She looked up at him with wide blue eyes. “Oh, Ian.” Instead of fearing his strength, she rested her hands gently on his arms. “You think Hart did this, don’t you?”
Ian shook his head. He closed his eyes and kept shaking his head, but he held on to Beth as though he’d be torn away if he didn’t. “No.” The word echoed through the room, and he said it again. And again. And again.
“Ian.”
With effort, Ian stopped, but he kept his eyes shut tight. “Why do you think so?” Beth’s voice wrapped around him like eiderdown. “Tell me.”
Ian opened his eyes, the anguish of five years trying to drown him. Sally had boasted that she knew secrets that would ruin Hart, cut him out of politics altogether. Hart loved politics, God knew why. In the middle of coitus with Sally, she’d enraged Ian so much, going on and on how she’d blackmail Hart, that Ian had withdrawn, snatched up his clothes, and left the room. He’d felt the rage coming on, knew he had to go. He’d walked the house, searching for whiskey, searching for Hart and not finding him, trying to calm down. Once he could think coherently again, he’d returned to Sally’s room. “I opened the door and saw Hart in the bedroom. I saw him with Sally on the sofa at the end of the bed.” The images rose before Ian could stop them, every single one as coldly clear as it had been that day. Hart with Sally, her naked limbs wrapped around him. Her soft cry of joy turning to fear.
“Hart took a knife away from her—I don’t know why she had it. She swore at him. He tossed the knife away. Then he pressed her throat until she quieted, and she laughed. I don’t want you to know these things.”
“But…” Beth frowned. “Sally wasn’t strangled, too, was she? No one has mentioned bruises on her throat.”
Ian shook his head. “Hart, he used to be… You wouldn’t understand the terms. He owned the house. Mrs. Palmer and her women belonged to him.”
“He can’t own women. This is England.”
For some reason, Ian wanted to laugh. “They obeyed him. They wanted to. He was everything to them, their lord and master.”
Beth frowned a little longer, and then her brow cleared.
“Oh.” The syllable was short, pregnant with meaning.
“He did it before he married, then stopped. After his wife died he started again. He was very discreet, but we knew. He was grieving. He needed them.”
“Goodness, most people make do with crepe and mourning brooches,” Beth said faintly. “But why would he try to strangle Sally Tate?”
Ian placed his hand at the base of Beth’s windpipe.
“When you cut off the air, the climax is deeper, more intense. That is why he had his hands on her throat.”
Beth’s eyes widened. “How very… interesting.”
“And dangerous.” Ian removed his hand from her neck. “Hart knows how to do it, exactly when to stop.”
“You saw that,” Beth said slowly. “But you didn’t actually see him kill her?”
“When I saw them together, I left them to it. I knew if anyone could talk Sally out of blackmail it would be Hart. I thought to go home, but I’d left my watch on her bedside table, and I wanted it. I found a decanter of whiskey in the parlor downstairs and helped myself while I waited. Later I heard Hart rush out the front door and saw him leap into his coach. I went back upstairs for the watch and found Sally. Dead.”
“Oh—“ Beth broke off and bit her lip. “What does Hart say happened?”
The fact that she was still standing in front of him, talking in her cool and puzzling way, was a miracle to Ian. Beth hadn’t left him in disgust, hadn’t fainted in shock at all he’d revealed. She remained, still the anchor in the vast, bewildering river that was his life.
“He told me that he’d left the room once he’d got Sally bent to his will again and had his valet help him clean up and dress in another room. When he returned, he found Sally dead and ran downstairs and out of the house. He didn’t see me in the parlor, he said, or he’d have insisted I come with him. He said he couldn’t risk being there when the police came, because of his career.” Ian shook his head. “I don’t believe him. Hart wouldn’t run away if he hadn’t killed her. He’d have taken the house apart until he found the culprit.”
“Possibly,” Beth said in her slow, sure voice. “If I hadn’t met Hart, I might believe he killed her and bolted. But I did meet him, and I’m confident that, if he had decided to kill her, he’d have made certain you were far away before he did the dreadful deed. He’d have avoided involving you, no matter what. Therefore, it couldn’t have been Hart who did it.”
