Axel (10 page)

Before Axel’s eyes, her countenance flooded with color, right up to her hairline. Whatever her supposed indisposition—

A drop of raspberry jam marred her otherwise clean plate. Raspberry was a staple in every woman’s herbal, useful for…

“One dose,” Axel said, turning her plate so the orange sections were closest to her. “I will watch you take it, and you will not ask for more.”

She tipped up her empty tea cup, studying the dregs, ignoring the succulent fruit.

“You make pronouncements as if your word is law, but on other issues, you can be reasoned with, somewhat. What is it about a medicinal dose of laudanum that bothers you so?”

Axel knew what it was to interrogate, to fire off questions in search of truth. He’d put enough questions to Abigail Stoneleigh that she was due a few of her own, though tomorrow, he’d be taking a breakfast tray in the glass house reserved for his roses.

He went to the window, which looked out on a bleak, snowy landscape. In the distance, the broodmares were heavy, dark shapes, heads down against the winter wind.

“My mother,” Axel said without turning, “died of an intentional laudanum overdose the very night after my brother’s wedding. She’d been addicted for years, but we didn’t see that final maneuver coming. My father was gone a little over a year later, dying essentially of a broken heart—or guilt—though he managed to hang on long enough to see me engaged.”

“I am sorry.” Axel hadn’t heard her move, but she was beside him, a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Gregory told me that in India the whole issue is openly accepted. There are places for addicts to go and consume themselves to death, places where opium is offered like tea or coffee. Their society shrugs, and tolerates the whole tragedy, which he seemed to think was far more sensible.”

“Ours shrugs and ignores it.”

She rubbed the middle of Axel’s back in circles, drawing the tension from him. In winter, Caroline had applied her scented lotions to his back, soothing the dryness caused by cold weather.

“How old were you when your mother died, Mr. Belmont?”

Whatever difference did that make? “Sixteen. Matthew was seventeen, nearly eighteen, marrying a woman who was in need of an immediate husband for the obvious reason. Our mother opposed the match, and when it went forward over her protestations, she took her own life.”

Mrs. Stoneleigh dropped her hand. “Your poor brother and his poor wife.”

“And my poor father, and on and on. I do not generally speak of this.” He did not
ever
speak of this part of his past.

“Of course not. You’d rather ask near strangers whether they’ve taken lovers or have unpaid gambling debts.” She poured another cup of tea, added cream and sugar, and brought it to him. “We need not discuss this further.”

The tea was good. Comforting, and prepared exactly as Axel preferred. “You still want your dose?”

“I do. By this afternoon, my back will be in stitches. I doubt I’ll come down to dinner tonight. I do not normally
speak of this
either. I try not to even think of it, if you must know. Shall we sit?”

Axel held her chair, realizing that his expectation—his near wish—that breakfast degenerate into an argument was to be thwarted. He was confident life without a female in the house was a more peaceful existence than the alternative, but Abby Stoneleigh had refused to prove his hypothesis true.

Yet.
“Your back pains you?”

She flicked a glance at him, inherently feminine, nothing he could read, then dabbed her finger in the drop of raspberry jam and licked the tip.

“Midwives have told me a child could improve the situation, but that solution seems both drastic and unrealistic now.”

Axel had known exactly when Caroline’s menses were bearing down on her, because she’d go from laughter to tears to bellowing mad in the course of an hour. Then, without warning, she’d be up in bed, sweet, sleepy, and achy, willing to cuddle for hours, apologizing for the previous three days of dramatics.

He’d comforted her as best he could, feeling privileged to do so.

“You are lost in thought,” Axel’s guest remarked. “Reminiscing?”

“If you can call it that.” He finished his tea in a single gulp and stood. “My apologies for being a poor breakfast companion. I’m off to finish perusing your ledgers, and I will retrieve your medicinal tot. If I am back in time for luncheon, will that serve?”

She rose before Axel had a chance to hold her chair. “You will be careful at Stoneleigh Manor?”

“Do you caution me for a particular reason?” He was revisiting the scene of a murder. Of course he would be careful, and he would ensure every lock on the property was changed too.

“Whoever killed Gregory,” she said, “seems to have known his schedule intimately, and knew how to enter and depart the premises undetected. That suggests the murderer was a familiar, possibly somebody on staff, or a frequent visitor. They might even have had a key.”

Which meant Abigail Stoneleigh was afraid of her own staff, and not without reason.
Well, damn and blast.
Axel would hire more than one locksmith to expedite the job.

“Before I depart for Stoneleigh Manor, would you like to visit the new foal with me?”

