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“Of course. Come with me.” He led her down the hall, past the library, to the comfortable morning room. “I tried to reach you. Theresa said you and your”—Baxter swallowed hard—“husband …
were in Wight.”
“We were. We’ve been back for a week.”
“I see.” Still reeling with the impact of Vanessa’s appearance, Baxter was having a difficult time comprehending the reason for Ariana’s rage.
But not for long.
“We’re going to talk about Trenton,” Ariana stated flatly, arms folded across her chest. “And about you. And about Vanessa.”
Baxter visibly started at the mention of Vanessa’s name. Ariana couldn’t know anything, could she? “What about us?” he managed.
“After I left Winsham two weeks ago, I read Vanessa’s journal.”
Relief, potent as brandy, surged through him. “Did you? And how did you talk your husband into showing it to you?”
“That’s not the issue, Baxter. The issue is that I now know everything our sister claimed happened between her and Trenton.”
“Claimed?”
“I’ve also spoken with my husband.” Baxter didn’t miss the emphatic possessiveness in her reference to Kingsley. “He told me everything.”
“Everything.” Baxter was “beginning to feel like a parrot. But for the life of him he couldn’t think of what to say.
“Yes. And now I’m here to try to understand how you could do such a thing. I know you’re greedy and self-centered, but for God’s sake, Baxter—”
“Wait just a bloody minute!” Baxter’s stupor vanished instantly. “Greedy? Self-centered? Whose words are those, Ariana: yours or Trenton’s?”
“Mine. Do you think I don’t know what you are just because you’re my brother?”
“You never maligned my character before!”
“I never had reason to. Your weaknesses never affected me … until now.”
“I raised you from the time Mother and Father died—”
“I raised myself, Baxter. With Theresa’s help. You gave me the roof over my head and spent whatever money Mama and Papa left for me. So let’s say that I’ve more than paid you back for what you’ve given me and dispense with the theatrics, all right?”
Baxter’s mouth opened and closed a few times before he spoke. “He’s certainly turned you against me, hasn’t he?”
“I’m not against you. I only want to know the truth.”
“What truth?”
“Did you blackmail Trenton into paying you fifty thousand pounds for that journal? And did Richard Kingsley die as a result of vicious slander that you spread throughout the ton?”
Baxter inhaled sharply, then sat. “And here I thought you were discovering new species of birds on the Isle.”
“Answer me: yes or no.”
“It isn’t as simple as that, sprite. Yes, Kingsley paid me … I believe it was fifty thousand pounds. But it wasn’t blackmail. It was a debt he owed me.”
“For what?”
“For what he did to our sister.”
“That’s blackmail,” Ariana retorted, shaking her head in disbelief. “I was half hoping you would deny it, or at least explain it. But you can’t, can you?”
