Chapter Seven
January 17
Olivia glanced up from her notebook to see Price, Pennhyll’s butler, in the doorway of the tower parlor she already thought of as her unofficial office. She closed the cover in case his eyesight was better than she thought. The pewter-haired butler watched with what she fancied was a gaze of sorrowful concern. He always seemed on the verge of a solemn delivery of terrible news or just leaving to attend a dear friend’s funeral. Good morning, Miss. I regret to report the world has come to an end.
“Yes, Price?” she asked.
“My lord Tiern-Cope requests a moment of your time this morning, Miss.”
Her heart slammed against her ribs, but she lifted her pen and squinted a little so Price would think she was consumed by thought instead of caught completely off guard by the summons. She wasn’t ready. She’d let herself believe he didn’t mean to follow through, and was relieved to think so, too.
Price gestured toward the door. “He is most anxious to speak with you.” She put away her pen, blotted her journal page and slid the book into the desk drawer. She had a sudden recollection of Tiern-Cope staring at her before they left the churchyard in Far Caister. Eyes like blue ice. A ruthless man. No mercy in him. None whatever.
The butler waited while she draped her shawl around her shoulders, which she fussed over more than necessary. “This way, Miss.”
She followed him from the salon. She felt like a criminal on her way to the gallows. They turned a corner to a wood-carved hallway. A hard left took them through a closet lined with shelves of jars and dried plants and then into a saloon of ivory and blue accented in yellow the shade of new butter. Olivia frowned at his back while he opened a double set of doors leading to a parlor of crimson and grey. She did not think herself far wrong in supposing Price was taking her to the earl’s private quarters. Where they were unlikely to be interrupted. No wonder Price disapproved. From the parlor, they passed through a withdrawing room with gilt doors.
“Mind your step here, Miss Willow.” He stopped at the next set of doors but instead of opening them tapped on one of the gilt panels. “Miss Willow, my lord.”
“Permission to enter.” That voice gave no hint of anything but that the speaker possessed a soul of granite, which did nothing to quell the racing of her pulse.
Price opened the door and nodded as she passed him. Although not large, the room imposed on her senses. To her right, three high, arching windows let in early light of day and offered a sweeping view of the hill falling away from the rear of the castle. Portraits lined the opposite wall from above the wainscoting to the ceiling. She noticed little else after that, for Lord Tiern-Cope stood from the desk. Hands clasped behind his back, he made the very slightest of motions with his head, conveying at once both an acknowledgment of her and, so she imagined, his approval at seeing her. He must have expected her to refuse. She ought to. She wanted to.
“Thank you, Price,” he said. “Dismissed.”
“My lord.” Price bowed and on his way out, very pointedly left the door open.
Tiern-Cope glanced at the desktop and set aside a stack of papers. A tray with a teapot, one cup, a saucer and a half-eaten scone took up the space to his right. To his left sat a wooden chest about a foot square. She supposed he locked the household cash and his most important papers in the chest. He gestured to a tufted armchair, inviting her to sit. “At ease, Miss Willow.” All business. Not a drop of warmth. She had no idea what to expect. Except that she would at last know what she’d come to Pennhyll to remember, for she had no doubt as to the reason for his summons.
“My lord.” She perched on the edge of the chair, fighting the urge to put a hand to her aching head. Lack of sleep, she decided. Since coming to Pennhyll, she’d begun having nightmares again, horrible dreams of someone threatening her, of running and running and however fast she ran, never escaping. She’d not slept well since. “I’m ready.”
Still standing, he moved another sheet of paper to the pile on his right, ignoring the chest, the tea and her. He wore fawn breeches, a brown waistcoat and a camel hair jacket. Despite the informality of his dress, he seemed more formal than ever. No level of informality disguised his Alexander looks. What, she wondered, would happen if the present Tiern-Cope ever learned to smile? Half the women in Far Caister swooned over him without his mouth so much as twitching. If ever he did crack a smile, she suspected the rest would swoon, too, while the other half fainted dead away. He looked up, and the question seemed irrelevant. This man surely never smiled in all his life and never would. “I have not been myself since I came to Pennhyll, Miss Willow. I do not sleep well.”
“An epidemic, it seems.”
His icy gaze fell colder yet. “I am well aware of my social shortcomings, Miss Willow, and I hope you will make an allowance for them, as well as forgive me for bringing you here in order that we may be private.”
