Dreamspinner (42 page)

The hostile tone startled Juliet. Had Chantal hated Emmett enough to punish him by killing his daughter? She would have to be a madwoman...

“But Papa came from a poor background, too.”

“Perhaps that’s why he craved respectability. When I learned of his betrothal to your mother, I walked out on him, even though I knew I was to bear his child. He offered to buy me a house, to give me a generous allowance.” Chantal frowned at her elegant hands. “But I was young and foolish and hurt, so I refused him. After Emily was born, I left her with an aunt and fled to India, to escape the intolerable memories.”

“And you met William Deverell there.”

She nodded. “I’d already encountered him in London. You see, he tried to court me, too.” Casting a glance at Kent’s reserved expression, she added, “But I feared his interest stemmed from the rivalry. It wasn’t until later that we fell in love.”

Juliet regarded Chantal with suspicion. There had to be more that she wasn’t telling. “How could you love two men who were so very different?”

“Different?” Tossing back her blond head, she uttered a brusque laugh. “William and Emmett were more alike than you can imagine. Both stubborn, both proud, both intriguing. It was a challenge to find the gentleness beneath the arrogant exterior. Kent, don’t you agree?”

Sipping his brandy, he gave Juliet an intent look. “I wouldn’t know about Emmett, but Father did have a kindhearted side. He had a sensitivity that he seldom showed anyone outside the family. You can see it in his drawings.”

The image so jarred with Juliet’s view of William that she sprang to her feet. “Sensitive! A man who would sell Emily’s pony, even her locket... out of spite?”

“William never touched a penny of that money,” Chantal said. “He gave it all to me, to purchase Emily’s clothing and to provide for her future.”

“How generous,” Juliet mocked. “William denied her his love and forbade her to seek the love of her natural father. For heaven’s sake, Chantal, he made my sister’s life miserable.”

“Emmett is as much to blame—”

“Papa wanted to take care of her,” Juliet said hotly. “He wanted her to keep his gifts. He would never have abandoned his own daughter. Emily herself wrote that he said so.”

Chantal arched a fine brow. “So you would excuse Emmett, but not William? The situation was Emmett’s fault in the first place—he denied both Emily and me the honor of his name.”

An angry retort seared Juliet’s throat. Abruptly she caught herself. Why was she defending Papa? He wasn’t the gentleman she’d grown up to admire and love. He’d hidden a mistress and a sister from her. He’d denied poor Emily the right to a father’s love and protection. And all the while, she herself had enjoyed luxury and contentment. She had had everything while Emily had suffered Papa’s neglect.

“Perhaps,” she murmured, dropping into the chair, “Papa isn’t as perfect as I used to believe. He renounced me easily enough.”

Kent set his glass down sharply. “You can’t know that for certain. I’m sure he’d welcome you back for a visit.”

“You’re leaving?” Chantal asked, her keen eyes on Juliet.

“No. At least not for a while.”

She looked at Kent; his lips were taut, his gaze grim.

“There’s something else you should know,” Chantal said. “I received a letter from Emmett the other day.”

Juliet swiveled to stare at her. “What on earth did he say?”

“He asked me to watch out for you, to let him know the instant you’re unhappy here at Radcliffe.” Her lips quirked with biting humor. “So you see, even Emmett can care in his own stiff-necked way.”

Juliet’s mind plunged from high hope to deep anger. He’d taken the time to write to his former mistress, but not to her. “If he loved me, then he would have come after me.”

“Emmett has far too much pride,” Chantal said with a brusque sweep of her arm. “He’d want the world to think he’d washed his hands of you. Coming here would be tantamount to admitting he approved of his daughter marrying a Deverell.”

“This ridiculous feud,” Juliet burst out. “When will it ever cease?”

“When old men fail to pass on their disputes to the next generation,” Chantal said dryly.

“Yet some good came of the past,” Kent said. “I’m sorry you were hurt, Chantal, but I must say I’m glad that Emmett married Dorothea.”

Because of you,
his eyes added to Juliet. The tenderness on his face trembled inside her heart. She took a steadying breath. If emotion kept clouding her logic, she’d never decipher the truth.

She looked at Chantal. “I wanted to ask you about something puzzling in Emily’s diary—”

“Rose should never have given you that diary. She should have brought it to me.”

