The Lady’s Secret (27 page)

“Good lad. You can come with me on my horse.” He glanced at Dunsmore and Osborne as he strode to the door. “I have to go.”

“We’ll join you,” Osborne said grimly.

“Then you’ll have to make your own way. I’m leaving now and I have no time to waste.”

They had finished their tea and crumpets and Georgy was clearing the plates away when they heard the noise. Footsteps running upstairs? Georgy looked at Max questioningly.

“What the devil—” Max said, moving towards the sitting room door. Harry began to struggle up from his reclining position.

Max was about to open the door when it erupted on its hinges, the edge of it colliding with his forehead, pitching him to the floor.

“Max!” Georgy began to run forward and was stopped in her tracks by the two men who had entered. One held a pistol, the other a battered looking club. The one with the club kicked Max viciously in the ribs and Max grunted with pain.

“One down, Bill!” he said to the other man, grinning. He had an undershot bite, like a bulldog, and his grin was more of a leer, his lips full and slightly wet.

“Leave him alone!” Georgy shouted. She started towards Max but the man called Bill stopped her with a growl that revealed a mouth all but empty of teeth.

“Get back. Both of you stay where you are and keep yer ’ands where we can see ’em.”

“Do as he says, George,” Harry said behind her in a low voice. She made a frustrated noise but stepped back, hating the sickening fear rising in her belly. Without taking his eyes off them, Bill gestured at Max with his free hand. “Move ’im,” he told the other man. “’E can be tied up till ’er Nibs tells us what to do with ’im.”

A third cloaked and hooded figure entered the room as the bulldog dragged Max off and shoved him into a chair. One heavily ringed hand emerged from the folds of the cloak to push the hood back from its wearer’s face. Her other hand, which shook slightly, held a small, elegant, pearl-handled pistol.

“You two have become very troublesome,” Lady Dunsmore said. She sounded aggrieved, upset, her expression disgusted. “And it needn’t have come to this at all. You only have yourselves to blame!”

Georgy glanced at Harry. He stayed silent but his eyes burned. They stood in the centre of the room with Lady Dunsmore and the man called Bill facing them. Lady Dunsmore had her pistol levelled at Harry and Bill had adjusted his aim to cover Georgy. She heard the sound of a blow connecting behind her and then another a low groan from Max. When she turned her head to look at him she saw he was secured to a chair now. His head lolled back and blood trickled down from his forehead.

“Please don’t hurt him!” she pleaded, but the bulldog only laughed, seeming amused by her reaction. She looked back towards Lady Dunsmore, whose expression of disgust had intensified.

“Not yet,” she said to the bulldog in a voice icy with anger, before returning her attention to Georgy.

“There’s no point whining now. It is entirely your fault that your friend is suffering.” She sounded like a haranguing governess. “If you had left well alone, things need never have reached this pass.”

“Of course,” Harry said. “We should have
accepted
our mother’s murder and the theft of our birthright.”

Lady Dunsmore’s angry gaze whipped from Georgy to Harry. “Theft!” Lady Dunsmore scoffed. Two deep lines bracketed her down-turned mouth. She might have been pretty when she was young, but the years had carved her face with an expression of haughty pride that was repellent. “How can it be theft, when your own grandfather decided the matter? It was he who made sure the marriage was hushed up and the parish record destroyed. It was he who settled money on you. Not my son—not my husband or me. We have merely carried out
his
wishes.”

“We have never touched his money,” Harry cried.

“It matters not. Your mother agreed to take it.”

“If she’d imagined for a moment I had a chance of inheriting the earldom she’d never have done it. And anyway, neither she nor anyone else had the right to do such a thing on our behalf.”

Georgy watched with anxiety as Lady Dunsmore’s colour rose throughout this heated exchange. Her lips had thinned and the hand that held the pistol was still shaking.

“You miss the point,
boy
.” Her staccato voice cut off the end of each word with cut-glass scissors. “Your grandfather did not
wish
you to have the title.”

“No. It is you who misses the point,” Harry replied. “The title and the estate are entailed. It was not for grandfather to decide who inherited. The law of primogeniture decided that point. And I
am
the Earl of Dunsmore, not your son.”

Too much, Harry!
Georgy put her hand on his sleeve and squeezed.
Stop!
For a moment she thought Lady Dunsmore might simply shoot him, she looked so angry, but she seemed to bring her mounting fury under a degree of control and turned back to Georgy.

