After a long, hard ride about his property, Benjamin made his way to the Ravenscroft Castle library and poured himself a snifter of fine brandy. And then another. He was about halfway to a drunken stupor when a glorious vision appeared in the doorway of the library. He must have been more foxed than he thought, for surely, this could not be real. After six days of silence, she wouldn’t simply appear before him, would she?
“Phoebe?” He said her name in a whisper, unable to believe she was really there. But then she spoke back.
“I-I found this,” she said, crossing the room on tentative feet until she stood an arm’s length away from him.
He wanted to reach out and grab her, pull her into his arms and never let go. But he wasn’t quite sure where he stood at the moment, so he decided instead to follow her lead. His eyes shifted from her face—which was markedly thinner than last he had seen her—to the familiar piece of foolscap she held out to him. It was amazing how one little piece of paper could sober a person in an instant.
“Where did you get that?” he asked, raising his heavy eyelids to meet her gaze.
“Ahem . . . it was . . . ” She closed her eyes and shook her head with a little laugh. “It was in my laundry.”
He waited, wondering, but terrified to ask if she had read it.
“I didn’t—” she said, possibly in response to his unasked question. His brain was slightly muddled and he couldn’t be sure. So he was pleased when she added, “—read it, that is. I didn’t read it. It took all my strength not to, but I figured if there was something I was meant to know, you would tell me. I betrayed your trust when I read the letter from Lillian. I didn’t want to do it again by reading this.”
He said nothing, only stared at her, unblinking.
“I know it’s from my cousin Geoffrey,” she continued. “But that is all.”
“You found it in your laundry, you say?”
Phoebe nodded.
It didn’t take a genius to figure out that Kat the Canary was behind this. Though it was hard to believe she’d had the audacity to go behind his back and give the letter to Phoebe, no matter how indirect her method. Damn her! As much as he wanted a reunion with his wife, he was far too incensed to focus on that just then.
Benjamin snatched the torn-up letter from his wife and stalked across the room. “Katherine!” he bellowed as he leaned into the hallway, and then he yelled it again.
“Benjamin, don’t!” Phoebe was at his side in a moment.
“Don’t? Phoebe, there is only one person who can tell you what is in that letter. Only one person who has the right to say anything to you. That person is not I, and it certainly is not Katherine. If your mother doesn’t want you to know—”
“What on earth are you shouting about, Benjamin?”
Katherine approached them, and it took every ounce of willpower he possessed not to wrap his hands about her neck. “I thought I told you to stay out of my affairs!” he yelled, brandishing the letter.
She paused, finally appearing to be slightly afraid of him, but it was only a fleeting moment. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said haughtily.
Phoebe pushed past him into the corridor. “It’s all right, Kat. We know you planted the letter. Don’t infuriate him further by lying.”
Kat’s eyes grew wide at having been properly scolded, and Ben wanted to give his wife a pat on the back. God, how he missed her! How he wished all this mess would just go away so he could be with her!
“Did you read it?” his sister asked of Phoebe.
Phoebe shook her head. “I appreciate what you were trying to do, Kat, but I . . . ”
“Katherine?”
All three of them looked up to find Lady Grimsby standing in the hallway behind them. She was thin—frighteningly so. She looked almost as awful as she had that first day he had found her in her room with Colonel Wallace. But what had brought her from her chamber at last?
“Mother? You’re out,” Phoebe said, appearing to be just as perplexed as he was.
“Of course I am. When Katherine told me there was an emergency, I assumed something was wrong with you. I went straight away to your room, but . . . darling, you look fine to me. Is everything all right?”
Benjamin and Phoebe both turned their gazes to Katherine, who was slowly backing her way down the long corridor. He shook his head. There was no hope of a cure for his meddling sister.
“Everything is fine, Mother,” Phoebe said, turning her attention back to Lady Grimsby. “But I think you and I need to have a chat.”
Benjamin shifted his gaze from his sister’s retreating form to his wife, wanting more than anything to draw her into his embrace and carry her off to their bedchamber. But he knew he couldn’t . . . not yet.
“I won’t be long,” she told him, planting a kiss to his cheek. “Try not to kill Katherine in the meantime. You know she means well.”
Phoebe took her mother by the hand and led her into the library, leaving Benjamin all alone in the corridor. He wondered if the truth would come out, or if he would simply have to accept that Phoebe had forgiven him, but that she would go on believing the worst of him.
Either way, he was certain it would be a while before she and her mother emerged.
***
Every last one of Phoebe’s nerves tingled with frustration. This had all gone on long enough. She wanted to know the truth, but she wanted to know it from her mother. She probably could have read that letter and perhaps known everything, but it wouldn’t make things any better. She had to hear it from her mother—every last word of the truth, no matter what.
“It is my impression, Mama, that you’ve been keeping quite a bit from me over this past year,” she began, making sure to keep her voice calm and even. She wanted to lull her mother into a discussion, not an argument.
But her mother remained silent, so Phoebe amended her last thought: she wanted to lull her mother to talk. Full stop.
“Would you like to begin with Colonel Wallace? Perhaps explain why he attacked me in London?”
Her mother turned suddenly to look at her with haunted eyes. “He what?”
“He attacked me . . . tried to violate me, really. He said you still owed him payment.” She paused to allow her mother a chance to explain, but still she said nothing. At least for a moment. And then the floodgates opened with tears and explanations and stories that Phoebe almost wished she didn’t have to hear.
Her mother recounted her horrific encounters with Wallace, and Phoebe hoped and prayed with all her might that the man would be brought to justice. It was awful to listen to; she couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for her mother to live through. No wonder she had kept it a secret. Anyone in their right mind would have.
