By late afternoon, Meredith’s nerves were frayed. She paced in the drawing room, waiting for Warren to return from Crell’s country house.
Darius and his other friends had left earlier that morning. She’d only had dim, sweet memories of him kissing her goodbye before he’d slipped out of bed. That tender parting had left her feeling strangely bittersweet, perhaps because she now wished she had told him about her plan to trick Crell into confessing.
They had started this investigation together, and now it had all become twisted up. She’d pulled away from Darius to handle this on her own because she feared he would not let her do something simply because it was dangerous. But she had to do this. She had ignored the signs that Mrs. Crell was in danger. Flashes of the woman flinching as she’d moved in the gardens, and her mention of being clumsy…it was so obvious now that Mr. Crell likely had a hand in those bruises. Sadly a man had a right to beat his wife, at least in a court of law, but that didn’t mean he had the right to murder her. Still, she hadn’t felt she could push Darius to let her assist him, and it had become clear he no longer wanted to be involved in catching Crell, not after his failure to find evidence with Doyle.
He may have given up, but I cannot. I must press on, even if it means keeping this from him until I’ve seen it through. I owe it to Minerva.
Meredith turned that memory of Darius’s goodbye kiss over and over in her mind, remembering the feel of Darius’s lips upon her throat, her cheek, her forehead as he murmured he would bring her back a gift from the jewelers before coming home. But the real gift had been the way he made her feel before he had left. She felt loved and cherished, and that only twisted the knife deeper into her chest at the thought that she had been the one to keep this a secret from him.
She could have let this all go and focused on her marriage to Darius, but she couldn’t get Mrs. Crell’s face out of her mind. That poor woman had been so excited about an afternoon tea with Meredith, and Mr. Crell done something to her. Meredith knew it deep in her bones. And she could not let such a wretched injustice go unpunished.
Mr. Chelsea appeared in the doorway and announced Warren’s arrival. Meredith instructed him to be shown in at once.
Warren soon entered the drawing room, passing his hat and gloves to Chelsea. His usual teasing smile was gone, and in its place was a somber expression that made her feel uneasy.
“Did you deliver the letter without being seen?” she asked once Chelsea had left them alone.
Warren nodded solemnly. “I hid in the woods and saw Crell receive the letter from a footman at the door.”
She absorbed this new information, her plan was coming together.
“What is next in this dangerous plan of yours?” His tone wasn’t exactly disapproving, but clearly he had his concerns.
“If he read the letter, he will be in his garden at seven o’clock tonight,” she explained, twisting her fingers nervously in her skirt. “Next, I will send a note to Mr. Doyle, asking him to wait in Darius’s garden, by the…”
She paused as a flash of a memory hit. Darius stood shoulder to shoulder with her, trying to discern what was transpiring on the other side of the wall. “By the heart-shaped hole in the wall. Then he will hear Crell’s confession.”
“Ideally,” Warren murmured.
“Yes,” Meredith agreed, reaching out to touch Warren’s arm briefly before asking, “And you will be hiding nearby, just in case things do not unfold as I hope they will.”
Warren nodded in understanding, but he did not look pleased.
“Good,” Meredith said. “Then I believe we may just catch a murderer tonight.”
Meredith felt no joy at the thought, but she was determined. She had to do something for Mrs. Crell, and whatever fate befell her. Like Minerva Crell, Meredith had felt alone for many years. Even though Uncle Ben had given her a wonderful home, she’d always felt like a guest there. She wasn’t Ben’s daughter, no matter how much she’d grown up wishing she was. A woman alone in the world deserved to have someone care about them, and Meredith cared about Minerva Crell. Even if no one else did.
“Meredith, why does it need to be you who meets with Crell? I would readily take your place.”
“I appreciate that, but it must be me, Warren. As a woman, he will underestimate me. He will be more likely to confess to me, because he will think I have no power to prove his guilt.”
“He will also think that he can easily remove you if you are a threat to him,” Warren countered. “You are exposing yourself to far too much risk, even with Doyle and myself nearby to protect you. Trapped men become desperate, and desperate men are dangerous. Is catching this man worth your life?”
Meredith rubbed her arms and looked toward the drawing-room windows. “It might make little sense to you, but I believe that Mrs. Crell and I are similar creatures. She was alone, unwanted, and I believe her husband erased her for the crime of being inconvenient. She did not deserve that. Women are often overlooked, hurt, and erased from life by the violent desires of men.” She held her head high as she met Warren’s gaze. “I don’t want Mr. Crell to get away with whatever he’s done. If he killed his wife, he shouldn’t be at liberty to live his life, not when he stole Minerva’s.”
“You really believe he killed her then?” She studied him as he asked this, and she found a hint of uncomfortable resignation mixed with the barest hint of admiration which steeled her spine and her resolve to defend what she was certain had happened.
“Isn’t is possible that, rather than reconcile, they agreed to live apart? He stays with his mistress, and she with relatives? No one wants to draw attention to a broken marriage.”
She shook her head. “The scream I heard the night of the ball was human. I know it was. There’s been too much I’ve seen, too much I’ve heard coming from that house to think that whatever happened between Crell and his wife was innocent. I saw her flinch when she moved and she mentioned bruises. I should have known something was wrong.”
“No one wants to assume something terrible has happened to someone. You cannot take that blame upon yourself.”
“I must catch him…I owe it to her. You believe me, don’t you? That he truly did it?”
She saw a hint of uncomfortable resignation mixed with a hint of admiration when she asked him this, which only steeled her resolve.
Warren took a deep breath. “I believe you.” She hadn’t realized until that moment that she needed to hear those words.