“I’m glad I had the chance to read my sister’s thoughts. On the day of her death, she mentioned that she’d devised a plan to defy Kent. Did she tell you what the plan might have been?”

Chantal cocked her regal head. “No. I’ve no idea.”

“Did you speak to her after Papa left?”

“Only briefly. She said she wanted to be alone, to think, so she returned to her bedroom in the family quarters. Emily was never one to distress others with her private suffering. I should have...”

“You should have what?” Kent said.

She shrugged. “I should have gone after her, talked to her.”

Juliet had the strange impression that wasn’t what Chantal had intended to say. “So you didn’t see her again?”

“No.” Her composure suddenly crumpled and she looked old, her mouth sagging. “But, oh, how many times since then have I regretted respecting her wishes! I knew she was despondent—I should have insisted upon comforting her. Perhaps I could have stopped her from taking her own life.”

Tears glistened in her blue eyes. Sympathy tugged at Juliet, but she forced herself to remember that Chantal was an actress, capable of staging a superb performance to throw off suspicion. But was she capable of killing her own daughter?

Kent got up to touch the woman’s shoulder. “I don’t mean to upset you, but the diary has reawakened distressing memories. Juliet’s accident has finally made me realize there may be some truth to the curse.” He paused, looking keenly at Chantal. “I’ve been thinking of selling Dreamspinner.”

Startled, Juliet stared. His gaze remained fixed on Chantal.

She sprang up and paced toward a window. Her grieving expression became tight-lipped resentment. “That abominable necklace! But are you sure, Kent? You’ll be breaking your vow to William.”

“I’d sooner do so than risk another tragedy.”

She nodded sagely. “A wise decision. We must keep disaster from striking this family again.”

A pensive quality underlay her voice. Sunlight silhouetted her majestic figure and cast her expression into half shadow. Yet Juliet sensed with shuddering certainty that she herself was the focus of that speculative regard.

Did Chantal realize a murderer lurked somewhere in the castle?

Or was she herself the one?

Chapter 21

Which one?
Prowling his bedroom, Kent let his thoughts travel the dark road of suspicion. As always, the journey proved both frustrating and painful. Everyone here had cause to dislike Emmett Carleton. But in which person had animosity degenerated into a twisted excuse for murder?

He thought about the interview they’d left an hour earlier. Chantal had delivered no surprises. And he’d been right about Rose leaving the diary. In her usual childish way, she hadn’t considered the consequences; she’d wanted only to let Juliet know they’d shared a sister. Rose was so sheltered, she’d never learned how to make friends. Guilt niggled at him. Since their father’s death and then Emily’s, loneliness had shadowed his sister. When all this was over, Kent vowed, he’d spend more time with her. Perhaps if he took her to London for the Season, she could find a husband.

His mind veered back to the mystery. Hidden emotions seethed inside so many people here. He had the nagging sense that he was missing something. A vital clue. Something to do with the feud?

Oh, God. He was the one who had perpetuated the quarrel. It was hard to believe that he’d once felt justified in using Juliet for vengeance. He’d taken the gift of her love and pulverized it beneath the heel of hatred.

Remorse engulfed him. Snatching up his glass from a table, he took a gulp of brandy. The liquor burned untasted down his throat.

Grimacing, he set down the glass with a sharp click.

Drinking the afternoon away wouldn’t erase his sin. Or protect his wife.

Drawn by an urge stronger than logic, he moved to the open doorway. Stepping quietly inside, he looked to her bed. Empty.

His heart lurched, then calmed as he saw Juliet sitting before the gilt desk in the corner. Brow furrowed, she wrote on a sheet of stationery. Sunlight illuminated the purity of her profile and set fire to the red highlights in her upswept hair. She looked slender and soft, the image of a perfect wife. His wife.

He recalled her angry words:
I despise what you’ve done to me. Our marriage can never be what I thought it was.

Memory hammered at Kent. He hungered for a return of their too brief interlude of happiness. Oh, God, what if he failed to protect her?

Deliberately making his footfalls louder, he stepped into the room. “Shouldn’t you be resting?”

She tilted a cool face to him. “I wasn’t sleepy.”

“Do you feel all right?”

“I’m fine. The nausea comes only in the morning.”

