“I know. My feud with William is too infamous for my presence to be construed as innocent. But I hate to leave you alone to deal with this shambles.”
Sidonie was so used to managing on her own, struggling to chart a course through impossible situations. This time she could rely on Jonas. She’d already trusted him with her body. But now she trusted him with her life. More, she trusted him with her sister’s life.
An extraordinary moment to realize how profoundly she’d fallen in love with him.
For days she’d struggled against this revelation. Now that she at last acknowledged the truth, deep peace settled in her heart. She’d resisted falling in love with Jonas, terrified he’d turn her into a weakling, incapable of living without him. But as she accepted what she felt, what she’d felt almost from the start, strength and power filled her. It was as though she tapped into some mysterious source of energy pulsing through the world.
I love Jonas. I love Jonas.
“Does Lady Hillbrook take laudanum?” he asked.
Her sister never traveled without a supply of the drug. There were days when laudanum offered Roberta her only escape from horror. Roberta shot Jonas a frightened glance. “You’re not suggesting I kill myself, are you?”
Jonas’s lips quirked at her dramatic tone. “No.”
“Then what?”
“Take a dose and go to bed.”
“I couldn’t sleep. Not after this.” Her sister’s gaze slid from Jonas’s face as though his scars offended her. Even here where he did his best to save her, Roberta couldn’t look him in the face and say thank you.
Oh, my love, no wonder you’ve learned to mistrust the world.
“Listen to him, Roberta,” Sidonie said urgently. “He’s your only hope of avoiding the noose.”
Roberta’s eyes widened in fear. “Surely it won’t come to that.”
“Surely it will.” Sidonie tried to shock her into understanding their dire situation. She looked at Jonas. “What do you want us to do?”
His gaze met hers. The panic thundering in her chest quieted under the glow of approval in his gray eyes.
“Lady Hillbrook, I want you to take enough laudanum to put you to sleep. When the servants return, they’ll discover you unconscious in your room. If anyone asks, you slept all afternoon and had no idea your husband arrived. His death comes as unexpected news.”
“Yes.” Roberta sounded stronger. “Yes, I can do that.”
“Sidonie, we need to clean up the nursery, then you need to leave the house until the servants return. You’ll walk back across the park and enter the house to discover William’s body. When the authorities arrive, you’ll say you came down from London with Roberta, then took a stroll while your sister recovered from the journey. We need to establish that the house contained only two people, a sleeping Roberta and William, who faced irretrievable financial ruin. He either fell or in a fit of despair threw himself down the stairs.”
Frail hope stirred. “You know, it just might work.”
Roberta shot Jonas a suspicious glance. “You’re very cozy with my sister, Mr. Merrick.”
Jonas’s mouth flattened with impatience. “We’ll talk about that when you’re not facing arrest for murder, Lady Hillbrook. Now we must act.”
Roberta frowned, but even she realized there was no time for an inquisition. “If I must.”
Sidonie released a relieved sigh. “Roberta, go and lie down. I’ll help Jonas then come and mix your laudanum.”
Roberta clasped Sidonie’s forearm with a shaking hand. “I can’t believe it’s come to this.”
“Courage.” She embraced Roberta.
Roberta drew away and nodded slowly. She turned toward her room but hesitated and her voice rose with hysteria. “I… I can’t. I can’t walk away when he’s lying there dead. It’s too horrid.”
“Shut your eyes, Lady Hillbrook.” Jonas stepped closer and swung Roberta into his arms. Roberta squeaked with shock, but after a delay that pierced Sidonie’s heart, she twined her arms around Jonas’s powerful neck.
“I assume she uses the viscountess’s apartments,” he said over his shoulder to Sidonie.
“Yes. They’re along—”
“I know.”
Of course he knew. He’d grown up in this house.
Left alone, Sidonie’s strongest instinct was to avoid looking at William, but macabre curiosity won out. In death her brother-in-law seemed shrunken, the shock and rage of his last moments distorting his face. His dull eyes glared past her and his body twisted grotesquely against the flagstones. The effects of his fight with Jonas were obvious. She hoped to heaven nobody attributed the bruises and abrasions to anything except the fall.
