Regency Romance: More For A Duke (The Fairbanks Series - The Familial Adventures) (CLEAN Historical Romance)

by Bennett, Jessie

  So he had strayed. He’d had many affairs with women all over Europe during the first ten years of the century while he’d traveled on business. Every day since 1815, when he’d returned to his home in Fairfield County, whether he liked it or not, he thought about his last dalliance with the maid Abigail, who had borne him a child. He’d not heard from the woman after the affair ended, other than the announcement that she’d had a girl. His brother Abe had been involved, trying to help him avoid the scandal the birth would have created, and had been kind enough to inform Will of the gender of the child. However, Abe had mentioned nothing more and had never brought it up in the four years since then.

  When William woke to the sound of commotion outside his door, he sat up in bed, ready to take up his sword and cut someone from stem to stern. There was a knock on his door and then it swung open to reveal his butler, James.

  “Lord William, there is a problem with the lady. We cannot rouse her. Please come quickly.”

  Will was out of bed in a heartbeat, grabbing a thick robe from the chair next to his bed and throwing it around his shoulders as he made for the door. “What do you mean? Have you gone in Liza’s room? Is she ill?”

  “I am unsure of the facts, my lord. Only that Mary came to me crying, saying she cannot rouse the Lady Montgomery.”

  Will’s face collapsed in worry. He hurried beside his butler down the hallway to his wife’s room, which was not far from his. The door was standing ajar. He pushed it open and went through to see two of the maids standing over the bed. Mary, his wife’s personal maid, was holding Liza’s hand, patting it and speaking softly.

  “Lady Liza. Please wake up, my lady. Please wake up.” He could hear the tears in her voice.

  He approached the bed and rested one hand on Mary’s shoulder. She looked up. Tears had made her cheeks soaking wet. She turned away from him, lifting her apron to cover her face. “My Lord, I don’t think…I don’t think she’s alive.”

  William’s heart squeezed tight in his chest. He had not been in love with Liza for many years. Nevertheless, he had always cared about her well-being and never wanted to see any harm come to her. “How can this be?” he murmured, leaning to look closely at his wife. “She is so young.”

  “Yes, m’lord.”

  William reached out and touched Liza’s cheek with the back of his fingers. She felt cold to him. She was not moving. He could see that she was not breathing. Her chest did not rise and fall as it should have. He looked at James over his shoulder. “James, send a messenger to the constable and the doctor. We must remove Liza from here as quickly as possible. Also, have the messenger go to her parents’ home and fetch them.”

  Mary began to sob uncontrollably. Helen, the other maid who was also in the room, wrapped her arms around the woman’s shoulders and held on to her. She began to lead Mary out of the room, knowing William did not want to deal with her. William gave Helen a grateful look. Helen nodded.

  “Come along, Mary. Let’s go get some hot cocoa.”

  “Oh my lady…” Mary moaned, her voice muffled against the apron she was holding against her face. “My lady, oh my lady.”

  “It’s going to be all right, Mary. It’s going to be all right. She’s with Jesus now. She’s happier where she is, I’m sure.”

  William listened to Helen’s words of comfort. Liza probably was in Heaven. She certainly had no reason to go in the other direction. She’d always been a faithful wife, a dutiful woman who doted on William even though she had to have known he was dallying behind her back with other women all over Europe. She’d never voiced a word of concern, anger, hatred or anything negative.

  He inhaled deeply. He was now alone in the room with his dead wife. He sat on the edge of the bed and looked down at her. She looked more fragile than she ever had in real life. She was always small compared to his large stature. She was slender, with long blond hair that trailed down over her chest like strands of gold, waving and swirling at their own leisure. She’d never been able to tame her wild locks, so she generally let them flow free. Her hair was so fine, she’d been unable to find combs or ties that would stay in it.

  He touched the strands of hair and blinked back unexpected tears. “I’m so sorry we didn’t get along better, Liza,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry we couldn’t be a happy couple. I wanted to make you happy, I truly did. But…I guess it was just impossible for me. I’m so sorry, sweet woman.” He ran his fingers over her long locks of hair, trying to keep his tears to himself. “If things had been different between us, we would have been so happy. If we’d been able to have a child, if we…” William stopped. His words were useless and he felt stupid even saying them. They’d not had a child. They’d not had a happy marriage. It was only in the last few years that he had become able to control his desires for other women and give his attention to Liza. He’d been a terrible husband and he knew it. Even now, years into their marriage, he did not share the same room or the same bed with her.

  He’d given her a nearly loveless life. Without children, he’d been the only one to show her the kind of love every woman needed in order to be happy and to thrive. And he’d withheld it from her more than half the time. Nearly all the time, he would venture to say.

  He was ashamed.

  It would be hours before anyone came to see to Liza. He didn’t want to leave her alone in the room, whether she was alive or not. He pulled the cord behind her bed to ring the bell downstairs so that a maid would come up. It probably wouldn’t be Mary. The woman had barely been standing when she left.

  A few minutes later, Caroline came in, her face grey with distress, almost matching the color of her hair. “Yes, my lord,” she said when she entered.

