Chapter 8

Eight

RYCLIFFE PLACE, LONDON - JUNE 6, 1816

CELINE

By the time I finished readying for the day, it was a reasonable hour to meet with my brother-in-law. Xander was a notoriously late riser, but that would merely leave me my window of opportunity.

The sun was bright and warm when I stepped out of my carriage. But my stomach sank when I realized I had forgotten one thing. To visit Xander, I would have to enter the house. The facade of Rycliffe Place was as lovely as ever. It was still painted a creamy, buttery yellow with a bright red door. And the three stone steps leading up to that door remained. My heart gave a painful wrench at the sight.

With a fortifying breath, I ascended and knocked purposefully. I knew better than to look down. The last time I had looked, the stains from my husband's blood remained. If not precisely in reality then in my mind. No matter how hard the servants scrubbed, the red ring from where he'd fallen remained. I could still see the gnarled iris petals trapped in a bloody prison.

After an eternity, the door opened to reveal Reeves. "Lady Rycliffe! How good to see you. What an unexpected pleasure."

Reeves had served as butler even before my tenure as mistress of the house. I liked the man a great deal. But his voice, no matter how warm, never failed to remind me of that day. I fought my instinctive revulsion and gave him an appreciative, if brittle, smile.

" Bonjour , Reeves. I was hoping to meet with His Grace this morning if he is in. I have something I wish to discuss with him."

"I will see if he is available for visitors. Would you like to wait in the drawing room?"

I handed the man my bonnet, then stepped around him and wandered down the hall rather than turn into the drawing room off to the side.

"I think the study would be best today, Reeves," I called back. "Please let His Grace know I will meet him there."

He sputtered after me, crying something about protocol, but after two years with me as mistress, he knew I could not be stopped.

This house… I had nearly forgotten how the memories warred here.

Gabriel's mouth on my neck, a hand up my skirts as his broad form pressed me against that wall.

His blood trailing down this hall.

A late afternoon spent teaching him to play on that very piano bench.

Pressing myself back against that door as I fought for breath, jostled by frantic servants as they worked to stem my husband's bleeding.

They each fought for prominence in a way that left my stomach churning.

The part of me that was given to poking bruises paused outside the open dining room door. The table was gone, replaced with something darker in color and lighter in form.

I had shuttered that door in the final months I lived here. Even this hall, the main thoroughfare through the house had been avoided at all costs. But I abandoned this room entirely to his ghost.

I was given to understand that his blood had pooled for so long that it warped the table irreparably. That information had been relayed by the late duke with a tone that left little doubt as to whom he assigned blame for the desecration of the fine mahogany piece.

He had informed me in no uncertain terms that my unwillingness to move, to leave Gabriel, for hours after his passing had ruined a perfectly lovely dining table. One that had to be replaced at great cost.

Never mind that no one else in the family could stomach the sight of it, let alone consume a meal at it. I was responsible.

No one, save Her Grace, mourned overmuch when the late duke passed. Xander, by all measures, was a much better man—and duke—than his father had been.

Finally, I reached the study at the end of the hall and slipped in, shutting the door behind me. It was different. More modern, full of darks and lights that warred for purchase. Xander took after his mother in his interior decorating tastes.

His choice of art, however, was lovely. Where Gabriel's grandfather's portrait had once hung, now was a painting of a girl in blue looking out from a gazebo at the bright countryside below. The image was equally full of hope and longing, entirely inappropriate for a study, and completely perfect for this one.

But I could not allow myself to be distracted from my efforts. I had no idea what I was searching for, what I might have missed, but it certainly wasn't the painting.

I pulled out the notes I'd roughly sketched from my pelisse. No doubt Reeves was peeved I hadn't handed over the cloak. When I glanced around the room, my eyes landed on the shelf behind the desk.

Ledgers!

I scurried around the desk and fell to my knees. They were organized by year and then by month for years that had overfilled the first book. But there were no more than five years present, certainly nothing that had once belonged to Gabriel.

I could not help but laugh at the last one on the shelf labeled simply "Davina." She would require her own ledger.

"Can I help you?" A perturbed male voice came from behind me. Drat , hadn't that door squeaked?

I spun around, clutching my notes in hand. My eyes met Xander's, his brows quirked in amusement and lips gathered to one side in his trademark expression. It was intended to demonstrate irritation, but his amusement was plain for all to see. His sister was a frequent recipient of the look.

"Xander! How are you this morning?"

"I'm— I had an eventful night. What are you doing?" He gestured toward the seat intended for visitors, before taking the one he called home.

"Oh, you know. I did not get to speak very long with you last night. I wished to see how you were doing."

"And you could not have done that in the drawing room?" His hands danced while he talked, flitting toward the door. I'd never seen another person speak with their entire body the way Xander did.

"Well, no because..." My investigation was proving slightly more awkward than I'd originally thought.

"Reeves is under the impression that you have overspent your portion, and you are here to beg for pin money. That seems unlikely to me."

"I..."

"Weren't you once skilled at manipulating men?"

"Well, yes. But you do not count. I cannot use my feminine wiles on you." That earned me a burst of laughter, and the feigned disapproval vanished.

"Tell me. It cannot possibly be worse than Davina's latest debacle."

I hesitated for less than a second. The truth was on the tip of my tongue, dying to burst forth. "I know who killed Gabriel."