“I know what I saw.”
“Yes.” Beth turned and walked away from him, but thinking, not hysterical. “And the police would believe as you did, and a jury, and a judge. But they don’t know Hart. He’d never put you in jeopardy of arrest or returning to the asylum. He never wants you locked away again.”
“Because he needs me and my bloody inconvenient memory.”
“No. Because he loves you.”
The woman was incredibly innocent. She’d seen what she’d seen in London’s slums, she’d been destitute and desperate, and yet she still looked for good in the Mackenzies. Unbelievable.
“Hart is ruthless,” Ian said. “I told you I don’t have the capacity for love. Neither does he, but he doesn’t wonder about it as I do. He will do what he needs to, even if it’s deadly, even if one of his brothers has to pay the price.”
Beth shook her head, her dark hair glistening under the light. “You have to be wrong.”
Ian laughed sharply. “We’re all very bad at love, Beth. I told you we break whatever we touch.”
“Ian, in five years, have you never put aside what you saw, thought of the thing clearly, without Hart in it? Can you pretend Hart wasn’t there and decide who else might have done it?”
“Of course I have,” Ian said irritably. He ran a hand through his hair. “I have run through every scenario, every possibility from beginning to end. I thought of the other men there, of Mrs. Palmer, of the other ladies in the house, an intruder breaking in. I’ve even worried that it was me, and I simply can’t remember doing it.”
“What about Lily Martin? Why did you hide her at Covent Garden?”
“She was looking into the room, watching Hart with Sally. She swore to me she never saw Hart stab her, but I couldn’t tell whether she lied. I couldn’t risk what she’d tell the police, so I sent Curry back to get her out of the way before the constable came. But I didn’t hide her well enough.”
“You think Hart found her a few weeks ago and killed her?”
“Yes.”
Beth paced away from him again. “Goodness, what a mess.”
“It doesn’t have to be. If Fellows keeps his nose out of it, we could go on.”
“No, you can’t.” Beth came back to him. “It’s tearing you apart. It’s tearing Hart apart, too, and the rest of the family. Everything you say makes perfect sense, but there’s another explanation. Hart thinks you did it. That’s why he ran out of the house, looking for you, to make sure you were gone and hadn’t done it. It must have been a dreadful shock for him when he realized you were still in the house when Sally died.”
Ian blinked, and for a second he met her gaze. He loved her eyes, so blue. He could drown in her. He looked away. “Because he believes I’m mad? He does believe I’m mad, but you’re wrong.”
“Why are the Mackenzies so bloody stubborn? The killer must have come in and stabbed Sally while Hart was with his valet. No matter how ruthless Hart is, someone else was even more ruthless.”
Memories flooded him thick and fast, memories Ian had tried to push away for two decades. The image of Hart with his hands around Sally’s neck became superimposed on an other man and woman. “I think it was Hart, because. Beth, he looked so much like my father.”
“Your very hairy father? Hart resembles him a bit, but…”
He didn’t hear her. The terror of the nine-year-old Ian rose up in him, memories of crouching behin
d the desk in his father’s study when he heard his parents come in. They’d been shouting at each other, as they always did, and Ian would have been punished.
He’d watched his mother rush at his father, claws ready, and his father catch her around the neck. The duke had squeezed, then shake, shake, and she’d gone limp. Ian’s beautiful mother had crumpled to the floor in an unmoving heap, while his father stood over her, hands open, his face gray with shock.
Then had come the terrible moment when his father had looked around the desk and seen Ian. The watery terror in Ian’s limbs when his father had rushed at Ian and picked him up, shaking him as he’d shaken Ian’s mother.
You tell no one. Do you understand me? She slipped and fell; that is what happened. You have to lie. Do you understand?
More shaking, harder, harder. Damn you, why won’t you look at me when I’m talking to you?
Ian had been locked away in his room, and the next morning jostled into a carriage that had taken him to London and the courtroom that had condemned him as a lunatic. He’d been in the private asylum two weeks before he finally understood he’d not be allowed to go home. Ever.
Beth’s palms touched his face. “Ian?”