  “Stay with Lady Liza.” He stood up and held his hand out toward his wife. “I…I cannot be in here anymore and no one will be here to see to her for at least an hour or more. I…I will be in my chambers when I am needed. Please come and get me from there when the doctor and constable arrive.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  “Have James bring me my morning tea. And I don’t want any food this morning.”

  “Yes, my lord.” Caroline nodded.

  He glanced one more time at the woman on the bed. It was a tragic morning. A morning he would never forget.

  * * *

  He was resting on his chaise lounge when the men he’d sent for arrived. He had remained there for the hour and nearly forty minutes it took for them to come. During that time, he had reminisced, thinking about his courtship with Liza, how much fun they had had together. She’d been a different woman then. When she found out that she was unable to have children, it was as though she’d shut down, cut herself off from the world. She wanted only to be with him, following him around like a puppy dog, catering to his every whim. She was not the happy, fun-loving girl he’d known before. In fact, she was no fun at all, crying when he was annoyed with her, begging for his attention when he was not prepared to give it.

  Was he cursed because of his past behavior? Would he ever meet a woman now, a woman to love, who would not be caught up by disaster and destruction?

  He ran through the last few years in his mind. He’d kept the fact that he’d fathered a child with the maid, Abigail, from Liza. Neither he nor his brother ever mentioned it or talked about it, so she could not have overheard a conversation revealing the information. If she had known, it would have crushed her to her very soul. William knew that. He was glad she had never found out.

  It didn’t seem to keep her from leaving him in death. For all he knew, his daughter and Abigail were also dead.

  The door was cracked open and James put in his head. “My Lord, Doctor Barnaby is here, as well as Constable Farashay. Would you like to come and talk to them?”

  William turned his head to look at his butler. “Yes, James, I will be right there. Please let them know.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  After James closed the door, William pushed himself up from the lounge and stretched his
large arms above his head. This chapter in his life was about to come to a close. He was free now to seek adventure and find another woman to love, this time without the bonds of matrimony holding him back. He wondered about Abigail. He wondered where she was and where his little girl was.

  With a fluttering heart, he moved to the dresser. He poured some water from the pitcher into the basin and splashed it on his face, rubbing his hands together. A soft white towel sat next to the basin. He used it to dry himself.

  “It’s going to be a long day,” he murmured. He’d have to inform everyone of the tragedy and make funeral arrangements. The doctor would most likely remove Liza’s body from the estate, relieving him of that duty.

  He would give Liza a proper funeral and burial. He would make sure she was comfortable in a fine coffin. Perhaps he would have lilies carved into the side of the coffin. The lily was her favorite flower.

  As he passed through his doorway and out into the hall, his mind went back to Abigail. He could see the little Irish maid in his mind. Abigail O’Reilly. Where would she be now? Would she still be in the employ of the Worthingtons? He hadn’t seen her there since they’d had their tryst in her attic loft. He’d only been back to the estate four times and it was while accompanying his brother, Abe, who had business with the Worthingtons on a regular basis. Abe was at the mansion at least twice a month. However, he’d never mentioned Abigail to William. Not once.

  He wondered if Abigail’s daughter looked like her or like him. If he had to bet, he would say the little girl looked like her mother. He’d noticed in the past that the Irish had strong genes. They all seemed to look similar to each other, even when they were only cousins. The golden red hair was a dead give-away, and if the red was more prominent, that was nearly a guarantee.

  He passed through the open door to Liza’s room, one last tear of regret sliding slowly down his face, only to be wiped away hastily by his large hand.

  * * *

  CHAPTER TWO

  LUNCH WITH NIGEL AND ABE

  Will scanned the crowd, his eyes narrowed to focus on each face until he found the ones he was seeking. The restaurant was elegant, clean and quiet. Just how he liked it. He hadn’t seen Abraham in many months. They were not always happy with each other’s presence, so they spent time together only when it was needed.

  When that time came, they enjoyed being around each other. Abe’s face was not happy today, but William knew why. Liza had had very few friends and didn’t know Abe, her parents-in-law or their sister Meg well. But she’d been a member of the family nonetheless and Abe was feeling the loss. William inhaled deeply. His brother was a kind-hearted man, a widower and father to 15-year-old Carter. In some ways, William felt like Carter was more mature at 15 than he was at 35.

  He reached the table and extended his hand to Abe. “Abraham Montgomery, my brother. How are you on this fine afternoon?”

  “I’m well, brother. I’m well. It is good to see you. Please sit. Nigel and I were just talking about the tragedy, the loss of your dear Liza. How are you taking it?”

  The men sat down after William shook Nigel’s hand and bowed slightly to him. “Duke Huntington,” he greeted the man before answering his brother. “I’m doing as well as can be expected, Abe. You know me better than anyone and you know all of what I’ve done and been through as well.” He turned his eyes to Nigel for a moment, who nodded. “And you as well, Nigel. You are privy to my private information, are you not? Therefore, I am sure you know that I am very saddened by Liza’s sudden passing, but it has freed me of a burden I thought would never end.”

  Abe’s face flushed, highlighting his cheeks with a deep red color.

