A Little Deception (40 page)

Oswald chuckled. ‘The clothes Rose pawned on Helena’s
behalf…? Rose did not know Lady Chawdrey’s necklace was sewn into the lining.
The pawnbroker was paid handsomely for his well-rehearsed act.’

Arabella gasped and rushed forward to shake Oswald, crying,
‘How have you the effrontery to confess such crimes which could send you to
Newgate, Cousin Oswald?’

He put her away from him and Felix moved in, smoothly, to
hold her against his side.

Oswald glared. ‘Only Helena could send me there for only she
knows the energies I expended on her behalf.’ His cocky banter was replaced by
a menacing energy. ‘She has all the fruits of my labours and my only reward is
telling you just how black her heart really is.’

Impatiently, Rampton moved to the door. His guilt and shame
were compounding by the minute. ‘I’m more concerned with Rose’s safety than
Helena’s black heart. Where in God’s name could she be?’

‘Have you asked that little maid of hers?’

‘Beth is locked up at Bruton Street,’ muttered Rampton,
shoving the tell-tale blood-stained handkerchief into his pocket. ‘She’d have
told us anything to lessen the sentence she’s facing.’ He opened the door but
Felix blocked his way, saying with sudden excitement, ‘Not if she knows other
secrets and there were any chance of escape. Remember, Beth was in league with Helena.
Helena used many avenues to gain the funds she needed—’

‘Poor Charles doesn’t even know she’s gone!’ interrupted
Arabella. ‘We must return to the house to tell him, gently.’

‘We must return to the house,’ said Rampton, pursuing his
brother’s line of thought, ‘to discover from Beth what it is she has neglected
to tell us.’

***

Rose struggled to keep up the relentless pace Geoffrey had
set. The length of cord that attached her wrist to his waist chafed painfully.

Her energy was flagging and her slippers were wet through
and torn. ‘You can’t have trusted each other very much,’ she managed between
gasps as they toiled through a thicket of gorse, ‘if Helena hid from you the
ill-gotten gains that were supposed to buy your freedom.’

She felt the chill through to her bones and glanced
fearfully at her surroundings, deserted in the gathering twilight. What was
Geoffrey planning? She’d felt frightened in the carriage but had believed she
would be freed eventually. Geoffrey had no use for her, after all, she’d
reassured herself. He’d be leaving England on the next packet. He had no choice
but to flee, but he’d not harm Rose, surely.

And then he’d bound her wrists with rope and dragged her out
of the carriage to this deserted expanse of countryside.

‘About as much as Rampton trusted you after you deceived him
into marriage,’ muttered Geoffrey.

Rose turned her head from his unkind grin as he went on,
‘Desire and trust don’t go hand in hand – surely you know that? Cousin
Oswald was thieving for Helena on both our accounts, though of course Oswald
didn’t know it. If it made Helena feel safer to store some of the booty where
no one would find it, why should I care when what we each know binds us to one
another as surely as marriage binds man and wife?’

Pausing to catch their breaths in a clearing, Rose glanced
at Geoffrey’s hard profile. She supposed some would consider him a handsome man
but loose living was taking its toll while Helena, ten years his junior, was
still an exquisite creature.

Bitterly Rose contemplated how easily Helena had persuaded her
to go with Geoffrey so that she could skip away, free from the men who desired
and had thieved for her, while she claimed the booty.

Would Helena seek greener pastures with the jewels Geoffrey
was convinced she’d hidden somewhere near by? Choking down her rage at the
sister-in-law who’d gone to such lengths to ruin her life, she whispered, ‘If
you find her, what will you do?’

‘I shall remind Helena that she needs my protection.’
Geoffrey’s look was ugly.

‘When my husband finds
me
all the wickedness you and Helena perpetrated in my name will be revealed.’

‘Which is why you’re such a threat, my dear Lady Rampton,”
growled Geoffrey, swinging round, ‘since we need time to leave this country
without you revealing all.’

Cursing her stupid bravado as Geoffrey gripped her chin and
tilted her face upwards, Rose gulped, ‘I’ll keep your secret.’ She was shaking
so much she could barely get the words out. Geoffrey was volatile. She knew him
only enough to be certain he’d have little compunction in doing what was
required to save his own skin.