Her heart flew to her throat. “I imagine it’s necessary. Privacy.”
He gave her a stare that made her wish she’d chosen a chair at a farther remove from his desk. Lord, that icy-blue gaze could peel paint from the walls. “Are you absolutely certain,” he said, “that you agree to this?”
“Yes.”
“Then I may expect your full cooperation.”
“Yes.”
He looked at her. “My lord.” After a long moment, he said, “I will have you know your place, Miss Willow, and have you stay in it. Is that understood?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“What is your income per annum?”
“It varies, sir.”
“Let me ask the question another way. May I presume that your father left you and your mother adequately provisioned for his absence?”
“No. He did not.”
“Your father owned property. A not inconsiderable estate.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And he took no steps to provide for his family?”
“It seems not.”
“You will not be disrespectful.” He spoke in an uninflected tone, but the effect was worse than a shout.
“I cannot believe he left us nothing.” She met his gaze and found no comfort in the chill blue depths. “I engaged an attorney to look into Papa’s estate.”
“And?”
“Nothing came of it but his bills.”
He moved from behind his desk until he stood before her, hands clasped behind his back. “Had you no guardian?”
“My uncle, I suppose.”
“You don’t know?”
“I was ten when my father died. No one told me what was going on. My uncle looked after us. For a while.”
“What does your uncle say about your fortune?”
“He passed on seven or eight years ago. My cousin Mr. Hew Willow has the estate now.”
“Why doesn’t he look after you?”
“I do not know.”
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know. He’s been away. We don’t correspond.”
“Miss Willow.”
“There was talk of a duel, sir. I heard, and I believe, that he fled England because he killed a man. Or nearly so. I do not know the particulars.”
“A swordsman, I take it.”
“I’ve no idea. My cousin is considered an excellent huntsman, though. He lives for shooting. He would surely have used a pistol.”
“You have no guardian and the man who ought to be responsible for you is not. How, then, do you support yourself? Are you a charity case? A burden upon the parish?”
“I have a small stipend from teaching in Far Caister.” She stared at his neck cloth in a vain attempt to avoid the chill blue eyes.
“And yet,” he said in words sharp enough to cut paper, “you are compelled to carry away food from my kitchens.”
Her eyes snapped to his, and she felt her face go hot. “My lord?”
“Do not play the fool with me. I well know you are not.”
“What does this have to do with your brother?”
“A great deal, since it speaks to your character. Or lack thereof. The fact is, I have been asking after you, and I am no longer at ease with my previous opinion of you. You’re not at all what you seem. What you pretend to be. I will call you to account for that.”
“I hope, my lord, that you will not blame your staff for their generosity.”
“Do not concern yourself with my staff. They understand their duties.”
“If you will send me your bill, I will repay you. My lord.”
“Have you ever been robbed, Miss Willow? Of possessions. You or your mother, perhaps.”
“No.”
His eyebrows rose. “Proper respect, Miss Willow,” he softly said.
“No, my lord.”
“Perhaps you aren’t aware of the loss. Perhaps you believe certain valuables of yours were merely mislaid.”
“No.”
“Are you certain?”
“My lord.” She took a trembling breath. “I regret my recent actions exceedingly. You have made me understand I should not have done so. I assure you, I will not in future.”
“Why aren’t you married? What was it you said? ‘Never loved and never in love?’”
“Yes. My lord.”
“Is that why you jilted Mr. Verney?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Don’t waste my time, Miss Willow. Why did you jilt Mr. Verney?”
“I did no such thing.” She watched him walk to the door and close it. The lock engaged.
“He tells me you broke off the engagement. One of you is lying.”
Her voice fell just short of a whisper. “He made his reluctance more than plain, and so I released him from his promise. A clergyman cannot have a wife connected with scandal.”
“And your heart?” Tiern-Cope returned to her and stopped six inches from her knees. “Was it irreparably crushed?”
The words lodged in the back of her throat. She swallowed hard. “I thought he loved me. I was wrong.”
“Did you jilt him because someone better came along?”
“No one did, my lord. Isn’t that plain enough? I have red hair,” she said.
Something flickered across his expression, consternation perhaps, or surprise. “Believe me, your hair is not the impediment you think.” He gave a short laugh. “I dare say some men find your hair quite compelling.”
