. You even carried a captain’s uniform in your trunk!”

  “How do you know what I carried in my trunk?”

  “Because I looked, of course! Honestly, Jamie, can you be so naive?”

  He appeared hurt by that. Agatha calmed her temper with an effort. “I know that you are worried about me. But all is well. I am the Widow Applequist. I’m not supposed to be a maiden.”

  “Even widows must watch their reputations, Aggie.”

  “Well, then it is a good thing my dear brother is in residence to act as my chaperon, isn’t it?”

  “About that … I don’t think anyone should know that I’m here. Whoever I escaped from may still be looking for me. You could be in danger if I’m discovered.”

  “Oh.” That did put a different light on things. “Well, no matter. I may receive a few callers in the next several days, but there shouldn’t be much fuss.”

  However, there was a great deal of fuss. No sooner had the noon hour struck but flocks of tearful ladies descended upon the house in Carriage Square.

  Jamie had been trapped upstairs all afternoon, and Pearson had warned Agatha that Cook was all but in tears over the run on refreshments.

  Agatha whispered to him to let cost be no object and to fetch a likely scullery maid from an agency to help in the kitchen. She wasn’t sure, but she thought she caught a glimmer of approval in his dry gaze.

  Then she was forced to return to her tearfully fascinated guests. The ladies were clustered around the tea tray as she reentered the parlor, but their whispers carried well across the room.

  “Strangled by his unmentionables! Do you think he was trying to do something … unusual?”

  “Well, he was an exotic sort, wasn’t he? All that traveling, you know. Perhaps he picked up some bizarre … proclivity?”

  Agatha wished mightily that she had restrained herself while writing that news account. It had given her great vengeful satisfaction at the time, but now she realized what Jamie meant by calling attention to herself.

  An accident while cleaning his pistol, a fall down the stairs, or even a simple trampling—anything would have been more forgettable.

  Agatha strode into the hushed titters with her head high. She had no need to fake her pallor or her reddened eyes, for she had spent the last two days alternately raging and weeping.

  Indeed, she fed her anger, for without it she would have dissolved into a worthless puddle of tears. Simon had much to answer for, but the one thing that she most hated him for was the fact that she couldn’t hate him at all.

  Despite the titillated gleam in her visitors’ eyes, Agatha welcomed their sympathy. She had suffered a loss, after all. She had lost her heart.

  So she tried to remain serene in the face of their fascination, nodding at their condolences and ignoring their veiled attempts to extract the gruesome details.

  In truth, she toyed with the idea of embellishing upon her tale. How deeply could she embarrass Simon with this story?

  But in the next wave of visitors was a young woman whom Agatha recognized. She was Clara Simpson, the widowed sister-in-law of Mrs. Trapp. Her black dress signified her own mourning and her sympathy was very real.

  “I know you want us all to go,” Clara said in a low voice. “I remember precisely how I felt. But when we do, the silence will be so very … loud. Please send for me if you wish someone to fill the silence. I won’t tell you that ‘only the good die young’ and that you should immediately turn your life over to your nearest male relative.”

  Agatha was moved and somewhat shamed by Clara’s simple and sincere sympathy. In the face of real grief, Agatha’s little fib seemed suddenly rather nasty and cheap.

  It was wrong, just as Jamie had said.

  Unable to look Clara in the eye, Agatha glanced away to see Pearson moving past the parlor to the front door. Oh, blast. Not more visitors.

  A moment later, Pearson appeared at the door of the parlor. Agatha was astonished to see that he’d gone completely ashen.

  “M-madam, Mr. A—”

  Simon slid past the petrified butler with a quick movement and stood before the room with a slight smile on his face.

  Mrs. Trapp screamed and fainted dead away. The other ladies shrieked or fanned the shriekers, depending on their dispositions.

  Pearson raised his voice above the mayhem, his stutter gone. “Mr. Applequist, madam.”

  “But—but he’s dead!”

  Agatha dropped her hand from Clara’s and rose, glaring at Simon. Her heart was racing. From anger. Only anger.

  “Ladies! Ladies, please!” She raised her hands. “This is my husband’s brother. His twin brother.” She shot Simon another killing look. “Ethelbert Applequist.”

  The ladies sighed with relief.

  Loudly and in unison.

  Agatha wanted to roll her eyes at such dramatics, but she kept her gaze firmly on Simon, daring him to say her nay.

  She saw his lips move slightly. Ethelbert?

