Chapter Nineteen
Graham sat in the quiet, pretty parlor, looking around as his heart throbbed. He had returned to his home and made his arrangements an hour ago, but a driving voice had been pounding in his head for days. So finally, he had gotten on his horse and come here. To this place he had once vowed to never return.
He moved to the fireplace and looked up. On the wall was mounted a painting of the inhabitants of this place—the Duke and Duchess of Crestwood. Simon and Meg. His best friend and his once fiancée.
Not that long ago, seeing their portrait would have made Graham flinch at Simon’s betrayal. Now he saw the picture through very different eyes. He saw the love that was between the pair even in the painted image. She was seated, with Simon standing behind her. His hand rested on her shoulder and her own was lifted to cover his. He glanced down with a small smile, as if he were enraptured by her.
Which of course he was. Always had been, it turned out. And Graham understood that far better now.
The door behind him opened and he turned to find Meg standing there, her eyes wide as she stared at him. She was lovely, she always had been, with chestnut hair and dark eyes and a lively, expressive face. Right now he saw her shock reflected there. Her wariness.
“Graham,” she breathed. “My God, when Finley said you’d arrived I thought he had gotten into the mulled wine. But you are here.”
Graham took a step toward her. “I am. Does Simon not wish to see me?” he asked as a swell of pain spread through his chest. Perhaps he had waited too long to speak to his friend. Perhaps it was too late.
Meg shook her head. “Oh no, not at all. Simon is out, that is all. He should be back momentarily, and I know he’ll want to see you. My God, you’re truly here. Please sit. Let me get you tea.”
Graham was about to tell her that he didn’t want tea, but she was already racing to the sideboard, pouring from the service there and sweetening his drink just as he liked it. Because of course she would remember that detail. This was Meg, after all.
He smiled as he retook his seat and reached for the cup she brought him. “Thank you, Your Grace.”
She sat across from him and shook her head. “Oh, please don’t do that. It’s Meg, it’s always been Meg. If you’re here I have to hope that it will be Meg again.”
He inclined his head in acquiescence. “Very well, Meg. You look well. You look happy.”
She hesitated and he could see she questioned how to respond. But at last she nodded. “I am happy, Graham. It was difficult at first, of course. Simon and I had our struggles. Even now, there are whispers, which I know you’re fully aware of. But I am happy.”
“Good,” he said softly. “I would hate for all that turmoil and hurt not to have a happy ending for you. You deserve happiness and love.”
She drew in a sharp breath at that statement. “Thank you, Graham. You deserve the same and more.”
He swallowed. He’d come looking for Simon, but now that he was here with the woman he’d once planned to marry, he recognized that she had answers for him, to questions he’d never thought he’d ask.
“When did you know you loved Simon?” he asked.
Meg shifted at the direct question. It clearly made her uncomfortable, like she was betraying him by admitting any part of the truth. But at last she straightened her shoulders and met his eyes. “You want my honesty, yes?”
“I do.”
“I was fifteen when I first realized that I loved him,” she whispered, her voice thick with emotion, but not regret. “A year before James arranged for my marriage to you. In truth, I had probably loved him since the very first moment I met him.”
“How did you know?” he asked.
She tilted her head, and he could see her reading him. Meg had always been able to do that with everyone around her. She could see what people were at their core, she could see what they needed. It was her greatest asset and always had been.
“When I pictured my future and could not imagine it without him, I knew.” She leaned closer. “And I’m so very sorry I wasn’t brave enough to say something to James that very moment. If I had been braver, none of what happened a few months ago would have had to come to pass. And you and Simon both wouldn’t have been hurt.”
He considered that for a moment. Perhaps months or even weeks ago, that might have been the words he needed to hear. The apology. The admission of guilt. But now…
“I didn’t understand what happened at the time, you know. I couldn’t understand how you two could do what you did. But now, with months between that moment and this one and…and with other things intervening, I think I understand more.”
Her expression softened. “Do you? Could you?”
“Yes.” He let out a long, heavy sigh. “The heart is not something one can control, is it? We want what we want, there is no arguing or negotiating that. In our case, we were each driven by a need not to hurt anyone else. And instead we were all damaged. I don’t pretend that you and Simon weren’t hurt by what transpired. Nor do I imagine that it could have ended any other way. If you and I had married, it would have been devastating to us all. So I want you to understand something, Meg.”
