Seduction Becomes Her (24 page)

Her face full of concern, she touched his cheek again. “Charles, what is it?” she asked quietly. “What is so very bad that you feel you dare not speak of it?” She smiled faintly. “I may not find it so very bad, you know.”

“You will,” he stated unequivocally.

Fear knotted in her stomach. Whatever Charles was keeping from her, it was obvious that it was more, and a great deal worse, than a drunken, spendthrift father. Taking a deep breath, she said, “Then perhaps you better tell me about it.”

He looked away from her a moment. They stood at the edge of a chasm, and he wished they’d had more time together before it had yawned before them. Once he told her, would she shrink away from him in panic and aversion? Would she shun him? Order him from her bed? Yet unless he spoke, the secret of Raoul would lie between them like a black, ugly festering wound, destroying any chance he had of winning her, any chance of them finding lasting happiness. His jaw clenched. He must tell her…and live with the consequences. God help him.

His face set, he pulled her down next to him. When she was comfortably nestled beside him, he said bleakly, “Let me tell you of Raoul….”

And so he told her. Everything. Nell’s nightmares. The dungeon beneath the Dower House. The multitude of woman who had died shrieking beneath Raoul’s knife. John’s murder by Raoul and Sofia, and Sofia’s death by his own hand. His reason for being in Cornwall. Everything.

When he was finished and Daphne lay stiffly and silently at his side, his heart sank. Would she now look at him in terror and repugnance, knowing he had shot and killed his stepmother? Knowing that at least some of the same blood that ran in Raoul’s veins ran in his? What would he do if she turned from him in disgust? How could he live?

That such creatures as Raoul and Sofia existed appalled Daphne. Despite the challenges she’d faced, she’d led a normal, unassuming existence, one in which murderous relatives and wanton slaughter did not exist. She’d been prepared to hear of some philandering rake or an adulterous spouse, perhaps even an illegitimate birth lurking in the midst of Charles’s family, but nothing like the horrific tale he had just related.

The inexplicable mental link between Nell and Raoul was difficult for her to grasp, but the ghostly events at Beaumont Place helped her understand and accept that there were things for which no rational explanation existed. John’s murder repelled her, and her heart ached for Charles. Knowing how she felt about Adrian and April, she couldn’t conceive the motives, emotions that had driven Raoul to commit such a dastardly act. That Raoul murdered for his own pleasure disgusted and horrified her, and it was utterly obscene, she thought, that Sofia had known and protected him. There was no question in her mind that Sofia had deserved to die. As for Raoul…She shivered. To think he might still be alive and living near Beaumont Place.

She jerked upright. Wide-eyed with terror, she blurted, “We must warn the others! What if he was to snatch April? I could never forgive myself if something happened to her.”

Charles took comfort that she had not leaped from the bed making the sign to ward off evil at him. Carefully, he said, “April is safe. He only stalks those of the lower classes, choosing as his victims women whose disappearance will not make much of a stir.”

“Which doesn’t make it any better, does it?” she said gently. Looking at him, seeing the rigid way he held himself, her heart ached for him. It had not been easy for him to speak of such intimate horrors. How he must have suffered knowing that his brother…. She paused, and her mouth tightened. His
half
brother had been a monster. And now, having confessed his terrible secret, he looked as if he were braced for a beating. Love and understanding stirred in her breast.

“Oh, my poor dear Charles! How ghastly for you,” she cried. Flinging her arms around him, she hugged him tightly. “You must have suffered so very much, knowing that Raoul had killed your good John and helped cause Daniel’s death. I cannot imagine how you stayed sane.” Raining soft little kisses along his jaw, she murmured, “Sofia deserved to die. She was a wicked woman, but she cannot harm anyone again—she is dead, punished for her wickedness. I hope that as she burns in hell—as surely she must—she knows that you are Master of Stonegate and that her fortune is yours to do as you please. And if as you believe Raoul is alive, we will find him and stop him.”

A fierce light leaped to his eye, and his heart began to beat again in thick, rapid strokes. Jerking her onto his chest, he found her mouth and he kissed her again and again, love surging through him. Sweet, adorable Daphne! She had not rejected him. She was not repulsed by him.

