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Marion was filled with dread. Not only had her father threatened people before, he had shot people before.My father is a murderer.
“What if I don’t care?” Marion said more boldly than she felt, but she wanted her father to know he couldn’t intimidate her. Ted smiled again, that hideous smile that turned Marion’s stomach.
“Don’t forget, dear Marion, I know where your husband lives,” Ted said. “I know where your great friend, Eleanor, lives with her two young sons.” Marion struggled to breathe at the cruelty of that threat. “If you don’t value your own life, I imagine you value theirs.”
Marion stared at her father, locking eyes with this man who had just threatened the lives of everyone she loved. Since her mother’s death, Eleanor’s family had been her own family. Since her marriage to Simon, he had become part of her family, too. She stared into Ted Laurie’s eyes, a man who was supposed to be her family, trying to see the evil in his eyes. He must be evil, surely, to make such threats. But she couldn’t see it. All she saw was an old man with a gun and eyes as dark as her own. If he was evil, it was not an evil that could be seen, and she wouldn’t let him anywhere near her family.
“I do,” Marion slowly removed her hand from the door. “More than you know.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Simon watched as the carriage Marion was in trundled through the town. Simon had thought that they might be driving back towards Covent Garden, to the park that they had met up in the day before. He wondered, with a flash of jealousy, if the park was special to Marion and the man. Perhaps they had secret memories they had shared there. But then Simon rebuked himself sharply. Eleanor was worried for Marion. If Marion held love for this man, if Marion was having an affair with him, then surely her face and body language would have conveyed some hint of happiness or safety that Eleanor—or indeed Simon, watching afar—could have picked up on?
Whoever this man was to Marion, whatever past they may or may not share, Simon couldn’t let that divert him from assuring his wife’s safety.
What if she doesn’t want to be rescued?an insidious little voice inside his head said nastily.What if she just wants to be left alone with him?
Jealousy and pride might have made Simon listen to that voice. After all, they were the many voices of his mother, Lady Henrietta, and other prominent members of society who had questioned him and questioned his choice of bride when his wedding had been announced. The woman he loved, the woman who shared his bed, who had pledged her body only to him, was currently seated unescorted in a carriage with a man he didn’t know, and the voices in his head were loudly giving him all the reasons he could mistrust her.
What on earth are you thinking, taking a common woman for a bride? How could you ever expect her to live up to the position of an aristocrat?
How can you trust a woman who no one has even heard of? What of her family, her people? How will you ever know who she really is?
Simon ignored them all, brushed them away, telling himself and the fear and insecurity inside of him the truth:I know the heart of my wife.Restored, love compelled him onwards. Whatever Marion’s past, whoever this man was to her, none of that really mattered. What mattered was that he loved her, that he had chosen her. She was his and Simon could not simply leave and go back home without seeing she was safe with his own eyes. Aside from the fact that Eleanor had made him promise to get to her, he had sworn it to him. Simon felt an urgency deep in his heart to lay eyes on Marion’s face. If there was the slightest chance, the smallest possibility that Marion was in danger and needed him, then Simon would be there. He had to be. He would not lose another wife.
“My Lord, they are going into Cheapside,” his coachman called over his shoulder, reining the horses slightly.
“Cheapside?” Simon exclaimed, leaning forward to watch the carriage disappear into the less reputable part of the town, leaving the shining shops and promenades of London for the dank and dismal tenements and slums of the criminal underbelly of society. Simon’s heart lurched at the idea of Marion going into such an area as this with someone Simon didn’t know.
“Yes, follow them,” Simon said, sitting back in the carriage. “At a distance, but don’t lose them.”
Simon’s trepidation increased as the coachman carefully manoeuvred the carriage through the tight, dirty streets behind the heavy, commercial areas of Cheapside so regularly frequented by the middle classes of London society. Simon rarely ever came to Cheapside, though he knew gentlemen who attended cheap bawdy houses down here, or even opium dens. It was not, under any circumstances, a suitable part of town for the Countess of Reading.
He tucked himself away behind the folded roof of the barouche, knowing that a man of his status would be a tempting target for pickpockets or robbers. Then his driver stopped at the end of the street as Marion’s carriage pulled up beside a downtrodden, sad looking house. Simon was astonished. What could possibly be going on? The house looked like it was destitute, its windowpanes rotting and unruly plants growing over the brickwork. It was a place where homeless squatters and beggars and low city criminals might gather, not where his wife should be meeting any friends. It certainly did not look like the appropriate rendezvous for a lovers’ meeting. That, at least, placated Simon’s most jealous impulses.
Simon watched as the man climbed out of the carriage, looking around with dark, shifty eyes. Simon was glad that his barouche carriage was not marked with his crest. He was hidden far back in the seat, and luckily there was a lumber cart between them. It was unlikely the man would see him.
Simon watched as the man jerked his head towards the person in the carriage, and Marion stepped out, following him. She did so quickly, ducking out and hurrying into the shabby house as if she was afraid to be seen on the street. Or she was afraid of the consequences of lingering. If nothing else, Simon knew at this moment that Eleanor’s instinct had been correct—Marion was in trouble.
He had certainly had cause to doubt his wife in the last few days, but he had few doubts about the content of Marion’s character, and there were three things he had seen today that did not chime with her personality. First, Marion was unlikely to climb into the carriage with a man alone, even a man she was possibly having an affair with, in such a public place where she could have been observed by anyone, including her best friend. Second, Marion would not trespass into a dangerous part of the town without a companion she trusted. Last, and most significantly for Simon, he knew that whatever Marion was feeling personally about their marriage. She would never publicly endanger their reputations by risking being seen entering a disreputable establishment such as this one with a man who was so clearly not her husband. Marion could never pass as a simple workman’s wife. She was a lady through and through.
Simon was convinced that whatever the details of how it was being done, whatever the circumstances of her acquaintance with the man, Marion was not acting entirely of her own free will at the moment. And that made his blood run cold.
What has happened here?Simon wondered.Why would she not tell me she was afraid?
Because I never told her when I was afraid.
Simon realised then that his own withholding of his love, his own retreating into his fear and worry about losing Marion, had allowed a space to grow between them where they had not felt able to trust one another with their fears.
This ends now,Simon thought grimly. He knew he had to do better, and he would, as soon as he brought his wife safely home, away from this terrible place. He waited until the door to the house had been closed and the hired carriage had rolled away before jumping out of his barouche, cane in hand, deliberately leaving his hat inside to make him less conspicuous.
“Shall I wait for you here, My Lord?” his coachman asked, looking doubtfully around the dirty back street. This was not a part of the city he was used to driving his master to and from.
“No, you’re far too conspicuous,” Simon said. “Drive back to the Earl of Brixton’s townhouse. Tell the Earl where I am and tell him to fetch the constable. I have a feeling that we might have need of him.”
“Yes, My Lord. At once!”
The coachman quickly set off down the street and Simon began to slowly approach the dusty house. He knew better than to go and simply knock on the front door and demand his wife—he knew enough of vagabonds and rogues to know they always had a back entrance somewhere for a quick getaway. If Marion was in trouble, then the man might escape with his wife before he could get to her.