She stared at him, tears glistening in her eyes. “What is that?”
“I’m glad it happened.” He said the words and he meant them all the way down to his core. All his anger, all his pain, it faded with that acceptance. “I wouldn’t change it. We are all where we are meant to be and that couldn’t have happened without that night in the cottage between you and Simon.”
She drew in a ragged breath. “Does that mean you forgive us? Forgive him?”
He nodded, and it was so very true in that moment. A peace filled him, filled every fiber of his being, filled every space in his mind and the universe felt clear. Without the betrayal that had cut him so deeply, he would have married Meg. They would have been miserable. He never would have roamed London aimlessly, he never would have been directed toward Lydia, he never would have found Adelaide.
His life would have been cold and empty and miserable. And now he had a future in front of him. One that was clear and powerful and filled with…love.
He loved Adelaide. He loved her with a power he hadn’t known he could possess. And it was terrifying and wonderful and perfect and thrilling all at once. It made him understand everything Simon had done because the idea of someone taking her, someone keeping her from him, made his mind race and his hands shake.
“You are here.”
Graham got to his feet and turned as Simon entered the room. His friend with the mischievous air to him, with the kindness that permeated everything he did, with the light that had always made the darkness in Graham just a little easier to bear, stared at him. There was pain on his face, but also hope.
Graham said nothing, he just came around the settee, crossed the room to him in three long strides. Simon stiffened, his expression uncertain, but when Graham grabbed his arm and tugged him in for an embrace, Simon’s arms folded around him. They stood that way for a moment, then Graham backed away, smiling as Meg stepped up with tears in her eyes.
“I’ll leave you two,” she said, squeezing Graham’s hand before she leaned up to kiss Simon’s cheek gently. The couple’s eyes met, and a world of love and understanding passed between them. He recognized it now, as he hadn’t before because he’d never felt love like that before. Now he did. And he understood everything so much better.
She left, and Simon leaned back to shut the door. “I can’t believe you’re here,” he said. “Sit. She gave you tea, didn’t she? Meg and her tea. Would you like something stronger?”
Graham chuckled. “No, I’m fine.”
“I might need something stronger,” Simon muttered as he went to the sideboard and splashed some scotch into a glass. “Finley said you were here and I thought—”
“He was drunk? That was Meg’s reaction too.”
“Well, we are often of a mind,” Simon said with a shrug.
“You are that,” Graham said. “I just never understood it. If I had, I would have stepped aside long before that night in the cottage.”
Simon flinched as he slowly took the place across from Graham where Meg had last sat. “You were right the last time you talked to me. You were right when you said that I should have done something. It wasn’t your responsibility.”
“The last time I talked to you, I was very drunk,” Graham said with a shake of his head as he thought of a bleary afternoon at White’s when he’d tried to force Simon to fight him. “And I was cruel.”
“No, you were honest,” Simon said. “Which is more than I gave you. But your words that day drove me back to Meg. Drove me to fight for what I wanted, even if I refused to fight you. And you saved us, Graham. I’ll never be able to repay that debt. Nor will I be able to apologize enough for my bungling of the matter. I destroyed our friendship, not just that night when Meg and I were trapped together, but for years before that. Because I couldn’t look you in the eye and tell you what I wanted.”
“Desperation can drive a man to do things he wouldn’t normally,” Graham said. “And love. I…I understand that more now.”
Simon wrinkled his brow. “Are you saying you’re in love?”
Graham took a deep breath. “Yes,” he admitted, then ran a hand through his hair. “Christ, that’s the first time I’ve said it out loud.”
Simon laughed. “Am I correct to guess it is with Lady Adelaide?”
Graham’s eyes went wide. “And how do you know that?”
“Meg and Emma are close, remember,” Simon said with a shrug. “And Adelaide doesn’t think much of Meg. Since everyone adores my wife, her reticence made it obvious that Adelaide liked you and was taking your side on the matter.”
“Well, her hesitations about Meg will change once she realizes I’ve forgiven you,” Graham said with a smile as he thought of his warrior Adelaide, always on his side. “She’s protective of me.”
“She is.” Simon leaned forward. “Do you truly forgive me?”
Graham nodded. “Yes.”