“Red hair or not, I am nearly twenty-five.” The familiar pain of loss hit hard. “I am too old and too poor.”
“Not the first blush of youth, I agree, but not so decrepit that you might not find a protector should you set your mind to the matter. Why, I do believe there’s at least one man here who would happily put himself forward in just such a capacity.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Not so long ago, my brother, perhaps?”
The room went quiet as the grave. Instead of making an imprudent retort, which she was quite certain he would have been pleased to crush beneath his metaphorical boot heel, she folded her hands on her lap and regarded him thoughtfully. “I think, my lord, I deserve to know what you mean by that.”
“How long did Andrew support you?”
“He didn’t. Why would he?”
Tiern-Cope curled the edge of his mouth at her denial. “He was generous.”
“Yes, of course. But what on earth does that have to do—” Then, she understood. Two spots of color flamed in her cheeks, she felt them hot as embers. “What a vile thing to suggest.” She spoke softly because everything in the world depended upon her remaining calm. “That I would deceive Lady Tiern-Cope, who was my friend, in such a despicable manner.”
“Miss Willow, let me make myself quite plain.”
“I think you have.”
“You were Andrew’s lover.”
“No.”
“He was a handsome man, Miss Willow, who deserved his reputation as a rake. He collected mistresses the way other men collect snuff boxes. You would not be the first young lady to fall prey to a charming rogue.”
“I never did.” Her head pounded, and she put her hands to her temples, wishing she could rub away the throbbing pain.
“Don’t hide your face from me. I said I’d call you to account, and I will. I wonder what is your true character. Innocent spinster or desperate female who steals from her host? Neither James nor his sister, thank God, have any idea of what went on between you and my brother.”
“Nothing did.”
His lip curled. “Well, perhaps James does know, and that’s why he’s after you like a dog after a—”
She shot to her feet. “How dare you? You—You—You—spalpeen.”
“That’s the worst you can think of? Spalpeen?”
“If I were a man, I’d—I’d—”
One eyebrow lifted. “What?”
“I don’t know. I’d—”
“Shoot me dead?”
“Your brother was my friend.”
“Your particular friend?”
“He was kind to me and nothing, nothing ever happened between us. Andrew was good and kind, and never, ever anything else. You’re just like all the others. Men who think my hair means I cannot control my passions. That I haven’t a good character. Well, I do have. I defy you to prove otherwise.”
“Miss Willow,” he said crisply, striding to his desk. He swept a hand above the box. “Do you recognize this?”
“No.”
“Look closer.”
“Why?”
“Because I told you to.” He pushed the chest across the desk. It skidded, but stopped just before the far edge. Metal straps curved over the rounded top of dark wood. “Well?”
“If it’s full of money, yes, it’s mine.”
“Answer me.”
“I’ve never seen it before.”
He flicked up the metal tongue. “Are you quite certain?”
“Of course.”
The top opened with a chirp of stiff hinges. More quickly than her eye could follow, he turned the chest toward her. “Look inside, Miss Willow, and tell me that again.”
His mouth thin with anger made her heart hammer, but she felt nothing. No emotion whatever. In his view whatever was inside damned her. She walked to the desk and looked into the chest with no idea what she would see but certain whatever it was would be easily explained. And then let him grovel with his apology.
On the very top of the jumble of items inside lay her father’s watch, engraved with his name and the outline of the tree that represented their family name. Her heart swelled. Tangled in one of the fobs was a slender gold chain with a willow-engraved medallion, a gift from her father just a few months before he died. His signet ring, two bracelets and several dozen buttons. Her brother’s pocket knife. Beneath those, a pair of kidskin gloves, an ivory fan, tortoiseshell hair-combs, embroidered handkerchiefs, a set of silver brushes and combs. The trappings of a life long-lost to her.
“My dear Miss Willow,” he drawled, shaking his head in mock disappointment. “How could you have been so careless with your things?”
She touched the watch and the pocket knife. “I thought I’d never see these again. How did you—Where did you get them?”
“Andrew.”
Their eyes met over the chest. Anger and suspicion filled his, not that his reaction mattered anymore. “How is that possible?” Oh, her heart was going to break. Surely, it would.
He pointed at the open chest. “You’re a clever girl. Let’s see how fast you think on your feet. Explain how your belongings came to be here. In my bother’s effects.”