“He killed her,” Ian said. “He didn’t mean to. But he had the rages, like I do.”
“You mean Hart?”
Ian shook his head. “My father. He killed my mother, broke her neck with his own two hands. He told everyone she’d slipped on the rug, fell, died. My brothers didn’t believe it, but they couldn’t ask me, could they? I was declared mad, shut away, so no one would believe me if I told what I saw my father do.”
Beth laced her arms around his waist and rested her head against his chest. “Oh, Ian, I’m so sorry.” Ian held her there a moment, taking comfort from her warmth. He had a fear inside him that one day he’d lose his mind like his father had, put his hands around the neck of the woman he loved, and kill her before he could stop himself. Beth trusted him, and Ian would die if he hurt her. Beth lifted her head, tears wetting her lashes, and he kissed her forehead. “Hart is as ruthless as my father ever was. He doesn’t rage, but he is so cold.”
“I still think you’re wrong. Hart sent you to Scotland after Sally’s death to protect you, not keep you quiet.”
Ian gave the ceiling a brief exasperated glance before he took Beth by the shoulders and pushed her against the high bed “I can protect you from Hart, but only if you stop. Forget about High Holborn, and never speak to Inspector Fellows again. He’ll crush you to get what he wants, and so will Hart.”
She looked at him in anguish. “You want me to go the rest of my life watching you in so much pain? Believing your brother murdered a woman? Isn’t it better to find out what really happened?”
“No.”
Tears swam in her eyes, and she turned her head to avoid his gaze. “I want to help you.”
“You can help best by never speaking to Fellows again. And stop trying to find out what happened. Promise me.” She went silent a moment, then sighed. “Mrs. Barrington always told me curiosity was my besetting sin.”
“I’ll keep you safe, I promise you, my Beth.”
“Very well,” she whispered. “I’ll stop.”
Relief relaxed his body. He pulled Beth into his arms, held her tight against him. “Thank you.” He kissed her hair. “Thank you.”
She reached up to kiss him. As he slid his lips over hers it didn’t occur to him that she’d given up a shade too easily.
Chapter Nineteen
When Beth woke much later, Ian slept next to her, his naked body touched by lamplight, his muscles gleaming with sweat from their passion. When he’d climaxed inside her, he’d almost, almost looked at her fully again, but he’d closed his eyes at the last minute. Now he slept, and Beth lay against his warmth, her thoughts troubled. Ian might not want to know the truth, but the truth was that Sally Tate and Lily Martin had died, lost their lives. Beth knew enough of game girls to know that unless they found a long-term relationship with a wealthy protector, their lives could be short and brutal. The wrong client could beat them senseless, even kill them, and no one would care. They were just whores. Even if the girls managed to find a place in an elegant brothel, when they grew older and lost their looks they could be turned out, sent to live on the streets again. Those with protectors fared better, but only if the protector was kind to them. Beth knew full well that but for the grace of God and the kindness of Thomas Ackerley and Mrs. Barrington, she could have become one of them.
Fellows didn’t care that the women had died; he wanted only to destroy the Mackenzies. Ian cared—she could see his sorrow for Sally and Lily and his own mother—but what he cared most about was sparing his brother. The brother who had delivered Ian from hell. Beth ground her teeth. Damn the dead duke for locking Ian away because Ian had seen what he wasn’t supposed to see. Damn Hart Mackenzie for enmeshing Ian in his games of power. And damn Ian for his undying gratitude to Hart. Beth hadn’t understood at first why Isabella had walked away from Mac when she obviously still loved him. She understood better now. Beth wasn’t certain what Mac had done to upset Isabella so much, but then he was a thickskulled, stubborn Mackenzie. Wasn’t that enough? A sweet debutante like Isabella hadn’t stood a chance. Beth rose and dressed herself. She’d learned to dress simply and hastily when she’d worked for Mrs. Barrington, having to tend the old lady any time of the day or night. Ian didn’t wake. He lay facedown, his body relaxed, eyes closed. Lamplight brushed the firm mound of his backside, the small of his back, the tight muscles of his shoulders. He was a large and beautiful man, so strong, and so very vulnerable. Hart had called him that. And yet, Hart had backed down from him.