“And are you planning on marrying this woman who has tempted you to love?” Simon pressed, his tone much lighter now. It was like old times, in fact. Old times when Simon had been the one he could say certain things to. Things that needed gentleness or finesse or lightness.
“I am,” Graham said slowly. “We made the agreement earlier today, though I haven’t yet told her my feelings.”
Simon wrinkled his brow. “No? Why?”
“We’ve been a bit forced into it,” Graham said with a shake of his head. “That seems to go around in our group, doesn’t it?”
“We’ve all been dragged into our futures thus far, yes,” Simon conceded. “But it’s been a very worthwhile endeavor for James and for me. If you love her, you’ll find a way to make it work. And I tell you, loving them is well worth any price you’d pay.”
Graham nodded. “Yes, I can see that now. I can understand it for the first time. Truly, aside from my lack of honesty about my heart, there is only one mar on our future together.”
Simon cocked his head. “What is that?”
“Her aunt,” Graham mused, thinking of the rage on Lady Opal’s face when she had lunged at Adelaide. Thinking of Adelaide’s confession that the woman had been physically abusive a handful of times in the past. “The woman is jealously protective of her charge’s virtue. And she is violently angry at Adelaide’s actions.”
“But if your intentions are true, isn’t it possible you could soften her to you and to Adelaide?” Simon suggested. “Talk to her?”
Graham paused. It had been impossible for him to see past the anger Lady Opal had expressed. It triggered a response in him that was almost out of his control. But he knew that Adelaide still thought of her aunt as her only family. Her defense of the woman proved that. And Simon could be correct that a conversation might soften the response.
And if not, Graham could firmly tell the woman that if she ever laid a hand on Adelaide again, she would be very sorry indeed.
He glanced at Simon. The peacemaker of their group, he had managed many a rough encounter. “I don’t suppose you’d want to accompany me on this mission?”
Simon’s lips parted. “You would want my help?”
Graham nodded. “You don’t know how many times I wanted to talk to you in the past few months. But now more than ever I need your counsel.”
Simon reached out and squeezed Graham’s forearm. “Of course. After all, how could this woman even think to turn down two powerful dukes? One of whom actually has charm.”
Graham tilted his head back and laughed, and it was like that motion bled away all the remaining vestiges of his pain and his betrayal. It reminded him of how much he loved his friend. His brother.
“Good,” he said, rising to his feet. “Then let’s go now.”
“Now?” Simon repeated with a laugh. “You really do love this girl.”
“I do,” Graham said, and each time he said it, the emotion grew stronger in his chest. “So help me win her, will you?”
Adelaide had been waiting long enough for her aunt in the parlor that she was beginning to become nervous. Especially since the home had become increasingly quiet over the past half hour. The sounds of servants bustling had faded and no one had come to check on her or see if she required refreshments.
She could only assume that was on her aunt’s order. Which meant Opal was still angry with her.
She drew in a deep breath at the thought. What would she do if her aunt raged at her? If she refused to forgive or to accept the future that Adelaide would now pursue?
“I’ll leave,” she said with a sigh as she scrubbed a hand over her face. “I’ll leave and go to Graham. I’ll accept that my future is where I belong.”
She said the words and smiled, for in that moment the future felt very bright, indeed.
The door behind her opened, and she turned to face Opal. Her aunt was wearing the same gown she had had on when she’d come to call at James and Emma’s home earlier in the day. Only now there were smudges on it, like she had been doing some kind of work in the outfit.
Adelaide frowned. “Good afternoon, Aunt Opal.”
She tensed as she waited for her guardian to respond. To get angry. To lash out. Instead, her aunt merely inclined her head. “Hello, Adelaide. I’m so sorry I didn’t come sooner. I wasn’t expecting you after that terrible scene at the Duke and Duchess of Abernathe’s.”
Adelaide drew in a short breath at the softness of her aunt’s tone. She actually did look and sound regretful. That gave Adelaide hope. “Yes. It was terrible. I’m so sorry you were upset that I went to Emma’s home. You must know I never intended to stay away forever. This is the only home I’ve known for most of my life.”
Opal’s lip twitched and she held Adelaide’s stare for what felt like forever before she said, “Why don’t you come up to your room with me?”
Adelaide wrinkled her brow at the odd request. “Why?”
“I want to show you something,” Opal insisted, motioning for Adelaide to lead the way. “And talk to you, calmly this time, rationally, about what we must do for the future.”