“Where are the letters?”

The letters. Of course, she wanted them back. Perhaps they would be dead already if not for them.

Georgy resisted the urge to look at the valise that sat quietly in a corner of the room. She had tucked them back in there after Harry had read them. To her, it seemed so obvious a place to look that she couldn’t believe Lady Dunsmore didn’t just go and rip it open—but she did not.

“What letters?” she hedged.

“Do not toy with me! I am out of patience. I knew who you were the day you arrived at Dunsmore Manor. When I saw Peter’s desk had been tampered with—and it was obvious to me as soon as I opened it—I
knew
it must have been you. You and Harland were just about to leave when I discovered it. So I had to send someone after you.”

“How did you know it was me?” she asked, breathlessly.

Lady Dunsmore eyed her scornfully. “Surprised, are you? I’ve been keeping an eye on you for a long time. When you disappeared from your employment here, I had your friends followed. That actress friend of yours soon led me to you—stupid of you to meet her publicly. I had only to see you to know. You look so like your greedy mother.”

Georgy swallowed. “I don’t have the letters with me.”

Lady Dunsmore made an impatient noise. “Am I going to have to hurt him?” She gestured at Harry carelessly with the pistol, making Georgy wince with anxiety. Lady Dunsmore had no intention of letting them out of this room alive. The only thing keeping them alive now was the existence of those letters and her desire to get them back.

“They’re with Lord Harland,” she lied. “He knows everything. If anything happens to us—”

“Lord Harland! I know his sort very well and I can tell you that you are nothing more than a whore to him. If you imagine he is about to support your ridiculous claims, you are going to be very disappointed.”

But for all Lady Dunsmore’s scorn, Georgy saw the news had panicked her. Disposing of Georgy, Harry and Max was going to be hard enough, never mind having Lily to deal with, and now—so much worse—Harland. A peer of the realm and a friend of her son’s. Pandora’s box had been opened and would not be closed again.

“Lord Harland knows everything,” Georgy said in a firm tone, forcing herself to appear calm. “If Harry and I disappear, he will make those letters and everything I told him public. And he will not rest until he brings you to justice.”

She realised, with a little jolt of surprise, that she believed her own words. But Lady Dunsmore only glared at her.

“What rubbish! Even if Harland does make a fuss, no one will be able to prove anything. It will be mere speculation.”

“Of course he’ll be able to prove it. So many people know the truth already.” Georgy gestured at Bill. “Can you trust him or his crony? You can be sure that when Lord Harland begins asking questions, he will leave no stone unturned.” She deliberately glanced at Bill, the toothless thug who was listening intently. “Lord Harland has already disposed of one of your men. And he has a lot of money to persuade people to answer his questions.”

“Stop your prattling!” Lady Dunsmore hissed, swivelling her body in Georgy’s direction so that Harry was momentarily uncovered. Before Bill could react, Harry lunged forward, knocking the pistol from the other man’s hand and bearing him to the ground. Bill roared with outrage and his pistol skittered across the floor, coming to a stop a few feet from Georgy. She made to crouch down for it, but Lady Dunsmore’s angry voice stopped her.

“Stay still or I will shoot you right now.”

Georgy slowly straightened and looked at the older woman again. She had raised her other arm to steady her grip on the pistol and her gaze was shifting wildly around the room, her expression panicky. She looked from Georgy to Harry, who was wrestling Bill on the floor, and then to the bulldog, who was watching the scrap with apparent enjoyment.

“Get the gun, you idiot!” Lady Dunsmore shouted at the bulldog, nodding at the pistol at Georgy’s feet.

“Please,” Georgy said, taking a step towards Lady Dunsmore. “Stop this. This cannot end well, but if you stop now—”

“Shut up,” the other woman screeched. “Shut up! I cannot think with you whining in my ear!”

She was not rational. Georgy glanced over her shoulder. The bulldog was edging around Harry and Bill, who were thrashing around in the middle of the floor. He mustn’t reach the pistol at her feet.

Georgy glanced at Lady Dunsmore. The older woman’s pistol was still trained on Georgy but her attention was riveted on the bulldog. Georgy had one chance.

