“Yes.”
That was the truth, they all agreed, and Dimm nodded, handing the Frenchman his clothes. That was the name on the papers.
Rex consulted his own notes. “But the valet’s name is Jean!”
Murchison wore a smug smile. “Twins.” Then he left, taking Amanda’s lace garter with him.
Rex and Amanda were taking up where they’d left off, this time with the door locked. And they were in the stuffed chair instead of the bed, making their tryst a sliver more respectable. A thin sliver.
Amanda was trying to understand their conclusions, while Rex was trying to unfasten her gown again.
She batted his hand away. “So the twin took the valet’s place, and told the truth when you asked him? That means we are no closer to finding the real killer.”
“Much closer.” Rex pulled her back against him, much closer. “Claude admitted that he and Jean exchanged identities regularly, so they were familiar with each other’s households. Now we have reason to hold him for further questioning.”
“But the real valet, Jean, is gone. Claude would not say where?”
“We’ll find him.”
“Not if he has gone back to France.” She touched his cheek. “Rex, let me go.”
He took his arms from around her, reluctantly.
“No, I mean let me leave England. Let me flee. You might never find the real valet, never be able to clear my name. They will demand the trial be held sooner or later, no matter how many debts your father calls in, and I cannot prove my innocence. Even if no one can prove my guilt, I cannot stay on with your parents. Have you noticed they are smelling of orange blossoms? They need their privacy after so many years apart. Nor can I go back to live with my stepfamily. Why, to plan Elaine’s wedding? There would always be a taint to my name, no matter what.”
He held onto her arms. “No!”
“But I need to go. You must see that. You do not need to help or even know the details. In fact you can say I overpowered you. I’ll hit you over the head again to make it look real, although that would hurt me, too. Let me go, Rex!”
“I cannot.”
“Your honor is satisfied if you are unconscious. And mine is also, for I never gave my word not to go. You have tried your best, I know, and I am grateful. Now do not make me wait for a trial, to become a headline in the scandal sheets again, to be placed on view as an accused murderess. Sir Nigel will not accept the word of a sneaky French valet. Or of you or your cousin. We have no proof!”
“We’ll find Jean.”
“We might not!” She stared at the window, her lip trembling.
Rex had to concede the possibility. Thibidoux had alreadyleft London, for who knew where, before they knew to question him. Dimm’s men were looking, Harry’s, too, but another servant in a nondescript coach, another guard sitting with the driver, meant there were too many chances for Jean to slip through the web. Rex gently tugged on one of Amanda’s curls so she would turn to face him again. “A few more days, my dear, and then we will leave together.”
“Together? You would flee England to live elsewhere?”
“I don’t think I can live anywhere you are not, my love.”
“But what about your honor, your given word?”
“You asked me once which I valued more, my good name or your life. I choose you.”
Tears welled in Amanda’s eyes as she threw herself back against the viscount’s chest. “Oh, Rex. I do love you.”
After an earthshaking, chair-rocking kiss, Rex told her, “There can be no more lies between us. I love you. And who knows how much good our sons can do in the world, even if not in England?”
“Our sons? You intend to have children?”
“I intend to make love to my wife, constantly and with great enthusiasm. Children are the usual result.”
“You would marry me?”
“We sure as Hades do not need any more bastards on the Royce family tree.”
“But all of your oaths, all of your vows to remain unwed and—”
He silenced her with another kiss while he tugged down her bodice. “One more week. If we cannot find the valet in a week, we’ll leave. But we will find him, or information about him. We think we know where to look. Only one man outside the family could have briefed the valet to speak the truth and nothing else.”
“I do not understand.”
“And you will not, not ever. No one can, not even us.” He took a deep breath. “The Royce men, and Daniel, through his mother somehow, can tell truth from lies.”
“No, that is impossible.”
“And that was a red falsehood, my dear. Try again.”
Her brows knit in concentration as she tried to comprehend what he was saying, while ignoring what his hands were doing. “I love you.”
