Chapter Seventeen
‘I will explain later,’ Jake said, stroking her hair. ‘Are you all right? Did he hurt you?’
A glimmer of a smile curved her luscious lips; lips that were bleeding because the bastard had obviously struck her. ‘Not as much as you hurt him,’ she replied, glancing down at Grantley’s prostrate form with considerable satisfaction in her expression. ‘But Tom…they gave him laudanum.’
‘Take Tom from that woman, Parker,’ Jake said in a mordent tone. ‘We will get him home and have him seen by a doctor immediately.’
‘Lady Marchant is not involved, Jake.’
Jake looked at the lady in question, then back at Olivia, not understanding but willing to take her word for it.
‘Come back to Grosvenor Square with us in that case, Lady Marchant,’ he said. ‘We must get there immediately for Tom’s sake. You can explain everything once we arrive. Parker, stay here with these two until the carriage arrives, then bring them back. We shall lock them in the cellars until I know what precisely has happened here. Oh, and search this hovel. Bring back anything you find.’
Molly moaned, implying that she had been on the point of helping Olivia. Jake glanced at Olivia, who shook her head decisively.
‘I gave her every opportunity, but she is loyal to Hubert,’ she said.
‘Then she will suffer the consequences of her folly.’
‘Nooo, I was deceived!’ Molly wailed. ‘He said he loved me. Promised me I would be famous.’
Jake ignored her and ushered his party into the curricle, hoping against hope that Olivia was right to trust Lady Marchant. He made sure that Olivia sat beside him and that she had possession of Tom. Lady Marchant sat on the outside of the cramped box seat, where she could do the least harm if she tried anything desperate.
By the time they arrived back at Grosvenor Square, Tom was starting to regain his senses, much to Olivia’s relief. She refused to be parted from her son, and sat with him on her lap until the doctor arrived to examine him.
‘No harm done,’ the medical man said to sighs of relief all round. ‘Put him to bed, he will sleep well tonight and feel none the worse for wear in the morning. In fact, he probably won’t remember much about what happened to him.’
‘Just as well,’ Jake muttered.
A subdued and sleepy Tom went up without any fuss. When Olivia returned from helping Jane to put him to bed, she had changed back into a gown, washed the blood from her face and a little colour had returned to her complexion.
‘He is sleeping,’ she said, smiling at Jake. ‘I have never seen a more precious sight.’
‘I told you we would recover him safe and sound,’ Jake replied, patting her hand. ‘Now, perhaps you would like to tell me what happened.’
Olivia did so, helped by occasional comments from Lady Marchant.
‘I really had no idea he intended to go so far,’ she said. ‘I thought I was dealing with a blackmailer, not a child abductor. I am so very sorry.’
Jake was unsure whether to believe her. She sounded sincere but then she was a famed actress. However, Olivia appeared to be in no doubt and that was enough for Jake. He stood up, went to his safe and extracted her letters.
‘Yours, I believe,’ he said, handing them to Lady Marchant.
‘Thank you so very much,’ she said, flipping through them and then throwing them into the fire. ‘You can have no idea what a weight that is off my mind.’ She stood up. ‘I will leave you now, but I hope in time we can be friends, Mrs Grantley.’
Olivia stood also. ‘I should like that.’
‘I will have someone summon a cab for you,’ Jake said, ringing the bell.
Parker joined them almost as soon as Lady Marchant had left. ‘They’re locked in the cellar,’ Parker said. ‘And I found a lot of cash, presumably from the sale of those paintings, hidden beneath the floorboards.’
‘What do you want done about them, Olivia?’
‘Hubert admitted that he set up the robberies that killed Marcus and that poor night watchman, but it would be his word against mine and no one would believe I was not involved. You know very well that some still suspect me. Molly is so besotted with Hubert that she will take his side and if Lady Marchant was forced to testify to what she heard, it would mean the end of her marriage. She has been foolish, but still, I could not do that to her.’
‘What about the men he hired; the ones who killed the night watchman?’ Jake asked. ‘They ought to be brought to account.’
Parker shrugged. ‘I doubt if he knows who they are. He was, shall we say, persuaded to give me the name of the man whom he paid to make the arrangements. We could pass that on anonymously to Chief Inspector Drake and let him take it from there. I doubt whether the man will be found, though.’
