by CJ Archer
"He didn't kill Cottesloe!"
Alex caught her shoulders and wrenched her about, forcing her to look at him. "Yes, Georgiana, I did."
CHAPTER 17
Alex couldn't get out of Louisa's waspish presence fast enough. Or more accurately, he couldn't get Georgiana away fast enough. Taking her there had been a bad idea. He shouldn't have exposed her to the infections spread by Louisa's tongue.
They walked quickly in silence around the corner, out of sight of the Twickenham's townhouse. As soon as Alex could no longer feel Louisa's sharp glare stabbing him in the back, Georgiana spoke.
"Was Cottesloe a big man?"
"Yes," he said, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. It came away damp with sweat. "And I know what you're thinking. That he's the one trying to kill me, the one meeting Philly. I can assure you, it's not him."
"How can you be sure? You haven't seen his face?"
"Cottesloe is dead. I know that for fact."
"But there was no body. How can you be certain that you killed him?" Her voice was thin and stretched. "Particularly since you can't remember that night."
A heavy weight pressed down onto Alex's chest, making breathing difficult. He would have to tell her. He wanted to tell her. It was time.
"It was only through a dream that I realized what happened." A pulse drummed an erratic beat in his throat. He couldn't swallow past it.
"But it was only a dream. It doesn't mean you did it."
"In this case it does." He stared straight ahead. The late afternoon sun hurt his eyes and the faces of the oncoming pedestrians blurred together. His attacker, Louisa's man—he was certain she was behind it all—could set on him now and he'd be completely unprepared. He was much too unfocused to deal with an attack. That had to change. He drew himself together, gathered his wits. "I know I killed him."
He felt Georgiana's slender figure beside him shudder. His fingers touched hers but withdrew quickly. She was shaking because he repulsed her. Frightened her. He had no right to request her heart, or even her sympathy. Murderers had no rights.
Louisa, in her deranged way, had spoken the truth—Georgiana was too sweet for him, too good. She deserved better than a killer with an opium addiction.
But there was no way he was going to tell her that. He needed her by him more than ever, not just now but every day. He couldn't imagine a future without her.
"It doesn't make sense," she said, sounding calmer, more rational. He admired her even more for her practicality. Yet another reason why he needed her. She balanced him, her self-control against his fiery temper. Her lightness against his dark. "Why would you kill him?" she went on. "Over her?" She scoffed. "It's a ridiculous notion."
They crossed the road and Alex scanned the area for the brown-coated man. Several pedestrians passed them, town coaches rumbled up and down the street, shadows grew long, all providing ample places from which to launch an ambush. The sooner he got Georgiana home the better.
"Alex? Are you listening?"
"I know it seems unbelievable," he said. "But the truth is I did do it. I informed the authorities after that first dream but they didn't believe me." He'd told the Swiss authorities but they'd been unwilling to arrest an English gentleman for killing another Englishman during war time based on nothing more than a dream. Later he'd wondered if Sir Oswyn had influenced their decision in any way. Like Georgiana, Sir Oswyn hadn't believed Alex was the murderer, although that could have been an act—Sir Oswyn didn't want to lose Alex from his spy network.
For his part, Alex had resigned immediately. He wanted nothing to do with that life anymore. If he was to fight in the war he'd rather do it as a soldier or better still, in a truly diplomatic role working on a peace agreement, not as a spy, never knowing who his friends were, who to trust.
"What happened immediately before and after you killed him?" she asked as they turned down Mount Street.
He scanned the shadowy depths of an adjoining lane. All clear. "I don't know. That first dream began and ended with me..." He cleared his throat. "I started taking opium after it so I haven't had the nightmare again until last night. That dream also only covered the same incident, not the before or after."
She stopped. Stared. He stopped too and lifted one shoulder in question. "Then you don't know what you did after you found Cottesloe lying there? You don't know what led up to it?" She grasped his hands and held them up. "In your dream you look at your hands, covered in his blood...and then you wake up. Alex, you need to find out more."