“Quickly!” Lady Dunsmore ordered the bulldog. He stopped in his tracks, sending her a belligerent look.
I’m not your slave
, his sullen face seemed to say. And for a moment their gazes locked, the haughty lady used to being obeyed and the lawless thug who obeyed no one. That moment would have to be enough, Georgy decided. She dove to the floor, reaching for the gun.

Lady Dunsmore shouted “Don’t let her get it!” as Georgy settled her fingers around the pearly butt. And then a boot swung into her field of vision, connecting with her inner arm with unbelievable force. She heard a crack and pain arced through her, astonishing pain. As she screamed, the pistol flew from her fingers, discharging itself loudly. The bulldog roared and fell to the ground, clutching his thigh.

She staggered to her feet and saw that Harry was up too, warily circling the man called Bill, who now wielded the club. He swung it at Harry and Harry feinted, just avoiding it. Harry looked ashen with pain and exhaustion.

“This has become a farce,” Lady Dunsmore wailed.

Georgy looked at her, her expression pleading, her arm throbbing as though it was on fire. “Please. Just let us go. People will have heard the gun now. Someone will come soon.”

“But then what?” Lady Dunsmore hissed. “You won’t go
away
, will you? You’ll just come back, again and again, until you find some mud that sticks. Even if you can’t prove your story, you’ll ruin my reputation!” She let out a sob. “You and him.” She gestured at Harry. “You are relentless. I do not
want
to kill you but you make it impossible for me!”

Angry tears brimmed in her eyes. She was outraged righteousness made flesh. Her face was stiff with fury, and her matronly bosom heaved. She quivered with indignation. “
You
,” she said to Georgy, more softly and more hatefully. “Coming to my home, sneaking into my private rooms, reading letters my
husband
sent to me.
Stealing
them!”

She was working herself up into a murderous rage now.

“Please—” Georgy tried again, but it only seemed to fuel the flames. Behind her she heard a thud, and Harry groaning, then another thud. She glanced over her shoulder to see him on his hands and knees. Bill stood over him, looking at Lady Dunsmore with a question in his small piggy eyes.

“No,” Georgy moaned, despair drenching her. “No.”

Lady Dunsmore thought for a moment, then pressed her lips together and decided.

“Finish him.”

Bill drew back his club. He wasn’t like the bulldog—he didn’t show glee. To him it was a job, and his attention was concentrated on doing it well.

And then the door flew open wider, smacking into the wall.

“
Georgy!
”

Nathan erupted across the room, not even hesitating before he knocked Bill to the floor with a right hook, following him down to the floor to pummel him ruthlessly while Harry rose painfully to his feet.

“Harland!” Lady Dunsmore called over the racket. “Stop that right now or I will shoot this woman dead.”

His head snapped up and Georgy saw then that he hadn’t realised that Lady Dunsmore was armed. His gaze fastened on her pistol with consternation.

The man he had been beating—and who now lay groaning on the floor—was forgotten. He got to his feet, his eyes shifting between Lady Dunsmore, her pistol and Georgy. He began to move slowly forward.

“Do not be foolish, my lady,” he said gently, his eyes fixed upon her. “Give the pistol to me.”

She swung it so that the barrel pointed at his chest.

No!

“Nathan, do not move,” Georgy whispered, not daring to approach the other woman in case the gun went off. “Stay where you are.”

“You should listen to her,” Lady Dunsmore said. She held the pistol in both hands now, but still it wavered. Nathan took another step towards her, holding his hands up, the palms facing outwards to show his own helplessness.

Georgy’s fear climbed crazily, her heart pounding in her breast, her breathing quick and shallow. She watched him advance. He was so open, so exposed to this irrational woman’s fear and panic.

“You’re all so relentless,” she complained bitterly, her eyes shining now with angry tears.

“I know,” Nathan said soothingly. “But it is over now. And your son is on his way here. He is very worried about you.”

She made a scornful noise. “I doubt that very much.” For a moment her haughty expression hardened, and then it crumbled. A sob erupted from her, from deep in her chest. She looked horrified by the outburst, lifting one hand to her mouth to hold back any more noise. In her other hand, the gun listed alarmingly.

She hadn’t truly petrified Georgy until this moment. Now she was erratic and all her attention was on Nathan.

“
Nathan,
” Georgy whispered, desperate. This could end now, with a wicked woman’s bullet in his heart. When he ignored Georgy’s whispered plea, she stepped towards Lady Dunsmore instead. “Please,” she pleaded again. “He is not to blame for this.”