Wicked Christmas (Regency Sinners 8)

by Carole Mortimer

  Monique nodded. “That might be best, Your Grace.” She had no interest in further pursuing the previous conversation.

  “Very well.” The duke nodded abruptly.

  The beginning, Monique soon learned, was Napoleon’s escape from the island of Elba, and the battles and bloodshed that followed.

  By the time the duke had finished speaking, Monique was sitting in one of the armchairs, her legs no longer feeling capable of supporting her.

  The duke had explained that Napoleon’s escape had been facilitated by a spy amongst the English aristocracy, and that he and his friends, those gentlemen known as the Sinners, had been charged with finding the traitor. A traitor the duke had eventually discovered, after many trials and tribulations, resided within his own household: Lady Jacqueline Kingston, his own mother-in-law and Angelique’s mother.

  Monique needed no further explanation as to how Lady Jacqueline had died, as she knew the penalty for treason was to hang.

  She was also no longer in any doubt as to what the duke believed her to be guilty of. “You think because I was personally employed by Lady Jacqueline and my name is French that I must somehow have been involved in her treasonous acts.” Tears stung her eyes. Tears she refused to allow to fall. There would be plenty of time for that once she had left Stonewell Park.

  “No—”

  “Absolutely not—”

  “Yes,” the duke stated firmly over the protest of his wife and the doctor.

  Monique rose gracefully to her feet, looking neither left nor right at she steadily met Stonewell’s accusing gaze. “I am as English as any of you, despite my name. I was born here. My father was English,” she added in a halting voice. “Earlier, you accused me of hiding something. You are quite correct, and if you knew what that something is, then perhaps you would not be so eager to throw out these false accusations. But I assure you, my secret is not, nor was it ever, that I am guilty of colluding with your mother-in-law in the act of treason.”

  “Monique—”

  “No.” She stepped aside as Martin would have reached for her, refusing to look at him as her gaze remained firmly fixed on the Duke of Stonewell. “I cannot and will not defend myself in any other way than to state I have never acted in a manner which would cause harm to you or the duchess, your son, your family and friends, to England or the Crown.”

  “Then what are you hiding?”

  Her smile was edged with bitterness. “A childish hope which did not stand up to the test of reality.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” the duke demanded.

  Monique gave a shake of her head. “You would not believe me if I told you. Not without proof, and I have none.” Her shoulders straightened with determination. “As you requested, I have answered your questions. I owe you no further explanation than the one I have already given. Now, if you will excuse me, I wish to return to my bedchamber, gather up my few belongings, and leave here and all of you as soon as suitable arrangements can be made.” She swept majestically from the room.

  “Well, that did not go at all as I expected it would,” Stonewell murmured.

  “That is because you are an arrogant arse who cannot see any further than the end of your aristocratic nose.” Martin snapped his disgust with Stonewell’s overbearing handling of such a delicate situation. Poor Monique had looked positively devastated.

  “You know, you can take this impertinent younger brother thing too far,” the older man snorted.

  Martin grimaced. “Are you satisfied now that Monique is innocent of treason, or is it your intention to accuse her of cruelty to small animals and children next?” He strode purposefully toward the open doorway.

  “Where are you going?” Stonewell demanded.

  Martin gave him a scathing glance. “To beg on my knees for Monique’s forgiveness, if I have to, for having stood by and even allowed that conversation to take place.”

  “What is it she is hiding, do you think?” Stonewell mused.

  “No, Martin!” The duchess hastily stepped forward and took a grasp of his arm as it swung back in readiness for punching the older man on the nose. “Nik did not mean it that way.” She glanced thoughtfully in the direction of the doorway through which Monique had so recently disappeared. “I wonder…”

  Stonewell gave her a sharp glance. “What do you wonder, my love?”

  Her cheeks became flushed. “Something so incredulous, considering what we have already learned today, I am not sure I dare even speak it out loud. But it is a possible explanation as to why my mother might have offered Monique employed.”

  “Which is?”

  The duchess gave a slow shake of her head. “Monique is very beautiful and her demeanor one of refinement and delicacy.”

  “She is all of that and more,” Martin agreed warmly.

  “I have never denied her suitability as a lady’s maid,” Stonewell defended.

  Martin glared. “You all but accused her of committing treason!”

  The older man glared back. “She readily admitted she has been harboring a secret all this time!”

  “But not that of treason.” The duchess straightened, her brow clearing. “I should like the two of you to accompany me to the west wing. I have something I wish to show you, and then we shall all go to Monique’s room.”

  Stonewell scowled. “You are being very mysterious, my love,” he complained as the two men were given no choice but to follow in the duchess’s—Angelique’s—wake.

  Martin’s mood was just as impatient, his only desire being to go to Monique and assure her of his faith in her. To hope that their intimacy together last night meant as much to her as it did to him. Enough that she might listen to him, at least.

  Chapter 17

  Monique’s control lasted only as long as it took to reach her bedchamber and close the door behind her, at which time the tears cascaded hotly and unchecked down the pallor of her cheeks.