He pulled away from her. He didn't want to do this. Not now. He had to get her home, safe, then make sure Phillippa and Aunt Harry were safe too. Then he was going to draw out Louisa's minion and make the villain confess.
"How did you get your injuries, Alex?"
They reached his house and he scraped the street mud off the souls of his boots on the cast iron bootscrape. "Cottesloe gave them to me in self-defense. That part I remember."
"But why? To think you killed him because of a woman is—."
"Don't!" The blood thumped slowly through his veins. His head hurt. He'd been over and over it ever since that first nightmare. He'd learned Cottesloe was sleeping with Louisa. They'd argued about it at the ball. Cottesloe had left, Alex had followed him and that's where his memories faded. They must have argued again. Over Louisa.
Or had they?
There was something in what Georgiana said. He had no real affection for Louisa. He never had. True, he'd been angry with Cottesloe because his friend knew Alex had already taken her as his lover, but he'd been just as angry with Louisa for her part in the duplicity.
Still, it didn't sit comfortably with him.
What did make sense however, and what he knew to the very core, was that he killed Cottesloe. That was bad enough. But to learn that Louisa had loved Harry and would stop at nothing to get her revenge was much, much worse. She was prepared to hurt the ones Alex loved to get her revenge.
He had to stop her before she succeeded.
They climbed the front steps together and Worth opened the door. Aunt Harry stood at the hall table, sifting through the cards on the salver.
"Alexander," she said, looking up. She was dressed in the black velvet pelisse she used for walking on cool days and wore her matching gloves. Her black lace parasol rested against the table's leg. She was either going out or had just returned. "We need to speak."
Her greeting made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. Something was wrong. She didn't acknowledge Georgiana at all. Didn't even glance at her. Aunt Harry always put politeness above her own feelings. She never cut anyone.
"What about?" he asked.
"Not here. In the library. You too, Miss Appleby."
She strode into the adjoining library without even checking if they followed. He forked an eyebrow at Georgiana.
"We'd better go," she said. "It might be important."
"Or it might be another lecture."
She smiled and it lit his heart. When she smiled like that, he could endure a thousand of Aunt Harry's lectures. They entered the library side by side. His aunt stood near the unlit fireplace looking like a grim crow.
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"I've just returned from a visit to Sir Oswyn Crisp," she said.
That wasn't something he'd expected to hear. "Why did you go to see him?"
"Because before you two left the house, Miss Appleby wrote him a letter detailing what Lady Twickenham is up to."
Georgiana gasped. "That was private!"
"The footman dropped it," Aunt Harry said flippantly. "I merely picked it up." Alex suspected Georgiana knew it was a blatant lie but she pretended not to.
"So?" Alex prompted. "I didn't know about the letter but it doesn't matter. I would have told Sir Oswyn myself soon enough. Miss Appleby has simply saved me the time."
"Lady Twickenham's deeds are..." Aunt Harry closed her eyes and for a moment he thought her constitution had failed her and she was having an a
ttack of the vapors. But when she opened them again, there was steel in their depths. "What she has done is despicable and I will ensure she pays for it. But my main concern is over what I learned at Sir Oswyn's office about Miss Appleby."
"And what did you learn?" Alex asked. Beside him, Georgiana didn't move.
"I've suspected you were a spy for some time, Alexander," Aunt Harry said. "Sir Oswyn would neither confirm nor deny it of course but he didn't need to. What he did confirm was that Miss Appleby had been employed to stop you smoking opium." She held up her hand to silence him.
He would not be silenced. "I didn't tell you because I didn't want to worry you. I had asked Sir Oswyn not to make it known. I can't think why he'd break that agreement. However it's true that Miss Appleby is a physician of sorts who cures opium addicts. She learned her art from her father, a baronet—."
"I know who her father is." Her voice rose above his. "And before you blame Sir Oswyn entirely, I assure you it took some convincing for him to confide in me."
"Convincing?" Alex prompted.
