Isabel stared up at him, her heart hammering in her chest. He surely didn’t intend?—?
Freddy’s lip curled. ‘Don’t look at me like that. Believe me, I’ve no interest in what’s beneath your skirts. I’m just going tosecure you while I find the man I’m looking for. I would hate for you to go running off.’
Rope of varying kinds seemed to be in plentiful supply, and he bound her ankles. To make doubly sure, he ran a rope from her wrists to her ankles and gagged her with a strip of cloth torn from her petticoat. When he was done, he covered her with the verminous blanket.
Trussed like a Christmas goose, Isabel could do no more than watch helplessly as the leather flap fell across the door. She forced herself to close her eyes and try to sleep, but the cramps in her bound wrists kept her wakeful. She wondered about the time. The dank weather made it almost impossible to judge. It could still be an hour or so until full tide—still time for a search party to catch up with them.
Whoever came, it would not be Sebastian. For the first time she allowed herself to think of him, his terrible death: burned alive in the stables. Her eyes filled with tears, and she sniffed, wishing she could blow her nose.
Eventually, she must have dozed, only waking when someone shook her shoulder. She woke with a start, hope fading when she looked up into Freddy’s cold blue eyes. He sat down beside her and began to undo the ropes that bound her.
‘We’ve about an hour,’ he said as he worked. ‘I’ve paid the man well. He’ll have his boat standing off the beach at six.’
As he untied her wrists, she flexed her fingers, tentatively rotating her sore wrist. It did not appear to be swollen or badly injured, but it still hurt.
He thrust a hunk of bread at her, and she tore into it hungrily. As she ate, his fingers stroked the back of her neck. Her skin crawled but she couldn’t risk aggravating him.
‘It will be all right, Isabel. I’ll take care of you, just like I always took care of Fanny. Everything I did was for her.’ His tone had become light and musing.
She turned her face to look at him. ‘What was it you did for Fanny?’
His fingers dropped from her neck. ‘Everything. They wanted to send us to the workhouse but I took Fanny and ran away to London to make my fortune. We were rescued by a man.’ He gave a twisted, humourless smile. ‘He ran a house for other gentlemen. I don’t suppose you know of such places.’
‘A molly house?’
Freddy turned to look at her and she could see shock in his eyes. At first, Isabel thought his surprise might be caused by the fact she knew about molly houses, but his lip curled back in a sneer.
‘What do you take me for? This house catered for the needs of gentlemen, not the common rabble.’
‘And you... you provided services to these gentlemen?’
He looked away. ‘I was only sixteen and I had Fanny to think of. They put her to work in the kitchen. She was only a little thing and I don’t think she ever had any idea what went on upstairs.’
For the first time, Isabel felt a flicker of sympathy for Freddy. A desperate boy with a pretty face must have been easy prey for a procurer.
‘The money was good, and it had some perks. I learned to cheat at cards, and I learned how to be a gentleman. All useful skills.’
‘That’s where you met Anthony?’ The pieces of the puzzle were beginning to fall into place.
In a small, tight voice, she asked, ‘Was he ...? Was he your lover?’
Freddy looked down at his hands as if inspecting his fingernails. ‘He frequented my house, but he had his favourite and it wasn’t me. Then he stopped coming, and I didn’t think anything more about him ’til I went to a soiree with one of my clients and saw him with you.’
Isabel drew away from him. ‘Me?’
‘You wouldn’t remember. Those were the days when you weretrying to be a good wife, laughing, and being the lady. Were you in love with Anthony?’
Isabel turned her mind back to those early years of their marriage. She had tried to be the wife she thought Lord Somerton wanted. The gall rose in her throat. She had no inkling of this secret life; his predilection for men. He had never been an enthusiastic lover but how would she have known any better?
‘Did you not wonder what he did on those trips to London after you retired to the country?’
There had been the stories that had filtered back to her of his womanising. Had that, too, been a charade played out for public benefit?
Freddy stretched out his legs.
‘He drifted back to us,’ he said with a smile. ‘Anthony wanted to resume the friendship with my friend. He wrote some lovely letters but the poor boy was dying of consumption and gave them to me for safekeeping. You should see the letters, Isabel. Your darling husband laid his heart on the page. When my friend died, I made it my business to help poor Anthony in his grief. We became very close and of course I had his letters.’
So that was it. Letters. Were the letters that Freddy had in his possession enough to hang her husband for sodomy?