  Nigel looked down at his plate, where the rind of a hunk of bread he’d been eating sat invitingly. He stared at it for a moment before picking it up and putting it into his mouth. He was aware of the awkward situation his friend faced and for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out how it affected him in any way. He shook his head.

  “You need not worry about me, William,” he said and lifted his eyebrows. “I know what you are thinking and how you must be feeling. I know you very well. And if you were expressing great pangs of sorrow and tears, I would suspect you were not yourself anymore, and that we had been invaded by an imposter somehow.”

  “I loved her,” William retorted almost instinctively. He sounded defensive and he knew it.

  “You certainly did,” Abe said. “You would not have tried to change after…the incident and tried to be faithful and good to her if you didn’t love her.”

  “I must agree…I did not love her properly though. I’m afraid she probably died a very unhappy woman.”

  “I don’t know about that.” Nigel swallowed his bread. “She was always smiling when I saw her. She may have been in pain and keeping it hidden, of course. But it didn’t look that way to me. She was so proud of you, Will. She always had that look of complete adoration on her face. She loved you more than anything. So any attention you did give her, I must say, she soaked it up like a sponge.”

  “It sustained her,” Abe agreed. A server brought three fresh glasses of wine and took William’s order. When the young girl was gone from the table, Abe continued. “I agree with Nigel. She probably was very upset in her mind, maybe even daily. But the fact that you did not throw her to the wayside must have meant everything to Liza.”

  “May I ask…” Nigel sat forward. “What exactly caused her death?”

  William shook his head. “It appears she slipped away in the night. Her heart stopped beating. She stopped breathing. She died for no obvious reason.”

  “Was she suffering from any diseases?”

  “None that I knew of.”

  “Do you think she may have been hiding something from you?”

  “I…I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

  “The doctor would surely have told him if there was something medically wrong with Liza,” Abe said to Nigel, who looked thoughtful.

  “That is true.”

  William nodded. “I don’t think any doctor would have kept such information from me. What call would they have not to warn me that something was wrong with my wife since I would need to prepare myself?”

  “Do you think she ingested anything poisonous that could have contributed to this?” Nigel asked.

  William raised his eyebrows. “You have quite the imagination, friend.”

  “I don’t think it’s that far-fetched,” Abe interjected. “She was a frail creature. Not very sound of mind or body. Perhaps the poison was administered by her own hand.”

  William felt a chill run through his body. “You believe she took her own life?” he asked, his voice incredulous.

  “I’m saying it is a possibility. You must admit, it is.”

  William looked down at the table. He picked up his glass and took a swallow before answering. “Yes, damn you. You are right.”

  “I am sorry to bring up such a terrible thought.”

  William shook his head. “Do not fret. I am willing to consider it as an option, but Liza was a religious woman and believed that to harm oneself or kill oneself was a mortal sin against God. I don’t think she would risk being wrong about that.”

  Abe lifted his eyebrows. “I did not know she was religious.”

  William nodded. “She was.”

  “That changes what I’ve said then. I must doubt that if she was religious, she would have taken her own life.”

  “I believe her heart just gave out. She was weak. Her condition was getting worse during the last few months. I did notice and I did inquire with her. She simply said that her sleeping was not restful and that she was tired. I can do nothing to help if I am not asked.”

  “Did you require that she see the doctor?”

  “I did. She was given a diagnosis of fatigue. But Liza never did anything to tire herself. So she could not do less than she was already doing without being bedridden, which would have been just as bad, in my opinion.”

  �
��I agree.” Nigel nodded. “She needed sunshine and fresh air outside the mansion walls.”

  “Yes. And that she got. I made sure the gardens were filled with her favorite flowers and trees and that she had a place to rest on a comfortable bench near a pond. It has beautiful scenery all around it. She often took her sketchpad and would draw what she saw, the little animals and the pretty flowers and such. I’m telling you, she was content, whether she was ill or not. I knew her well. I didn’t see a hint of deception.”

  “If anyone would know, Will, it would be you.” Abe was satisfied. “And she had no enemies, so there is no chance this was done by another.”

  “She barely had any friends. I am certain she could not have angered anyone enough to cause her death.”

  “I agree.”

  “Do you have a plan?” Abe asked. “Now that you are free of your marital bonds?”

  “I am going to travel.”

  Neither man looked surprised. William had done a fair amount of traveling even when he was married.

  “Where will you go that you haven’t been?” Abe asked.

  “America. I’m going on a ship to New Bedford, in the state of Massachusetts.”

  Nigel raised his eyebrows. “I have been there. I will give you the names of a few business associates so you will immediately be in good company.”

  William smiled. “Thank you, Nigel, I very much appreciate that.”

  “I must admit, I didn’t expect you to say America, Will. I wonder what it will be like there this time of year?”

  “I will be finding out in a few weeks. I have chartered the ship already and bought my ticket across the ocean.”

  “That was fast. Are you sure you did not already have this planned?”

  William raised his eyebrows. “You imply that somehow I knew Liza would die? Are you accusing me of something?” The lighthearted tone he used indicated he believed no such thing.