At least an hour passed as her mother relived the past, but at the end of the sordid tale, Phoebe still didn’t know the last piece of the puzzle. What was this horrific thing they were all trying to keep from her? She’d known about Wallace—she just hadn’t known all the details. But there was still something more, of that much she was certain.
“Mama, I know this has been taxing, to say the least. But I know there is more that you are not telling me.” She squeezed her mother’s hands between her own. “Please, Mother.”
For the first time in the last hour, her mother lifted her head and met Phoebe’s gaze. There was a great deal of shame in her eyes, and Phoebe hated to press her further, but she needed to know. Whatever this secret was, it was causing a great deal of unrest in her family.
“Darling,” her mother began, her voice thick and raspy, “Benjamin was not the cause of your father’s death.”
It took Phoebe a moment to even comprehend how her mother knew Benjamin had caused the fever that had led to her father’s passing. Perhaps this was how they’d ended up arguing the other day, but . . .
“Are you saying the fever was coincidental then? That Benjamin is innocent in all this? Why the secrecy if it was merely a coincidence?” She was having trouble wrapping her mind around this particular idea.
“You have it partly correct. Your husband is completely innocent.” Her eyes filled with fresh tears and she tried to turn away, but Phoebe would have none of it.
“Mother, look at me,” she said, adding a force behind her voice that she had never used with her mother. “What part, exactly, do I have wrong then?”
“I didn’t want to tell you. I thought it best to protect you from such a harsh and horrible reality. Lord Grimsby was an awful husband to me, but he loved you. More than anything else, he loved you. And he was a good father when he came around. That’s what I wanted you to remember of him.”
“So there are no misconceptions, Mama, I had no illusions about my father’s character. No glorified impressions of the man whatsoever. And my memories of him have been clouded by a year of being hunted by his creditors. I’m not sure anything you say would surprise—”
“Your father killed himself.”
Phoebe blinked at her mother’s sudden admission. “He . . . what?”
“He kill—”
“No!” Phoebe held up a hand. “Don’t say it again. I heard you the first time. I . . . I can’t believe it. Why?”
For the first time in a very long time, her mother burst into laughter. Phoebe stared at the woman, not quite sure what to think after admitting her husband had taken his own life.
“Mother?” she asked, reaching out to lay a comforting hand on her shoulder. Clearly, the woman was going mad.
“Oh, Phoebe, I know this is no laughing matter.” She dabbed at her moist eyes. “But it feels . . . good to finally have all of this out in the open. Darling, I’m so sorry I never told you.”
Phoebe dragged her mother into her arms and hugged her long and hard. In the end, it didn’t really matter how her father had met his demise; she had already mourned him, his debts had been paid—in more ways than one. What really mattered was keeping her family together now, finding a happy ending to more than a year of misery.
She pulled back from her mother with a sudden jerk, her mind shifting to Benjamin. Oh, poor Benjamin!
“Go to him,” her mother urged with a teary half smile, and Phoebe needed no further prodding.
She ran from the room, through the halls, checking any and all of the locations she thought she might find him. Not surprisingly, she found him in his bedchamber—their bedchamber—practically pulling his hair out. It was obvious he’d been worried about the outcome of her chat with her mother, but she would be quick to set him at ease.
The large wooden door swung back and banged against the inside wall of the chamber. Benjamin turned at the sound. His eyes were wary, his dark locks stood on end, and a general look of dread clouded his features.
Phoebe barely stopped to look at him, for she was drawn to him like a magnet. She needed to be in his arms, to tell him how much she loved him and how very sorry she was for all he had been through, and all she had put him through as well.
His arms wrapped about her middle; he held her so close and so tight that her feet came off the ground. She hugged him back and ran reassuring fingers through his tousled hair as she did. She breathed him in, the masculine, alluring smell of him she had missed so much.
And then he was kissing her and carrying her to the bed. It turned out that words weren’t actually necessary in the making-up process. She knew the truth now, and he knew she knew the truth. They didn’t need to talk about it. So, they made love instead. For Phoebe, it was the most freeing experience of her life, lying with her husband, knowing that nothing else stood in their way. No more lies, no more questions . . . only the love they had for one another.
Sometime later, as the rain beat against the window of their bedchamber, Phoebe curled into the crook of Benjamin’s arm and sighed contentedly. His hand stroked her hair and she was tempted to let the tender motion lull her into the deep sleep she so craved. But she had one more secret she needed to get off her chest.
“Benjamin,” she said quietly into the darkening room.
“Hm . . . what is it, my love?”
“Well,” she turned slightly so she could rest her chin on his chest and see into his eyes that sparkled in the dim firelight, “as long as we are sharing secrets, I do have one more thing I think you should know.”
He sucked in a breath, and his eyes widened slightly; her serious tone clearly made him uneasy. But it was impossible for her to keep up the somber ruse, and a smile broke out on her lips before she could stop it.
“You needn’t look so very terrified, Benjamin . . . or should I say, Papa?”
It took only a moment for him to comprehend her words, and then he leapt from the bed with a great holler of joy. Phoebe laughed at the sight of her husband, naked and virile, jumping about like an India rubber ball. He gave a few more ecstatic shouts of “I’m going to be a father!” before he returned to the bed.
He nearly smothered Phoebe with his kisses, but she didn’t mind one bit. There was love, so much love, behind every kiss, and it was the sweetest moment Phoebe had ever known. Though her life had been filled with uncertainty for so long, she knew she would never, ever doubt again that she was thoroughly and completely loved.