Does she know you’re in love with her?
When he had returned to England from the war, he had been so certain that his love had died along with his hopes. That now all he felt for her was residual fondness and the desire he had never been able to repress. Now, with Knight’s voice ringing in his ears, he wondered if he had ever conquered his affection, or if it had slumbered in his chest, waiting for her to reignite it all over again.
Cruel of fate to compel him to love her twice, and both times to be denied her.
She came closer, the dusty skirts of her dress brushing her legs. The sound of the fabric was the only sound in the silent room, not even the ticking of a clock to interrupt the tension.
“The letters,” he said before she could mention what had passed between him and Knight. “Why does he want them so urgently?”
She glanced down at the letters in her hand as though she had forgotten they were there. “Ah yes,” she said, and cleared her throat as she unfolded the most worn page and began to read. “My darling brother.Forgive me for not writing as often as I said I would. I never meant to make you worry, although I know you will have done, but the truth is, things are more difficult here than I ever could have imagined. In your last letter, you described the house you wish to buy for us, and I cannot stop thinking about it. In my darkest moments, I think it is the only thing that keeps me going.
“I wish I could bring you good news, but I miss you terribly and it is so miserable here. I am frightfully hot, and I dare not leave the house, though there is little enough furniture. Mr Roberts—you remember I mentioned him in my last letter; he is in charge of reclaiming Anthony’s debts—is an odious man. Now there is nothing of mine left to sell, he is talking of marrying me off to his son and calling the debt complete. Papa is dead, and even if he were not, England is so very far away.
“You were right when you told me never to marry Anthony. I wish now I had listened to you.
“Please come for me soon, Vin. You said the end of the summer, but I’m afraid I do not have that long. I’m so scared.
“Your loving sister,
“Arabella.”
Chapter Seventeen
Louisa stared at the letter, the paper along the fold feathered and the ink smudged. This was no doubt what Knight was so desperate she return to his possession. Not because it was evidence against her, but because it was evidence of his weakness.
He had a sister.
All the investigations she had commissioned had never come back with this information. It had been as though he had emerged from nowhere, nothing to his name but enough charm to compel her husband.
Henry caught her elbow as she stepped back, her knees soft as butter. Knight was cruel and cold in so many ways. The method he had gone about securing her money proved that, and he had evidently looked into her past as thoroughly as she had attempted to look into his—with significantly more success. Her past was an open book; she had always been a member of theton, and many people of thetonhad long memories.
Yet now she knew he had a sister, finally a memory tickled the walls of her mind. A bright young lady with laughing eyes and a brother who gave in to her every whim. Not members of theton, but not so far below it that they could not aspire.
“A sister,” she murmured, regaining her balance. “He has a sister.Thatis why he wants the money.”
“For her alone?” Henry’s voice was scathing, his hand still at her elbow. “Unlikely. Think, Louisa. That amount of money is unlikely to be all destined for her.”
Perhaps not. But enough of it would be that it explained his sudden urgency, why she could not find any evidence of pressing debts.
She smoothed the paper, reading over the lines again. The girl’s handwriting was poor, and there were some splotches that she attributed to tears. Arabella, a girl who had evidently married either because she was compelled, or because she had been seduced by money. Poor, foolish child. It was a wicked thing to be married to a man one could not respect, never mind love. And crueller still to hold a widow accountable for the sins of her husband.
“He must have received this while being here,” she murmured, thinking through the timeline. “That would explain why he demanded a portion of the money early.”
“It doesn’t make what he’s doing to you any less heinous.”
She glanced up into his face for the first time since reading the letter. His eyes were dark and serious, fixed on hers in a way that made her stomach do something uncomfortably like flutter. “You need not be so concerned for my safety,” she said lightly, discomposed by her reaction and the accusations Knight had levelled at Henry.
Does she know you love her?
Now you hope to establish yourself in her affections just as you did before. Is it her fortune? Things are different from when you were children, are they not.
Finally, Henry dropped her arm. “Must we go through this again? You know why.”
She did, or at least, she knew his explanations, and they again made her chest tight.
“You have done all you came here to achieve,” she said, tapping the letter against her hand. “I haven’t retrieved the proof, but I have something almost as good.”
“Which is?”
