Armand rushed up the steps to stand face to face with Lavinia, resting his hands on her arms. “You don’t have to leave,” he said, more passion in his voice than he was used to. “That’s not what I meant at all.”

“No, Armand,” she contradicted him in a quiet voice, her eyes downcast. “I do have to leave. This whole thing was a mistake.” She glanced up at him, an inner strength in her eyes that took him by surprise.

He took a step back. “Mistakes can be corrected,” he said. “I can do better.”

She shook her head. “I thought I could cope with a loveless marriage, but I was wrong.”

Armand’s heart sank and misery tightened every muscle in his body.

“If it was simply a matter of waiting for time to work its wonders and for the two of us to find some degree of love, I could have been patient,” she went on. “But we both know that’s not it. You are a physician, Armand. You will always want to be a physician. I saw the way you treated Lord Malcolm’s knee on the field just now. You loved it. That part of you will always be missing, and I can’t fix it.”

“I don’t—”

“The least I can do is to give you the freedom to pursue the life you want,” she cut him off before he could protest. She attempted to smile. “And this way, I can have the life that I want as well.”

Armand let out a breath, his shoulders drooping in defeat. “You want to be an independent woman,” he said. It’s what she had told him before their lives careened so wildly off track.

She nodded, blinking rapidly as her eyes grew watery. “And thanks to you, in a way, I’ll be far better situated to have that independence as Vicountess Helm than I would have as Lady Lavinia. I’ll start my new life at Starcross Castle, and we will both be able to have what we wanted.”

Except that, as she spoke, the gnawing feeling that the picture she was painting wasn’t the life he wanted at all consumed him. He wasn’t sure what he wanted anymore, only that he didn’t want to continue the way things were.

“Mama, what are you doing with that suitcase?” Bianca Marlowe’s question cut through the miserable tension on the stairs. Bianca and Natalia approached Broadclyft Hall’s front entrance looking exhausted and put out as they accompanied their dejected brother up from the cricket pitch. Katya had moved down the stairs and had her head together with Marigold, but she glanced up from the intense tête-à-tête at Bianca’s question.

“Lady Helm and I are leaving for Starcross Castle,” Katya told them. “I’ve instructed Mrs. Ainsworth to have your things packed and to send you along tomorrow.”

Immediately, the two young women broke into sharp protest. “I like Broadclyft Hall,” Natalia whined.

“I want to stay here.” Bianca followed suit.

“Do you need me to travel with you, Mama?” Rupert asked. “Give me half an hour and I can wash and change and have a bag packed.”

Katya looked hesitant for a moment before saying, “All right.” Rupert dashed into the house as she turned to her daughters. “I’ve left the two of you on a long leash for more than long enough. You’ll do as your told and prepare to leave tomorrow. Malcolm can bring you out to Cornwall.”

“Oh no.” Malcolm stepped forward with a wry laugh, limping slightly. “I’m not letting you out of my sight. Besides, if you’re going to Starcross Castle, then I’m coming with you so I can tell Peter all about what just happened here.”

Katya crossed her arms, stepping into Malcolm’s path when he tried to enter the house. She had a mischievous glint in her eyes that increased Armand’s sense of having lost control of the situation. “I think I know a damn sight more about what just went on here than you do,” she said.

“Do you think so?” Malcolm snapped back at her. “We just lost the match with Shayles. He has our letter, and he’s leaving for London immediately.”

“That’s quite right, I am,” Shayles himself said as he stepped out of the house, Gatwick behind him, Carl bringing up the rear with their baggage. Rage joined with the misery tearing through Armand, making him feel even more impotent. “Do forgive us if we fail to stay around for lengthy goodbyes,” Shayles went on, passing them all with barely a side glance as he rushed to the carriage waiting in the drive. “We’ve places to go and people to blackmail. I mean, see.”

It was a sign of just how defeated Armand and his friends were that none of them tried to stop Shayles as he bolted into the carriage. Gatwick climbed in behind him without so much as a word of goodbye. He did send a quick glance to Lavinia, though, if Armand was right. Armand peeked at his wife out of the corner of his eye to find her waving to Gatwick with a weak smile. A sudden burst of jealousy filled Armand. Had something developed between his wife and his cousin in the last few days? Had he been so busy worrying what sort of corrupting influence Shayles would be on Lavinia that he had failed to see the threat Gatwick might pose?

That didn’t feel right either. He tamped down his errant assumptions, reminding himself that he was distraught about too many things and likely seeing things that weren’t there. Although Lavinia had defended his cousin at the cricket match. She’d insisted Mark was the one who warned her of the threat to his life.