She stretched her neck, lifting her proud chin. "I know a thing or two about Lord Castlereagh that the gentleman wouldn't want repeated in certain ears. I told his lordship's Permanent Under-Secretary as such."
"And what did he tell you about me in turn, Lady Weatherby?" Georgiana held herself erect and calm but there was wariness in her eyes.
"He told me about your lover."
Alex's heart stopped beating. "Lover?" he whispered.
"A previous patient," Aunt Harry said, slanting her narrowed gaze to his.
"Previous patient and previous lover," Georgiana said. But the wariness was still there, still clouding her vision. She was holding something back. "There haven't been any since."
His heart kicked into its normal rhythm again. Whatever she was hiding it wasn't another man. Her heart was his.
"Miss Appleby is allowed to take lovers, Aunt." Alex ground his back teeth together to shut down his rising temper. "It is no concern of yours."
"It most certainly is! Particularly when the parallels with you are uncanny at best."
"Parallels?" His gaze slid from his Aunt's to Georgiana's and back again. Neither face gave anything away. "What are you talking about?"
"She killed him."
He began to laugh then stopped abruptly. No one was laughing with him. "What do you mean?"
"Her lover died because of—."
"Let me explain," Georgiana said, rounding on his aunt. "At least allow me that honor before you savage my reputation."
He touched her hand but she snatched it away. "Georgiana," he whispered but she didn't meet his eyes. Her gaze focused on his cravat.
"Very well," Aunt Harry was saying.
"Lady Weatherby is correct in that Lawrence Fullarton was my patient. We fell in love. Or thought we did." She shook her head and blew out a breath. There was no sadness in her distant gaze, but there was a great deal of pain. "Our relationship ended when I realized he didn't love me for me."
She paused and he had the feeling he was supposed to understand what she meant. "What did he love you for?"
"For what I could give him. Opium." Her gaze lifted fully to his. Her eyes shone with unshed tears. He caught her hands and held them tightly, tried to squeeze out her sadness. "I took his opium but kept it you see, to dilute with other harmless herbs. It was hidden, as was yours."
He didn't care about the opium. He never wanted to see the vile stuff again. "He found it, didn't he?"
She nodded. "He begged me to give him some. And I did."
"But that's all right, isn't it?" he asked, desperation and confusion creeping in. "You said it's part of your treatment to give out measured doses if necessary."
"It is. But he wanted more. At first I agreed because I hated seeing him in pain but later I realized my mistake and refused it altogether. He grew more desperate but it was when he begged me, telling me he needed me, that I ended our relationship. It wasn't based on love." She suddenly pulled out of his hands and strode to the fireplace. She stared into the grate, her back to them. "Because I'd allowed him into my room, Lawrence knew where I kept the opium. He stole it and that night he took too much and died."
"And thereby ruined her reputation," Aunt Harry said, rather unhelpfully.
"Hardly ruined," Alex said. "I investigated you a little before you arrived and there was no mention of a previous romance or the death of one of your patients."
"It doesn't seem to have traveled too far from the village," Aunt Harry said. "But Sir Oswyn knew of it. And now, so do I."
"It ends here, now. No one else need know." His throat felt full. He ached to go to Georgiana. "What is the purpose of this, Aunt Harry? Why bring this up now?"
"Don't you see, Alexander? Or has she bewitched you too?"
"All I see is that you've brought up a very painful incident that is completely irrelevant—."
"It's not," Georgiana said quietly, insidiously. She turned around and her face was ghostly white. "It's not irrelevant and your aunt is right. She's opened my eyes to what is happening. She has your best interests at heart, Alex, and you should thank her. We both should."
"Thank her? My best interests?" He shook his head. She wasn't making sense. "My best interests involve having you, Georgiana. By my side." Where she belonged.
"No. You see, it's the same. I cared for Lawrence and he died through my negligence. I wasn't careful. I let my feelings for him soften me. If I'd been wiser in the ways of men I'd have been able to distinguish between love and need. But I wasn't. It's the same with us."
"It's not the same," he snapped.