He smiled. “True-blue. Try again.”
“Very well, I do not love you.”
“That would break my heart if it were true. Luckily for me, it is a lie, a cherry-red falsehood. And do not even try to say you do not like my lovemaking, for your own body tells the truth. Here.” He bent his head to kiss her taut nipple, already pressing toward him. “And here.” He put his hand between her thighs, where she was wet and warm with wanting him.
“This does not lie, either,” she said, wrapping her hand around the hard length of him.
“Aah. Never. Try again.”
“You are the best lover in the world?”
“Hm. That one is a rainbow, which means you hope it’s true, and that’s all that matters. Of course I intend to be your only lover.”
“Of course,” she echoed, then asked, “You really can tell truth from falsehood? And your father and your half brother, and Daniel?”
“All of us. Our sons will be able to also, in varied forms, with all the trouble it can cause. Daniel gets rashes, which is why he is not welcome at Almack’s. All the lies people tell have him scratching furiously until people think he has lice or something.”
Amanda laughed. “The dowagers and doyennes of polite society do not lie.”
“No?” Rex raised his voice in a chirping falsetto. “ ‘I am so happy you came tonight, my dear.’ That is a lie. The matron wishes you to perdition because you are prettier than her own daughter. ‘You are looking lovely.’ A lie. This patroness thinks your gown is too revealing.” He smiled. “I myself adore it.”
Amanda was giggling at his imitation of the ton’s affectations. “Stop. I can see where poor Daniel would be uncomfortable.”
“My father used to work with the courts, for justice. Harry, well, Harry helps at the War Office. I suppose he helped Daniel and me develop our evil reputations, instead of letting the family affliction become known. We pretended to be ruthless interrogators, rather than have people believe we were sorcerers or some such. I have been helping Inspector Dimm, telling him which alibi is honest, which claim of innocence is a falsehood. It never fails. Now that you know the truth, will you still have me?”
“True love never fails, either.”
Then he explained about his parents, about his father’s jealousies, his mother’s fears.
“I could never be afraid of you.”
Which deserved another kiss, and another explanation of how the family gift tore apart the family, and why the unearthly trait had to be hidden.
“But your parents always loved each other, didn’t they? They are so joyous in their reunion that they forget to chaperon us altogether.”
“Excellent parents, don’t you think?”
She agreed by wriggling on his lap until he groaned.
“I . . . I don’t know where I’d be without them.”
“You would not be half as special, or half as dear to me.”
Chapter Thirty-one
Amanda was packing. She wondered who could help sell some of her jewelry without becoming implicated in her escape.
Rex was pacing, going over lists of every place searched, every suspect questioned.
Harry and Dimm and Da
niel were pursuing every lead or hint or purchased bit of information.
Lord and Lady Royce were planning their futures, together.
One day went by. Two.
Rex was feeling better, enough that he set himself up as a target in the park at dusk. No one bothered him, except Daniel, who was forced to stay behind, since such a large man did not skulk well. Harry did, of course, disguised as the old man again.
Three.
Amanda was in a panic. Would Rex really go with her? How would she live alone, without him?
Rex was in a quandary. How could he leave England, never to return, giving up his new work with Dimm, his family, his estate? He did care about the earldom after all, it seemed, now that he might lose it. And where could he go to keep Amanda safe?
His parents were in the conservatory, with the door locked.
Four days.
Rex decided to take Amanda to the theater, with her relations, Sir Edwin and his sister. Daniel refused the invitation, as did the Hawleys’ aunt Hermione. The earl and the countess attend as chaperons, and simply their presence together diverted some of the attention from Amanda, but not much, not with the way she was dressed. She did wear a gray gown, the color of which was suitable for mourning, but in watered silk that shimmered—what there was of it. She decided to wear her mother’s diamonds, proper or not, to fill in part of the low décolletage. She no longer cared what anyone in the audience thought, and she might have to sell the glittering necklace and matching bracelet tomorrow. Besides, the matching sparkle in Rex’s eyes was worth the raised brows and clucking tongues.