He froze, brown eyes wide and dark, heavy brows raised. "I beg your pardon?"

"I know who killed Gabriel. I met him last night."

"You met him last night… and he told you he murdered your late husband?" He was speaking slowly now, as though speaking to a child who could not understand.

"Well, no. Not exactly, but?—"

"Celine, you know I loved Gabriel, and I love you. But it's been seven years…"

"No, I know what you're thinking, but I'm not crazy. I saw him the day before at the races. I forgot until I met him again last night?—"

"You saw a man at the races the day before Gabriel died, and you think that makes him the killer."

"Would you let me finish?" I snapped, the irritation, the guilt, the sleeplessness all boiling over.

His palms flitted up in front of him in pacification. "Right, sorry. Tell me everything."

I blurted all of it. The entirety of my knowledge escaped in unending sentences, delivered without breath.

Xander sat before me, eerily still. "Celine… That's not evidence of a murder. That's barely evidence of a possible connection. To be honest, I'm not even sure half of what you said were sentences."

"You don't understand!"

"I do, Cee. I really do. I want to find his killer as badly as you do, but… I remember William. He was kind. He wouldn't have hurt Gabriel. His office handles our estate business. He is always welcoming and affable. Not the attitude of someone who murdered my elder brother."

"But wouldn't you, if someone hurt someone you loved? Not just hurt, but destroyed? Imagine if it were Davina?" He considered me carefully, his gaze flicking to the ledger with her name on it.

"All right, say I believe the motive. You have no evidence."

"No, I do. I have this." I opened my reticule once again, handing over the note I grabbed from the trunk this morning.

"Celine, this is nothing. W could be anyone. And it's not even dated. Who's to say this is from the day before?"

"But look at the slant of the writing, and the smear. It was written by someone left-handed. And William is left-handed."

"How do you know that?"

"He had ink stains on his left hand." I waved my left hand in demonstration.

"When were you close enough to notice stains on his left hand? I do not even recall seeing him last night."

"That's not important." Why could he not focus on the things of import?

"And where did you find this note, for that matter?" His voice rose in pitch, the same way it did when Davina was being particularly vexing.

"It was in Gabriel's ledgers and things."

"Why do you have Gabriel's ledgers?"

"Oh, the second ones, not the official ones."

"Gabriel had secondary ledgers?"

"Xander, that isn't the point!" My hands had started to dance the way his did, but mine were more irritation than expression.

"I rather think it is. What was he involved in that he needed second ledgers? And why did you take them?"

"There was some nonsense with horse studding that wasn't strictly legal. And he owned a stake in a brothel. Also some gambling." I waved the reasons away. "And I took them because he wouldn't have wanted you or his father to know about that."

"And you think his murder has to do with an affair he had years before but not whatever nonsense he was doing with the horse studding, the brothel, or the gambling?" His hands grew more and more agitated.

"He stopped all of that when he met me. Please, Xander? I know it's him. Something isn't right about William. I can feel it—in here." I pressed both palms to my heart, one atop the other. Willing him to understand, to believe me.

He was silent for a beat, two, three. Studying me. "Say I agree that it's an unlikely possibility that he might have been involved. What do you plan to do about it?"

Finally! "I'm investigating him. I was hoping you could tell me more about him. And then I intended to have a sneak through his office for anything incriminating that I didn't recognize then."

He sighed. "I don't remember much. I was very young. I did not like Adriane—she stared through me all the time. But Will was nice to me and Davina. He would slip us the frosting off his cake—said he didn't like it. Which was a lie, everyone likes frosting. Now, I use his services. He and Mr. Summers—Lord Leighton—own a practice and they manage the legal business and finances for the estates. He's… nice."

"He was in the army, though. He must know how to stab someone. That's not the sort of thing nice men know how to do."

"Celine, you've spent the best part of a decade learning to fence. I rather think you know how to stab someone too. That doesn't mean you've ever done it. And I know you're not suggesting that army men cannot be kind."

I was left with no alternative but to release a frustrated, "Agh!" at his deliberate nescience.

" Agh yourself. You sound like Davina." The last bit was muttered under his breath.

"Xander, please!"

" If , and I do mean if , I help you, we need to agree on some things."

"Anything."

"No running off by yourself. In the unlikely event that he did murder Gabriel, we're dealing with a killer. I won't have you getting yourself hurt."

"Unnecessary, but agreed."

"No telling anyone and everyone you meet your suspicions. Not until I agree that we're certain. I won't have you ruining the life of an innocent man. An accusation from someone of your station could put him in the gaol at best, the noose at worst."

"Fine." As irritating as it was, I could see the advantages of prudence.

"I want you to remind yourself every day—no, three times a day—that he is likely innocent."

"But—"

"No. Your evidence is flimsy and circumstantial."

"Fine."

"And I want you to do me a favor," he leaned forward, ensuring my gaze met his. "I want you to start to move on. Gabriel was a selfish man, but even he wouldn't have wanted you to mourn him this deeply for this long. I don't need you walking down the aisle tomorrow, just… Promise me you'll cut down your visits to once a month. You cannot possibly move on when you talk to your husband's grave nearly every day."

"How do you know about that?"

He merely shot me a look from under his brow that clearly stated what he thought of that question.

"Fine, I will try. I do not promise to succeed."

"That's all I can ask. Now, what is the plan?"