He sighed. “A former acquaintance.”
“Former,” she repeated. “And yet she found her way into your bed.”
“Ah, Christ. Barlowe had to bloody well tell you that.”
She resumed pacing. “Do you mean to suggest you intended to keep it a secret?”
He shook his head. “Of course not, merely that I wished to be the one to relay that bit of information because of the rather sensitive nature of it. I promise you that I neither invited her there nor knew she was venturing to my rooms.”
Elysande had possessed a great deal of time to torture herself over every detail she had gleaned from Mr. Barlowe. There were so many facets that did not make sense. The story was akin to the jagged shards of a crystal decanter which, once smashed to bits, could never be reassembled in whole once more. But she was determined to try. Her marriage depended upon it.
She reminded herself to remain as calm as possible. Investigations required clear, rational thoughts. Even when she tested her electrical frying pan, or any other project she worked upon with Papa, she did not dare become emotional over the outcome.
“How did she know where to find your rooms?” she asked her husband next.
A flush colored his chiseled cheekbones for the first time since her arrival. “I assure you, the knowledge was from before I had ever met you. Mrs. Ainsley has not been an intimate acquaintance of mine since well before I knew you.”
An intimate acquaintance.The phrase should not puncture her heart like an arrow, and yet, somehow, it did.
She paused in her pacing, her chin going up. “She was your mistress in the past, then.”
“Not my mistress,” he denied. “She was a widow eager for companionship, and I was the man who provided it to her for a short span of time, no more. I had not seen her in at least a year, prior to the dinner on the night she was killed.”
“She was your lover,” she said plainly.
He nodded. “In the past, yes. No longer.”
“Clearly.” Her lip curled. “Mrs. Ainsley is quite dead now, is she not?”
Her words were cutting and cruel, and she knew a moment of regret when their barbs caused him to flinch as if she had physically struck him. Callousness had not been her intention. Nor was it like her to be so flippant. He had brought her to this low, she thought with grim resentment.
If he had only stayed in Buckinghamshire…
But no. That was a stupid thought, and a moot point. If he had remained, what would have happened? Would he have continued charming her until she had been as formless as pudding, incapable of resisting his handsome face and his knowing hands and lips? And what then?
“She is indeed deceased,” he said quietly.
Sadly.
She refused to entertain a moment of pity for him. Not until she knew more. Not until she had the answers she so desperately sought.
“She was murdered, Mr. Barlowe said,” she pointed out quietly. “How do I know it was not you who killed her?”
All the color leached from his countenance once more. “You truly believe me capable of murder?”
She held his gaze, challenging him to prove to her why she should not. “I scarcely know you, Your Grace.”
“Goddamn it.” Viciously stabbing his hands into the already ruffled waves of his mahogany hair, he turned his back to her and strode to a sideboard she had failed to notice until that moment.
Her emotions churned, her convictions vacillating wildly. Guilt pierced her before she tamped it down, forcing it away. Why should she feel remorse for questioning him? He deserved to be questioned. He deserved far worse, in fact. What had he done other than marry her and leave her, only to draw her into this dangerous web of his own making?
She was meant to be working. Thus far, she had been devoting herself primarily to the cause of turning Brinton Manor back into the impressive country house it had once been. How would she ever complete her prototype in time for the exhibition if she was too preoccupied running her husband’s estate and following him to London? And not just following him to London for innocent reasons, but to determine what had happened concerning the former lover who had been found murdered in his bachelor’s apartments.
Caught in the swirling mayhem of her own thoughts, it took Elysande some time to realize her husband had poured himself a more-than-generous draught of whatever spirits were assembled on the sideboard and tossed it down his throat before seeking another. She had never seen him drink to excess before.
She rushed forward without thinking, catching his elbow. “What are you doing?”
“Getting soused,” he growled, shaking her hand from him. “What else is a man to do when his wife informs him that she believes him capable of murder?”