  “Yes, Ethelbert,” confirmed Agatha, “come to pay his respects before he leaves on an extended tour of the Americas.”

  Again, the gathered ladies sighed as one, with the notable exception of the sensible Mrs. Simpson. Agatha could see herself quite liking th
e woman, were they meeting under other circumstances. True circumstances.

  But would someone such as that wish to be friends with a liar?

  As Simon bowed to each lady in turn, they twittered in obvious enjoyment of his novelty and charm.

  “To think there is another man just like your Mortimer, dear Agatha.”

  Agatha could scarcely keep from snarling. “Not so very like, in my opinion. Mortimer was entirely more handsome and appealing.”

  “Oh … ah, of course.” The lady fled to the other side of the room and joined the fascinated group seated there like an audience in the theatre. Perhaps Pearson ought to sell tickets.

  “More handsome, dear sister? You wound me.”

  Of course he had heard her.

  “Don’t you have some spying to do?” she hissed at him under her breath. “I believe I hear Napoleon knocking at your door this very moment. You do have a door, do you not?”

  He bowed slightly. “I do. A very nice door, on a house in a very respectable neighborhood.”

  “How nice for you. Please go there. Now.”

  “I’d rather stay. You and I need to talk.”

  “I don’t think so. Likely nothing would come out of your mouth but lies anyway.”

  “I’m sorry, Agatha. I was only—”

  “Doing your duty. Lord, spare me from a dutiful man. I declare I’ve had my fill.”

  The ladies were watching them both, avidly trying to hear every whispered word. Agatha wished them all gone, the women and Simon, too.

  Agatha thought furiously, trying to fabricate some excuse, some way to force him from the house.

  But her creativity failed her, and all she could think was how difficult it all was. Balancing the weight of all the lies she had woven around herself, until she couldn’t sleep nights for the anticipation of it all falling on her head.

  Abruptly she felt trapped. The room and the people within it seemed to be closing in on her, pressing upon her chest and stealing her breath clean away.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Simon must have seen it on her face, for he stepped forward to support her with one warm hand on her arm.

  “I think my dear sister has had enough visiting for the day. If you ladies will excuse us…”

  The ladies responded with a bustle of leave-taking, still casting fascinated glances at Simon. Mrs. Simpson left Agatha with a brief squeeze of her hand. “Do call on me, Mrs. Applequist, or send for me if you’d like a little quiet company.”

  Agatha struggled to smile at them all, then realized that in her pose as widow she needn’t put on a cheerful face. It was a relief to merely nod in reply to the well-wishes until the room was empty and all the ladies were gone.

  Then Simon steered her to the kitchen and sat her at the table. Cook, her face dusted with floury panic, rushed to fetch madam some tea. The kitchen was warm and very quiet after the endless chatter of her guests. There was only the sound of pots bubbling on the stove and the soft crackle of the fire in the hearth.

  “Drink,” Simon ordered, pressing the hot china cup into her shaking hands. “You look exhausted. You haven’t slept, I gather.”

  Agatha shut her eyes, for she couldn’t bear to look at his handsome face so near, and drank deeply. The tea scalded her tongue a bit, but the heat loosened the tightness in her chest and allowed her to breathe easily once more.

  Then she set the cup aside and laid her head down on her crossed arms. She would not look at him. She would not reach for him or beg him to hold her close against his warmth and strength.

  He never loved me. He never loved me.

  I love him.

  How could she be so weak? So girlishly sentimental?

  “How supremely annoying,” she muttered into the table.

  “I know you didn’t expect me to return.”

  “Actually, I rather thought you might. I’m annoyed with something else entirely.” Agatha gently banged her forehead on the scrubbed-to-satin wood. It didn’t knock him from her mind.

  “You expected me?”

  “Oh, yes. One doesn’t scrape off a leech that easily.”

  “Ah.” It was a quiet sound, but she knew she’d hurt him. It hurt her to hurt him.

  “I apologize. That was nasty of me. I seem to be growing nastier by the moment.” She took a deep breath and sat up. Then she opened her eyes.

  He looked rather terrible. Good. Why should she be the only one who was unhappy?

  “I see you’ve already found something black to wear.”

  “Simon, I was two years in mourning for Papa. Practically all I own are black gowns.”

  “I still don’t understand why it had to be Death By Drawers.”

  “I was—am—very angry at you. You weren’t here, so I took it out on Mortimer.”

  He gazed at her for a long moment. “Have you any idea how peculiar that sounds?”