Adelaide pressed her lips together. She was often ill at ease with Opal, especially in the past few years, but right now she wondered at the cause for the stirring in her stomach. Opal was being sensible, after all, even kind.
Adelaide nodded at last. “Very well. Let’s go to my chamber.”
She walked up the stairs with Opal beside her, passing by portraits of family members on the wall. Opal hesitated beside the one of Adelaide’s parents. “My dear brother,” she said with a sigh. “And his lovely wife. They cared for me so deeply. They tried to save me.”
Adelaide wrinkled her brow. In the entire decade and a half that she had lived under her aunt’s roof, she could count on one hand the times Opal had spoken of Adelaide’s parents. When she had, it wasn’t with the wistfulness her tone presented now.
“Save you?” she repeated. “That’s an odd turn of phrase. How did they do that?”
Opal ignored her and started up the stairs again. “What happened today is very likely something we can’t cover up, Adelaide. Not like the last time.”
Adelaide flinched at the comparison of Graham to a man who had left her after one unpleasant night together. “No, you are probably right,” she said softly. “But the circumstances are very different. You see…” She took a deep breath, uncertain how her aunt would respond to her next words. “Graham is going to marry me,” she pushed out at last.
They had reached the top of the stairs then, and her aunt froze and turned on her, her eyes wide. “Is that what he’s said?”
“Yes. He asked me after you left, and I agreed. So you see, it isn’t as bad as you thought it was in the parlor this morning. This time I have found myself with a very decent man. One who will not abandon me.”
Her aunt nodded slowly and continued into the bedchamber. Adelaide looked around. It was a simple room, yes. Her aunt had never encouraged her to decorate it overly much. But it had been hers for a long time, and she didn’t hate the place.
Opal paced to the window and looked down over the garden in the back of the house. “When you marry, he will want heirs. Spares.”
Adelaide found herself smiling at the thought of starting a family with Graham. Of him becoming the father he had never had. Of looking into her children’s eyes and seeing all the echoes of the man she loved. All the best of both of them.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I’m certain we will. He has obligations, of course. And I would want to be a mother.”
Opal pursed her lips. “Then it will not stop.”
Adelaide wrinkled her brow in confusion. “Will not stop?” she repeated. “Aunt Opal, I came back here today to tell you of my impending marriage, but also to ask if you will support it. You are my only living family, after all. I know we’ve had our differences and that I’ve let you down with my behavior, but I do want your blessing.”
Opal moved toward her a step. “Your only family,” she repeated with a shake of her head. “My, how right you are. More right than you even know.”
The hairs on Adelaide’s neck began to prickle as she stared at her calm aunt. Far too calm considering the morning’s outburst. Suddenly her room didn’t feel as safe as it once had, and she began to question if coming here was so very wise.
“I don’t understand what you mean,” she whispered, looking toward the door.
Opal sighed. “I know. And I thought I might not ever have to tell you. But it seems I must. To end this, I must have it all out.”
“What all out?”
Opal motioned toward the settee. “Sit.”
It was an order, not a request, and her aunt was blocking her way to the exit. Adelaide had no choice, it seemed, but to obey. She sank into the settee and folded her suddenly trembling hands in her lap.
“I was like you,” Opal began. “When I was young. Foolish and headstrong. And I met a young man and I thought he was a knight in shining armor. That he would sweep me away.”
Adelaide’s lips parted in surprise. “I’ve seen your portraits from when you were young. You were so beautiful. I’m not surprised that you had suitors, but we’ve never spoken of them.”
“This man was not a suitor,” her aunt spat, a flash of anger to her tone and her eyes. “He was a thief in the night, come to seduce an innocent girl and steal what she should never have given.”
Adelaide straightened. “Are you speaking of the young man who took my virtue?” she asked, utterly confused.
“No, the one who took mine,” Opal replied. Her lips began to tremble. “I did not give, but he took.”
Adelaide shut her eyes, understanding at last. She thought of Melinda, her battered face, her haunted eyes. She thought of a dozen other women she knew who had been subject to such abuse. She thought of Sir Archibald’s fat hands on her, of that moment when she’d known her fate before Graham burst through the door like some hero in a story to save her.
“I’m so very sorry, Aunt Opal,” she breathed. “I had no idea you suffered such a thing.”
