When Edmund moved to leave, Arabella offered parting advice. “Be wise and keep an eye on your sisters. William will want Lilly’s pretty face and fortune. He has none of his own. Sir Statham will want Lizzy’s innocence. They are both conniving, evil men.”
Mr. Jenkins didn’t know how to answer, frozen for a moment before making an awkward turn for the door.
The eavesdropping doctor cleared his throat, looking to her host as if expecting to be invited inside for refreshment now that his patient’s immediate danger had passed.
Arabella snarled as savage as a highwayman. “I, Baroness of Iliffe, am paying your fee, physician. You will stay here and care for Payne. If he so much as twitches, you will attend him. Retake your seat.”
Huffing, the man did as he was told, his resentment palpable. “Yes, my lady.”
Edmund Jenkins raised a brow at her outburst, but wisely kept his mouth shut before making a full retreat.
Day became night, music and laughter drifting cheerfully across the courtyard. A platter of food was sent, a bottle of wine, most of it devoured by the doctor who stuffed himself, belched loudly, and began snoring in his chosen corner.
Arabella could not bring herself to eat, but she did her best to see both Mary and Hugh took supper. When their bellies were full, each of them were tucked into a stall to sleep upon the hay, Arabella remaining on her stool at Payne’s side surrounded by the sounds of soft breaths and deep snores.
In the folds of her skirt she fingered the silver saw, warm tears running down cool cheeks to see her friend suffer because she had been foolish. Half of Payne’s face was swollen, his breath had begun to rattle, and she feared the blow to his head would finish him before any infection in his arm might do its work.
Leaning close to his ear, she whispered, “If you die, I will follow. Do you hear me, Payne?”
“Magdala assured me Payne’s proclivities for male attention made him no threat. Seeing you weep for him, I abruptly doubt her word.”
Startled, Arabella drew back, her grip tight on the hidden saw, and found Gregory watching from the dark. It had been so quiet, even the raucous party inside having diminished, that she had not heard a soul approach.
The doctor woke from her shriek, coughing mightily.
Mr. Harrow’s attention went to the man in the powdered wig. “The gentlemen are soon to retire, if you hurry, a port and cigar might still await you inside.”
Arabella refused to be undercut. “No.”
“Go.” Mr. Harrow went right up to the woman in question, growling. “I will handle the baroness.”
All it took was the word of the bastard gentleman for the doctor to abandon his chair and rush from the stable to the civility of the house.
On her feet, like a she wolf protecting her pup, Arabella put her body between her lover and her friend. “How dare you, Gregory!”
Looking her over, eyes lingering on each bruise, every last tear in her dress, Mr. Harrow growled. “You are unsteady on your feet. Sit.”
The command was not enough to move her. She had not eaten, her body ached from the fall from her horse, but she would not stand down. “You brought them here. Payne’s misery is your doing.”
A storm gathered in Mr. Harrow’s eyes, the man moving forward to physically push the rabid woman back upon the stool. “Point that finger at Lilly. Her meddling complicated my original plans, and for that she will pay. Now sit.” When he had her where he desired, his hands went to her hair, picking out stray pins, freeing the tangles, and smoothing mussed curls off her face. “I asked you to trust me. I seldom ask for anything, my love.”
He didn’t frighten her, large and imposing, as she thought he would. Not anymore. “Why are they here? Why here, Gregory? Why now? To act as if you had no hand in this is to lie to me outright.”
“Lilly would court the Iliffe title with her fortune— if her flirtations this night speak for her, she fashions herself the new baroness. As it is, she will have brought the scandal on herself. By the time I am finished with the chit, she will be ruined.”
“I do not blame her for any of this.” Arabella was unforgiving and adamant. “I blame you! You put her up to it. I don’t know how you did it, but I know you did. You wanted the Jenkins family to reject my acquaintance. You wanted my opinion of Edmund to diminish.”
It might have been the light of a nearby lantern, but a flash of regret lit behind the black of his eyes. “Yes.”
Heart breaking, Arabella’s tears fell free. “And still you ask me to trust you.”
Running a hand over his hair in the first nervous gesture she had ever seen Gregory make, the man swore. “Everything was put into motion with hardly a day’s notice. It could not be stopped without drawing suspicion. So long as I am here, they cannot touch you, I swear it to you, my love.”
The morning had been full of hope, the afternoon terror, and
the evening sorrow. “It was you who pulled me from Payne, who called for a doctor, who brought me to the stable in place of the house and left my friend on the stones. If you do not think men of their nature failed to notice, you are wrong.”
“Come morning, it will not matter.” Arrogance returned to Gregory’s wicked expression. “Dalton procured the key to the women’s wing. He will go to Lilly, she will accept him in hopes he might consider her for a bride. I have paid a maid to discover their amour.”