Chapter Twenty-Two

So, this is where you grew up?” Rafe raised an eyebrow as he scanned the quiet streets of Sir Alfred’s tony neighborhood. “No wonder you never pick up the check.”

Rafe was here in an official capacity to deal with the leak and unofficially to help Alec. Though Alec had initially balked, he was glad not to be alone now. They departed Venice on the next available train, then had to wait a day in Calais due to the weather, which put them two days behind Lottie.

“That’s rich, coming from an earl’s son.” Alec cast him a glance before continuing to look out the hackney’s window. “We were in Surrey most of the time, anyway. That is, when I wasn’t at school.” He pressed his lips together as Sir Alfred’s properly imposing town house came into view. Alec banged on the roof of the carriage and it stopped across the street. He pressed a hand against his knee to still his jittering leg. The closer they had come, the more restless his nerves grew. They watched the town house for another few minutes, but not a soul came in or out, and the curtains were drawn over every window.

The hairs at the back of his neck prickled. “I don’t like this.”

“Perhaps they went to Surrey.”

Alec’s heart sank at the idea. He needed to see Lottie. Now. “Let’s find out.”

As they alighted from the carriage, another pulled up in front of the town house and a spritely man in dark clothes wearing a vicar’s collar emerged.

As they walked across the street, the vicar took notice of them. “Good afternoon. Are you here for the wedding?” he asked with a cheery smile.

Wedding?

Alec stopped dead in his tracks and his hands immediately tightened into fists.

“Steady now,” Rafe murmured as he stepped forward to greet the vicar. “Yes. We are cousins of the bride.”

“Oh, how wonderful! I must admit, the summons I received yesterday made this all seem very mysterious. I felt a bit like the priest in Romeo and Juliet. Hopefully this wedding has a happier ending!” He laughed at his own terrible joke. “It’s always preferable to have at least some family in attendance.”

“Our dear cousin doesn’t know,” Rafe explained. “It’s meant to be a surprise, you see.”

“Ah! Even better! Well, you should come round the back with me, then. Those were my instructions.”

Rafe and Alec exchanged a subtle look. “That sounds perfect,” Rafe said, then flashed that easy smile that always got him exactly what he wanted. As the vicar led the way to the back entrance, Rafe gave Alec a spirited wink.

But as they stepped onto the grounds, Alec’s heart leapt to his throat. Whatever happened next wouldn’t be so easy.

“I suppose our uncle gave the staff the day off,” Rafe offered as they made their way to the servants’ entrance. There was still no sign of anyone about.

The vicar nodded. “I was told that discretion was of the utmost importance.” Then he turned to Alec. “Sir Alfred is quite an important man, I take it?”

Alec gave a noncommittal grunt in reply. He was busy studying the third floor. Lottie’s bedroom window was slightly open. An image of her standing before a mirror in a wedding gown flashed across his mind, and he dug his nails into the skin of his palm.

“My cousin is a man of few words.” Rafe gave the vicar an apologetic smile. “But yes, our uncle is important.”

“I see.” The vicar’s lips pursed and he turned back to Rafe. “Do you like the chap your cousin is marrying? A Mister…Wertherby? Have I got that right?”

“Wetherby?” Alec roared.

Rafe clapped a hand on the vicar’s shoulder to shield him from Alec’s furious glare. “Terribly sorry. He has very strong feelings about pronunciation. English teachers,” he added, rolling his eyes in commiseration. “You know how fastidious they can be.”

The vicar cast Alec a disapproving frown. “Yes, I do.”

A minute later they reached the back entrance. “I was told to go right in and up the stairs,” the vicar explained as he pushed open the back door that led to the kitchens.

Alec tugged on Rafe’s arm. “Wetherby is Sir Alfred’s bloody secretary,” he hissed.

“Well then. I’d say he no longer has any qualms about mixing work and family. Come along.” They followed the vicar into the kitchen, which was just as deserted as the outside.

“What time is the ceremony supposed to start?” Alec practically growled. Being in this house again set him even more on edge.

