The Duke's Perfect Wife

Of late, for some reason, Father began to believe that Ian was going to expose him. Perhaps Ian had grown more coherent about the incident, perhaps one of the doctors reported to my father that Ian was talking about his mother’s death—I never learned. In the end, I assume that my father feared someone at last believing Ian’s words and investigating. So he set his plan in motion.

I stopped that plan; I stopped it dead in its tracks. I found the men in my father’s pay, and I paid them to go far away. I sent my own people to guard Ian and had all missives from the asylum waylaid and passed to me.

My father found out and raged at me, but I knew he would try again. And again. My father was a ruthless man, as you know, selfish to the point of madness. I started proceedings to release Ian from the asylum into my guardianship, but the process was slow, and I feared my father would find a way around me before Ian was safe.

I knew I had to confront my father, to stop him for good.

One evening, two weeks ago, I went to his study at Kilmorgan. Father was well drunk, which was nothing unusual for that time of day. I told him that Ian had confided the story of our mother’s death to me and that I believed it. I told him that I was perfectly willing to testify to the truth of it, and I told him that I had put plans in motion to get Ian’s commission of lunacy reversed.

My father listened as one stunned, then he tried to attack me. But I am no longer a terrified little boy or a fearful youth, he was drunk, and I easily bested him.

He was surprised when I punched him full in the face. He’d trained me to be his obedient slave, to let him beat me any time he wished and to not shed a tear over the pain. He said he’d done it to make me strong. He’d made me strong all right, and now he was understanding how strong.

At the same time I started proceedings to have Ian’s commission reversed, I’d had my man of business draw up documents for a trust, one that divided the current wealth of the dukedom and the Mackenzie family into four equal pieces, one for each son, Ian included. The documents also give me custody of Ian, making Ian’s fate mine to decide.

Father railed against me, of course, but my man of business had done a thorough job. With one stroke of a pen, my brothers would be free, and Father’s money would be given to the sons he despised.

He shouted at me and told me he’d kill me, told me he’d kill my brothers and see us in hell. I had to threaten him with violence, and I do not want to tell you about what I had to do. It is enough to say that, in the end, he signed the document and regarded me in stark fear. I’d become a monster, in his eyes, but I am only the monster he created.

I gave the papers at once to my man of business’s courier, who was waiting outside. He took one copy to Edinburgh and one copy to London, and there they both reside.

My father raged until he fell into a stupor and was put to bed. The next day, he strode out with his shotgun, saying he was going after a buck. He took the ghillie along, but I didn’t trust him not to double back, get himself and the shotgun onto a horse, and ride across country to the asylum where Ian still resided.

My father must have known I would come after him, because he sent our ghillie ahead and waited for me in an isolated spot. Sure enough, the moment I caught up to him, Father had that shotgun in my face, his finger on the trigger.

I fought him. It was a mad struggle for the gun there in the woods. The barrel seemed to be pointed at me forever, and I knew that if I died this day, my brothers wouldn’t have a chance against him, even with the documents he’d signed. He’d find a way to annul the agreement and make their lives an even greater misery than he had before. And Ian would be dead.

I finally got the shotgun turned around, and now the barrel faced him.

I can lie and tell myself that it was an accident. That I was fighting for the gun and it went off. But I had it in my hands, El. I saw in my mind’s eye, in the split second before I pulled the trigger, the years of terror we’d have to endure if he went on living. Our father was a devious and insane man, and God help us, we inherited our bits of insanity from him. I saw that Ian would never be safe from him, no matter how diligent I was, if I did nothing.

I ended that hell in the woods. I pulled the trigger and shot him in the face.

The ghillie came running, of course. I was holding the gun by the barrel, looking horrified. It had jammed, I said. Backfired when it had gone off.

The ghillie knew, I know he did, but he said that, aye, His Grace must have failed to check that the barrel was clear before he fired at a stray bird. Accidents happened.

And so, the thirteenth Duke of Kilmorgan is gone. My brothers suspect the truth, just as the ghillie did, but they have said nothing, and I have not enlightened them. I vowed in that woods that they would never have to pay for what I’ve done.

Tonight, I confess my sins to you, Eleanor, and to you alone. Tomorrow, Ian comes home. Perhaps the Mackenzies can find some peace, though I doubt it, dear El, because we are so very bad at peace!

Thank you for listening. I can almost hear you saying, in that clearheaded way of yours: “You did what you have done. Let that be an end to it.”

I wish I could hear you say it, in your voice like a soothing stream, but do not worry. I will not rush to Glenarden and throw myself at your feet. You deserve peace as well.

God bless you.

Hart heard a faint sound. He looked up from the letter, tears in his eyes, to see Eleanor standing in the doorway, prim and proper in a dress buttoned to her chin, her lips parted as she stared back at him.

Chapter 11