by Sharon Page
“It was an illness that took your sight,” Helena broke in firmly, and she put her arm around the girl’s shoulders.
Maryanne shook her head. “I did something terribly wrong and I had to pay for my sin.”
“Lady Maryanne, none of this was your fault. You were not bad—”
“Killing someone is bad.” Maryanne put her hand to her mouth. The words came out muffled. “Mother hurt Damian, but Father said he loved us. He said he loved me, but what he did felt so bad. It made me feel so sick. I knew it was wrong—it was the thing Mother punished Damian for. Young ladies weren’t supposed to do that. Father said it was all right, because he would always look after me, but he was lying. It was wrong.”
“Your father committed the sin. You did not. You were innocent—”
“You don’t understand. I should go—our new governess will miss me.”
Helena looked. The woman had not yet noticed Maryanne no longer sat on the grass. “It is all right. I do want you to understand you aren’t to blame, and that illness was not a judgment. It was just chance, Maryanne.”
“Damian said he would claim he did it, to protect me. Damian was going to kill Father to stop him. But then I knew I’d been a coward. It was my responsibility. I couldn’t let Damian do it when I should do it. So I—I took one of Father’s dueling pistols and threatened him. He was furious. He threatened to beat me until I could not walk, then keep me prisoner. Then he lunged at me and—and next thing I knew, the pistol exploded in my hand, knocking me onto the floor. There was choking smoke and—and then Father collapsed. I’d pulled the trigger. I killed Father.” Maryanne jerked helplessly as sobs claimed her.
“It wasn’t your fault. Dear heaven, it was an accident. Not your fault.” Helena wrapped her arms around Maryanne and cradled the girl securely against her chest. She said every soothing thing she could think of.
“Grey said if anyone ever found out that Father was shot, he would say he did it,” Maryanne whispered. “They said in the newspaper that Father was murdered. They know, don’t they? But I can’t let my brother be punished for what I did! I can’t!”
The poor girl. No wonder Greybrooke had vowed to take the blame for it. “Do not say anything, Lady Maryanne. No one knows anything. Greybrooke has not been accused of killing your father. You must keep silent. Please, you must trust me.”
The girl nodded. “I do trust you, Miss Winsome.”
Helena was shaky with horror over the nightmare Lady Maryanne had lived through. She could not let this ever be discovered. But her investigation of Greybrooke had begun to expose his secrets. Someone was accusing Greybrooke of murdering his own father.
First there had been the accusation of treason, then the story that his father had been murdered, now the accusation about Lady Blackbriar’s death. Was Whitehall behind everything? Was he the villain, not Blackbriar?
But why was he trying to destroy the duke?
20
Helena hurried back to her pale-blue curricle. Finding out the truth from Maryanne, when Greybrooke had told the girl to never talk, was a terrible betrayal.
She slapped the reins, and her curricle launched ahead. Driving was still a challenge—she had her horses trotting slowly. Just as she would protect children, she was protecting others from her lack of driving skills.
When she reached her white town house, she turned her curricle over to her groom. As she entered the foyer, untying the bow of her bonnet, Betsy bobbed a curtsy. “His Grace has arrived. He is awaiting you in the blue drawing room.”
Helena choked down guilt as she reached the room.
Greybrooke sprawled in a wing chair, long legs stretched out. In his hand was a glass of brandy—he’d ensured her home was stocked with what he liked to drink.
He looked up, his mouth a brutal slash of grim anger. “Where in Hades have you been?”
“J-just for a drive,” she lied.
“I’ve been worried sick about you.”
He was concerned for her, and she had been finding out his secrets behind his back.
“The blackmailer has been found,” he said.
“Oh, thank goodness.” Greybrooke would be cleared and so would Will.
“Don’t be thankful yet, Helena. The blackguard’s body was dragged out of the Thames.”
For a moment she just stared. He drained his brandy, watching her over the glass. Then her wits finally worked. “He drowned?”
“No. He was found in the river, but he was dead when he went into the water. Someone strangled him, then threw him in. Bow Street’s magistrate suspects that someone is me.” His tones were cool and jaded, but his hand gripped his glass.
First the accusations about Lady Blackbriar, about the maid. Now this. “Does he have any reason to suspect you?”
“You mean—did I do it?” His voice was a low, deadly growl.
“Goodness, no! I mean was it like Lady Blackbriar? Was there supposedly a witness?”
He inclined his head, admiration in his eyes. “Yes. A couple of butchers, heading to work before dawn, saw a man of my description push a body into the Thames.” He paused. “Do you believe it?”
He was challenging her. She could see it in his green eyes. “No, I don’t. Someone is doing this to you. It must stop!”
A grin came to Grey’s lips, but it was a bitter one, as if he were laughing just before a noose was dropped around his neck. “Indeed? You have decided it should stop, have you, angel?”
“Don’t make fun. I suppose that sounds silly, but I am fed up with this. I refuse to have you hounded or arrested for something you didn’t do.”
The fury in his eyes dissolved. “I agree, Miss Winsome. This has to stop, and I have something I didn’t have before. Now I know what the blackmailer looked like.” From his coat pocket, he drew out a folded sheet of foolscap from the pocket.