Daphne responded frankly to his kisses, wanting to draw away the hurt, the pain she knew he had suffered. Still suffered, for it was clear that guilt and remorse ate at him. He made love to her with a tenderness that woke a desire so powerful she shook and trembled from the force of it. His touch was so gentle, filled with such passionate homage that she was half mad with longing, and she writhed on the bed, begging him to take her, pleading for him to end the sweet agony he had aroused. With a smothered groan, he joined them together, his swollen member sliding in and out of her slick warmth in increasingly frantic thrusts. In those last moments, there was a feral madness between them, gentleness gone, hands, mouths, and bodies seeking, demanding succor until breathless and gasping, their bodies convulsed and ecstasy flooded through them.

When he could speak again, Charles bent over and brushing back the waves of black hair that cascaded across her forehead, kissed her tenderly. “Do you know,” he said softly, “I am very glad that you went exploring in that cave. I do not like to think what my life would be without you.”

Daphne’s heart lurched at his words. She loved him, and unless she was reading more into his words than he meant, it appeared that he might very well love her. It wasn’t a declaration of love, but it was close and she treasured his words, holding them close to her heart.

Her smile luminous, she caressed his lips with her fingers. “Hmmm, I am very fond of that particular cave myself. One day, we should visit it again.”

His eyes darkened, and his fingers brushed against her nipple. “If we do, my dear, be prepared to be ravished. Quite thoroughly, in fact.”

Tingling from his touch, Daphne smiled and said, “I shall try to brace myself.”

Charles and Daphne spent three days at Stonegate. They wandered over the house and estate, Charles pointing out the various rooms, items, and areas of interest. They drifted through a dreamscape, lost in each other, falling deeper and deeper in love, aware and yet not aware of their surroundings, of the servants watching them with smiling approval. There were sweetly intimate breakfasts in the morning room; on one day, a gay alfresco meal enjoyed in the garden; and scrumptious meals served in the dining room. Nights were spent in wild, passionate lovemaking, but there were those dark moments that they spoke of Sofia and Raoul. Seeing the pain and guilt in his eyes whenever their names were mentioned, Daphne swore to herself that she would make him happy, make him forget that terrible past, but she knew that her husband’s heart would always bear the scars inflicted by Sofia and Raoul.

“Do you really believe that Raoul is alive?” Daphne asked him that last evening at Stonegate as Charles inspected the contents of the family safe in the room used by his father as an office. The safe was concealed behind a bookcase that easily swung out from the wall—if one knew where to find the catch that released it.

Daphne was seated on a silver and white sofa near the fire, and Charles glanced over his shoulder at her as he took out a large jewelry box constructed of ebony and satinwood elegantly decorated with seed pearls and gilt. “Hmm, I don’t know. Those dead women make me believe that he could be, but I have not been able to find anything tangible that encourages me to think I am right.” He looked thoughtful. “Raoul would need money, and while I’m convinced that Sofia was farsighted enough to make certain he would never want should his true nature be discovered and he was forced to flee, I can find no trail of it. Most telling of all, Nell no longer dreams of him.”

Daphne suppressed a little shiver. “It must have been horrid for her to see him actually killing those poor women.”

Charles nodded. “It was, but Nell is a strong woman.” He grinned. “She’d have to be to be married to my cousin.” He sat down beside her, the box on his lap. “But let us not speak of them. Let me show you all the pretty trinkets that are yours to wear as you see fit.”

Opening the lid of the jewelry box, Daphne gasped at the array of diamonds, emeralds, and rubies and other precious stones that gleamed in the candlelight. “Oh! There are so many lovely pieces.”

“Yes, and as my wife, they are all yours.” He touched one or two pieces. “Some of them are very old, but each generation has added to them, and I shall be no different—I have every intention of showering you with jewels upon occasion.” His eyes caressed her. “In the meantime, I think that this emerald necklace and earrings, given to my great-great grandmother by her husband, would look very fine on you.” A sensual smile curved his mouth. “Of course, you would be wearing nothing else.”

“Of course,” she agreed with a becoming flush.

They spent an agreeable several minutes examining the various pieces, but as time passed, Charles frowned. Seeing it, Daphne asked, “What is it?”