“I don’t know.”
“He was a married man, Miss Willow.”
Her hand flew through the air. He caught her wrist, stopping her palm inches from his cheek. “You have no right,” she said. “No right at all to level such an accusation.”
“On the contrary. I have every right. Did you know, Miss Willow, that the very day before he died, he instructed his solicitor to begin an action for divorce?”
“I don’t believe it.” But something nagged at her. The harder she tried to think what, the more her head hurt. Something. Something important, and it refused to come to her. He lifted her chin, forcing her to look at him. His eyes burned into hers. Her scar felt like a white-hot knot.
“I do not countenance liars,” he said. “And that includes old maids who pretend virtue they do not possess.”
The world pressed in on her, eager to crush her.
His fingers tightened around her chin. “Did you kill my brother?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
She opened her mouth to speak but all that came out was a sob. The light hurt her eyes. Too bright where the sun came in, too dark in the shadows shifting behind Tiern-Cope. “I couldn’t have,” she managed. “I couldn’t.”
He leaned close. “How do you know?”
She closed her eyes and trembled. She was dissolving inside. The side of her head, exactly along her scar, felt like fire. A familiar, choking unreality wrapped her in silence.
“What is it?”
She could see a face, a leering, grinning face that refused to come into focus. Her stomach pitched. Panic rose like a wave, drowning her. She heard Tiern-Cope’s voice, but she could not see him or understand what he was saying to her. Her lungs refused to work. A moan echoed in her head, a man’s guttural, drawn-out cry. Someone screamed, a high drawn-out keen of anguish and despair, deafening her, drowning out all sound. She was suffocating. Fingers gripped her, imprisoned her, stopped her breath. The side of her head exploded with pain. The world went white and then, suddenly, black. Silence, blessed silence. And then, nothing. Not even silence.
Her eyes fluttered open and for the space of a heartbeat, she had no idea where she was or even who she was. Someone behind her had an arm around her, just beneath her breasts and a hand over her mouth, pulling her head hard against his shoulder. He held her so tightly she could not get a full breath. She struggled, but his hand over her mouth did not ease. His arm tightened. Panic threatened.
“Are you going to scream again?”
Relief flooded her because she knew the voice. Tiern-Cope. She shook her head, and his fingers loosened. His arm eased around her torso, sliding around her when she breathed deep, filling her lungs. His fingers splayed, brushing the side of her breast, lingering. His other hand slid off her mouth, over her throat.
“Sit down,” he said in her ear. He released her, guiding her toward a chair. She sat, a bit unsteadily and found herself looking into Tiern-Cope’s blue eyes. Blue eyes. She stared at his eyes, trying to remember why she was relieved when every cold, hard line of his face seemed focused on her. “What happened?” he said.
He moved closer, and Olivia found she had to look a long way up in order to meet his eyes. She shook her head.
“What happened? What did you remember?”
“I don’t know.”
“A frequent lament from you.” He reached for her, tipping her head upward, thumb brushing the crest of her cheek. She felt his finger sliding in the damp of tears. “What scent is that?”
She hesitated. “Mine, do you mean?”
“Yes. It’s familiar.” He smiled, and her stomach dropped straight to the floor. If he wasn’t so hellishly fierce, he’d be a threat to innocence the county over.
“Verbena, my lord.”
“Pleasant.”
“Thank you.”
He leaned down and put a hand on either arm of her chair. “Miss Willow,” he murmured. “You are a most lovely cipher.” He smiled in exactly the way he did in her imagination, a slow, intimate smile that made her heart fly and her stomach flutter. His eyes drifted closed. His lashes, though not long, were absurdly thick. Despite that, she could not but think that he was a man. A grown man, tried and proved, and she was in woefully over her head.
He drew in a breath and leaned closer, hands gripping either arm of her chair. The idea that he meant to kiss her sent her to giddy heights. She wasn’t the least bit prepared for the way her skin burned with heat or the way she melted inside. Beneath the unfamiliar warmth, she felt panic gathering. Her head throbbed. She felt short of breath, a familiar sense of suffocation. He leaned closer yet. His breath stirred the hair at her temples. She could smell soap and wool and linen and beneath it all, him. How many times had she imagined him leaning this close to her? Heroic Captain Alexander, desperately in love with her and ready to lay his heart at her feet.
