Shock washed over her. All this time, the countess had been in love with the steward at Barlowe Park. But there seemed to be much of the story she was missing, and she knew that if she wanted to increase her chance of escape, she had to keep the countess talking.
“If you loved your Robert so, then why did you want to marry Zachary? Why did you end up marrying his brother?” she asked.
“My family is not wealthy, and my father made it clear I needed to marry well. I was forbidden from marrying Robert. Fools fall in love with ease. It did not take much to make Zachary notice me, and it took even less effort to catch the eye of his brother. Besides, if I were countess, I could help Robert. I was responsible for persuading my husband to bring Robert on as the steward here. After the rift between my husband and Zachary, Anglesey chose to have Barlowe Park closed up and never returned. It was all quite convenient. Until he died.”
It was diabolical.
She took another step in retreat, thinking she might be able to cause another distraction, besides talking. “But if you did not have any feelings for my husband, why did you kiss him that night?”
“There is one way to make a man do what you want.”
Bile rose in Izzy’s throat. The countess was even more manipulative, and even more evil, than she had realized. “You were trying to seduce him. Why?”
“Because Robert was fearful we were going to be caught with Anglesey in residence and indicating he intended to live here with you. So you see? This is allyourfault, you whore. Robert needed more time to collect the money we would need to go to America together. Zachary was desperately in love with me when I married his brother. You know that, do you not?” The countess flashed her a satisfied, snide smile. “I wanted to remind him of what he felt for me.”
“You wanted to use him,” Izzy concluded, taking another slow step backward.
“I wanted to control him. Doing so is frightfully easy. He always has thought with his trousers instead of his brain.”
The countess’s rancor toward Zachary made her ill.
“How dare you insult him?” she demanded, thinking that if this were to be the end for her, she would happily go defending the man she loved. “He cared for you, and you manipulated him and betrayed him and married his brother. He is a good man with a trusting heart, and you took advantage of that and used it for your own gain.”
“He is a slut,” the countess snapped. “But then, so are you, aren’t you,my lady? I saw just how depraved you are that night in the library. The two of you deserve each other. And if he hadn’t sent Robert to prison and tried to leave me to molder on that godforsaken island, you could have lived happily ever after. But now, you have to pay.”
“Izzy!”
Zachary’s frantic cry took Izzy by surprise as he jogged into sight at the head of the path. But she was not alone. The countess jerked, then spun toward the sound of his voice, but as she did so, her foot became caught in one of the roots intersecting the path. Izzy could do nothing but watch in horror as the other woman tripped and fell headlong into the falls, striking her head on one of the massive rocks protruding from the stream and sinking beneath the water in a billow of woolen skirts.
He rushed to her, taking her in his arms, and never had an embrace been more welcome. She clung to him, shivering, shaking.
“She—she was going to shoot me,” she managed past the fear clogging her throat. “But she has fallen into the river and struck her head on a rock. We have to help her.”
“Christ.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead and then turned back toward where Lady Anglesey’s motionless body was being dragged by the current. She was facedown in the water, arms outstretched, the pistol having been lost in the waters. “She is going to go down the falls before I can reach her. And if there was anyone less deserving of help, it is the woman who was about to murder you.”
“We have to try, Zachary.” She took his hand in hers and pulled him along the path.
Together, they rushed down the hill, reaching the flat area below at the same time as Lady Anglesey’s prone form bobbed back to the surface.
“Stay here,” Zachary ordered her grimly.
He waded into the river, and Izzy’s heart clenched as she watched, helpless, from the bank. When it was too deep and he began to swim, he finally reached the countess and hauled her back to the bank.
Together, they pulled her waterlogged body from the river.
But it was too late, just as Zachary had predicted. The countess was ashen and lifeless.
“She’s dead,” he said quietly.
Izzy burst into tears. Tears of relief, of gratitude, of grief. Uncontrollable sobs welled up from deep within her, and she was powerless to contain them as the magnitude of what had just unfolded hit her with the force of a blow.
“Hush,cariad.” Zachary folded her back in his arms, his coat soaked and cold and wet. “It is over now. You are safe, and she can never hurt you again.”
“She-she c-can never hurt either of us again,” Izzy said, teeth chattering as shock and the chill took over.
“Come,” he said, taking her hand in his. “Let’s get you home.”
CHAPTER22