“Three o’clock. You won’t come upstairs?” The vicar gestured up ahead.

“We don’t want to spoil the surprise.” Rafe again gave him that friendly smile. “And you won’t say a word, right, Vicar?” He added a wink and the vicar melted a little, now putty in Rafe’s capable hands.

“No, of course not. I won’t want to ruin anything.”

“I can’t thank you enough. We’ll come right after the ceremony begins. So there isn’t a commotion.”

The vicar nodded along, as if this all made perfect sense, and disappeared up the stairs.

Rafe wiped the smile from his face and turned to Alec. “We only have fifteen minutes. How well do you know this house?”

“Well enough to know where the servant’s staircase is.” Alec pointed to a small doorway in a corner of the kitchen. “And what floor her bedroom is on.”

“Good man. Let’s go.”

He headed toward the staircase, but Alec hesitated. What if she wanted this? What if he had driven her right into Wetherby’s arms? The man had come across as a pompous ass in their exchanges but could be a veritable prince in the flesh.

Alec wasn’t sure he could face that.

Rafe glanced back. “Come on, then. Before the vicar returns and I have to flirt with him some more. I’m running out of ways to explain your ridiculous behavior.”

The hallway outside Lottie’s bedroom was deserted, but voices could be heard in the downstairs parlor. Alec crept over to Lottie’s bedroom while Rafe kept watch at the main staircase. He tested the knob. Locked. One point for Lottie not wanting to marry the dashing secretary. Alec signaled to Rafe then pressed his ear to the door. “Lottie,” he whispered while knocking softly. “Are you in there?” There was the faint sound of mattress springs creaking as she rose from the bed and shuffled closer.

“Who’s there?” she asked in a muffled voice.

Alec’s stomach tipped from the weight of his regret. How many miles he had traveled these last few days, yet it was this slight distance that now felt insurmountable. He had to clear his throat before he could answer. For all he knew she would still prefer being locked up. “It’s—it’s Alec.”

She nearly shrieked and pulled on the doorknob. “Oh, Professor Gresham! Please help. I’m trapped!”

His heart plummeted to the richly carpeted floor. “Valentina? Where is Lottie? Is she well?”

There was an ominous pause on the other side of the door.

“Someone’s coming,” Rafe interrupted.

Alec glanced down the hall and back to the door. “Valentina,” he hissed, but before he could say more, their presence was discovered.

“Who the devil are you?” A man about Alec’s age, tall and thin with light blond hair and blue eyes, was prowling down the hallway. “The both of you?”

Alec faced him. “Alec Gresham. Mr. Wetherby, I presume?”

His glare turned malevolent. “You’ve got a hell of a nerve, showing your face here.” Apparently he had an inkling of what his bride had gotten up to in Venice.

Alec raised an eyebrow. “I won’t take etiquette lessons from a man who locks up women.”

The man narrowed his already beady eyes. “That is none of your concern. Get out of this house.”

Alec adjusted his gloves. “No. I think you will be opening this door.”

Rafe moved uncomfortably close to Mr. Wetherby. “I’m happy to assist you,” he added cheerily.

Mr. Wetherby cast him a wary glance, then quickly frowned. He grumbled something under his breath and pulled a key out of his pocket. Alec stepped away from the door while the blood pounded in his ears, first from outrage and now from nerves. Why, Lottie might very well shut the door in his face, and he deserved nothing less.

Once the key turned in the lock, Valentina pulled open the door, her face tight with anxiety. Alec shoved Mr. Wetherby aside. “Where is she?” he demanded as he entered the bedroom.

“I don’t know,” Valentina said miserably. “After they locked us in here, I went to the en suite. When I came back, she was gone.”

Alec raced toward the partially opened window. Fear gripped his chest even while his mind reasoned that she had made it to the ground safely. Otherwise they would have found her. Alec held back the wave of nausea that suddenly rose in his throat at the thought. He turned around and gripped Valentina by the shoulders. “Where did she go? Tell me everything she said to you.”