  Not only was she now completely estranged from ever seeing either of the Stonewells again, but she had lost Martin too. Her dismissal a year ago had given her the time to accept she would be allowed no part in the duke and duchess’s future life, but the loss of Martin was beyond bearing.

  Because she had fallen in love with him.

  From the first, she had been more attracted to Martin than to any other man. To his dark good looks. His intelligence. His impeccable code of honor.

  A code of honor he had broken when he made love to her in his surgery yesterday, and then again last night in his bedchamber here.

  Monique had hoped then it might be because Martin was as enamored with her as she was with him. Indeed, his actions yesterday evening and last night had seemed to confirm that he was.

  Monique gave a start of alarm as the door was suddenly thrown open and the Duchess of Stonewell entered, her young son held securely in her arms. The duke and Martin followed behind her, supporting a heavy weight covered by a sheet, which it took them some few seconds to maneuver through the doorway.

  Monique quickly wiped the evidence of the tears from her cheeks as she rose to her feet. “What is all this about?” she demanded as the two men propped the oblong object against one of the walls.

  “I am not sure if you have ever been to the picture gallery in the west wing?” the duchess spoke conversationally.

  She shook her head. “I have never had reason to go creeping about the hallways, no matter what others might think to the contrary.” She gave the duke a pointed glance.

  “Really, Nik, you have behaved abominably toward this poor girl,” the duchess remonstrated. “I believe you owe her an apology.”

  “Several of them,” Martin interjected grimly. “As do I,” he added huskily.

  It made Monique’s heart ache to look at him, but she made herself do so nonetheless. “If you are apologizing for last night, then please do not. If it is for believing me guilty of treason—”

  “I never believed you guilty of that!” Martin protested as he strode to her sid
e and grasped both her hands in his. “I was so certain you were not guilty, I made the mistake of agreeing to allow Stonewell to question you without interference.” He held her gaze with his. “An agreement I deeply regret if it has led you to believe I ever thought you guilty of doing anything underhanded.”

  A heavy weight lifted from Monique’s chest at the sincerity she could see in Martin’s eyes and expression.

  “Nor do I intend to apologize for what has been the best night of my life,” he added huskily. “I am hoping we shall have many more such nights together—”

  “Martin, there will be time for that conversation once the two of you are alone,” Stonewell interrupted dryly. “For the moment, my wife has something she wishes to show Monique.” His voice had gentled.

  In fact, the duke’s whole demeanor was softer than Monique had ever seen it before, other than when he was with his wife and son. Certainly there was none of the accusation and suspicion she had seen toward her in his face earlier.

  “Monique?” Angelique Sinclair prompted softly.

  She drew in a deep breath before turning to look at the other woman, grateful when Martin retained his grasp of one of her hands.

  “I thought you might like to see this.” The older woman handed her son to her husband before reaching out to lift and then pull aside completely the concealing sheet over the object the two men had carried into the room just minutes ago.

  Monique felt the color drain from her cheeks as she stared at the revealed portrait. It was of a blond-haired gentleman, possibly aged in his thirties, with warm blue eyes and a gentle smile curving the fullness of his lips. A gentleman Monique instantly recognized.

  “I believe this is your father,” Angelique murmured.

  Monique’s vision was suddenly blinded by the fresh onset of tears. “But not, as I had always believed, our father,” she murmured brokenly even as she pulled free of Martin to reach out with trembling fingers and touch the face in the portrait. A dearly beloved face. One similar to her own but more manly in nature.

  “Perhaps not in a biological sense, no,” the duchess conceded huskily. “But in all the ways that mattered, Jeremy Kingston, a man who only ever showed me gentleness and love, was my true father.”

  Monique glanced at the older woman. “You always knew he was not your father?”

  “Not until a year ago, when my mother took great delight in informing me she was already pregnant with a married man’s child when she married Jeremy Kingston,” the duchess acknowledged heavily. “A feckless man who I have since learned died of an excess of alcohol twenty years ago.”

  Monique gave a pained frowned. “I am sorry.”

  “I never knew the man,” Angelique dismissed.

  “Did…did Lord Kingston know?”

  “Of my mother’s dishonesty?” She shook her head. “Not until after I was born only seven months into the marriage. But he loved me anyway,” she stated with certainty. “He also protected me, I have since realized, from the worst of my mother’s vicious nature.”

  “I… I had always believed… My father never called you anything but his daughter. Nor did he ever try to hide from us that he had another family,” she assured the duchess.

  “You saw him often during your childhood?”

  She nodded. “As often as his marriage and Lady Jacqueline’s absences would allow.”

  Angelique smiled. “He was always the very best of fathers.”

  “In contrast, your mother is—was—a cruel woman,” Monique stated with distaste. “She liked to play games with the emotions and hearts of others.” She drew in a shuddering breath. “She came to see me shortly after my mother’s death, having discovered from some letters she found amongst her husband’s papers that revealed he had a child with another woman.” Her chin rose. “My mother was never in good health after my father died, and that winter, she succumbed to the influenza. I truly believe the cause of death to be a broken heart. They loved each other deeply.”