As soon as Carl had the baggage secured, Shayles’s carriage rocked into motion, pulling away from the front door. No sooner had they rounded the corner of the drive to the straightaway leading to the road than the horses switched to a run. Shayles was in a hurry to leave. The dust from his departure hadn’t settled when a second carriage, one of the ones that had brought everyone down from Winterberry Park, pulled up.

“This one is ours,” Katya said, nodding to Carl as he jogged over to take her bag. Katya turned to Lavinia. “Are you ready?”

Lavinia drew in a long, shuddering breath. With clear reluctance, she turned to face Armand. “Everything will be better once I’m gone,” she told him. “Your life will return to normal. And while the offer to practice medicine in India might have been false, I’m sure you have the will and the resources to find a way to be the man you want to be regardless.”

“This doesn’t feel right,” Armand said, stepping closer to her and cursing the fact that they still had a full audience of their friends. “I wish you would—”

“What is going on here?”

Armand swayed back and rolled his eyes so hard that he was surprised he didn’t fall over as Lady Prior stormed out of the house. Medicine, female independence, and the trials of Shayles be damned. The real reason he and Lavinia struggled so much to make things work was because of the tsunami of interference they’d been plagued with every second of their married life.

“Lavinia, I demand you go back into the house and change out of that ridiculous traveling costume at once,” Lady Prior demanded.

“Mama, no,” Lavinia said, rubbing her temples and looking as aggravated as Armand felt.

“Don’t you ‘no’ me, girl,” Lady Prior went on, marching up to Lavinia and shaking a finger in her face. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“To Starcross Castle,” Katya answered for Lavinia.

“And I suppose this is your doing?” Lady Prior shrieked, looking like an avenging fiend. “A woman’s place is with her husband,” she snapped at Lavinia before taking on Katya once more. “I never should have let her associate with you in the first place. I was wooed by your lofty title and what I thought it might be able to do for my daughter, but I was wrong. You are the worst possible influence my daughter could have.” She turned back to Lavinia. “Get into the house at one.”

“No, Mama,” Lavinia said with a strength born from being at her wits’ end. “I’m going to Starcross Castle.”

“Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous?” Lady Prior turned to Armand. “Stop her at once. She’s your wife.”

“Yes, she is,” Armand said, frowning. He offered his arm to Lavinia. “May I escort you to the carriage?”

Lavinia burst into a grateful smile. “Yes, please.”

She took his arm, and Armand led her down the stairs to where Katya’s driver held the carriage door open. “You’ll still have to wait a bit for Rupert and Malcolm,” he said, “but something tells me you’ll find more peace waiting in here.”

Lavinia nodded and stepped up into the carriage. Behind Armand, Katya and Lady Prior were still bickering, but that gave the two of them a moment of peace. “I’m sorry about all this,” Lavinia said.

Armand huffed a laugh. “It seems we’ve done nothing but apologize to each other in the entirety of our short marriage. I wish we’d had time to truly get to know each other instead.” He lifted her hand to kiss her knuckles before he let it go.

For a moment, Lavinia glanced at him with desperate, pleading eyes. It was enough to make him want to yank her from the carriage and into his arms so that he could hold her and kiss her and promise her that he would never leave her, that things would be different. But how could they be different? Their friends would always crowd around them. His duties to the nation would take him away from her as surely as a ship traveling to a hospital in India. There simply wasn’t an easy way for them to be together.

“Thank you, Armand.” Katya’s tap on his shoulder shook Armand out of any second thoughts he was tempted to have. “I’ve told Carl to let Malcolm and Rupert know that we’re going on ahead now and that we’ll wait for them tonight at an inn in St. Austell.”

“Very well.” Armand gave Lavinia’s hand one final squeeze before stepping back and making way for Katya to climb into the carriage.

Before she did, she reached for his hand. “Everything will work out for the best, you’ll see,” she said. With a glimmer in her eyes, she leaned in and whispered, “Hope may not be as lost as you think it is.”

She backed away from him and climbed into the carriage, leaving Armand puzzled over what she could mean. As far as he could see, there was no hope. He’d lost the letter, he’d lost any chance to defeat Shayles, and he’s lost his wife. And most of it was his own fault.

“Drive on,” he called to the driver once Katya was seated inside.

“What are you doing?” Lady Prior shouted as the carriage rolled away. She rushed down the steps as though she would strike Armand, preventing him from watching as the carriage drove off. “You wretched man! You can’t just let her leave.”

Armand turned to her, pinching the aching spot between his eyes. “Lavinia is not a child. She is a grown woman who has a right to make up her own mind.”