  “Simon, I invented peculiar,” Agatha said wearily. “I thought you knew.”

  He grinned, that swift and deadly slash of white. Did he never smile for longer than a fraction of a second?

  She couldn’t think about his smile, couldn’t sit here and wish more than anything that she could spend her lifetime making him smile.

  “So pray tell, why are you here? If you’re concerned that my brother has escaped you, Jamie is still in residence, recovering very well from his ordeal.”

  “I never thought anything but.”

  “Well, if you aren’t here to guard Jamie—”

  “I came to see you.”

  Blast. Why did her betraying heart have to leap at his words? She narrowed her eyes at him.

  “I’m growing annoyed again.”

  “Agatha, we have to address what happened. What I did to you—”

  “What you did to me? Unbelievable. Who undressed you? I did. For that matter, who undressed me? I did! I knew precisely what I was doing!” She tried to glare at him, but her vision was just a bit blurred. “I simply thought I was doing it with someone else.”

  “So did I.”

  True. He’d thought her a woman of low virtue, a ladybird who spent her lover’s money freely and took strange men into her home. For the first time, Agatha realized how she must have seemed to him.

  So many things that she had said and done had only reinforced his impression. It was almost as if she had lied without intention.

  “I know. But I never said I was a mistress. I thought you knew that Jamie was my brother.”

  He sat there, tracing a design on the table in her slopped tea. “I see. But the fact remains that I ruined you.”

  “Ruined me? You forget, I was a married woman. I am now a widow. It would seem odd to the next man if I were still virgin.”

  His head lifted abruptly and he fixed his gaze on her. She’d never known blue eyes could burn so hot.

  “What next man?”

  He needn’t act so surprised, as if she could not find another man if she wished. “I’ll have you know I have a standing offer of marriage.”

  “From whom?” The words were shot from his lips like bullets.

  Agatha leaned back a bit in her chair. This was a new Simon. Suddenly she could very easily see him leading a band of spies and assassins.

  She didn’t want to answer the question. She’d only mentioned the standing offer to bait him. Now she wasn’t sure she wanted this particular beast released.

  “Agatha?”

  She sighed. “Reginald.”

  “Reginald who?”

  “Reginald Peasley, my neighbor to the west of Appleby.”

  “Repulsive Reggie?”

  The slight slopping became a flood of tea on the table when Simon jolted her cup awry as he sprang to his feet.

  “You can not—I won’t allow—”

  Agatha only gazed up at him. “There is nothing you could do to stop me, Simon. I am of age, and may marry where I wish.”

  He twitched at that, and Agatha got the impression of darkness barely held in check. Pain
arced through her at his possessiveness. What did it matter who she married? They both knew it would not be him.

  She desperately wanted him to leave now.

  “Do you really want to know why I killed Mortimer? To set you free. Jamie explained who you are. I cannot marry you even should you ask, for you are too vital to the security of England. I will not rob her of you, dear as you are to me.”

  The weariness returned and settled between her shoulders and into her brain, booming like cannon fire. She rose shakily to face him, leaning her fingertips on the table for support.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll not marry Reggie, either, though Jamie might wish me to. He’d like to keep me close to Appleby, I think, and he doesn’t … he doesn’t know.”

  She walked past him, balancing her aching head carefully on her shoulders. At the swinging doors she turned. “Not that it matters really, but I’ll have no dearth of beaux once I let on how wealthy I am. Perhaps I’ll pick one of them.”

  “But James—”

  “Jamie was given Appleby, of course. He’s welcome to it, for I seem to have had my fill of sheep and apples. It was a lovely place to be a child, but I’m not a child. London is more to my taste now.”

  She managed a brief smile. “However, I was given half the funds. I believe it now rounds out to about twenty thousand pounds. So please, feel free to let any obligation die with Mortimer. I don’t need either of you any longer.”

  * * *

  James shifted restlessly in his bed and put down the book he was reading. Although his current prison was a comfortable one, he could see that it was only a matter of time before he was going to want to escape from it as well.

  Here it was, mid-afternoon, yet he had been put to bed like a weanling. Agatha had even come in a few moments ago and tucked him in!

  He had protested under the guise of teasing, but she’d been in no mood for it. He’d asked if she wanted to stay and play a hand of cards, but she’d declined, claiming the headache.

  He could hardly blame her for that. The hen chatter from her callers had resounded all the way upstairs. James had the distinct feeling that Agatha was regretting her rash vengeance, but she’d never admit it.