“My stepmother,” he said slowly, “loved jewels. She was always buying them…I remember several of them—a sapphire pendant, a diamond and pearl necklace with matching earrings, and many other pieces. They are not here.”

“Do you think she put them somewhere else? Left them with her banker in London? Or with a jeweler to be cleaned, and they have not been returned?”

He shook his head. “No. Her solicitor, as well as her banker, turned everything over to me when the estate was settled.” He walked over to a massive mahogany desk and after opening several drawers, found what he was looking for. He thumbed through a sheaf of papers, and plucking out one, he came back to sit beside her on the sofa. “This is a list of all Sofia’s personal belongings. You’ll notice that there is no mention of
any
jewelry. And I know her one extravagance was jewels. I may have forgotten some pieces of jewelry she owned, but not all of them. So where are they?” He glanced down at the glittering array of jewelry in the box in Daphne’s lap. “What’s missing would easily be worth a small fortune…and Raoul would need a fortune.”

“Jewels,” Daphne said slowly, “would be easy to hide and transport with no one being the wiser…. She could have given him various jewels to conceal in places that he could easily reach should the worst happen.”

“They would be better than money safely set aside in a bank,” Charles added, following her train of thought. “A small cache here and there would insure that he had plenty of money.” Scowling, he studied the jewels. “It appears that she was intelligent enough not to take family heirlooms, but I see no sign of the many jewels that she bought over the last twenty or so years. The missing items represent a fortune—and that’s just counting the ones I remember. There could have been many I never saw or do not recall. Certainly, they would be fortune enough for Raoul to live where and as he pleased.”

His expression thoughtful, Charles shut the lid to the jewelry box with a snap. He stood up and placed it in the safe. After pushing the bookcase into position, he returned to sit beside Daphne.

“If he is alive, I think we have discovered how he has been living these past three years,” he said grimly. “He had a hunting box in Leicestershire, a suite of rooms both in Brighton and London, a small yacht and a house that he kept at Poole. He could have stashed jewels in any one or all of those places.”

“You inherited his estate as well as his mother’s—wouldn’t there have been a record of properties owned by him?”

“I’m sure that there was, but I never paid any attention to it. Why should I? I believed him to be dead, and quite frankly, in the months following Sofia’s death and presumably his, I just wanted to be as far away from Stonegate and anything connected with the pair of them as I could be. Gerrard, my solicitor in London, handled everything, and from time to time, he would send me letters informing me of his progress in the settlement of the estate.” Charles stared at the fire, his expression remote. “At that time, I didn’t give a damn about any of it.”

“Did you sell the yacht or the hunting box or anything?”

He shook his head. “For all I know or care, the yacht has sunk to the bottom of the Channel. Gerrard takes care of everything not connected to Stonegate.”

“Well, I suggest that you write Mr. Gerrard and find out what properties Raoul did own,” Daphne said practically. “It is probably far too late to do any good, for I’m sure that as soon as he was able, Raoul would have moved swiftly to gather his, er, inheritance—assuming he survived.”

Charles nodded. “And if we find any jewels…”

She beamed at him. “Then it will prove that he is dead and those poor women in Cornwall met their fate at someone else’s hand.”

“It appears that we shall be extending our trip to include a brief excursion to Brighton, with a stop at Poole along the way before we return to Cornwall.” He slanted her a glance. “Unless, of course, you wish to return to your brother and sister? I can join you as soon as I have searched the house at Poole and his rooms in Brighton. I would not keep you from Adrian and April longer than necessary.”

There was something in his voice that made her look sharply at him. She sensed there was more behind his question than polite consideration. Did he not want her with him? Was he, she wondered sickly, bored with her and regretting their marriage? Even as that thought crossed her mind, she impatiently dismissed it. No, it wasn’t that he was bored with her or their marriage; it was something else. A mistress? Again she realized how little they knew of each other. For all she knew, her husband had half a dozen mistresses scattered across the British Isles. And, she thought gloomily, he wouldn’t be the first husband to seek his pleasures outside of the marriage bed. Yet she doubted Charles was a philanderer, but it was possible, because they had married so quickly, that he had not made a final settlement with his mistress…if he had a mistress. Her only recourse, she decided, was, until she knew what was in his mind, to tread warily. Cautiously, she asked, “Do you wish for me to return to Beaumont Place without you?”