Chapter 5 - JAHLEEL CHARLES, THE DUKE OF TORRANCE—THE BLASTED CONFESSION

Chapter 5

JAHLEEL CHARLES, THE DUKE OF TORRANCE—THE BLASTED CONFESSION

The Hamptons’ bedchamber smelled of mustard and sour tonics, a little like Jahleel’s when he was last sick.

Looking at Katherine’s thin frame, he decided she was too thin. Her back was to him, but it was elegant and straight. Wisps of ebony hair fell from her chignon, and he imagined the last time he saw her, coldly telling him to leave.

“Torrance? Is that you?” Tavis sounded tired, like he’d fought in a boxing match, a bout the man had lost.

Almost feeling tongue-twisted like Sebastian, Jahleel swallowed, then offered, “Rest, Lord Hampton. I’m here. As requested by you and Lady Hampton.”

“Good.” He closed his eyes. His panting eased.

An older man picked up the sick fellow’s hand again. “Good. You finally made it. I believe he stayed with us to see you.”

Katherine bristled. It was a slight jerking motion, but as always, Jahleel was attuned to every minute detail.

The physician glanced up at him. “So you are Russian?”

“English too.”

Jahleel wagered that was not the question the physician, like most, wanted to ask. Most wanted to know if his mother was a Black Russian princess while examining Jahleel’s features for signs of color.

If the curious doctor found yellow in his cheeks—that was jaundice from his last cold. He’d ridden all day, so there should be some brown. But in a year of little sun, Jahleel looked as pale as other peers who could attest to having two typical English parents.

“Mr. Carew said he knew you. Miss Scarlett Wilcox was insistent he’d be able to help.” The physician’s eyes were close together, hovering over a long, pointed nose. “She was right about Carew. He’s treated many injuries from the wars and his home is in the islands. Those colonies are always in rebellion.”

Steal enough people, deadly consequences will ensue.

With the Wilcox sisters of Jamaican descent, it made sense that they’d know others from the West Indies. In London, islanders stuck together.

Shaking his jowled cheeks side to side, the physician set down Tavis’s wrist. “Lady Hampton, I’m sorry. He’s barely with us.”

Jahleel shut his lids. Those were the worst words. He said a prayer. When he looked at the bed again, he met Katherine’s gaze.

Upturned eyes.

Flecks of gold on a blackened sea.

Then he saw them shimmering with water.

He drowned, and that empty space in his chest beat with some foreign drum.

And when her eyes hardened, and her frown deepened, he knew she still hated him, despised him for the lies the man in the bed told her.

Yet she chose to believe Tavis.

If she knew Jahleel like she said she did, then she would know he’d never abandon her.

So how dare she look fresh and beautiful and be poison to his soul.

“Jahleel,” Tavis said. “Not a dream. You’ve come. I hoped you would. A moment alone with my friend.”

“No.” Katherine shook her head. “No, Tavis. We’re in this together. I said I’d stay with you till the end.”

“But I want you out. I must speak to the duke alone. It’s my wish. My last request. Honor it.”

She looked at the doctor.

He shrugged and said, “Five minutes, no more.”

Then she gaped at Jahleel like this was his fault too.

Miss Wilcox took her arm. “Come on, sis. The duke won’t let you miss the moment.”

She stood and smoothed her prim dress. “Is that a promise, Your Grace?”

Katherine put up a dismissive hand and swung a man’s watch from a chain about her neck. “I can tell time. All Wilcox women can.”

The grieving wife headed toward to the door. “I’ll be back in five minutes, not a second later. No need to depend on the Duke of Torrance for anything, Tavis.”

Miss Wilcox made eyes at her sister as if to say she was being too harsh. All these antics would be over soon.

This goodbye would be done. Jahleel could leave with a clear conscience.

The door slammed and Jahleel was alone with his former friend.

“Get out of that bed and tell me what’s the latest scheme. I won’t judge you.”

“Wish I could oblige. Not this time, Jahleel.”

“Tavis. Can’t you see what it’s doing to Katherine? To all your sisters-in-law?”

Weak blue eyes glanced up. “I wish it was a jest. I can’t believe—”

“What in God’s name happened and why summon me?”

“A bet. Broke my back jumping a fence. Didn’t win the fiver. Horse . . . put down.”

Another stupid wager! “We’re older, you fool. You have a wife who loves you. There’s a family out there. They depend upon you.”

“Couldn’t resist a bet. Neither could you. That’s why we’re brothers, blood brothers.”

“That sentiment was before the woman I loved ran off with you.” Jahleel shook his head. “Just get better.”

“Jahleel Charles. Finally the Duke of Torrance.”

The last challenge had been rendered obsolete. His father’s marriage to a Russian princess had been accepted as legal. The Court of Chancery had conferred everything to Jahleel, two years too late to afford the medical care that might’ve made a difference in his sister’s short life.

His mother no longer cared to be the Dowager Torrance or to reside in London. Her cottage, a lovely pink dacha in Saint Petersburg, with easy access to the Neva River or Baltic Sea, gave her the peace she’d wanted.

Jahleel had fought too hard to be recognized and lost too much in the process to become a recluse in Russia. London would be his home now.

“Jahleel, you still there? My vision’s going.”

“If you want my forgiveness, fine. You have it. Try to get better for them. Physicians can be wrong. Let me get Kath—Lady Hampton. Maybe try a new treatment.”

“No, not forgiven. Have to confess. Jahleel, I have to tell.”