I love you, Ian Mackenzie. Beth’s heart ached.
She silently left the room and went downstairs. Glancing about to make sure she was not seen, she made for the door in the back of the main hall that led to the servants’ staircase. The cook worked busily in the kitchen, cleaning up the supper she’d just cooked for Cameron and Daniel. She beamed at Beth as Beth entered the warm kitchen, just like old times.
“It’s good to see ones eat so heartily,” the cook said. “They et it all straightaway and asked for more. A cook can’t ask for better. Not like yourself, who didn’t even come down. Can I warm something on a plate for you?”
“No, thank you, Mrs. Donnelly. I’m looking for Katie.”
“You’re the lady of the house now. You should ‘ave rung.”
“Have you seen her?” Beth asked impatiently.
“She’s on the scullery stairs.” The cook looked disapproving. “With one who’s no better than she ought to be. I wouldn’t let the likes of her in.”
Beth’s heart leapt. “It’s all right. She’s one of my charity cases.”
“You’re too softhearted, you are. Katie’s all right, but that one she’s brought is hard as nails, and her nose is stuck in the air. She don’t need your charity.”
Beth ignored Mrs. Donnelly and left through the scullery and to the stairs that ran to the street above. Katie waited on the steps, her face clouded in Irish fury. “Well, she’s here, as you can see.”
“Thank you, Katie. You may go in now.”
“Not bloody likely. I don’t trust her an inch, and I ain’t leaving her alone with you.”
The lady in question really did have her nose in the air, a slim, well-powdered nose. The rest of her face was well powdered, too, and rouged Diamonds glittered on her neck and in her ears. The young woman wasn’t beautiful, but she was attractive in a sensual way, and she knew it. Her red lips curved into a superior smile as she gave Beth’s simple gown a once-over.
“Molly said you was a duchess,” she said. “But I didn’t believe it.”
“You mind your manners,” Katie snapped. “She’s a lady.”
“Hush, Katie. Your name is?”
“Sylvia… That’s all you need to know.”
“I am pleased to meet you, Sylvia. I’m sorry to bother you, but I wa
nt to ask you a few questions.”
“Out here on the back stairs? That bitch of a cook wouldn’t let me in the kitchen. I want to be sat in the parlor, and your slaveys waiting on me, or I won’t talk.”
“Mind your tongue,” Katie snapped. “You’re not fit to sit in m’lady’s parlor. We stay in the shadows so no one knows she’s talking to you.”
Beth raised her hands. “Peace, both of you. It will only take a few minutes, Sylvia, and I know you are the right one to speak to. I imagine you know so much.”
Sylvia preened under the base flattery. “You was asking about the house in High Holborn. I know all about it, and about the right old bitch who runs the place. What do you need to know?”
“Everything.”
In answer to her questions, Sylvia confirmed what Fellows had said: that Mrs. Palmer had been Hart’s mistress and he’d bought her the house in High Holborn. “She met him when he was still at university, and her already long in the tooth,” Sylvia said. “Didn’t no one love a young man like Angelina Palmer loved him. She’d do anything for him, piss in her own shoes if he asked her to.”
“But he sold her the house later,” Beth said. “I had the idea she was no longer his mistress after that.”
“Oh, he gave her the push, all right, and she turned her hand to being a businesswoman, if you take my meaning. It weren’t a bad place when I was there, but me and Mrs. Palmer never rubbed on well. I left as soon as I found better prospects.” She glanced fondly at her diamond rings.
“Then it truly is over between them,” Beth said.
“It might have been for his part, but never hers. The duke started being high-and-mighty, hobnobbing with the queen. He’d need a young and beautiful lady, not some old biddy he had since he were twenty. I’d have been angry as anything, but Ma Palmer was most understanding. Went on loving him to pieces, though her heart was broke. If we ever said a word against the duke, we got our ears boxed.”
Beth stared thoughtfully at the iron railings of the staircase.
“You say she’d do anything for the duke?”
“Course she would. She’s like a dewy-eyed schoolgirl with him, for all she’s fifty if she’s a day.”