The girl hung her head. “She told me nothing, Professor. I swear! She was so unhappy. So scared. And now you have come for her, and she is lost!”

Alec pulled the sobbing girl’s head against his shoulder. “There now. Don’t cry. I’ll find her.”

“You never should have sent her away,” she scolded through her tears.

“Yes,” Alec said softly. “You’re right.” Then he leveled a glare at Mr. Wetherby. “Where is Sir Alfred?”

  

As Alec stalked down the hallway to Sir Alfred’s room, Wetherby was hot on his heels. “Stop! You can’t go in there. He’s not to have any visitors.”

Alec paused by the door. “Oh, I’m no visitor,” he said over his shoulder before entering the darkened sick room. There he found an older woman standing by the bedside helping an elderly man use a spoon to feed himself.

It was a moment before Alec recognized Sir Alfred.

His hair, always a healthy mix of salt and pepper, was now mostly white. Yet he looked almost childlike in a billowing nightshirt with a napkin tucked into his collar.

The sight brought Alec to an abrupt halt. The pair turned at his entrance and seemed just as surprised to see him.

Alec had come here to exact his revenge on a formidable opponent. To utter every word he had ever swallowed, express every emotion he had ever tamped down, every opinion he had ever been forced to doubt. But now…

Sir Alfred recovered from his shock first. He threw down the spoon and tore the napkin from his collar. “Get this out of here,” he growled to the woman, who bobbed her head and immediately whisked the tray away. He then tried to sit up straighter, pushing against the mattress with one hand while the other hung limply by his side. Sir Alfred let out a low curse and glared down at his body, already exhausted from the movement. Scores of people had quivered under the weight of his glare, but it held no power here.

Before Alec could think better of it, he was at the bedside with his hand on Sir Alfred’s shoulder, hoisting him up with uncomfortable ease. The man seemed to weigh no more than a doll. Sir Alfred wouldn’t meet his gaze as he grumbled a word of thanks and resettled himself. Alec stepped back and gave a short nod, then detected movement out the corner of his eye. Rafe and Wetherby had entered the room.

“Sir, I’m so sorry for the interruption,” Wetherby began. “I will have them dismissed at once––”

But Sir Alfred merely held up a hand to silence his secretary, and faced Alec. “So, then. You came after all.” He spoke more slowly than Alec remembered, as if he was taking great care to pronounce every word. But with his spine straight and shoulders back, any trace of vulnerability had vanished. His brown eyes looked nearly black in the dim light, as familiar to Alec as his own. As Lottie’s.

Alec’s heart wrenched anew as his anger came rushing back. This man had betrayed Crown secrets, endangered Alec’s life, and tried to marry Lottie off. “Of course I came.”

Sir Alfred gave a dismissive sniff and turned away. “Well, you are too late. Everything is already arranged.”

Alec couldn’t stop the incredulous laugh from bursting out. “I’m sorry, are you referring to the bit where you tried to force your niece into marriage?”

“I’m not forcing her,” Sir Alfred stubbornly insisted. “Lottie knows I only want what’s best for her. For her future. She needs some time to come round. But she will.” Then he faced Alec again, those brown eyes glinting. “She always does.”

“Not this time.” Alec shook his head. “She’s climbed out of the blasted window.”

“What?” Sir Alfred appeared genuinely perplexed by this development. “Why on earth would she do a silly thing like that?”

Alec practically quivered from the strain of holding back. How could the man not see how very medieval this all was? But then, perhaps he simply couldn’t. Had the apoplexy affected his mind as well? Rafe must have sensed that his self-control was quickly fraying because he immediately came beside him.

“Sorry to hear your lovely niece has escaped your clutches,” Rafe began, droll as ever, “but I’d like to say that it is a pleasure, Sir Alfred. One doesn’t often get to meet a legend in the flesh.”

Alec exhaled. Thank God for Rafe and his ability to defuse any situation.