“No.” He pounded back to the bed, inches from picking up the sick man and thrashing him. “Don’t tell me how you loved Katherine all along and couldn’t help—”

“I lied. I schemed. She turned to me in desperation, and I took advantage.”

Jahleel blinked, looked at his own balling fist and prayed that the temptation to punch a dying man would pass. “Speak fast. Tell me this new lie.”

“Truth.” Tavis put a hand to his nightshirt, right over his heart. “Father cut me off. No money. You left.”

“I left Saint Petersburg and Katherine to go take care of my father. That’s what a dutiful son does.”

“You made me swear not to tell anyone about your father’s decline or the battle to invalidate your parent’s marriage. Katherine. . . in trouble.”

“What?” Jahleel clutched the bedpost to give his hands something to do. “What about Katherine? What kind of trouble?”

“You left . . . family way . . . cad.”

“What?”

“Baby.”

“I was to be a father? If I’d known I’d have given up my fight for ascension. I’d give up everything for her. You know how I loved her.”

“Letter. I had Carew write this letter. Burn it once you read. Night table.”

Jahleel stuffed the cut of foolscap into his pocket. “Where’s my child? A girl or boy? Where?”

“Boy, but stillborn. You’d have made a great rich godfather.”

Like he’d fallen off a horse, Jahleel dropped into the chair Katherine had abandoned. “No wonder she hates me.”

“Yes. Yes, she does.” Tavis coughed and smiled.

He cursed the dying man in Russian, offered some choice phrases in the Ethiopian dialect his mother had taught him.

Were five minutes up?

Jahleel could take no more revelations. “If you weren’t looking like the devil, Tavis, we’d duel. I’d win and celebrate killing you.”

“I’m evil. And worse. Her money’s gone.”

“The debts you ran up.”

“Yes. House will go. Creditors. Don’t know last time . . . paid Mr. Thom.”

“How? How could you do this? I can’t believe this. You had her and her money. You’re losing them both.”

“Letter. Read. Then you fix.”

Couldn’t feel his hands. Jahleel’s palms vibrated like he’d have a spasm. “I can’t fix this. You need to be in hell.” He leapt up, again wanting to throttle Tavis. “You could’ve gotten word to me. You knew how I felt about Katherine. The strain of us ending, of her thinking I’d shamed her, that’s what killed our baby.”

“If I could take . . . back . . . I’d not’ve . . . bet. A fiver . . . too little to die.”

“A fiver wouldn’t do anything for the debts if Katherine has to sell her father’s coal business. You horrible—”

“You fix.”

Tavis coughed and wheezed, then finally settled.

With his hands pulsing to fight, Jahleel looked back at the door. He needed to escape and eased to the door. “You lied. You connived. You manipulated her—”

“Loved her. Don’t forget that.”

Was it a sin to kill a dying man? If he took the pillow and just held it on the fool’s face, would anyone . . . ? Oh, Lord, what was he thinking? “Bye.”

“Bet you can’t win her back. And she won’t believe the truth. She’ll hate you more.”

“I’m leaving. You’ve said your piece. This time you can’t fix it.”

Tavis’s head fell back. “Damn. Tell . . . come back. Now.”

Jahleel flung open the door and ushered everyone inside.

The weeping became loud.

“It’s . . . all right,” Tavis said. “I’ve mended ways . . . We’ll keep our oath, the one said on our fathers’ lives.”

“But your father’s still alive,” Lydia said. “He refuses to come here because you married a Blackamoor woman.”

The prejudice, the lies—it all made everything in Jahleel become fire.

“Metaphor, little sis. Jahleel. Bet . . . five pounds you can’t love ’em like I . . .”

Tavis lay still.

The doctor moved to the bed and gripped the lying fool’s wrist, then he put an ear to his chest. “Tavis Palmers, the Viscount Hampton, is now with the Lord.”

No, he wasn’t.

That blasted man was in Hades. Tavis was there now, lying to the devil, betting for spots with shade. Jahleel was sure of it.

Sitting by the bed, Katherine cried. Her sobbing sounded of pure pain. It was the most heart-wrenching thing he’d heard since his sister.

Jahleel drowned again. Katherine didn’t have to look his way. Her powers had grown or he was still weak . . . still in love.

No.

When she finally looked at him, she said, “Thank you for coming.”

Dismissed. The fire in her eyes was pure hatred. To talk of the secrets Tavis disclosed would seem opportunistic and cruel.

And what of Jahleel’s feelings, the years he’d felt used and discarded by a callous harpy who claimed his soul in secret while seeking a respectable title in public? Did he not think until this very moment that Katherine was an opportunist or a thrill huntress, that she was anyone but a woman who loved as deeply as Jahleel?

He had to go, for he didn’t know what to do with anything Tavis had disclosed. Before he could back away, the physician rubbed his fingers together, asking for an absent coin.

Oh . . . who knew what Tavis told him.

The duke nodded.

Poor Katherine and the girls couldn’t be hounded by a doctor turned bill collector. “In the hall, sir. I’ll take care of it.”

Before he could follow the man, Georgina and Scarlett wedged into Jahleel’s arms.

Then Lydia clamped again to his leg. He couldn’t escape.

Yet holding them, helping them in this moment felt right.

Damn.

His reformed soul had accepted the wager. In that moment, Jahleel vowed with his Cossack heart to right things for Katherine and her sisters and to curse Tavis every day until the work was done.