Dreamspinner

by Olivia Drake

  “No, usually in the river.” He drew her around to face him. “You didn’t come all this way to speak of fishing. What’s so important that it couldn’t wait until I came home to you?”

  His eyes expressed a deep, abiding love, an emotion so honest, she nearly swayed from giddy joy. How could she ever have found his handsome face difficult to read?

  Striving for composure, she lowered her gaze to his open collar, where the dark mat of chest hair was visible. The warmth of the day had caused him to half unfasten his sweat-dampened shirt... Her eyes sharpened.

  “You!” she gasped, then burst into startled laughter. “It was you!”

  Puzzlement etched his features. “Me? What are you babbling about?”

  She took a breath to contain her relieved amusement. “The button,” she said, plucking it from her pocket and eyeing the loose threads on his shirt. “I thought this belonged to the killer.”

  “The killer?”

  “I found this button on the parapet, wedged into the wall above the greenhouse—

  “You went up there?” He seized her arms so swiftly that the button went bouncing down the embankment and plopped into the water. “Are you mad? My God, Juliet, you could have fallen... died...”

  His horror raised a sense of guilt. “But I didn’t, love. I thought only to find a clue—”

  “You might trust me to do what’s necessary,” he snapped. “I checked the parapet myself this morning.

  “Did you learn anything?”

  “Only that the place is crumbling around our ears. I’m astonished that Ravi would escort you to such a dangerous place. I shall have a word with him.”

  “Don’t blame Ravi, please. I slipped away without his knowledge.”

  An ironic smile touched his mouth. “I might have guessed. You do have a way of taking matters into your own hands.”

  The reference to the dowry annoyed her, yet she held her head high. “I behave according to what I believe is right.”

  “This is one case where you’re wrong. You’ll leave the investigating to me.”

  The directive rankled. “If I hide in my room like a mouse, we’ll never solve this mystery.”

  A shadow passed over his face. Abruptly he loosed her arms and stepped back. “We’ll speak later, as soon as I’ve finished out here. I’ve something important to tell you.”

  Intrigued, she said, “About the mystery?”

  His eyes slid away for a moment. “Yes, but it’s too involved to go into right now. In the meantime, I want you to promise you’ll not venture out again without Ravi or me.”

  Unable to refuse the entreaty, she nodded slowly. She debated telling him about finding Emily’s diary, then decided its mysterious appearance would only cause him undue worry, when his mind should be on the harvest. There would be time later to show him the journal, to speculate on who wanted her to know about Emily’s thoughts and fears.

  Abruptly he walked away and returned a moment later with a sprig of forget-me-not. His smile seemed almost melancholy as he tickled her chin with the brilliant blue flowers. “Remember the time I brought you a spray of these?”

  “On our wedding night. If I recall, you identified the Latin name before I could.”

  “If I recall, you set me on fire with wanting you, my Lady Botanist. Perhaps I should show you again.”

  Her legs felt on the verge of wilting. Breathlessly she teased, “Perhaps I don’t kiss a man who has grease on his cheek.”

  “Have I?” Cocking a sheepish eyebrow, he rubbed a hand over his face. “Where?”

  “Here, let me wipe it.”

  Juliet pulled a rag from his pocket and stroked at the spot. He smelled faintly musky, uniquely male. His breath stirred her hair; his nearness stirred her blood. She wanted to shape her hands to the powerful muscles of his shoulders, to undress him, to lie in the sunshine and feel him inside her...

  Glancing up, she saw Kent watching her with that odd nervous intensity. What could he have to tell her? “I’d best take you back,” he murmured, “before I ravish you right here.”

  “I wouldn’t mind.”

  His mouth tilted into a half smile. “I told you once before, I won’t chance any other man seeing what’s for my eyes alone.”

  Placing the rag in his hand, she let out an exaggerated sigh. “Your wish is my command, Your Grace.”

  He tucked the stem of forget-me-nots into her bodice, his callused fingers brushing her breasts. Cupping her cheeks, he brought his lips down hard on hers in a sudden violent outpouring of emotion. Willingly she melted into him, welcoming the keen pleasure of his kiss. Time spun away as she tasted him, caressed him, pressed her hips to his. He held her tight as if he could not bear to let her go.

