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I dropped my head.
Loren’s hand curled over my shoulder.
“But I can assure you, it is with horror that I share it was the least of his transgressions,” Carling continued.
What?
I lifted my head.
“No, I’m not speaking about the fact he was an unkind employer, and often more than unkind, rather cruel, especially to the females in his employ, who are my charges, but I was powerless to help them.”
“Oh my gods,” I breathed.
“No,” Carling carried on. “I’m not speaking about the fact he gave no references, so one couldn’t leave his employ even if they wanted to, for they’d never find another position, and they were forced to stay tied to him, like indentured servants.”
At that, Mom and I both gasped.
“No, I’m talking about the fact that Beacher here”—he turned to the handsome fellow—“and Hagley”—he turned the other way and jerked his chin to the slim fellow—“both consummate grooms and consummate horsemen, warned his lordship not to put his little daughter on that large and unpredictable of a horse—”
Oh…my…gods!
Mom shot out of her seat.
Everyone looked to her.
I rose, getting close, holding on tight, staring at her ashen, distraught face.
“Mom.”
“Carling, don’t,” she whispered to Carling.
“I’m sorry, milady, it has to be known,” he replied.
“It does,” the inspector said gently.
Carling hurried on, jumping forward in the story, thank God.
“She blamed him, as she would. Who wouldn’t?” Carling asked a question with an answer everyone knew, so no one answered it. “He was beside himself with fury at what he considered her audacity. He never did anything wrong. He never took responsibility for mistakes he might make. To be honest, for twenty years, simply to stop his wife from demanding he return her daughter as well as stand up for what he had done and perhaps feel a hint of remorse for his actions, I thought he’d murdered her in that gazebo.”
“Bloody hell,” I breathed.
Carling sniffed the air and regarded Mom.
“I knew you didn’t take your own life. You loved that gazebo, for one. You took Lady Maxine there to nurse her. If you felt it necessary to leave this world, you’d never have done it there. Not ever.”
Okay, good news, Carling pretty much corroborated our story, in a sense.
Bad news, it seemed us being there meant maybe we’d just accidentally falsely exonerated Edgar for murder.
“I need to get back to Maxine,” Mom murmured.
“Momma,” I whispered.
She looked to me. “I’m fine.”
She wasn’t.
The dad of this world hurt the me of this world, a me who was now her daughter as sure as I was.
I didn’t blame her, and I wasn’t surprised. If I were her, I’d probably feel the same way.
But this further complicated things.
By a lot.
Now it was a definite that I had to get all three of us back to our universe, and how would Maxine handle that?
“If you have what you need, inspector, I’d like to escort the countess home,” Ansley said.
“I feel we do indeed, from Countess Derryman. Though, I’ll need a few words with Lady Dawes before she goes.”
“I’ll stay with Satrine, Father. Take Lady Corliss,” Loren said.
“I’ll send the carriage back,” Ansley replied, then to Mom. “My lady?”
She took his offered elbow, whispering, “My gratitude, your grace.”
Loren stood at my side as I watched them walk to the door.
But Mom stopped there.
And I stared as Carling stiffened with stunned surprise when Mom curled her fingers around both his arms, then went in to kiss his cheek.
“You are a good man, Rutherford Carling,” she said quietly.
His face stained red and he shifted awkwardly, pleased and uncomfortable with the sentiment.
“Beacher, Hagley, thank you,” she went on.
“Mum,” Beacher said.
“Milady,” Hagley mumbled.
She nodded to them, nodded to Ansley, and with her head held high, the Seventh Countess of Derryman strode through the door.
And they were away.
Chapter Twelve
Turn around the City
Loren
“Dear heart,” he called.
She was beside him in the carriage, her ludicrous hat on the seat opposite them, her head turned, eyes aimed out the window.
Her mood…unknown.
“Satrine,” he whispered when she didn’t respond.
“I didn’t know he…hurt her,” she told the window. “Either…her.”
Loren clenched his teeth at the thought and aimed his gaze out his own window.
He turned back when she lashed out, “Gods, I want him dead.” Her attention came to him. “Is that terrible? Does that make me like him?”
“No, sweeting. You’re angry. You heard some very ugly things today, and it hasn’t been long after you endured other very ugly things.”
“You know, we were always okay without him. It didn’t matter we had to scrimp and save and make do. But the minute he showed his face, oh noooooooo.” She dragged that last out. “It all went to hell in a handbasket.”
Hell in a handbasket?
This language she created with her mother in their seclusion was, unsurprisingly, as amusing and clever as she and her mother were.
“Every incarnation of him is evil,” she spat. “Pure evil.”