Sir Alfred narrowed his eyes in suspicion, but insipid flattery had always been his weakness. “And you are?”

“Rafe Davies,” he said with a grand bow. “Intelligence officer.”

Sir Alfred grunted. “You’re the Earl of Fairfield’s bastard?”

“No sir,” Rafe replied with staggering politeness. “I’m the legitimate offspring from his second marriage.”

“Ah. He married that actress, didn’t he?” Sir Alfred cast him a dubious look.

“Yes, to the great regret of nearly everyone in his life.” Rafe smiled broadly. “But I’m here on Crown business. Someone has been selling valuable information to our enemies, and the leak has been traced to you.” He leveled the charge so plainly that it took a moment for the words to sink in.

Sir Alfred’s frown deepened to confusion. “I haven’t a damned idea what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, well, be that as it may, the charge still stands. I’ve also taken the liberty of alerting the police. They should be here shortly.” Rafe raised an eyebrow at Alec’s surprise. “What? Surely holding one’s niece against her will is breaking some sort of law.”

Sir Alfred huffed. “Wetherby, what do you know about this leak business?” Alec had nearly forgotten about the secretary. He was still standing near the doorway but had gone even paler than before. Sir Alfred gestured to him. “He has been handling all of my correspondence for months now.”

“Months?” Alec and Rafe both said in unison. If that included intelligence dispatches, it was a huge breach in protocol. The protocol Sir Alfred had always insisted upon.

“I couldn’t manage it the way I had been,” he now blustered. “But Wetherby said he developed a system to keep the information secure.”

Alec inhaled sharply. Lottie. “No, he didn’t, sir. He used Lottie to decode the dispatches for himself. Then sold the information.” Alec turned sharply to face him. “Didn’t you?”

Wetherby held up his hands. “You can’t prove a thing. Not without implicating her.”

“What?” Sir Alfred roared from the bed. “You—you duplicitous rat! Treasonous coward!” As he spoke, he turned so red that Alec worried he would have another apoplexy.

Wetherby looked at each of them, then he turned and ran from the room. Alec moved to chase him, but Rafe pressed a hand to his chest. “Don’t bother. He won’t get far,” he said lazily and strolled from the room.

“My God. I had no idea,” Sir Alfred croaked and slumped down against the pillows. His color had returned to normal but the fight had gone out of him. He turned to Alec. “You must find Lottie. She can’t be dragged into this.”

“Of course,” Alec said. “But I won’t bring her back here. Not unless she wants it.”

Sir Alfred let out a sigh. “You think I’ve gone too far, but you don’t understand—”

“Try me,” Alec said through gritted teeth. He had never spoken so harshly to Sir Alfred, and the man noticed.

He shook his head. “After her parents died, I was supposed to protect her. I failed her mother, the poor girl. I couldn’t fail Lottie, too. If things had carried on between you, it would have been a disaster for her. And then all of it—all of it—would have been for nothing.”

Alec knew that Sir Alfred was still haunted by the death of his younger sister, but Lottie had paid the price for far too long. They both had.

“That wasn’t your choice to make. And I never should have agreed to your terms. I should have gone to Lottie. Instead I—” his throat tightened at the realization “—I was no better than you, was I?”

The barest hint of remorse crossed Sir Alfred’s face before the anger returned. “I made your career that day. Gave you a future.”

“No. You made me a killer. A liar. And I hurt the person I cared about most. Because I thought I was nothing. That I could give her nothing—”

“I’ll hear no more of this rubbish,” Sir Alfred grumbled as he reached toward the bell pull, but Alec snatched it away.

“Ah, but you will. And I’ve only gotten started.” He moved closer until he loomed over the man, but Sir Alfred merely tilted his head up, refusing to be intimidated. Even now. Even in this state. Alec couldn’t help but admire his pluck, but he wouldn’t back down. Not until he knew everything once and for all.

“Tell me what my mother was doing for you.”