Her stepsister wore severe black, with no jewelry. She complained throughout the first act of looking like a crow, especially next to Amanda. Then her beau Martin arrived at the intermission. He thought she looked beautiful.
“He really does, you know. He’s not simply being polite,” Rex whispered in Amanda’s ear, ruffling the black feather that curled down her cheek from a black velvet headband, tickling her skin. Or was that his warm breath that had her tingling, or simply his nearness? Amanda touched the necklace and turned away, knowing both the diamonds and her happiness were to be sacrificed soon.
Five days.
“You’re free, darling!” He swung her up in his arms and around in a circle, laughing.
“You can put her down now, Harry,” Rex said dryly, but he was grinning, too.
“I am free? You found Brusseau?”
Daniel stooped over and kissed her cheek. “It is true! Not the way we planned, but true.”
Daniel and Harry took turns explaining the recent events, interrupting each other constantly. As near as Amanda could understand, Sir Frederick’s deranged sister, Miss Hermione Hawley, never left the house, watched so carefully by her niece and nephew. So Rex took it upon himself to see what she would do if given free rein. What she did, sure enough, was creep out of the house while they were all at the theater, telling the servants, who were now on Rex’s payroll, besides young Edwin Hawley’s, that she was taking a donation to the nearest orphanage.
“I told you, didn’t I?” Daniel crowed. “That friend of my sister’s who eloped did the same thing. Charity, my arse, and especially at night. Sorry, my dear. If you see a trunk full of clothes being loaded on a hackney, worry.”
Amanda’s satchels were already hidden, one by one, behind the garden shed. At least she was not claiming to be giving her wardrobe away.
Rex was furious. “Why did no one send for me?”
Daniel looked at Harry, who looked back. “The saw-bones said you shouldn’t do anything strenuous for another week.”
Amanda said, “I did not know that!” then blushed.
Rex said what he thought of the surgeon’s edict, in one short word that made her blush deepen. “You should have sent for me!” he insisted.
Harry shrugged. “The family hope, don’t you know.”
“Do not protect me, not ever again, either one of you, do you hear?”
Amanda liked that the others watched out for Rex. “Do you want to argue or do you want to know what happened next?”
Rex conceded. “Go on.”
“Our men followed the hackney and sent messages back,” Harry continued the story. “Your guess was a good one, Rex,” he added to appease the viscount. “And paying the Hawley servants was a downy notion, too. Some of them took off after the hackney, also.”
“She did not go to any orphanage, did she?” Amanda wanted to know.
“Of course not,” Daniel said with a snort.
Rex guessed she went to Sir Nigel’s house.
“Exactly.” Daniel admitted he was all for barging into the barrister’s residence, but Harry said no, Miss Hawley and Sir Nigel were not doing anything wrong that anyone knew. Perhaps they were lovers, having a tryst.
Daniel made another rude noise. “Harry never met the aunt.”
Then both of them got in the same hackney, with one of Sir Nigel’s servants.
“Brusseau?” Amanda asked. “The other brother, Jean, the real valet?”
“Exactly!”
“Did you arrest them then?”
“No, we decided to see where they went.” Daniel told how he and Harry followed behind on horses, with a coach full of Bow Street Runners coming after the Hawley servants’ coach. They all went to Grave’s End, where Sir Nigel anchored his private yacht, which was under watch by the Royal Navy and the Revenuers, again at Rex’s urging.
“You arrested them before they boarded the yacht, didn’t you?”
“Not exactly.”
“Explain.”
Neither Harry nor Daniel wanted to relate the next part. Finally Harry spoke up while Daniel poured them all glasses of wine. Inspector Dimm, it seemed, as the officer in charge of the murder investigation, ordered the suspects to halt as soon as they left the coach at the dock area. They did not. Sir Nigel and Brusseau ran for a rowboat that could take them to the yacht, with Hermione Hawley screeching behind them. Daniel and Harry and some of the Bow Street Runners ran after them. So did the Hawley servants who were promised part of the reward.
