She knew.
She knew what they were going to say before they could say it.Johanna could feel the awful certainty closing around her, and she could not speak.She felt too overwhelmed… too acutely aware of her mother resting in the house, only one floor and two hallways away.
“Murdered,” Lady Astrid confirmed grimly.“The dukes know.We know.Delilah and Mei know.And now you two.”
“So far, nothing has happened that indicates any of us is in any danger of the same fate,” Kalina rushed to reassure them.“There have been no threats and no indication that whatever motivated the death of those dukes has anything to do with their heirs.”
“But there has been a threat, of sorts,” Tiffany said, heaving a sigh.“If we investigate.Which, of course, our husbands are.Though they are keeping it as secretive as possible.”
“They even tried keeping it a secret from us.”Lady Astrid snorted and shook her head.She eyed Johanna and Rose.“From your expressions, I assume Matthew has not said anything to you.”
Johanna shook her head, and so did Rose, although she shot Johanna another glance, pressing her lips together.She was clearly displeased with Matthew keeping Johanna in the dark.Johanna just felt sick to her stomach.
“How do you know what happened?”Rose asked.
“Well, we did not know until fairly recently.Tiffany overheard Sebastian and Gregory speaking of it, and things went on from there.”Lady Astrid huffed.“She told me.We told Kalina and Delilah—although it looks as though Delilah did not strictly need to know, since Zachary is a dunce.And I told Mei because I felt that if she was going to matchmake any of them, she should know what the young lady she matched them with might be getting into.”
“But Johanna had to marry Matthew after… well, after he purchased her at that awful auction.”Rose shook her head.“I know he saved her from a terrible fate, and I am grateful for that, but how can we be sure she has not jumped from the frying pan into the fire now?”
“We cannot,” Tiffany said grimly.“All we can tell you is what we know so far, so that you can be on your guard in case there is any danger.”
Rose nodded, leaning forward, obviously intent on defending Johanna by whatever means necessary.Johanna wished she could be so fierce, but right now, all she felt was faint.And it was about to get so much worse.
“A lot of what we know begins with the note my husband’s steward left him, the night he fled.”
I sold my sleeping potions to the Duke of Clarence’s steward.Johanna’s mother’s voice echoed in her head.I killed his father.
Oh God.She was going to be sick.
ChapterTwenty-Eight
Johanna
It felt like Johanna’s entire world was crashing down around her while she sat in a drawing room, sipping tea and pretending she was not dying inside.Her heart was not pounding, it felt very much like it had stopped as her skin had gone clammy and her mind utterly blank with panic.Yet somehow, her arm moved to lift the tea cup to her lips, as though she were some kind of puppet.
Rose had no hesitation in asking questions because she did not know that Johanna’s mother was involved.
Rose had not heard the confession.
Johanna had not told Rose because it was so ludicrous… but now, it was sounding as though her mother’s wild theories might hold the truth.
“Initially, Gregory was actually under suspicion of having murdered his father,” Tiffany explained.“His father was… well, he was not a very kind husband or father, and he was…” She trailed off, groping for words.
“He was altogether awful,” Lady Astrid said bluntly.“Do not look at me like that, Tiffany.Gregory would say the same thing.”
“Yes, though it seems wrong to speak ill of the dead, especially when I never met the man to form an opinion myself.”
“I met him once, and trust me, that was enough.”Lady Astrid made a face.“To make a long story short, he fathered several children on various maids, whom he ravished, then did nothing to care for them or their mothers after they were born.”
Glancing at Rose, Johanna reached out to take her cousin’s hand.Her uncle might not have been the best father, but her mother had been willing, and he had wanted to provide his daughter with her family, illegitimate or not.While he was absent from her life even after her mother passed, he had ensured she was taken care of.Rose’s chin tipped up.If she was bothered by being reminded of her own circumstances, it did not show in her expression.
“One of them was the steward’s niece.”Tiffany’s face became quite drawn.“She was… is very traumatized by what he put her through.According to Montblanc—that’s the steward—he wanted justice and knew he would not get it from the courts, so he took matters into his own hands.But in that same letter, he also claimed he did not understand what he was getting into.”
“We think there must be a conspiracy,” Kalina said softly, glancing at the others.“A group working together.Gregory swears up and down that Montblanc would never have had any part of murdering men he had no quarrel with.He believes if Montblanc had known the full extent of the damage that would be done, he would have turned himself in beforehand.”
“But we cannot know for certain because he has fled.”Lady Astrid flexed her fingers, looking peeved at the man for fleeing the hangman’s noose.
Johanna felt her stomach turn over again.It was a wonder she had not lost her breakfast already as the revelations came, one after another.Perhaps it was not just for Rose’s sake that she had reached for her cousin’s hand because now she was squeezing it tightly on her own.