“No, she isn’t,” Lady Prior insisted. “She’s a woman. We never have a right to make up our own minds. That right belongs to our fathers and our husbands.”

“Then who makes up your mind, Lady Prior?” he asked, perhaps harsher than he should have.

Lady Prior jerked back. “Why, I act on full authority of my husband,” she insisted.

“Really? Then where is he, madam?” Armand asked.

“He’s in London,” Lady Prior fumbled. “He doesn’t like the countryside. He has chosen me as his envoy in all things concerning our daughter.”

“Or have you chosen yourself?” Armand said. Lady Prior began to protest, but he shook his head and walked away, heading into the house.

“What are you going to do?” Alex asked, falling into step beside him, Marigold on their heels, as they crossed through the front hall and toward the grand staircase.

“I’m going to have a bath,” Armand grumbled. “Then I’m going to change clothes. After that, who knows?” He let out a heavy breath.

“We have to decide what to do about Shayles, now that he has the letter,” Alex went on, following Armand as he began to mount the stairs. “If we could just—”

“Alex, let him be,” Marigold said, grabbing her husband’s sleeve. As Armand turned the corner on the staircase, he noted that Marigold had the same glint of mischievous confidence in her eyes that Katya had.

Alex writhed with impatience, seemingly caught between his wife and pursuing Armand. “We can’t just sit back and let Shayles destroy Gladstone’s new government before it gets started.”

“It will be all right,” Marigold insisted. “Go to our room, change out of your cricket things, and come down to the dining room. Mrs. Ainsworth said that supper will be ready soon, regardless of everything else.”

“But—” Alex continued to protest.

“Trust me,” Marigold said.

Armand paused near the top of the stairs to watch his friend writhe. In the end, Alex let out a frustrated breath, stepped down to kiss his wife quickly, then continued up until he was by Armand’s side. “The ladies are up to something,” he muttered as he and Armand strode down the hall toward their rooms.

“Aren’t the ladies always up to something?” Armand asked.

Alex let out a humorless laugh. It seemed appropriate. As far as Armand could see, there was nothing funny in their situation.

“Stop here,” Shayles shouted up to his driver.

It was well after dark. They’d been speeding through the countryside for hours after picking Miller up in the village. The idiot had dosed Maqsood with laudanum, then proudly seen that the man was handed over to the care of his shipmates. Maqsood had been whisked off to Exeter before Shayles could catch up with him and slice his throat to get him to keep quiet. The whole, carefully-laid plot had fallen apart spectacularly, and all because of an errant cricket ball and Dr. Miller’s ham-fisted stupidity.

“Why are we stopping?” Miller asked as the carriage rocked to a halt. “I thought we were headed for Weymouth. This looks like a moor.”

“It’s just a quick stop,” Shayles said, scooting toward the door. He nudged Gatwick to wake him as he did. “Come on.”

Like the useless, confused puppy he was, Miller followed him out of the carriage. His driver had chosen their route well. Silent darkness stretched out in every direction. Gatwick stumbled out of the carriage behind him, rubbing his bleary eyes.

“What reason do you have to stop in the middle of nowhere like this?” Miller asked. Immediately, he answered his own question with, “Ah. Nature calls, I presume. There seem to be some amenable trees over that way.”

“Gatwick,” Shayles said with barely a hint of concern. “My blade.”

Wordlessly, Gatwick leaned back into the carriage and brought out a long-handled, razor-sharp knife. It was a small miracle that he’d been able to retrieve it from Maqsood’s wicketkeeper’s pads. Khan had been just as incompetent at the task given to him as Miller was at, well, everything he did. It would have been simple to puncture Pearson’s femoral arteries, as Miller had instructed him, so that the idiot viscount would bleed to death. Khan should have trusted his betters to get him out of the murder charge, not that Shayles had actually intended to help the fool once the police apprehended him. Pearson would have been dead, though, Gatwick would have inherited the Helm land, title, and money, and his financial woes would be alleviated.

Gatwick handed the knife over with a disinterested cough. At least the man was taking the failure to secure the Helm title in stride. But then, Shayles could count on one hand the number of times his friend had displayed emotion, and he’d have fingers left over.

“Henshaw, light a lamp, would you?” Shayles called up to his driver. “I need to see what I’m doing.”

“Very good, my lord,” Henshaw replied. A moment later, a match struck, then a lamp illuminated the darkness around the carriage.

“Oh, I say.” Miller turned toward the lamp, shielding his eyes from the sudden light.

“No,” Shayles said, “You don’t say anything. And you never will.”

“What are you talking about?” Miller asked with a confused frown.

