Did she have her heart broken for nothing?
Phillipa cast a glance around the room, tension building. Had it been there all along, and she hadn’t seen it? Or was she so caught up in her own emotion she hadn’t noticed that something was wrong?
“A note came from Veronica Turnbull this morning,” Tilda said, setting down her teacup with a calm but deliberate clink that alerted Maddy that all was not well. “She has apparently received troubling news that makes her retraction of the original article not only impossible, but further verifies the NWL claim.”
The coffee churned in Maddy’s stomach, and for a moment she thought she was going to be sick.
Nelson’s words rang in her ears. You’ll care soon enough. He must have sent that letter the day he’d arrived at The Grove.
Phillipa reached across the table, taking Maddy by the hand, her lips pressed together and her head cocked slightly to the right in that way of hers when she had to say something unpleasant. Phillipa was a master of secrets, but even she wasn’t perfect. Everyone had a tell, Maddy had overheard Elouise say once.
“Someone has linked you to what happened all those years ago,” Phillipa said at last.
To what happened.
Murderess.
“He was there, Phillipa. Nelson Taylor. We had words.” She stood abruptly, rattling the tea table and nearly sending a few of the delicate teacups crashing to the floor. “I will leave before the end of the day. I’m already packed.”
She turned to bolt up the stairs, ignoring the pleas of her friends. But there was one voice above the rest she dared not disobey.
“Stop this at once!”
Lady Em’s voice cut through the others, silencing them all. Lady Em did not need volume. It was direct and laced with that aristocratic tone she purported to despise but still managed to use to great effect.
“You, Miss Murray, are not going anywhere,” said Lady Em in a tone so imperious that it stopped not only Maddy in tracks, but everyone else too—save Tilda, of course. “Except to put on your best visiting gown.”
“But staying here puts Everwell in danger,” she said, confused by Lady Em’s request.
“If they know we will break so easily, Miss Murray, we will open the door to more pressures, not less. So we will not break. Do you understand?”
Maddy had only seen Lady Em this angry once, and it had been directed squarely at Emily Coughlin, their next-door neighbour and generally awful self-important person who had once made quite public disparaging remarks to Tilda in Tilda’s own home.
Lady Em rose. “Ladies, wear your best. We are going to visit Veronica Turnbull.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Uncle Archie and Aunt Vee had greeted Beau with such open arms it almost made up for the fact that his world was pulling apart at the seams. Aunt Vee was aghast at the rather nasty bruise that had formed on his cheek from the incident on the train. Even though it was late when he’d arrived, they’d tried to stuff him with food he had no interest in eating, and even the brandy he’d indulged in had done little to induce him to sleep.
He was up before dawn, writing messages to his sister Jess and his lawyer. He’d considered giving rather specific instructions about firing the board, who seemed a little too eager to support Neil’s witch hunt for him, but decided he would allow himself a few days let his emotions settle before he did anything too rash.
Between the dealings with his family and the business, there was Madeline. Christ, he missed her right now. His body missed her lush curves, full lips, and silky skin. He missed her steadiness. Her quiet. His gut twisted with regret as he remembered the way the moonlight shone down on her, illuminating her skin as eyes lit up with excitement, then just as quickly, darkened with fear. He would give anything to take that back now.
Eager for the morning’s headlines, he dressed and came down to the parlour with the handful of messages to be sent to the telegraph office. He paced the floors, waiting for the early edition of the Halifax Chronicle to arrive. When it did, he didn’t bother to wait for Davis, their butler, to iron the pages.
Case of Lumber King Murder Takes Turn, the headline proclaimed in huge letters, followed by Son expected to be absolved of crime after true killer confesses in smaller font. Alongside the column was an image of Frank, looking out at Beau, his eyes as Beau remembered them—grim and a little angry. Perhaps he was angry at losing the love of his life.
Maybe that anger was something else. A way to manage grief.
He scanned the article, written by Benjamin Miller—the same reporter Dominic had contacted to get details, such as they were, and they were grim.
Good news, and bad news. Dominic had warned him, but it was still hard, and somewhat surreal, to read such a sensational story when all the players were people so intimately connected to him. People he loved. People he’d liked, and thought he knew. His attention was so firmly captured by the article he didn’t notice his aunt entering the room until she spoke.
“You look like you haven’t slept a wink,” she said, tsking him in that maternal way she had with him. “Not that I could blame you. Still, I’m glad to see you safe and sound.”
There was something in his aunt’s voice—a note of concern that stretched her normally relaxed demeanour just a tad too thin. He wondered if she’d known anything about his parentage. Aunt Vee, and even Uncle Archie, were, compared to many of their social standing, rather relaxed in their outlook on propriety compared to most—more devil-may-care than Godfearing—but they were hardly reformists.
“Except for the fact I had no valet, I think I managed remarkably well,” he said, attempting a joke that, upon seeing the rather pale complexion in Aunt Vee’s normally rosy cheeks, fell rather flat. “If you are worried about my face, it is a little sore, but it will heal in a few days. If it weren’t for Miss Murray, I’d have been far worse off.”
