Chapter 27
“It has been good doing business with you, Your Grace,” the older gentleman, Harry, with mottled skin said seriously. He tugged down his glasses to look at Edmund more gravely. “I am glad that we have now managed to agree on everything and that the contract has been drawn up. I wish you much luck. I am sure that a man as ambitious as you will have no trouble in making a success of your new venture.”
“Well, I am used to overseas trade,” Edmund answered, still keeping a lot of his cards close to his chest. He was not like the other men who enjoyed bragging about themselves as if they were a gift to the planet. He enjoyed his business and loved talking about it to interested parties, but bragging was something else entirely. “But yes, some of this will be a new area for me. I am looking forward to it.”
He did not feel the need to express his real reason for the business. Harry was a nice enough man, but this was something that he had to keep to himself and to do in the shadow of darkness. It was the only way that it would work and keep everyone safe at the same time.
“You are an honest man.” Harry tipped his hat at Edmund with a bright smile playing on his lips. “The last man I tried to do business with swindled me. Luckily, it was not too much, but the damage was enough.”
“Oh, yes?” Edmund was barely interested now; he had gotten what he came here for, but he felt the need to ask out of sheer politeness. “Who was that?”
“A man named Walter Thompson.”
Walter. His eyes snapped up, and he looked at the man with sheer horror in his eyes. Harry did not know anything about the inheritance and the incident with Walter Thompson. Nor did he know about Edmund’s connection to Mary. There was no way that he could be saying this with some kind of hidden agenda. This had to be a coincidence, just another story of Walter conning someone out of their money. This horrible fiend had clearly acted before.
“What happened?” Edmund asked, feeling ashen and shocked. “With Walter, I mean.”
“Oh, it was all some scam business.” Harry waved his hand dismissively. “It was a long time ago now. But he got a lot of us with his fake lawyer bit. I think it was his charisma that caught most of us in his web.”
Including Mary’s father, before he died, Edmund thought with a swimming head. Only that has come to light now. Years later.
“How has he managed to get away with it for so long?” Edmund felt angry now. Maybe if these men had done something about it at the time, then Mary would still have her home now. “Why did he not end up in jail?”
“He is clever.” Harry shrugged, completely unbothered. “He covers up his tracks well. Plus nothing he did was big enough for anyone to make a fuss. You know how people are; they do not wish to be seen as weak, especially in business.” Edmund remained silent at that remark. He knew that all too well. “The only reason I’m mentioning it now is that I am about to retire. This sale is my last bit of business, then I am done. Plus, it wasn’t huge amounts of money, just enough to irritate a lot of people, that’s all.”
“Right ... yes.” Edmund took a step back with the legal document clasped between his fingers. “I see. Well, thank you for this. That is great. I have enjoyed working with you too. Now I need to ... I have to get on.”
He took a step back and smiled weakly at Harry, now needing some time and space to think things through. He knew that Mary had reported the crime to the police not long after Walter had vanished, but since he was the manager of the estate and the legal documents had not been seen directly by Mary – a fact that Edmund now understood was because Walter probably had nothing substantial to show –they had not been able to do much. It was all too convenient. Edmund could hardly wrap his head around it.
Was this Walter’s plan all along? he thought as he exited the building. Did he always intend to sell the home and run off with the money? It seemed reasonable, but there were too many variables to make it as simple as that. But what if Mary had just agreed to marry me? Then she would have inherited the house, and he would not have had the chance. Mary had even said that he was resistant to selling at first. It makes no sense; why does it not make any sense?
There had to be some plan, Walter must have wanted to do something criminal if that was how he worked, but what was it? Either he had something elaborate up his sleeve that was far too complex for an honest man like Edmund to understand, or he simply played it by ear and went with the opportunity as he saw it.
If only he were here – if only I could ask him ... but Walter had vanished. He could have been anywhere in the country by now. He could have been anywhere in the world.
Edmund shook his head and tried his hardest to stop thinking about it. He assumed that the new business deal was the hardest hurdle that he had to overcome in his grand plan, but now that part was done, everything else was coming to light too. He had been blinkered. Now it was time to get going before something else happened, and it was much too late. There was still a lot at stake after all, and he still needed to do very much. He could not wait to get started because he knew that he was working towards a positive future...