  “I love you, Juliet. Don’t ever forget that.”

  Joy thrummed inside her. To hear him speak such passionate words in the light of day brought a sense of boundless contentment. Last night had been no illusion, no isolated confession brought about by his fear for her life. He truly loved her.

  An arm at her waist, he walked her back to the dogcart. “I shouldn’t be much longer than another hour or two.” He looked at Ravi and added, “Guard her well.”

  “Yes, sahib.”

  Kent brushed a distracted kiss across her cheek; his mind must already be combing the list of suspects again. As the vehicle jolted down the lane, frustration eroded her heart. He must have thought of a vital clue; that must be the reason for his pensive mood. A pity the shirt button had proven to be a false sign. Her hand stole over her midsection. She wanted nothing to mar her happiness with Kent, nothing to harm their child.

  Inside the castle, she and Ravi met Gordon emerging from the library. His shoulders drooped beneath a frayed burgundy jacket. An odd gray pallor shadowed his face, and despite the dank coolness of the air, beads of sweat glistened on his brow.

  “Have you seen my wife?” he asked. “She was to procure my medication from the physician.”

  Gordon must be in pain from his rheumatism, Juliet thought in sympathy. “I saw Augusta come in a couple of hours ago. Would you like me to find her?”

  Confusion chased across his nondescript features. “No... no. She’s in our apartments, I would surmise.”

  With a wave of knotty fingers, he shuffled down the corridor. As she and Ravi continued upstairs, Juliet wondered if Gordon could be the one. Could he really wish to prevent the birth of an heir? Did he possess the strength to push Emily over the parapet? Could he heft a heavy rock in his deformed hands?

  She shook her head. Kent knew far more about the people here; later they could put their heads together and arrive at a culprit and a motive.

  Ravi locked the bedroom door and placed the key on a table. “If you should need me—”

  “You’ll be next door.”

  The corners of his mouth quirked slightly. “Yes, memsahib.” Bowing, he retreated into Kent’s bedchamber.

  Juliet freshened up in the dressing room, then wandered through the vast bedchamber and stopped by an open window. Leaning on the casement, she gazed down at the river, blue-gray and calm. Its lapping harmonized with the quack of a duck and the murmur of a wood pigeon. The outing had dissipated the nausea and left her restless. She longed to plunge her fingers into warm earth, to find peace in the mundane tasks of trimming rosebushes and pulling weeds. A dismal sense of loss eddied through her. All those beautiful seedlings. And the clusters of glossy green grapes, ready to darken to a rich purple. All destroyed. Of course, she might salvage something from the wreckage.

  But Kent had asked her to remain here. Out of love he’d begged her to be cautious. Even without the directive, she wasn’t certain she possessed the courage to work in the greenhouse, to know that someone might be leaning over the parapet, peering down at her...

  Shuddering, she took a deep breath. She refused to go through life fearing every shadow, seeing danger around every corner.

  There must be something she could do to chase away the specter of per
il. Perhaps she should reread the diary, more slowly this time, to search out a hidden clue.

  But the cream-covered journal had vanished from her pillow. In its stead lay a thin sheaf of papers.

  Someone had been in the bedroom during her absence. The notion unleashed a prickly sensation over her skin. The intruder could be anyone here in the castle. Even Ravi had had the opportunity to invade her private chamber.

  Hand trembling, she picked up the stack. One edge was ragged; the pages must have been torn from a diary. Yet these sheets were slightly different, of a finer-quality stock; they must have come from a different journal. Emily’s feminine handwriting unrolled across the ruled lines. The hand was firmer, less girlish.

  August 11, 1885. The day she had died.

  The third anniversary was four days away.

  Juliet swallowed. She had a sudden, peculiar urge to throw down the pages. Was the person who’d left the diary a murderer? Did the journal hold a clue to the mystery of Emily’s death?

  She dragged a wing chair to a shaft of sunlight. Curling her legs beneath her, she began to read.

