I had been so sick when Papa had come for me. I may have been confused in what I said, but I’ll never forget the disgust in his eyes carrying me out of Madame Talease’s bawdy house.
A headache started.
I rubbed my temples. “I married Adam. I had no proof when Papa located me. I’d been beaten, brutalized to the point of death. I doubt if anything I said made sense to Papa. But Adam and I went through a ceremony. I know Adam loved me, and I watched him die, protecting me.”
Ester gasped, she paled, looking like an ashy angel. “But it was fake. Adam Wilky was invented. Mama said it was a lie. Papa’s lawyers found no proof that a man by that name existed.”
“A lie is what they call the truth when no one believes it.”
I dug into the reticule and pulled out the halved page of the blacksmith’s registry. “See, this section says C. A. Wilkinso… and Ruth Eliz… The rest is cut off. My half had been in the trunk I received two weeks ago. Adam’s half, he sent by post to his family’s residence, Blaren House. That’s where we are going.”
“That makes no sense. The registry has to be available for everyone to view to maintain its validity. Why would you do something like cutting up the record that could validate your union?”
“Adam did it. He knew his life was in danger and that our marriage made me vulnerable to those hunting him. He took the registry, cut it in half, and sent his piece to his father. If his father has Adam’s last letter, then maybe he will give it to me.”
Ester held the torn parchment paper to the window. “This says Wilkinso. You’ve gone by the name Wilky?”
Was it wrong to be mad at a dead man?
I hated Adam for his secrets, as much as I hated that he was gone. I was conflicted and hurting, but these should be old wounds. For the past two weeks I’d told myself so many times it didn’t matter, that he’d had reason for this deception. Just more of his cloak-and-dagger ways. Truthfully, it made everything hurt all over again.
I took back the old document and smoothed it against my knee. “Wilky, Wilkinson. None of it matters. You don’t believe me.”
“Ruth, is it possible he took the document to get rid of the proof? That he’d changed his mind and thought it more convenient to have no evidence?”
It was possible, but I’d never let Ester know that.
The wrong last name was why Papa had found no evidence of Adam.
Time and hurt had a way of shifting things. Adam, hero or villain? Who was he? Why had he had so many secrets?
Ester put a hand on my shoulder. “Is it worth confirming that this man you risked everything for was a scoundrel?”
Scoundrel. Liar. Those were words I’d have never thought about Adam, until two weeks ago.
He could be all those things and still tragically dead.
For a moment, I wanted to make the carriage turn back. I should keep the lies I’d lived rather than find the truth and know how stupid I’d been.
I’d loved Adam with everything. I’d given him everything, and he couldn’t even give me his true name.
I felt weak, for I was weak.
Sinking against the seat, I wished to fall into the tuft of the fabric and never come out. I wanted to be a hairpin that slid into a crack and was lost.
Then I remembered my son.
He’d look for me like he did butterflies and birds and frogs. I wasn’t doing this for me. Chris needed to have a name, even if it was the wrong one.
Turning the plain gold band Papa had bought to replace the one taken, ripped from me like the cross Adam had given me, I stopped hiding. This was my truth. “I married Adam. It was a legal ceremony. The name is cut off, but it’s Wilkinson. Adam’s father, Algernon Nathaniel Wilkinson, that is who we are to meet. He lives at the address Adam scribbled on the back. I need both parts. That’s my proof.”
A sad sigh left Ester. She folded her arms and tucked a palm under her chin. “If he wrote the wrong name, the marriage is invalid. His family can claim it wasn’t legal. Christopher is as pale as Josiah. The white Wilkinson family will not claim you.”
I knew this.
I didn’t think Adam would be so cruel, but I never thought he’d lie to me, either. I closed my eyes. “I have to believe the good in him. He did not take me to Gretna Green just to have at me. We married. I was a bride. I was loved.”
My voice sounded strong. I saw my sister nod and back down. But she didn’t see my confusion, my growing doubts.