“Verbena,” he murmured.
She hadn’t ever been kissed, or at least nothing more than a brush across the cheek or forehead, and she wanted to know the sensation. Just before she succumbed to a very great stupidity, she brought her hand between them and give him a push. “No.”
His lips moved, forming the silent word, “Hell.” He gripped the arms of her chair, his eyes squeezed closed, mouth white with tension. She watched him take a breath that quite deliberately did not move his rib cage.
Too late, she realized she’d hurt him. “Oh, my goodness. Are you all right?” She wanted to disappear in a puff of smoke, to vanish from the face of the earth. “I’m sorry. So sorry.” She’d have stood up but he still clutched the arms of her chair. “Shall I call someone? Price?”
He shook his head.
“Your manservant?”
“No.” He spoke through clenched teeth and did not move. Then he focused on her, with no sign of pain in his face. “Do not even try to deceive me.” The man’s voice possessed the mercy of forged steel. He reached for her, cupping her face with his hand. “What happened the night my brother died?”
“I don’t know.” Her breath caught in her throat because his fingers traced the curve of her cheek. “I’ve told you, I can’t recall.”
“It happens I am the magistrate.” He released her, spreading his fingers wide. “I just found that out. If you try to leave Pennhyll, Miss Willow, I’ll have you arrested and bound over.”
“For what?”
“Theft, of course.” He returned to his desk and sat. Ice could not have been cooler than his expression. She knew he meant every word. “Something of mine is sure to come up missing. Another Stilton, perhaps. Once it gets out you’re a thief, I doubt you’ll find honest employment hereabouts.”
“I am not—” Her voice trembled, and to her horror, she felt tears burning her eyes. “My lord. I am not—I will not—”
“I don’t know what happened the night my brother died, but you, Miss Willow, are indisputably in the center of it. If you’ll not tell me the truth, I have no further use for you this afternoon or any other.” He picked up a pen as if he meant to bend to some task of great importance. “You have wasted enough of my time. Take the box with you. With my compliments.” He opened one of the account books on the desk and began to do sums on a sheet of blank paper. Without glancing up, he said, “Good day.” She did not stir. He ignored her for half a minute. “I said, good day.”
“I sold them.”
His pen stilled, and after a bit he looked up. “Why?”
“Because we needed to eat and pay the rent, that’s why.”
“All at once?”
“No. A few things at a time. I don’t know how they ended up here.”
“Where did you sell them?”
“A pawnbroker.”
“In Far Caister?”
“No.”
“You have the regrettable habit of refusing to answer the simplest of questions.” He leaned against his chair. “Where did you sell your things?”
“Carlisle.”
“Miss Willow.”
“Acton Street. Off Bellby Road.” He looked at her with one eye and she could not imagine what had ever possessed her to think he had even the smallest amount of mercy. “You said you’d help me.”
His lip curled. “Your mistake, if that’s what you thought I said.”
“You said you’d help me remember.”
He tapped one finger on the desktop. After a moment, he looked at her from beneath his lashes. “Not at the risk of a noose around my neck.”
“What does that mean?”
He leaned back, elbow on the top rail of his chair. “Exactly what you imagine.”
To her horror, she wiped at her cheek and found her hand came away damp. She fumbled for a handkerchief.
“I told you that you would not thank me.” His eyes turned a sharper blue than ever. “And now I find myself in the novel position of admitting an error in judgment.” He gazed at her. “Either you know what happened and have succeeded in keeping it from me, in which case, I congratulate you, or else there is some true impediment to your recollection. If the latter, the usual procedure will fail me. If the former, some level of coercion would gain me my object. Eventually.”
“I cannot live like this. Not knowing.”
“There is a thin edge, Miss Willow, between what I want from you and what I am prepared to do to get it.” His eyes glittered. “I cannot thank you for making me consider using a woman in such a fashion.”
“My lord—”
He slashed a hand through the air with such force she heard the movement of air. “Your permission does not absolve me of the guilt.” He rose, planting his hands on the desk. She felt scalded by the heat of his gaze. “Make no mistake, Miss Willow. What’s in your head belongs to me, and in due course, I will have it. But not—” His voice fell. “Not at the cost of what little decency is left me.” He drew in a breath and sat down. “Now, when I said good day, Miss Willow, I was not remarking the weather. You will kindly oblige me and leave.”