She still didn’t feel anything. Relief or grief or regret. It disturbed her to be so cold. She should feel something when a man whose life she’d shared for six years, however unwillingly, lay dead in front of her. Her only real reaction was a vengeful wish that William roasted in hell for eternity.
When Jonas approached, she glanced up. He’d retrieved a bottle of brandy from Roberta’s supply for mixing with her laudanum. Sidonie’s expression must have betrayed her troubled thoughts because he sent her a reassuring smile. “We’ll come through this, tesoro. Have faith.”
She believed him. Such power he held over her. With a naturalness she thought abandoned in Devon, she reached for him. “Thank you.”
He caught her against him for a brief kiss. She shut her eyes as his lips moved against hers. The sweet contact ended too soon.
Jonas drew away to uncork the brandy and splash it across William’s body. The scent of liquor sharpened the air. Then with sudden violence he flung the bottle onto the flagstones to shatter.
“That was clever.” She reached for his hand. “I still don’t understand why you came here this afternoon.”
“I wanted to make sure you got home safely. I meant only to watch you go inside, but the house looked deserted.”
“I’m so glad you checked. William was ready to kill Roberta.”
“Now he’ll never threaten her again.”
Sidonie shivered as if William’s ghost breathed cold air against her nape. “I’ll clean up the nursery and look after Roberta. You must go, Jonas.”
She tasted his reluctance to abandon her in his swift kiss. As she watched him stride away with his usual purpose, she blinked back tears. It seemed wrong that they should be apart. Such a difference a week had made to proud, solitary Sidonie Forsythe.
Jonas’s plan to save Roberta worked more smoothly than Sidonie could have expected, even in her most optimistic moments.
She entered the house from the terrace just as the aged butler, who to her knowledge hadn’t been paid in six months, started lighting the lamps. Thus he discovered William’s body and fetched Sidonie from the terrace. After the wrench of parting from Jonas, she didn’t need to feign distress. Recovering from a hefty dose of laudanum, Roberta was quiet and dozy and hardly aware of events when she woke to news of her husband’s demise.
Sir John Phillips, the local magistrate, arrived that night to complete the formalities. He accepted Sidonie’s tale of being away from the house all afternoon. During a short interview, Sidonie hinted at William’s financial woes and his increasing reliance on alcohol. Sir John, an elderly gentleman of sedentary habits, showed no interest in pursuing William’s death as other than accidental. To Sidonie’s relief, Jonas’s name was never mentioned.
Beneath her surface calmness, Sidonie was worried sick about Roberta. She couldn’t forget that terrifying instant when her sister seemed likely to throw herself after her foul husband.
The next morning, she carried a breakfast tray up to Roberta’s room. After depositing the tray on a table, she pushed the curtains apart and opened the window so fresh air dissipated the sickly scent of laudanum and the heavy perfumes Roberta favored. Roberta’s only response to these activities was a pained groan. “For pity’s sake, Sidonie, my head aches like the devil.”
“Good.” With another groan, Roberta pushed herself up in the bed, slumping against the headboard. In the daylight, she looked ten years older than she was. Sidonie’s rankling irritation with her sister for continuing to gamble drowned under a wave of helpless love. When they were small, Roberta had seemed so strong and clever. Now she was lost and defenseless, a mirror image of their sweet, sad, ineffectual mother.
Forcing the painful memories away, Sidonie poured Roberta a cup of tea. “We’re lucky he’s so lazy.”
Roberta grunted as she sipped her tea. Weariness, distress, and the aftereffects of the drug shadowed her blue eyes. Sidonie began to tidy the room, collecting scattered clothes and shoes and jewelry. Silence reigned until suddenly Roberta started to shake so violently that the cup rattled against its saucer.
“Sidonie, what are we to do?” Tears poured down Roberta’s cheeks and a strangled sob escaped her.
“Oh, darling. Roberta…” Sidonie dropped the handful of silk scarves she collected and rushed to rescue the cup. She sat on the edge of the bed and curled her arms around her distraught sister. “It’s all right. Don’t cry. You’re free. He’ll never hit you again.”