***
Mary shrank in her seat as she heard yet another screaming argument coming from the kitchen area of her sister’s home. She had been expecting this; it felt like it had been brewing for days, but now that it was here, it felt like the worst storm she had ever experienced. She could almost feel the lightning bolts hitting her shoulders and sending shock waves right through her.
I cannot sit here and listen to this anymore, she thought as she squeezed her hands over her ears. She knew that Charlotte had told her not to interfere because it would make things so much worse, but how could it get any worse than it was? Ever since Lord Jones had discovered that his wife was having his baby, he had grown worse by the second. His temper had intensified, and he no longer cared about who he expressed it in front of. Mary had heard and seen more than she ever wanted to. I need to do something.
She pushed herself into a standing position and staggered across the room. Mary felt disoriented and dizzy as she moved through the house like she did not really know what she was doing, but she kept on going. She forced her feet to keep on moving with the thought of Charlotte and her unborn baby at the forefront of her mind. Now that she did not have a plan to save them both, she needed to at least try to prevent the constant arguing from escalating. Everything about her was shaking, even her insides vibrated against her ribcage. The sheer terror was so intense now, and that only grew the louder the screaming got, the nearer she got to the danger.
“... you do not dare behave like that in public again,” Lord Jones yelled as he towered over Charlotte who had fallen to the floor in a heap in her fancy dress which now looked torn and dishevelled. Mary did not know what had happened before this moment, but she could hazard a guess. He had been forceful with his hands again, leaving her with fresh bruises to hide. Surely whatever he thought that Charlotte had done, it was not bad enough to deserve this? Her sister was meek and quiet around him; she was like a shell of herself. There was no way that she could have done something terrible. “I will not have it.”
“But ... but I did not ...” Charlotte sobbed. It seemed that she was not even sure what she had done wrong, but there probably was not anything to be honest. It did not take Lord Jones much to snap anymore. “I do not ...”
“Stop,” Mary rasped loudly, trying not to sound like a broken woman as she did. She needed some of that inner strength that she had been so proud of before, but it had deserted her. “Stop it, this is not right. Please, leave Charlotte alone ...”
On hearing her voice, Lord Jones span and glared at Mary as if she were the sole source of his anger. He almost seemed to forget about his wife on the floor as he discovered someone new to absorb his temper. His nostrils flared, and his eyes flashed with rage as he stared at her as if she was the Devil. “Are you still here?” he snarled as he took a step closer with his fists curling around until his knuckles turned a funny shade of white. “I cannot believe that my wife allowed you into my home. The ruined Roberts sister, affecting my reputation with her own.”
Mary felt scared. Genuinely frightened, even more so than before. She felt it consume her and swallow her whole, leaving her a shuddering wreck. Much as she was glad to help Charlotte, she could not help thinking that this might well have been a big mistake. She took a step backwards as sheer terror consumed her. There was something in the way that Lord Jones was looking at her that made her feel as small as an ant. “I am sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t want to cause ... this.”
“This?” Lord Jones yelled as his arms flailed in front of him. His cheeks were redder than any human’s that Mary had ever seen before. How did Charlotte stand this? It was utterly insane. “This? You mean my marriage, which by the way is absolutely nothing to do with you I might like to add. I do not want to ever hear you speak about my marriage.”
“I did not ... I did not mean ...”
“What? You did not mean to cause offence? Well, you have done ...”
The words dragged Mary’s sister out of her daze of confusion. Charlotte’s vision had returned now after the whack she had received earlier, and she could see her husband looming down towards her sister with that same terrible glint in his eye that he had when he came at her. She could not take this; he had already taken things way too far, and she could not allow him to go after Mary. That would be the absolute worst thing ever and also entirely her fault. She did not think that he would ever do this to someone else. If so, she would have done something much sooner to put a stop to it.
I should have kept them separate, she thought as she blinked rapidly. I should never have let Mary come into my home. Maybe none of this would have happened; maybe she would even still be at home. She would not have lost her inheritance and kept her mouth shut.
Despite the fact that she was a very quiet person these days, her husband was always telling her off for her mouth, just as he was today. She was not totally sure what she had done, but maybe he was right. Maybe if she had not mentioned that things were difficult to Mary, then none of this would have happened.