“The blackmailer’s body was taken to a mortuary in Whitechapel. I went to take a look—it was the first time I saw the villain without his mask. I produced this.” He unfolded the page. “It gives us something to show people to find out who he was. I want to connect him to Blackbriar.”
It was one of his remarkable drawings. On the white foolscap, a strikingly handsome man came to life. This was the face behind the eerie mask, the face of the man who’d threatened her life. Hatred boiled up, but so did a stronger feeling. A warm, aching, intense feeling directed at Greybrooke, who had saved her life.
“I haven’t forgotten Will Rains of that damned newspaper either. With all that’s happened, I haven’t had time to destroy his newssheet. Though he’s had time to print more lies.”
“He was forced to print those things! I don’t believe he was working with the blackmailer. Mr. Rains is innocent.”
Greybrooke stared at her in surprise. “How do you know all this?”
How could she tell him without giving herself away? “I—I went to see him. I believed what he told me. We have only the word of a criminal that Mr. Rains was involved. He has younger sisters. Please, Greybrooke, do not destroy him. Please wait.”
He hesitated, and her heart lodged so firmly in her throat she couldn’t breathe. Finally he said, “All right.”
Helena almost sobbed with relief. Will was safe for now.
“I am going to take that picture to St. Giles where the blackmailer met Orley. See if anyone recognizes it.”
“We must go at once,” she declared.
“Soon. There’s something I need to do first.”
“What could be more important than clearing your name? Than proving you innocent?”
“One thing.” Greybrook set down his drink and stood. “Making love to you. Something quick. I can’t be in a room with you without wanting you. Lean over that table, angel, and let me tie your hands.”
Startled, she did what he asked. And made remarkable discoveries.
Who knew sex could be so exhilarating when it was enjoyed in mere minutes? Who knew he could make her come so many times, so quickly?
He gave a soft, deep chuckle. “Yes, I suppose we should. But first let me fix your hair.”
Even on a gloriously sunny day, stepping into the Mast and Sails made Helena think she was climbing into a soot-filled closet. Dirt and grime clung to the windows, extinguishing any hope of daylight in the small room. At the bench tables, men hunkered over tankards of ale. In the corners, women sat in bedraggled finery with glasses of gin in their hands.
“Something should be done about such despair,” Helena murmured. After all, she knew how easy it was to tumble from respectability.
She felt Greybrooke’s gaze on her. Studying her. Had she said too much? Made him wonder about her past again?
To stop him from pondering—if he was—she asked, “What are you going to do?”
“Speak to someone.”
Every female eye had gone quickly to Greybrooke, but he singled out one woman, bestowing his stunning smile. She was middle-aged, her face marred by pockmarks. Wispy gray-brown curls stuck out beneath her gaudy purple bonnet. The woman shuffled away from the man beside her—a heavy-set, balding man—and scuttled toward Grey as he sat elegantly on the bench at her side. He ordered the woman a fresh drink.
Heavens, Helena thought, he was good.
She stayed near the door, watching as he took out the picture. Wariness came to the woman’s eyes. Greybrooke’s gaze held her captive though.
He drew out several gold sovereigns and dropped the coins into the woman’s hand. They fell with a melodious clink. The woman bent close to Greybrooke, cupped her hand to her mouth, and whispered something in his ear. He nodded, then he stood and bowed over the woman’s hand in parting.
Helena bit her lip as he prowled across the tavern to her. He had to duck since the timbered ceiling was so low.
“She will probably spend it all on drink,” she whispered.
“Agreed. But I cannot force the woman—her name is Mrs. Winslet—to change.”
“Sometimes you have to make people change whether they want to or not. I always have to do what is best for children.”
“There are some people you cannot change.”
Helena knew he meant himself. “I do not believe that.” She lowered her voice. “How did you know to speak to her?”
“Last time I was searching here, I was told Mrs. Winslet knows everyone in the stews. Now that I have the picture, she was able to help me. She is supposed to be able to tell fortunes too.”
“What did she tell you?”
“Something very valuable. And she told me my future, though I doubt her powers of prognostication.”
“Why doubt her?” Though Helena did not believe in any of that—in love she had stopped being practical, but she was determined to stay that way in everything else.
“She told me I was about to fall in love,” Greybrooke said.
She gaped at him in shock, then said quickly, “Did she tell you who the man is?”
“Come along, angel.”
He said nothing more about the prediction, nor did he reveal what else the woman said.
Finally, as the carriage rattled down the Strand, Helena exploded, “She gave you the man’s name. That’s why we’re racing so quickly. You must tell me who he is. We are in this together, and I want to know.”
Greybrooke sat across from her. “I suppose we are in this together. There’s no point in trying to protect you. You’re too stubborn. All right, his name is Turner, and he’s an actor. According to Mrs. Winslet, he’s been in several plays on Drury Lane. So we will show his picture around there.”
“An actor.” She thought of Whitehall, who had not been a real agent of the Crown. “Playing the part of a blackmailer?”
Greybrooke flashed an admiring look. “I wondered that myself.”