Shayles toyed with his knife, testing the tip. “How long do you suppose it would take a man to bleed to death once his neck had been slit?”

Miller shrugged. “It depends on how deep the cut and whether the jugular veins on both sides were cut or only—” He stopped with a strangled cry as Shayles twisted to grab him from behind and sliced his neck as deeply as he could. When he let go, Miller fell to the ground, sputtering, blood oozing everywhere.

“You fool,” Shayles sneered over him. “Maqsood will talk, now that you allowed him to go free. There’s no telling who he’ll share my plan with.”

“Maqsood won’t darken England’s doorstep again, I think,” Gatwick said, watching Miller gurgle and bleed to death with an expressionless face. “Even if he did, who would believe a lascar would pose as a doctor with the sole purpose of luring a peer aboard a ship and disposing of him at sea?”

Shayles hummed, watching with growing excitement as Miller’s life drained away. “I suppose.”

Miller’s eyes slowly rolled back in his head. Apparently bleeding to death happened in no time at all. A grin spread across Shayles’s face. His cock was growing hard as fast as Miller’s life left him. Watching people die was the best aphrodisiac he’d yet to discover. They’d have to stop and find an amenable brothel before reaching Weymouth, or, failing that, a farm with a suitably young daughter for him to fuck as a victory celebration.

“Henshaw,” he shouted. “Get down here and figure out a way to make this look like highwaymen.”

“Yes, my lord. I know just the thing.” The driver hopped down from the carriage, took the bloody knife from Shayles, and crossed to scoop Miller’s body up by the arms, dragging him to the side of the road.

Shayles let out a satisfied sigh and leaned his back against the carriage. “The whole thing could have gone better, but at least I got to kill an idiot.” He reached for the bulge in his trousers, contemplating giving himself relief while Henshaw did his job. Instead, he slid his hand into the inner pocket of his jacket to take out the letter from Winterberry Park. “At least we have this.” He chuckled as he turned the letter over in his hands.

“Well done,” Gatwick said, leaning against the carriage on the other side of the open door and yawning. “I still think you should charge more than you quoted to The Observer for a look at that,” he added, closing his eyes.

“Perhaps I will,” Shayles chuckled. “Perhaps I—”

He stopped. Something wasn’t right with the envelope. It had partially resealed itself after spending so much time against the heat and moisture of his chest, but the flap was completely open now. He pushed away from the carriage, walking until he stood directly under the lantern, and yanked the letter out of the envelope.

“Something wrong?” Gatwick asked, one, bored eye open.

Shayles unfolded the letter and read. “Dearest Lavinia. Can you ever forgive me for the situation I have had a part in thrusting on you?” The rest of the pages held more of the same drivel.

Shayles growled in fury, which quickly turned into a shout. “Those filthy bitches.” He ripped the letter, tearing it to shreds and dropping it to the ground to stomp on it.

“Is there a problem?” Gatwick asked, as if asking whether the fish at a banquet was to his liking.

“Those bloody bitches,” Shayles continued to rage. “They switched the letters.”

“You’re joking.” Gatwick pushed away from the carriage at last, looking startled. “When? How?”

“I have no idea,” Shayles raged. “It had to have been at the cricket match. I knew it was a mistake asking Miller to guard the blasted thing.” He marched off to the side of the road, where Henshaw was removing Miller’s purse, coat, and anything that would have been considered valuable to a thief from his body, and kicked him. “You fucking idiot,” he shouted, kicking Miller over and over.

“Calm down,” Gatwick called from behind him, sounding more put out than enraged over the debacle. “What’s done is done. Miller is dead anyhow.”

“I’ll climb down to Hell and murder him again if I have to,” Shayles growled, stalking his way back to the carriage. His blood boiled, and he clenched and unclenched his hands, desperate for someone to strangle. “This is all Malcolm Campbell’s fault.”

“How do you figure?” Gatwick asked.

“It’s always Malcolm’s fault. He put that whore Marlowe woman up to pestering me. He’s had it in for me since he stole Tessa from me.” His breath came in heavy, hot gulps, and everything in his vision was red. “He won’t get away with this. I’ll see him dead if it’s the last thing I ever do.” Still seething, he leapt back into the carriage.

“Are we going back to Broadclyft Hall, then?” Gatwick asked.

“No,” Shayles muttered, fighting to keep his breathing even and his temper in check. He would be better able to plot revenge if he controlled his emotions. “We’re still going on to London. But Malcolm had better watch his back the moment he sets foot in town again. Katya Marlowe too. I’ll see the two of them broken, humiliated, and dead if it’s the last thing I ever do.”