Jake doubted it too. ‘Well then,’ he said. ‘Why do we not give all that money to Lady Grantley so she can at least pay for her boys’ education and have something left to live on? We will put Grantley and Molly on a ship to America with the clothes they stand up in and let them make of their new life what they may. That will save you from further scandal and give them their just desserts.’
Olivia nodded. ‘That will serve very well. I gave Molly every opportunity to switch sides whilst we were in that cottage but she stuck by Hubert, even after he punched her, so she has no one but herself to blame.’
‘Then we are agreed.’ Jake stood and extended a hand to Olivia. ‘Come along, my sweet. You look exhausted. Besides,’ he added in an undertone that Parker could not hear. ‘You are in need of a lady’s maid and I am offering my services.’
҉
Olivia smiled to herself as Jake’s carriage returned her to Grosvenor Square the afternoon after her ordeal. She had been to visit Margaret; aware that that delicate task could not be delayed or delegated, even though she would have much preferred to remain with Tom. Jake had assured her that he would act in loco parentis, setting her mind at rest, and he greeted her now with a squealing Tom thrown over his shoulder.
‘There you are,’ he said, sending her a somnolent smile. ‘We missed you.’
‘Not too much by the looks of things,’ she replied, smiling at her upside down son and ruffling his hair.
‘Mama, we have been building a fort,’ Tom cried enthusiastically.
‘So I see,’ Olivia replied, having surrendered her outer garments to the maid who stepped forward to take them and smiling as she saw an assortment of building bricks spread across the rug in front of the fire in Jake’s library. The makings of the promised fort emerged triumphant from the chaos. She idly wondered which of the budding architects had enjoyed himself more. ‘Very impressive.’
Olivia spent ten minutes with Tom, admiring his handiwork and listening to his endless chatter, glad to see him restored to his normal inquisitive and talkative self. He did not seem to recall anything about the previous day and Olivia was grateful for that. Jane appeared to take him up to the nursery and Olivia reluctantly let him go.
‘Now, tell me how it went with Lady Grantley,’ Jake said when they were finally alone.
Olivia planned to visit her sister-in-law alone. Jake’s idea of alone was to send her in one of his carriages, with two footmen up behind. She allowed him to take such excessive precautions, even though she knew they were no longer necessary, just so that he would know peace of mind.
‘I told her everything…well, almost everything. I did not mention that her husband tried to rape me. What would be the point of inflicting unnecessary pain? Anyway, she accepted what I did tell her with remarkably good grace,’ Olivia replied. ‘I expected her to blame me somehow, or to make excuses for Hubert.’
‘I suspect she already had a good idea that he was behaving rashly, even if she was not prepared to admit it to herself, much less anyone else. How did she respond to the knowledge that her husband and the girl he foolishly caught in his web of deceit are about to leave these shores permanently?’
‘You know, I think she was relieved; especially when I gave her all that money. I dare say she will tell everyone that Hubert is dead, thereby retaining her dignity and society’s sympathy. Either way, at least now she knows his fate and will not spend her days wondering what has become of him.’
‘What does she plan to do now? The money will not be sufficient to restore that barn of a house.’
‘She had been thinking of moving into the dower house. She has taken control of things in Hubert’s absence and is already accepting her estate manager’s suggestions for improved productivity on the farm. She will try to find someone to take over the house for a peppercorn rent, in return for their doing the repairs. She does not wish to sell it if it can be avoided, since she looks upon it as her eldest son’s inheritance.’
‘Well then, we no longer need concern ourselves with Lady Grantley. Let us think of ourselves for a change.’
Olivia permitted her surprise to show. ‘Whatever do you mean? The danger is past. I can go back to Chelsea and leave you in peace.’
Jake fixed her with a look of fierce protectiveness. ‘You know precisely what I mean, and it has nothing to do with Chelsea.’ He canted his head and smiled at her with his eyes, his lips, his entire face. ‘But then again, perhaps it does.’
‘If you are about to scold me for leaving here with Molly yesterday then you can save your breath. My son’s life hung in the balance and given the same circumstances, I would do so again without a second thought. You are not a mother so cannot be expected to understand what primal forces influenced me.’
‘Actually, I was thinking of our future.’