“But wouldn’t it have been a terrible risk?”
“Not if you intended all along to kill him.”
She shivered, struggled to make sense of it. “Why would Blackbriar blackmail his wife?”
“If he wanted to make her death look like a suicide, he needed to show she had motivation to take her own life. Escaping blackmail—and ruin—would give a strong reason.”
“But if he wants to make it appear that you murdered her, why give her motive to have taken her own life?”
“That’s the perverse madness of this.” With stunning coolness, he added, “All I can guess is that he wanted me to hang either for Caro’s murder or for the blackmailer’s murder.”
“Why would he hate you that much?”
“He was obsessive about Caroline.”
“You weren’t her lover though. You weren’t the father of her child.”
“I don’t know what Caroline told him—maybe she told Blackbriar I was the father to protect her real lover. Or perhaps she told him the truth and Blackbriar refused to believe it. He told me he believed she was always in love with me. Regardless, it doesn’t matter. She was my close friend, and she warned me that Blackbriar had always been jealous of our friendship.”
“Perhaps she really did love you.”
“She would have had no reason to. I never treated her as anything more than a friend. She wanted someone to give her what Blackbriar refused. Tenderness, kindness. Normal love. I couldn’t give her that. I’m more warped than Blackbriar.”
She hated to hear him say that. And say it with such cold acceptance. “That is not true. You have a terrible past and you must feel so much rage over it. But that is natural—what child would not be afraid to love and open his heart after enduring pain and torture from both his parents? After being whipped. Put in a trunk, for heaven’s sake. Your father was a complete madman and attacked his youngest daughter. I understand why you feel such pain, and why you have all this anger. But it doesn’t mean you have to feel that way forever.”
Greybrooke frowned. Helena had the suddenly sensation of a wall of ice growing instantly between them. Oh God—she realized what she’d said....
“How do you know about the trunk? How do you know about Maryanne? Who told you?”
Helena knew she could never think of a lie to explain how she could know something so specific, so she told him the truth. “I wanted to help you forget the past.”
I wanted it because I have a mad dream that I can be with you. Despite all the good sense I’ve learned to possess, I fantasize about being with you. About being loved by you.
She certainly didn’t let one word of that off her lips. He could draw back from her. Probably leave her in a minute if he knew how desperately she cared.
She took a calming breath. “I found your former governess, Miss Renshaw. From what she said, I realized what had happened. You are haunted by what happened to you. You are haunted by what happened to Lady Winterhaven and Lady Maryanne. Greybrooke, you mustn’t torment yourself. What could you have done?”
“We’re here,” was all he said.
The carriage had stopped near one of the theaters.
“I’ll show the picture.” She couldn’t sit in the carriage, knowing he was furious. She grasped the picture from his hand, flung open the door, and raced down the steps.
She went from one theater to the next, explaining to people that the man in the picture was a friend of her brother’s, that her brother was missing and she was praying this friend could help her. It had become so terribly easy to lie.
Greybrooke watched from the shadows. Helena felt his gaze on her like a burning brand.
Finally, at a theater called the Sans Pareil, which meant “Without Compare,” she found a young, pimply lad who was building a backdrop of a Venetian scene, and he recognized the picture at once.
“He’s one of the most popular actors here.” The redheaded lad hauled off his cap as he spoke to her. He blushed when he looked d
own into her eyes. “His name’s Richard Turner. He plays in all the risky plays. They call them the ‘burlettes’ or something like that.”
Helena knew those plays. Called burlettas, they were ribald versions of operettas from the Continent, filled with naughty jokes and scandalous innuendo.
Impetuously, she touched the young man’s hand. He puffed out his chest in front of her.
“Thank you so very much. You’ve been such a hero. I will never forget your kindness.”
“You’re welcome, miss. What’s yer name?”
She gulped and gave him a false one. Then quickly asked, “Do you know where Mr. Turner would live? I could ask him about my brother.”
“He’ll be at the theater tonight. I think he lives on Kean Street.”
Her heart thudded with excitement—they were getting close to finding who had hired Turner to act as a blackmailer, close to having proof it was Blackbriar, if it was him. But what was Whitehall’s role in this? Who was he?
Had Blackbriar really concocted all of this to see Greybrooke hang?
Keeping Miss Winsome behind him, Grey rapped on the door of No. 14 Kean Street, then shoved it open. The place was a rabbit warren of apartments. It appeared there were supposed to have been two residences on each of the three floors, but they had been divided into smaller and smaller spaces, with no logical method of marking the numbers. Neighbors claimed Richard Turner lived in an apartment on the third floor, the last on the left.
He did not like having Miss Winsome with him in what could prove a dangerous place. But she’d insisted on coming. He had seen the strain in her face. Knowing she was hurting so much, he couldn’t hurt her more by refusing to let her come.
She followed him down a dingy hallway with a floor that undulated like waves. At the last door, Grey knocked hard. He was preparing to break it down when it swung open to reveal a woman in a filmy muslin nightdress. Her breasts were caught together and lifted, for the nightgown was tight and the neckline was a low scoop. Blinking, the woman focused on him. “Who might you be then?” she purred.