But there was no point in getting lost in past mistakes. Not when the effects of those mistakes were happening right now in front of her. What she needed to do was finally take action, to stand up to the man who had terrorised her life. She needed to do this for herself, for her sister, and for her baby too. If her husband was willing to go at Mary like that, then it was likely that he would not treat their baby well either. She had held onto the wish that he would at least be a good father, even if he were a terrible husband, but it seemed that dream was vanishing as well.
“Stop,” she panted out as her tight chest tried its best to get some air in. It was almost as if she had something wrapped around her insides, refusing to let her breathe properly. “Stop it now.”
She staggered over to him, tackling his rage head on for the very first time in their turbulent marriage. It had never been so bad before. Things had never been so violent. There had been intense rage and the odd outburst that resulted in her getting hurt, but nothing like this. This was on another scale.
“Please, let us just talk. We need to talk ...”
Charlotte could not even finish her sentence because Lord Jones smacked his hand backwards without even looking at her and hit her in the face again. Because she was already hurt, it did not take long to knock her to the ground again. Her body fell backwards without her permission, making Charlotte feel more out of control than she ever had done before. It was awful. Even as her arms flailed around trying to grab onto something, she knew that she would find nothing. It was taken out of her hands now, and she just had to go. She hit her head so hard as her body finally reached the floor that the blackness came for her rapidly. Charlotte knew that she needed to keep her wits about her to stop this from escalating, but she could not. Her eyes fell closed, and she shut the world out completely.
“Stop!” Mary screamed, repeating what the girls had been saying to Lord Jones ever since this whole rampage started. Despite hitting his wife again, he was still coming for her, but Mary really needed him to stop this time and not just for herself. She knew that he wanted to hit her which, of course, she wanted to avoid, but this was not about her. “Charlotte is hurt.”
With an unexpected burst of strength, she shoved Lord Jones out the way and flew past him. There was an ice-cold sensation deep in her stomach that something was wrong, really wrong, and she needed to address that. Mary could not stand it; this was not what she had wanted at all. When she came to intervene, she hoped to make it better, not worse, just as Charlotte had warned her that she would.
I should have listened, she thought desperately. I never should have gone against her wishes.
“Step away from my wife,” Lord Jones growled, but there was much less conviction in his tone this time. He could see the panic in Mary’s eyes, and he could feel that there was something behind that. The red mist that had descended in front of his eyes had dissipated rapidly, and now he was not sure what to do. It was never like this. Usually, he got to calm down by himself. Now, it seemed that he had gone too far ... even for him.“Charlotte?”
Mary’s heart was in her throat as she tucked her hand under her sister’s head. She pulled her up to look into her cold blank eyes. She felt cold from the bottom of her toes all the way up to the top of her head. It left her foggy and unsure of what to do next.The man that she hated – the one that had caused this damage – was the only other person that she had here. She had to rely on him even if she did not want to, for Charlotte’s sake.
“We need a doctor,” she gasped desperately but refusing to look at him directly. She could not meet those cold eyes, no matter what. “Charlotte is bleeding.”
She turned and looked at Lord Jones’ body which was frozen to the spot. She could almost see his thought pattern, and he did not want to call the doctor because he did not want to take the blame for what had happened. He was man enough to cause the damage but not man enough to take the blame for it.
“We do not have to say anything,” she said exasperatedly. “It does not matter. We simply need to get someone here to look after Charlotte. She and her baby’s lives are depending on it.” She narrowed her eyes at Lord Jones angrily. “You will do this, and you will do it now,” she gulped noisily, not wanting to say this, but knowing that she had to. “This is your baby as well. Do not let your pride get in the way.”
As Lord Jones finally walked off, she allowed a tear to roll down her cheek. This was scary, the most terrified that she had been in her entire life. Charlotte had been knocked out by her husband’s bad temper, which was potentially her fault for intervening when Charlotte told her not to, and now things did not look good at all. She could hardly contain the sad emotions that threatened to consume her whole.
Please be alright, Charlotte, she begged sadly. The tear fell from her cheek and onto Charlotte’s face that was frozen in time, stuck in the moment that she was struck. Please do not be hurt. You are all that I have left. I need you.