  Papa came to visit this afternoon. When Mama slipped me his note yesterday, I had no notion of the grief his call would wreak upon my heart and upon my marriage. Only joy and excitement danced inside me. His brief letter was the first response I’d received since writing to him about my marriage, then the coming child, his grandchild. For the first time I would see Papa in my own home and, as the Duchess of Radcliffe, receive him. I prayed my newly respectable rank had inspired him to at last acknowledge me as his true daughter. Perhaps I’d taken the one step that would win his esteem.

  He did not shun me altogether. When the old duke was alive, Mama arranged a trip to London once or twice a year, ostensibly to purchase new gowns. (Rose preferred to remain at Radcliffe with her father.) Mama would contrive a meeting between me and Papa, while she went to the dressmaker.

  Those stolen hours were short, but achingly sweet and the only time I felt truly secure. Sometimes Papa took me for a walk along the Embankment or to the Punch-and—Judy show on a street corner. We explored the echoing cave of St. Paul’s Cathedral and took tea in a tiny shop near Covent Garden. Once he bought me a baby doll from the penny toy man, a doll still tucked away in my wardrobe.

  When I was eleven, Papa pointed out the street where he’d been born, a dingy lane near the fearsome edifice of Newgate Prison. Filthy children played chase along the curbstone, and women sat gossiping on stoops. Though he wore an unassuming dark suit and I a simple dress, the cut of our clothing marked us as superior to the poor souls here. Amazed at the news that my papa hadn’t always been rich, I clung tightly to his hand and admired him all the more.

  For a long time, he gazed up at the brick tenement. Then he spoke: “My mother worked herself to death taking in the laundry of gentlemen. I swore then that I would never suffer as she did, that I would never act as any man’s servant. That I would become one of the privileged myself.”

  An inexpressible sadness colored his strong features and compelled me to speak. “And you did, Papa, you did.”

  He looked startled, as though he’d forgotten my presence. Suddenly he seized both my hands and said, “You must never worry about money, Emily. I cannot help you as long as your mother insists upon living with that... devil. But upon my death, you’ll be well provided for.”

  The thought of losing him made me shudder. Bursting with love, I pressed my cheek to the fine fabric of his lapel and drew in the scent of his expensive cigars. “Oh, Papa, how I wish we could be together.”

  His arms held me tight for an instant and his mustache brushed against my brow. Then he pulled stiffly back. “Don’t waste your time on foolish dreams. Come along now.”

  Choking back tears, I regretted the rash outpouring of my heart. I should not have forgotten my status as bastard. Though I tried to content myself with the stolen moments, I was bitterly aware that we never went places where persons of Quality might recognize him and wonder about the thin girl with the straggly blond braids. We never rode the elephant at the zoological gardens or saw the Egyptian exhibit at the British Museum or fed the swans at St. James Park. Those places Mama took me, and Rose, too, when she came to London with us.

  As hurtful as it is to admit, I know Papa is ashamed of me. He’s ashamed to acknowledge his dark secret because it would bring down the wrath of Society on himself and his legitimate family.

  I recall vividly the time Mama let the truth slip. It was a gray November day when I was thirteen. Papa and I had spent a precious hour roaming the toy stalls at the Lowther Arcade; then he left me in front of the millinery where Mama had spent the morning. As the hansom cab rattled away down Regent’s Street, she emerged from the shop and swept to my side. Her lovely features were pinched into a frown.

  “He won’t even let you ride in his own carriage,” she said, her tone caustic. “And he won’t be seen speaking to me.”

  It was always in those sad moments when leaving him that I was most apt to leap to his defense. “But look what he bought me.” I reached into a parcel and drew forth a trinket. “When I wind the key, the rabbit’s paws beat the drum.”

  She made a sweeping wave of her arm, her cloak billowing. “A pittance, a salve for his guilty conscience. Imagine what he must spend on her.”

  “On who, Mama?”

  A pink flush crept up her alabaster cheeks. Then her breath formed a fog in the chilly air. “I suppose you’re old enough to know, darling. Your father has another daughter, born of his marriage to a noblewoman.”