“William’s gone. I can hardly believe it.” She buried her head in Sidonie’s shoulder until finally broken howls subsided to soft mewling. Finally she drew away to wipe her eyes and sniff. “I hardly know what to think.”
“We’ll come through this, Roberta.” Sidonie echoed Jonas’s words from yesterday as she reached into the nightstand drawer for a handkerchief.
Roberta wiped her eyes and blew her nose. “I loathe how we had to rely on that odious man.” Roberta’s eyes sharpened and with a sinking feeling, Sidonie realized her sister’s immediate concern had shifted from her husband’s death. “What happened in Devon? You and that Merrick creature seemed great chums yesterday. I imagined after your ordeal that you’d abhor the very mention of his name.”
God give her strength. Sidonie wasn’t sure she was up to this discussion, although she’d known it was inevitable. She still wasn’t sure what she wanted to tell Roberta. Not the full story, that was for sure. “He was kind to me.”
“That doesn’t sound like the ruthless devil I know. Merciful heavens, Sidonie, the scoundrel compelled you into his bed. He’s little better than a thug.” The opium’s effects well and truly ebbed. Roberta’s gaze focused in a way Sidonie found discomfiting. “Or did you somehow talk him into letting you keep your maidenhead?”
“I told you yesterday that he didn’t hurt me.” If she blushed any hotter, she’d self-combust.
Sidonie dreaded more questions, but even worse than an inquisition was the way Roberta’s face tightened with remorse. Roberta grabbed Sidonie’s hands, wringing them in her distress. “Oh, my dear sister, I’m so sorry. You’ve gone and fallen in love with the villain. I thought you’d be safe. He’s so hideous and rough. But of course, you’re so inexperienced with men. I should never have let you go. How can I forgive myself?”
Sidonie tore free of Roberta’s clinging hold and rose to stand trembling by the bed. “He didn’t force me although he could have. I thought you’d be pleased about that.”
“Except the cur was too clever for both of us. He was wicked enough to seduce you into cooperating in your ruin and now you’ll break your heart over him.” Roberta scowled at her. “It’s part of his revenge on our family. He hates me. You know that.”
“He hated William.”
“Any strike at me was a strike at William. And he struck at me through you.”
Sidonie stepped back to distance herself from Roberta’s horrible, maniac insinuations. Nobody could be so Machiavellian as Roberta painted Jonas. “He helped you yesterday.”
“Only because he’s plotting something. You’ll see.” Roberta rose on shaky legs, clinging to a bedpost for balance. Her cream lace nightdress flowed around her, adding to the dramatic effect. “Wake up, girl. He’s over at that ridiculous house right now, sniggering at your foolishness.”
“He’s not like that. If you knew him as I do…”
“Listen to yourself! You sound so inane. Jonas Merrick set himself to ruining William and everyone associated with him. Confound him, he’s succeeded. William’s dead after seeing every enterprise ruined. I’m so debt-ridden, I’ll never hold my head up in public again. And he’s convinced you that he’s some kind of knight in shining armor. Fit revenge on all of us, wouldn’t you say? ”
Sidonie wouldn’t listen to this calumny against the man she loved. “He had every right to hate William. William scarred him.”
Even before she spoke, Roberta’s calmness indicated that this was no revelation. “I know. Which gives him every reason to destroy any connection of William’s.”
Sidonie felt sick and faint. She loved her sister but sometimes the changes wrought in her over the last years left her staggering in horror. Roberta hardly seemed to care that her husband had disfigured a younger boy from sheer spite. “You never told me about Jonas’s scars.”
“It’s hardly something one boasts of.” Roberta paused. “And it’s all so long ago, isn’t it?”
Except it wasn’t. Jonas had suffered all his life for what his cousin had done. Roberta sighed with impatience. “I suppose you think his scars are romantic. You spend too much time with your nose buried in a book. Honestly, Sidonie, I thought you of all women would have more sense. The man is incapable of finer feeling. After all, he set out to seduce me and then had no compunction in depriving you of your virginity.”