Sir Nigel leaped for the boat. Daniel leaped for Brusseau, who could not go as fast because of a bandaged leg, and dragged him back to the dock. He had his hands on Brusseau’s neck. “Say it.” He did not have to spell out what he wanted; he did tighten his grip on the valet’s throat.
“I . . . I killed Sir Frederick.”
“And Lord Rexford?”
“I hit him with the brick. If the cursed chien hadn’t been hanging on my leg, I’d have killed him, too, and we could have gotten away.”
Everyone heard him, right before they heard Sir Nigel shoot him from the rowboat. The barrister threw his empty gun aside and leaped into the water. Harry was stuck holding Hermione Hawley from leaping after. He pushed her into the arms of some of her former servants and jumped into the boat.
The crew of Sir Nigel’s yacht sent a boat out to haul their master aboard. One of the Revenue officers sent out a skiff. They started shooting at each other. Then another ship, a merchantman in the distance, weighed anchor, set sail, and surprised them all by sending a broadside at the navy cutter. The merchantman, they later learned, was one of Johnston’s traders. He’d been hiding out, ready to make his getaway too, as soon as Sir Nigel paid him his share. The harbor was all smoke and sails and shouts and small boats colliding, oarsmen falling overboard, servants screaming. The cutter tried to come about to stop the merchantman before it reached open waters. No one got to Sir Nigel in time.
“He got away?”
“He drowned. We fished him out. The navy boarded Johnston’s ship and found Breverton—with the money from the bank! And Thibidoux, too. We got them all! Neither turncoat nor tuppence got to France to finance Bonaparte and his plan to conquer England and the world. All the ships were confiscated, the crews arrested, several fortunes rescued. The War Office is delighted, the navy and the Excise officers are fighting over the prizes, and we are all heroes!”
<
br /> Amanda was happy for them, of course, but still worried about her own future. “But if Brusseau is dead, how will I prove my innocence? The others were traitors who sought to buy titles and lands at the expense of their own country, but the charges against me are not a matter of the nation’s welfare.”
Daniel and Harry reassured her. Scores of people heard Jean’s confession, and his twin brother confirmed everything when he realized he was an accomplice to a huge failed plot. Claude confessed his part, and his brother’s, in front of Dimm and his superiors. There was no hint of coercion, no chance of a lie.
As Rex and his parents expected, Sir Nigel was behind it all. Sir Frederick never had the wit to think up the false investment scheme, only lofty ambitions and greed. He followed Sir Nigel’s plan, but then he was going to cut Sir Nigel out of the profits, to use Thibidoux and Johnston to get to France. He’d been a problem from the first, scrimping on his payments, which cut down on Sir Nigel’s influence with the French, and leaving too many trails back to the barrister. He had to be eliminated. Jean Brusseau carried out Sir Nigel’s orders while Claude was seen in a pub, then switched places with his twin. Claude could deny everything without perjury. Jean left the gun to point the blame toward one of the investors, all of whom had good motives.
Harry concluded: “Amanda’s appearance merely stirred up Sir Nigel’s ill will toward Lord Royce and gave him a way to revenge himself on the countess and further discredit the family. He had his own obsessions, beyond money and foreign titles.”
Daniel finished: “Everything is neatly tied, with no loose ends. Unlike Rex’s neckcloth.”
While Rex hastily repaired his cravat, Harry told Amanda, “You are free to go, free to stay. Free to live the rest of your life any way you want.”
Daniel handed them each a glass and raised his in a toast. “To Amanda and her future.”
Amanda kissed him. Then she kissed Harry.
“What about me?” Rex asked. “It was my idea that Miss Hawley would lead us to Sir Nigel, and I was the one who ordered a watch on his yacht.”
So Amanda kissed him, too.
Truly Yours Page 28