  “I am so glad he had that, and both of you, in his life,” Angelique said emotionally. “As I am sorry his sense of honor would not allow him to abandon me to his wife’s untender mercies.”

  “He loved you dearly.”

  Angelique drew in a shaky breath. “As I loved him. I am concluding that he died too suddenly and far too young to have even thought to make the necessary financial provision for you and your mother?”

  Monique swallowed. “Yes.”

  The duchess sighed. “Having been left completely alone in the world, my mother’s offer of employment must have seemed like a godsend.”

  She nodded. “But one that became hell on earth when she then took every opportunity to taunt and ridicule the fact I was illegitimate. I would not have stayed if not for your kindness to me, the affection I had grown to feel for you, believing you were my half sister. Then to have Lady Jacqueline tell me a year ago, before she cast me off, that the two of us are not sisters after all—” She broke off abruptly, biting her trembling lower lip.

  “Monique.” The duchess reached out to grasp Monique’s free hand in both her own. “Whatever our biological birth—I am the daughter of a rake who could not and would not marry my mother and refused to make provision for me, and you are the true daughter of a loving and truly wonderful gentlemen—we are sisters in every way that matters. We are sisters of our father’s heart.” She gently took Monique into her arms and hugged her.

  It was true. Never at any time had Monique ever had reason to doubt her father’s love, for herself or for his other daughter, Angelique. He had loved them both equally, of that she was certain.

  Monique drew in a shaky breath as she drew back from that hug. “So what happens now?”

  “There is plenty of time, the whole of our lives, for us to get to know each other as the sisters we are,” Angelique stated firmly. “But for now, Nik and I are going to leave you and Martin alone together so that the two of you can talk in private. But we shall expect the two of you to join us downstairs for family Christmas luncheon at three o’clock.”

  Monique eyed the Duke of Stonewell warily as he stepped forward to first grasp and then lift her hand to his lips. “Welcome to our family, Monique.”

  Color heated her cheeks. “I have never expected to be accepted into your family. I only ever wished to get to know the lady who I believed was my sister.”

  The duke straightened. “Angelique is your sister from this moment on,” he assured. “And if my wife can accept Martin as my brother,” he drawled, “then I can most certainly accept you as her sister. You are far easier on the eye, for one thing.”

  “Arrogant arse,” Martin muttered.

  “Impertinent puppy,” Stonewell returned without rancor before joining his wife outside in the hallway.

  He closed the door softly behind them, leaving Monique and Martin completely alone in the silence of her bedchamber.

  Chapter 18

  “Brother…?”

  Martin gave a grimace at Monique’s obvious bewilderment. “It seems we were both hiding something.”

  She swallowed. “The duke is the older brother you spoke of?”

  “Half brother,” he qualified dryly before chuckling. “You should have seen Stonewell’s face when he learned the truth!”

  She shook her head. “I cannot even begin to imagine it.”

  “It was…satisfying to be able to knock him on his arrogant arse for once, if I am being completely honest,” Martin admitted ruefully before a frown creased his brow. “Although perhaps I should not feel that way when Angelique assures me her husband and I are very alike.”

  “You are,” Monique confirmed, some of the tension leaving her shoulders. “I am pleased for you, Martin.”

  He looked at her searchingly. “Are you not equally as pleased for yourself?”

  Her smile did not quite reach her eyes. “The duchess has been very kind.”

  “But?”

  “The truth is, I am not really her sister.”
/>   His mouth tightened. “Lady Jacqueline sounds like a monster.”

  Monique gave a shudder. “She was.”

  “She hurt you deeply.”

  “Yes,” she sighed. “For three years, I put up with her spiteful jibes about my birth and horrible comments about my mother, but only because I believed Angelique was my true sister, and I wished…wanted…”

  “To know your only family, as I did,” Martin acknowledged gently. “There is nothing wrong with that.”

  “No,” she agreed shakily. “But none of what I had believed for so many years was true.” She swallowed. “How can I possibly now accept the duchess’s generosity of heart when there is no real blood connection between us?”

  Martin wanted nothing more than to take Monique in his arms, to reassure her of the duchess’s sincerity, but she appeared so emotionally fragile, he feared a single touch might shatter her control completely. That the way in which Lady Jacqueline Kingston had so cruelly told Monique the truth, after deceiving her for so many years, had broken Monique’s heart in a way she might never accept the family connection the duke and duchess so generously offered her.

  Instead of touching Monique, he walked over to look at the portrait of Jeremy Kingston. “Your father sounds as if he was both a kind and honorable man.”

  She smiled sadly. “Was it honorable and kind to have an affair with another woman and a child out of wedlock?”

  “When his wife was as vicious and underhand as Lady Jacqueline proved to be? Yes,” Martin stated firmly. “She tricked him into marrying her. Both lied and cheated to have her way. From what I have heard of her, she also used the deep love Kingston felt for her daughter as a means of forcing him into continuing with the marriage.”

  “She did,” Monique acknowledged heavily. “I have no doubt whatsoever that he loved my mother and would have left his wife if not for Angelique.”

  “I repeat, your father was a kind and honorable man.”