Returning her attention to the letter, she continued writing. Only the ticking of the mantel clock and the faint scratching of her pen marred the silence. A few days ago, she would have abandoned her work and come running for his kiss.

No more.

Unable to bear the encroaching darkness of despair, he said, “Who are you writing to?”

“My mother.”

Shoving his hands into his pockets, he paced to the desk. “Didn’t she ask you not to contact her?”

“Yes, but matters between my father and me could hardly be any worse than they are now.”

The chill in her voice discouraged further dialogue, yet a self-punishing impulse made him go on. “Are you telling her about the baby?”

“Yes, I ve already written that part.”

“What are you writing about now?”

“Hannah Forster. As soon as I receive the money from Papa, I intend to take her to a London physician. I’m asking Mama’s advice about making the appointment.”

“I see.”

Christ. How wrong he’d been to oppose her about the dowry. He’d viewed the money as contaminated; she viewed it as a benefit to the people of Radcliffe. The legacy of his father’s hatred had blinded Kent to her goodness. She was right; he was as rigid and self-seeking as Emmett Carleton.

Her womanly fragrance drifted to him. He ached to reach across the chasm separating them, to fold her into his embrace, to kiss away the pain and distrust and betrayal. To prove he wasn’t altogether a scoundrel.

Impossible.

“Did you say anything... about what’s happened?” he asked.

Juliet set down the pen. Her green gold eyes looked as cold as Emmett Carleton’s. “Shall I tell Mama that you married me for revenge? That you were once wed to her husband’s bastard child? That you blamed him for driving his own daughter to suicide?”

The truth shriveled his soul. Would he ever grow accustomed to seeing repugnance where love had once bloomed?

You sowed the seeds of vengeance, he reminded himself. Juliet’s hatred is the bitter harvest.

Wrenching his gaze away from her lovely face, he went to a window and braced an arm on the stone casement. Dizziness swept him, as if he teetered on the precipice of black damnation.

Far below, the river flowed serene and blue-gray, lapping against the ancient wall. A trout’s fin flashed against the water. He concentrated on the familiar view of hills and fields. Doom ebbed slowly, driven away by the calming sight of his castle, his lands.

He had Radcliffe. His heritage... his child’s heritage. It offered at least a token hope for the future, even if she raised their child far from here.

He turned back to Juliet. Her frigidity had thawed to a guarded coolness, as though she took pity on his suffering.

Pity. Not love.

He returned her stare. “No, I don’t expect you to tell your mother anything distressing. Yet I wonder if you ought to let your father know about the greenhouse incident.”

“One of you badgering me to leave here is quite enough.”

“So you believe he still cares?”

Her gaze faltered; then she sat up straight. “I don’t know what to think anymore. Except that I want to find the murderer so we can...”

We.
She’d used the word unconsciously, of course. Yet for a moment he could only look at her and yearn for a future together. Would he ever again be singed by the flame of her love?

The mantel clock chimed four times. She turned away, and his fantasy faded into dreary reality.

“Since you’re determined not to rest,” he said, walking to her, “do you mind finishing the letter later?”

“Why?”

“I sent a note to Augusta, asking her to join us for tea at five o’clock. I’d like you to be there. But first, I’d like to speak to Gordon.”

“About what?”

“Dreamspinner.” Frustration gnawed at him. “At this point, the necklace is our only clue. I’d like to see if he—or anyone else here—reveals strong feelings about it leaving the family. Will you come with me?”

Hesitating only a second, she rose to face him. “Do you suppose Chantal resents the fact that your father never gave the jewels to her? Could she have turned that resentment on Emily?”

“No,” he said, emphatically shaking his head. “I’ve known Chantal Hutton for almost twenty years. She keeps her emotions close to the surface.”

“But she was an actress, Kent. Can you be so sure she isn’t playing a role?”

An arrow of misgiving pierced him. What if he was wrong about Chantal? He’d certainly been wrong about
someone
here.

He gazed at Juliet. Pregnancy had enhanced her natural beauty with the glow of health, and sunshine shimmered upon her cinnamon hair. Her dainty features were so dear that he ached just looking at her. From their first meeting she had brought an unexpected radiance into the darkness of his heart. The absence of that light left him dismal and empty. “Julie...”