‘You’ll have to, but the only way to ensure that,’ said
Geoffrey, contouring her face without tenderness, before tapping her nose
lightly as if she were a child, ‘is to bind you securely to a tree in the midst
of the thicket we’ve just come through and leave a note which, we must hope,
will be delivered at the appropriate time.’ His lip curled. ‘While I have no
particular wish to see harm come to you, my safety is more important to me than
yours.’

Panic charged through her as she glanced at the trees and
thick gorse behind them. How would anyone ever find her, if Geoffrey bound her
as he threatened? Rampton would believe she had left him. Why should he send
out a search party, much less look for her here? With Geoffrey and Helena
neatly executing their evil plot he would forever think her guilty of their
crimes.

Weakly, she began, ‘Rampton will—’ but Geoffrey cut
her off. ‘Rampton believes you a liar and a thief, my dear.’ He stroked her
hair. ‘You’re a pretty thing that caught his fancy but your allure quickly
palled when he discovered the depths of your wicked soul.’ He laughed. ‘Poor
Rose. Even Dr Horne innocently gave credence to Helena’s diagnosis of your
illness of the mind … of the lapses, where a pretty jewel was too hard to
resist and telling the truth beyond your capacity.’

Rose sucked in her breath sharply and twisted her head away
from his loathsome touch. Dear Lord, what had they
not
stooped to? And at her expense. She’d had no idea Helena hated
her quite so much. All these years she must have bottled it up, waiting for a
chance to have her wicked revenge on the sister-in-law she held responsible for
her own blighted happiness.

Her breath misted in front of her. A bird startled into
flight made her cry out but there was not another soul upon the heath to hear
her. In the faint mist the trees looked like ghostly spectres of doom. If
Geoffrey bound her leaving her helpless in such a remote spot, Rampton might
never learn the truth. The forlorn desperation that her life not be cut short
here was like a flickering flame, faint but strong enough to sustain her; but more
than her safety, Rose wanted her husband to believe in her honesty.

She felt the rope tug as Geoffrey turned back to the thicket
but she stood her ground. New strength surged through her. She’d not give in
without a fight. Someone might help her. Someone could possibly be round the
next tree, out of sight. Opening her mouth, she was about to utter a shriek
when, from the corner of her eye a slight movement caught her attention. She
drew in her breath, hope giving her the strength to remain calm as she extended
her arm and pointed down the hill.

‘I think,’ she managed crisply, ‘you might want to attend to
other matters, first.’

She watched the play of emotions cross Geoffrey’s face as he
looked in the direction she indicated.

In the far distance, near a copse of trees, Helena was
wielding a large shovel with surprising expertise. A small pile of dirt rose
from beside the hole she was creating.

Geoffrey measured his response. ‘How observant, Lady
Rampton, though congratulations are due to me, also, for my hunch has paid off.
You see, I followed her one night after a particularly heated argument.’ He
pushed back his handsome curls from his sweating forehead, his delight apparent
as he added, ‘Let’s discover Helena’s intentions and who’s included in her
little plan, shall we?’

Stealthily, Geoffrey bore Rose along with him as he
descended the hill, approaching Helena from behind. The pain from Rose’s cold,
torn feet was nothing compared with her fears for her own future. Helena was
ruthless. Rose doubted she’d countenance anything that might jeopardize her
escape with the jewels.

And Rose was the greatest threat of all.

Above the horizon Rose could see the moon, as if caught in
the tree tops. Soon darkness would be upon them. Geoffrey and Helena would have
their booty and Rose would be the inconvenient witness. She drew in a
shuddering breath and cast about for some means of escape as Geoffrey bore her
relentlessly onwards.

‘Not a word,’ he hissed, ‘or you’ll be sorry.’

Rose wasn’t about to do anything to try his already ragged
temper. Obediently she followed, despite her fear and the pain of every
footstep. In the distance she could see Helena, the folds of her coquelicot
pelisse spread about her as she knelt with their back to them.

Stealthily they continued, halting a few feet away. Geoffrey
regarded his erstwhile lover with a mixture of amusement and anger and Rose
stiffened in anticipation of the response as Geoffrey’s clipped tones sheared
the silence. ‘Well-prepared, as ever, my love, and just in time to make the
evening’s tide.’