"For Heaven's sake, Alexander, the woman has admitted—."
"Please leave, Aunt."
She hesitated only a moment then left, taking all the air with her. His lungs tightened. His hands shook.
"It is the same," Georgiana said in that quiet, determined way she had. The color returned to her face and her gaze was no longer filled with pain. Indeed, her eyes seemed empty altogether.
He went to her but she put her hands up and he stopped. "No," he managed to say. "It's not the same. I've given up the opium. I don't want it anymore. I'm not like him."
"Three days is hardly a real test. There will be many more nights and you will crave it."
He scrubbed a hand over his face. It was slick with sweat. "Damn it, Georgiana, your talk of the difference between love and need is...is pedantic. They can't be separated. Of course I need you. I need you in my bed, by my side..."
She looked up at him with her big, brown eyes and he cursed himself. He'd said the wrong thing.
"I'll leave in the morning," she said, hugging herself as if she were cold.
"No!" He thought quickly. What did he have to say to get her to stay? "You misunderstood. Of course I don't need you. I'm not a child." But the damage was done. He knew it like he knew his life would never be the same again. "Georgiana," he said, appealing to her one last time.
"Good bye, Alex. And please don't see me off in the morning. It'll be too..." She shook her head and moved past him.
He caught her arm and their gazes locked with such a deep, desperate sadness that he suddenly knew what it meant to have a broken heart. God, it hurt.
"You can't go," he said. His voice sounded thick with emotion but he didn't care. "I can't do this—." Oh. Hell. He'd been about to say he couldn't do it on his own. It was precisely what she'd been trying to tell him—that she was not a substitute for the opium.
Her sad smile was all the response she gave before she left him alone with his sorrow.
***
Georgiana returned to her room—her large, spacious, pretty room that Alex had so thoughtfully assigned to her—and didn't let anyone in. Not the maid who brought her tea, not even Phillippa. She sat by the window and watched the sky turn darker with nightfall. It grew colder but she didn't request the fire to be lit. She just wanted to sit and embrace the cold, embrace her misery, and cry.
But her tears wouldn't come. Perhaps because she'd known this moment would arrive and that it was necessary. She must leave Alex to sever the connection between them and end the need he had for her to be by his side.
Need. It all came down to that. Not love, not the thing she wanted, but need. He needed her. He didn't love her. And she couldn't remain with him without love. In time his need would end and the lust would be slaked and then they'd be left with nothing. A clean, swift break was the perfect solution.
If only she could convince her battered and bleeding heart.
After pushing aside her dinner of cottage pie and roast beef, she packed for an early departure. She picked up the portraits of her parents and placed them on top of the folded clothes in her valise, face down. She couldn't bare them to see her like this. They'd always been so happy together, always so sure of each other's love.
A knock on her door, more forceful than a maid's or Phillippa's, startled her. "Miss Appleby!" It was Trent. "Miss Appleby, it's the master."
Her heart dropped to her stomach. She flung open the door. "He's not smoking opium again, is he?"
"No, miss, nothing like that." The flame from the candle he held lit up his freckles and his wide eyes. Fear flickered in their depths.
Georgiana refrained from taking him by the shoulders and shaking him like she wanted to. "Then what is it, Trent?"
"He's having a nightmare, miss. He's thrashing about on the bed, talking and sometimes shouting. I'm worried he's going to hurt himself and came to ask you what to do. Should I wake him?"
She hesitated for a moment then grabbed her shawl from the foot of the bed and the bronze candelabra from the mantelpiece. "Thank you, Trent, I'll care for him now."
He looked relieved as he stepped aside. He didn't follow her as she headed to Alex's room.
She heard Alex's mutterings before she entered the bedroom but she couldn't understand them. She closed the door behind her and placed the candelabra on the tea table away from his bed. Alex did indeed thrash around a great deal. He was uncovered and naked, his smooth skin glowing in the light cast by her lamp. She didn't touch him although it was devilishly difficult not to run a hand along the contours of his muscular thigh.