The gorge rose in Sidonie’s throat. Hearing Roberta speak was like viewing the week at Castle Craven through a distorting mirror. Sidonie refused to listen to her poisonous insinuations. Roberta was wrong. Sidonie knew Jonas. She knew the attraction flaring between them had ambushed him, too. Hadn’t he asked her to marry him? The feelings between them were strong and genuine. She must believe that. If she loved him, she had to trust him.
Which meant, astonishingly, she’d decided to accept his proposal.
Heavens, what a change in a woman once determined to lead her life alone and independent. Sidonie Forsythe was about to do the unthinkable and surrender herself to a man in matrimony.
Roberta surveyed her with a troubled scowl. “What is it, Sidonie? You have the most bizarre look on your face.”
Sidonie shook her head. This morning, she’d hoped to tell Roberta that Jonas was the rightful Viscount, warn her before Jonas used the marriage lines to claim the title. Roberta’s difficult humor discouraged sharing such unwelcome news. How she wished she’d told Jonas yesterday, but in the confusion and panic after William’s fall, she’d thought only of concealing Roberta’s crime.
She hoped that when she revealed everything to Jonas, he wasn’t so angry that he withdrew his proposal. She could write to him, she supposed, but that seemed a cowardly method of handling this last secret dividing them. It was only a couple of days’ delay, after all. Once William was buried, she’d go to Jonas as she’d gone to him at Castle Craven. She’d give him the marriage lines, then tell him that she loved him and wanted to be his wife. Surely he’d know that her acceptance was unrelated to his new status. Good God, she loved Jonas Merrick so much, she’d marry him if he came to her a pauper.
The next days passed in a flurry of activity as Sidonie handled funeral arrangements, the estate, her sister, and her nephews, who arrived home from school. Neither boy seemed overly upset to hear of their father’s end. Roberta remained of little assistance. She mainly stayed in her room wallowing in a fog of laudanum. Her complete collapse fortified the impression that she was a grieving widow. After their acrimonious encounter the morning after William’s death, Sidonie was grateful that her sister remained largely uninvolved in practical matters at Barstowe Hall.
Soon the story Jonas concocted was so widely accepted that Sidonie almost believed William had jumped to his death to avoid the shame of bankruptcy. Sidonie’s ever-present fear of her sister’s arrest subsided to a distant hum. It appeared Jonas was right and they would make it through. Those nightmarish seconds when Roberta shoved her husband down the stairs might never have occurred.
Sidonie had originally hoped to escape to tell Jonas about the marriage lines. But she’d quickly realized that to avoid suspicion falling on him, it was better to have no open contact between Ferney and Barstowe Hall for the present.
Sidonie supported Roberta’s faltering progress down the aisle of the village church after William’s funeral service. The sickly scent of lilies procured at great expense from London had her head aching—or perhaps she had a headache because of Roberta’s generous hand with attar of roses.
She blinked eyes scratchy with exhaustion. No matter how weary she was when she collapsed into bed, she couldn’t sleep. It was odd; she’d slept alone for twenty-four years and only shared Jonas Merrick’s bed for a matter of days. But it seemed wrong not to lie in his arms at night and wake to his presence in the morning.
The church was crowded with local gentry, tenants, and a few of William’s London acquaintances. Nobody seemed particularly cast down. But then William had devoted most of his tenure as viscount to quarreling with his neighbors and embroiling them in pointless legal disputes. Not one soul genuinely regretted his absence. What a sad epitaph, Sidonie couldn’t help thinking, much as she’d loathed her brother-in-law.
She turned to check on her nephews trailing behind their mother. Seven-year-old Nicholas had handled his role in his father’s rites with a stoic courage that had brought tears to Sidonie’s eyes. Young Thomas at five had become restless during the service, but settled upon his brother’s hissed reprimand.
Ahead six brawny tenants carried the coffin, piled with more lilies, through the double doors. The villagers despised William as a man who brought ruin to the estate and who blustered to hide his complete ignorance about farming. Sidonie gathered from the servants that the local tavern had resounded with toasts to William’s long sojourn in hell.
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