It was clear that Helena had not expected to see him.
Stifling her gasp as she swung round, she assumed the air of having intended
Geoffrey to be a party to her escape plan as she straightened, indicating Rose
and saying, ‘What possessed you to bring her along? Couldn’t you have
dispatched her?’

Geoffrey shrugged. ‘Couldn’t find an opportunity. I thought
we could tie her up hidden in the trees so we’d be unhindered.’

Helena’s small white teeth glinted in a parody of a smile. She
put her head to one side, as if contemplating the matter and with sinking
heart, Rose knew that in Helena’s mind there was nothing to contemplate. Helena
would go to almost any lengths to ensure her silence, for Helena’s crimes were
sufficient to send her to Newgate.

Gulping down her terror Rose squared her shoulders and said with
an assurance she was far from feeling, ‘Rampton will come before you can harm
me.’ In truth, Rampton had never felt further from her.

‘Rampton! Little loyalty he’s shown you when you were mad
for him from the start, which is so unlike you, my dear.’ With a toss of her
head, Helena sliced the shovel she’d retrieved from a clump of bushes into the
damp earth as she went on, ‘Now you’re learning what pain really is; the pain
of separation and of love gone wrong. I hope you’re suffering!’

She looked beautiful, her dark eyes glittering with a
mixture of malice and self pity, her raven hair half tumbling from its
coiffure. Rose could understand Geoffrey’s enslavement. She’d lived with
Charles and Helena long enough to have observed the pattern Helena used to
exert her power. It had been like living with an unrelenting tide of cloying
sweetness interspersed with cutting scorn and wheedling requests.

‘Not as much as you will be when Rampton learns of your
villainy and that I was never once untrue,’ Rose bit back, trying to block from
her mind the very great threat that she faced. Her heart cried out to Rampton.
He’d been so cold the last few times she’d seen him but if he only knew the
truth, would he not love her again?

Memories of the closeness they’d shared descended upon her
like a comforting caress before the chill of fear tore away the warmth.

‘So confident, Rose, but I am always one step ahead.
Granted, Rampton may learn of my villainy if I have not time to dispose
properly of your remains, but when he does it will be too late.’ She swung
round to Geoffrey, her voice hard. ‘We must get rid of her.’

It was small consolation that Geoffrey visibly blanched.
‘Theft is one thing, Helena, but murder—’

‘Both carry a death sentence.’

Rose closed her eyes as she forced strength into her legs to
prevent them buckling. Geoffrey’s arguments would carry no weight when Helena
was the stronger force.

‘Tie me to a tree,’ pleaded Rose. ‘You only need a few hours
before you’re on a boat bound for France. No one will find you. You’ll have all
the money you need.’

Helena drew herself up like a cobra about to strike. ‘For as
long as I can remember, Rose, you’ve been my nemesis, for all that I’ve been
the daring one, the beautiful one.’

Rose flinched at the venom in her hissed judgement, blinking
with disbelief as Helena went on, ‘You hated me enough to condemn me to the
worst fate imaginable, damning me in Sir Hector’s eyes after Geoffrey left me.’

‘Leave it, Helena!’ The note of warning in Geoffrey’s voice
gave Rose hope. He was just behind her and though he was not about to release
her, Rose knew he could at least see reason. ‘We had a bitter fight, if you
recall, and you told me never to show my face again. You have only yourself to
blame.’

Helena dismissed this with a snort of derision before
warming to her theme of highlighting Rose’s role in her own downfall. ‘Because
of you, Rose, I was forced to marry Charles. Charles!’ She spat her husband’s
name with more hatred than Rose had ever heard. ‘He had not the means to
support a wife when he could barely feed his sisters, but did you warn me?’
Helena’s grip on the shovel tightened while her eyes narrowed. ‘Even when you
were dowdy Miss Chesterfield in your drab clothes with your hair pulled back I
heard the men whisper their interest, but you were too stupid to see how you
could benefit us all. Why should I show you any clemency when your inaction
ensured that we all remained stuck on that island, condemned to a
poverty-stricken existence? When I was destined for so much more?’