Chapter Seven
Bridget let Lord Alasdair hand her into the curricle, her mind whirling. He’d changed, while she hadn’t even managed to put up her hair. He was now dressed impeccably in black, even his shirt, though he wore a white cravat. He had, she noticed, tied it perfectly.
After the brief ceremony, he’d excused himself, recommending she gather some few possessions she might need. When they’d reconvened in the foyer, he had her valise stowed in a trunk secured to the back of the curricle. With his things.
Their possessions, in one trunk. Them, together in the curricle, his strong hands guiding the team. They were married. They shared a life now. Heaven above, she was Duchess of Ceann na Creige.
Bridget craned her neck, looking behind her as they sped down the narrow, twisted road away from the hulking keep that was her home. Her father hadn’t come to the foyer to say goodbye. After he witnessed the ceremony, he shook Alasdair’s hand, kissed her on the forehead, and dismissed them from his office.
“While you were packing, I had Fiona removed to a place I hope is safe. I sent for someone to come for her,” Alasdair said. At the base of the crags, he followed the roadway south.
“She wasn’t safe in Lomall a 'Chaisteil?” she asked, though she knew the answer. “What was she doing in that tree?”
“She was watching to see if anyone spied on us.” His lips, the ones that had seared all reason from her not two hours past, pressed into a hard line. “I don’t know if she was followed, spotted or chose to confront someone. The doctor said if she wakes soon, she’ll likely make a full recovery. We can pray she does.” The last, he said in a soft tone.
Bridget was struck by the sincerity in his voice. How unlike her father, who never gave a hint of care for anyone, except Ollie. “Are you really Lord Alasdair?” she asked, worry shooting through her. If he was not, she wasn’t truly married. She was ruined, and alone with a man who could fool even her father.
He cast her a reassuring smile. “I am.” He slowed the team. They turned down an eastbound road. It was one she didn’t know well, cutting inland through dense forest.
“But that’s not all you are,” she pressed. He’d promised, after all. As little as she knew about Alasdair, she thought he would keep his promise.
“It is, now,” he said. “My older brother died, half a year ago, without an heir.”
Half a year ago? That was a few months before Ollie’s missions began to go awry. Had the whole network been compromised? “Was your brother a spy for the Crown?”
Alasdair gave her a startled look. “My brother? No. They prefer not to use heirless members of the peerage as spies. My brother had no offspring. That’s why I had to return.”
“But Ollie’s the only son of a baron, and he’s a spy,” she protested. Anger sparked in her gut. Was a duke’s line so much more important, then?
“That’s different. Your brother is…different.” He fell silent.
“You said I would have the truth,” she reminded, anger in her voice.
He grimaced, his gaze on the ground ahead. Though the afternoon sun hung high above, they were cloaked in gloom beneath the trees. The slanting ribbon of light that snaked through the foliage only illuminated a sliver of the roadway, casting the rest in shadow.
“Your brother is a special case,” he finally said. “They call him the Dagger. It’s a hereditary position. He will have trained from boyhood.”
Bridget digested that. Yes, Ollie had trained. For as long as she could remember. Her father had trained him. “Do you mean my father was also a spy? A Dagger?”
Alasdair nodded. “And your grandfather, and so on, for generations.”
“Ollie’s missions, they started going wrong,” she said. “The letters from Lord Winston tell the who, I’m sure of it, and the ones from Lord Belview tell the where.” She searched Alasdair’s profile, but he evidenced no reaction to her words. “I don’t know what Ollie is meant to do with the information. I think when he writes back that he’s gone to the place and enjoyed it, and approves of what Lord Winston’s letters claim are names for his hounds, Ollie’s done what he must.”
Alasdair nodded.
Bridget pursed her lips, frustrated. A nod? Years of speculation, and he would nod? “What does Ollie do for the Crown?”
“He eliminates problems,” Alasdair said in a low voice. “Permanently.”
Bridget furrowed her brow. “But the names, they’re people.”
“Yes.”
“You’re saying Ollie eliminates people?” The words came out a high squeak. A heaviness settled on her. “Father, too?”
“Yes.”
Those single syllables, his voice so cold… “And you?” she whispered.