  My heart seemed to cease beating. Shoppers surged around us, but I felt trapped in a glass-enclosed island, where sights and sounds failed to penetrate. At last I managed to ask, “How old is she?”

  ‘‘Near Rose’s age, I believe. Probably eight or nine.”

  “This other girl... she’s my half sister, then.”

  “Yes.” Taking me by the shoulders, Mama studied me closely. “Are you quite sure you’re all right, Emily? Perhaps I shouldn’t have told you.”

  Guilt and worry tightened her regal cheekbones. The pall over my senses lifted slightly. I knew she hadn’t meant to hurt me, only to help me see the reality of the world.

  “I’m fine, Mama. I’m relieved you told me about her.”

  She nodded, and turned away to hail a cab. 1 badgered her for more facts about my legitimate sister, but she refused to speak of her again. The shocking news ate away at me, kept me awake at night wondering about the daughter fortunate enough to share every day with Papa. I didn’t even know her name, yet I couldn’t erase her from my mind.

  The morning before we were due to depart for Radcliffe, I could no longer contain my curiosity. Never have I been the venturesome sort, but this once the need aching inside me overwhelmed any natural caution.

  The Oxford omnibus conveyed me from our modest hotel in Soho to a point near the elegant address where my father lived. Fog hung in the cur and a few icy raindrops spattered my face. Wrapped tightly in a cloak, I trudged the few remaining blocks and wondered what I would say if anyone challenged my presence in this elite neighborhood. Of course, I was being foolish and fanciful; no one would take notice of a nondescript girl.

  On a quiet street near St. George’s Church in May fair, I located the terrace house. As I paused across the road, beneath the bare branches of an elm, my hands trembled as much from nervousness as the cold. Why had I done such a foolhardy thing as to come here? Suddenly I wanted to run as fast as possible, but my legs felt stiff and frozen.

  The house lacked the immensity and majesty of Castle Radcliffe, but it was certainly more luxurious and well kept. Four stories high, the redbrick residence towered over its neighbors. Despite the damp weather, the brasswork on the door gleamed and the tall windows shone. There was no sign of life anywhere, not even a servant sweeping the porticoed porch.

  So I had seen where Papa lived. Now what? Agitation and indecision engulfed me. Lacking another plan, I walked
slowly down the street, then back again.

  A brougham stopped in front of the house. My heart began to pound faster. I shrank against a wrought-iron fence and hoped the hooded cloak concealed me. Perhaps I might glimpse these visitors, see the noble folk who associated with my father.

  But the footman remained perched on the rear page board; no one got out of the carriage. Puzzled, I stared until realization struck—this must be Papa’s carriage. Just then, the front door opened and a girl emerged from the house.

  She stood somewhat taller than Rose, with a mass of reddish brown hair curling over the miniver collar of her coat. Dainty high-buttoned shoes peeked from beneath her knee-length dress, and her hat sported a cluster of pink hothouse roses.

  Papa stepped outside and took her gloved hand. He looked elegant in his top hat and double-breasted coat, more elegant than when he took me on outings. Smiling, she tilted her head up at him and said something which made him laugh. The jolly sound carried across the street.

  Even from the distance of years, I can still feel the jumble of emotions that choked me. Pain, anger, and yes, even envy, for I yearned with all my heart to be her. This was Papa’s other daughter. The pampered daughter who shared every day of his life. The legitimate daughter he proudly presented to society. But for a trick of fate, I might haw been the sun in his universe.

  He helped my half sister down the steps and into the carriage. Neither noticed me gawking shamelessly. As the brougham rattled away, hot tears coursed down my cold cheeks. Did she realize her good fortune? Of course not. Such a well bred girl would have no knowledge of anything but privilege and luxury. In her wildest fancies, she would never dream that Emmett Carleton had another daughter...

  Chapter 19

  The handwriting blurred before Juliet’s eyes. She had the dizzying sensation of sinking into a mire of disbelief.

  Her father and Emily’s father were one and the same?

  Impossible!

  Papa would never engage in such a sordid affair. He was too proper, too gentlemanly. He couldn’t have a secret life. A life he’d hidden for so many years.