Opal’s gaze was far away, years away. “Oh yes, I suffered. My father cut me off, as I presented no more hope for a good match. And when I began to swell with that bastard’s child, I was forced to go into seclusion in my brother’s home.”
Adelaide stared. This was not a story she knew. Not a story anyone had told her. “You had a child?”
Opal jerked out one nod. “I did. No one knew. My brother and his wife hid what I’d done from the world. And when the baby came…they pretended.”
Her aunt’s words sank in, and Adelaide rose from the couch, her hands shaking as all the blood rushed from her face and made her dizzy with horror and understanding. “Pretended? Are you saying…are you saying that your brother and his wife took in the child? Pretended the baby was their own?”
“I didn’t want you,” Opal hissed, rising as well and glaring at Adelaide. “I looked at you and I saw that horrible night. A reminder of him.”
Adelaide lifted a hand to her lips. “You are lying,” she said. “You are deranged. They were my parents. No one ever hinted otherwise. I was theirs.”
Opal shook her head. “No, you were mine. You stole my future and my hopes, and I loved you and hated you so very much.”
Adelaide was shaking so hard, she was hardly able to stay upright. She stared at her aunt. Oh, she’d always seen the similarities between them. The faint reminder that her aunt’s hair had been blonde before she went gray. The hands that were the same. The lips.
But she’d always chalked those things up being family. She’d never thought, not once, not ever, that the woman who raised her, who held her at arm’s length, who gave her only the bare minimum of support, was her mother.
“If that is true, why did you take me when they died?” she whispered, her voice cracking on every word, because the truth of what was being said was starting to sink into her body, her skin, her soul.
It was tearing her apart piece by piece.
“Because no one else wanted you. And I knew that their deaths were my penance being forced back on me. So I took you. And I prayed you wouldn’t be like him.”
“Him?” Adelaide’s stomach turned as she comprehended what Opal meant. “How can you compare me to a man who forced himself on you?”
“You are a wanton, Adelaide!” her aunt roared. “You were for that boy, that boy who came mooning about. I saw what you were then. I thought I could stop it by stopping him.”
“Stopping him,” Adelaide repeated, backing up a step. “What does that mean? How did you stop him? He left.”
Her aunt shook her head slowly. “I let you believe that, hoping that you would recognize your true nature and work to better yourself. To rise above your natural tendencies.”
“What did you do?” Adelaide asked.
“I killed him,” Opal said. “I killed him.”
Adelaide staggered backward, as far as she could from her aunt. Until her back hit the window, until there was nowhere else to run. No way to hide from the horror that her aunt spewed at her.
“No,” she said. “No, that isn’t possible.”
“It very much is.” Her aunt was nodding and nodding, like her head was on a hinge. “You pay a man enough and he’ll help you get rid of a body and make it look like he left London of his own volition. So I did.”
Adelaide covered her mouth with both hands, praying she wouldn’t cast up her accounts then and there. She thought of that man, Charlie, who she had taught herself to hate. Taught herself to forget because she’d believed he’d used and discarded her.
Now she knew better.
“Poor Charlie,” she sobbed. “Oh God, Aunt Opal, how could you?”
“So you would stop!” her aunt burst out. “I had to make you stop. And you did, for a long time. You wore the clothing to cover your shame, you stood along the wall as you should. You hid away as was your destiny. But then he appeared.”
“Graham,” Adelaide whispered, and came forward a long step. “You will not hurt him, Opal. I’ll not let you. You will not hurt a hair on his head.”
“No,” her aunt agreed, walking across the room. She picked up a small statue that she’d given Adelaide years ago. A figure of Persephone, forever torn between two worlds. Forever punished by both her lover and her mother.
Now Adelaide stared at it, and everything made such perfect sense.
“I’m not going to hurt him,” her aunt continued as she moved forward. “Because I realize that it is you who must be silenced. Stopped. Or else you will make more spawn like you who will only do worse. We are damaged women, Adelaide. And the only way to stop it is to die.”
She swung the statue, and Adelaide lifted her hands with a scream. But she couldn’t block the heavy statue as it hit her in the side of the head. She slid down the wall staring up at her aunt, her mother. The world was spinning, going black. She had to fight it, had to stop it, but it was too powerful. Too strong.
And she slipped into unconsciousness with one thought in her mind.
Graham.