‘What future?’ Olivia flapped a hand. ‘I have agreed to come to Torbay this summer and we were to speak of it then.’
‘That was before you put yourself in danger. Again.’ Jake clasped one of her hands in both of his own. ‘There is no help for it, my sweet, you will just have to marry me.’
Olivia’s mouth fell open. ‘Marry you?’
‘I will be a very considerate husband and only beat you if you really deserve it.’
Olivia punched his arm, still convinced that she must have misheard him. ‘What of Thorndike and your worries about your enemies getting to you through me?’
‘It seems my enemies are the least of my worries. Your own relations are the ones most determined to harm you and I cannot keep you safe if you are not living beneath my roof. And I know you will not agree to do that indefinitely without my ring on your finger since you are an infuriatingly independent woman!’
‘I might consider marrying you, if I thought your declaration came as a result of undying love; a word I have yet to hear pass your lips.’
‘My sweet, how could you ever doubt it?’ His eyes glistened with emotion. ‘When I knew you had gone with Molly yesterday…when we arrived at that cottage and I saw what Grantley was about to do to you out of malignant spite; what he would have succeeded in doing had we been a few minutes later, I wanted to die. He would have had to kill you, you know.’ Olivia swallowed. She did know, but preferred not to think about it. ‘He could not have allowed you to live after that because he knew that I would put all of my resources into unearthing him and exacting revenge.’
‘Very likely, but he was so enraged that I think he acted without thinking things through properly.’
Jake nodded. ‘I realised in that shabby cottage that my life has been half-empty without you and that it will not be worth living if you will not share it with me.’
‘Jake, I—’
Jake quieted her by placing his finger against his lips. ‘Say you will be my wife, my love, and I will devote the rest of my life to making you and Tom happy. We will fight off our enemies together, have a dozen more children and be the happiest couple in all of England.’
‘Oh, Jake!’
‘As to Tom, I would be privileged if you would permit him to take my family name. He would be Thomas Morton, you would be the Countess of Torbay, and we need never hear the name Grantley mentioned again.’ Jake’s eyes glistened. ‘Do you suppose Tom could be persuaded to address me as Papa? I cannot make him my heir; that is not possible, but I can provide for him, protect him and love him as much as I love you.’
Tears spilled from Olivia’s eyes. ‘Then yes, I will marry you with gladness in my heart, but we’d had best make it soon.’ She wrapped her arms around his neck and placed a gentle kiss on his lips. ‘If you want our first child to be legitimate, that is.’
Jake looked at her aghast. ‘Are you saying—’
‘Yes, I have been waiting for the right moment to tell you. It is the result of our intimacies in this house two months ago. I did not want you to think I was trying to trap you into matrimony, you see.’
‘Oh my love!’ Jake’s smile was broad and infectious as he pulled her into his arms and kissed her witless. ‘I shall arrange a special licence and we will be married this week.’
‘And you will give up working for Thorndike, we will retire to Torbay and grow those roses together?’
He chuckled. ‘I shall certainly give up working for Thorndike but I cannot promise to stop righting individual wrongs.’
‘Ever the vigilante,’ Olivia said, sighing.
‘Bear in mind, that is how you and I met, so I have a great deal to thank my vigilante tendencies for. When I heard what had happened to you, I sensed a potential miscarriage of justice and could not help involving myself.’ He spread his hands. ‘There are bound to be other instances…’
Olivia nodded. ‘Very well, but you must promise to talk to me about any rescue missions you plan to embark upon.’ She touched his face. ‘No secrets, Jake.’
‘No secrets,’ he promised, kissing each of her fingers in turn and sending her a wolfish smile. ‘But as to the roses, I cannot promise you that I will embark upon that particular project with much enthusiasm. I can think of much better ways for us to occupy our time.’
Olivia laughed because she could not seem to help herself. She was the happiest, the most fortunate woman in the entire Empire and had every reason to laugh.
‘We shall see,’ she replied.
When Parker entered the room a short time later, Jake grinned at him.
‘Fetch champagne, Parker. You may be the first to congratulate us. Olivia has graciously agreed to become my countess.’
Parker flashed an ear-splitting smile as he pumped Jake’s hand and placed a kiss on Olivia’s cheek. ‘About time an’ all,’ he said as he disappeared to fetch the champagne.
The End