The old man said nothing. Just stared back at him in silence. Alec swallowed a frustrated sigh. What he would give to have Rafe’s interrogation abilities…

“You owe me the truth, Sir Alfred,” he began again, taking care to hold back any note of the desperation currently flooding through him. “After all I sacrificed for you. For Turkey.”

Sir Alfred’s expression faltered at that. Perhaps he had a heart after all. “Her husband was a duplicitous scoundrel,” he said reluctantly. “But I needed information to prove it, and she agreed to spy on him. After she took up with your father, she still returned to the count on occasion to stay in his good graces. He refused to give her up completely, and he was a powerful man. They needed his approval.”

Alec inhaled. It wasn’t anything he didn’t already know, but it was still difficult to hear Sir Alfred confirm it.

“Somehow the count found out,” Sir Alfred continued. “He demanded Maria leave Edward or else he would have him thrown in prison. Edward was already regarded as a troublemaker because of his irritating habit of championing the cause of the common man. One word from the count was all it would take. There was no way he would have survived the filthy place, so Maria left.” Then Sir Alfred looked away. “It…it was not an easy decision for her to make.

“But if your father was imprisoned, she would have been forced to go back to the count anyway. And she would have lost you. Appeasing him to keep you with one parent seemed like the better option. And the count was an old man. He could have died at any time.”

Alec squeezed his eyes shut. The count had ended up outliving his mother by two years.

“But neither of us could have predicted your father’s reaction,” Sir Alfred said softly. “I couldn’t tell him why she had really left, of course, but I did try to make him see reason. How all he needed was to wait, that she would return someday, but he was weaker than I realized. God rest his soul, wherever it is.”

And now Alec had done much the same to Lottie—told her a despicable lie in the name of saving her. Alec let out a bitter huff and opened his eyes to see Sir Alfred actually looking remorseful. Alec never expected to feel pity for Sir Alfred until he was faced with an old man who had nothing but a long life full of manipulation to look back on. It was a dire warning of a future Alec wanted no part of.

“I cared about them both, you know. And you. It was an ugly business, what happened.” Then he paused. “I suppose…I suppose I felt partly responsible,” he admitted with great reluctance. “So I took you when she asked me to. But you should know that your mother did not want to leave you. She did the best she could given the confines of her marriage.”

“And yet you would have forced your own niece into a similar arrangement.”

Sir Alfred seemed startled by the comparison, but then nodded. “It appears so.”

“All because the idea of her marrying me was so utterly distasteful.” Alec couldn’t keep the bitterness out of his words.

Sir Alfred gave him another long look. “You could have told me to go to hell five years ago, you know,” he pointed out. “But you didn’t. You saw the benefits of my offer.”

Alec thought of that morning. Of how easily Sir Alfred preyed on his deepest fears. And of another morning only days before when he had performed a similar manipulation. “Only because I believed the things you said about me. I believed I would ruin her life. That I didn’t deserve her.”

Sir Alfred seemed to consider this. “And now?”

Alec let out a dark laugh. “Oh, I still most certainly don’t deserve her. But I owe her an apology. One that is long overdue. And the truth.”

“We both failed her, didn’t we?” Sir Alfred sighed. “I know you love her, Alec. I’ve never doubted that. But I—I—” His voice broke as he collected his thoughts. “I’ve had to make a great many sacrifices in my life. Personal sacrifices. Some of which I have come to regret very much.” His gaze grew hazy, and Alec had the distinct impression that he was thinking of a certain beguiling Irish housekeeper.

One who clearly wasn’t in this town house…

Then Sir Alfred narrowed his eyes. “I suppose I didn’t see why you should have been any different.”

Alec had long assumed Sir Alfred’s strict discipline stemmed from dislike, but the man had simply been holding him to the same impossible standards he’d set for himself. There was a time when Alec would have been bullied into agreeing with him; now he could only hear the resentment lacing those words.

“But I am different, sir,” he said with absolute certainty. “If given the chance, I would have always chosen her. Over everything. Every time.”

Alec knew where Lottie was. And there wasn’t a moment to waste.