Because every indisposed woman longed to tramp through the cold and snow to see an awkward, gangling bit of livestock whose acquaintance she’d already made.

“Fresh air appeals,” Mrs. Stoneleigh said.

Axel ushered his guest to the hallway, settled her cloak about her shoulders, and stepped back rather than tend to the fastenings beneath her chin. He did, however, take her arm as they crossed to the stable yard, pleased she’d make the outing with him.

A fellow incapable of scintillating repartee liked to know that his company, however prosaic, yet held some attraction for a woman who might well have told him to go to blazes.

“You’re worried about your brother.”

Matthew Belmont’s new wife settled into his lap, which eased all of his worries. He and Theresa had been married only a handful of weeks, and with each passing day, Matthew’s ability to recall his years of widowerhood faded.

“Axel sends felicitations.” Matthew set Axel’s letter aside and wrapped his arms around Theresa. “He reports that Remington and Christopher appeared to enjoy their recent visit and nearly waddled back to their studies.”

“And?”

Theresa had a way of caressing the nape of Matthew’s neck that positively wrecked his concentration. Positively and most agreeably.

“And Axel has a murder investigation on his hands. His immediate neighbor was shot dead, and for reasons my brother isn’t being entirely forthright about, the widow is now visiting at Candlewick.”

Theresa appropriated a ginger biscuit from the tea tray on Matthew’s desk, took a bite, then held it up for Matthew to do likewise. No biscuit had ever tasted better, and Axel claimed ginger settled a woman’s digestion in the early months of pregnancy.

“Do you fear Axel has taken a murderer under his roof?”

“A lady who conspired to commit murder, perhaps. I’m more worried that Mrs. Stoneleigh is conspiring to commit… marriage.”

The matter wanted discussion, so Matthew rose with his wife in his arms, gently deposited her on the sofa, and took an armchair across the low table from her. Theresa had bloomed since their marriage. She no longer wore only drab colors, her smiles had acquired a hint of devilment, and her affectionate nature had become
inventive
.

Alas, Matthew’s affectionate nature had failed to lock the library door.

“Axel is lonely,” Theresa said, rising to fetch the bowl of biscuits.

She offered them to Matthew, who took three. Affection, at the rate Matthew and his spouse expressed it to each other, was a delightfully taxing aspect of married life.

“My brother is… I hesitate to use the word, but it fits: vulnerable. He wishes us well on our nuptials, then dispatches his sons for an extended visit here. I’d wager Axel has spent his days since returning to Oxford in his glass houses, eating from trays, when he eats at all, soil staining his fingers, and little sprigs of greenery peeking from his pockets. He’s always been widow-bait, but now that I’m married…”

Re-
married, though Matthew’s heart didn’t feel that way. Conjugal union with Theresa was the institution as it was meant to be enjoyed.

“Widow-bait, Matthew?”

“Richard coined the term, though he was referring to Nicholas Haddonfield.”

Theresa helped herself to a second biscuit. Her dresses were high-waisted, but because Matthew’s marital enthusiasm for his wife—and hers for him—had already resulted in conception, the dress was snug across the bodice.

Distractingly snug.

“When last I saw Nick, he struck me as restless,” Theresa said. “He’s waiting for the social Season to start, so he can begin bride-hunting, and yet, he’s enjoyed his time here in Sussex.”

Nick Haddonfield, though an earl’s heir, had spent the last two years working as a stable master on the neighboring estate. The post had provided a reprieve from the matchmakers and allowed Nick to keep a close eye on a younger sibling.

“I have a confession, my dear,” Matthew said, getting up to lock the door. “I have been naughty.”

Theresa set down half her biscuit and dusted her hands. “I do so adore your naughty streak, Mr. Belmont.”

“I suggested to Nick that if he’d pay a call on Christopher and Remington, I’d be most appreciative.”

The way Theresa watched Matthew cross the library suggested another kind of appreciation all together.

“Candlewick is in Oxfordshire,” she said, scooting closer to the middle of the sofa.

Matthew dropped to the carpet and positioned himself between his wife’s knees. “So it is, and I have yet to warn my brother of this suggestion I made to our Nick.” He insinuated a hand beneath his wife’s skirts, where lovely memories abounded. “Mrs. Belmont, promise me you will never take up the Continental fashion of wearing drawers.”

“Drawers would be a waste of time,” she said, fingers going to Matthew’s cravat. “One would end up taking them right back off again. You will write to Axel today Matthew, and alert him to Nicholas’s impending visit.”

Matthew closed his eyes and for the hundredth grateful time, memorized the contour of Theresa’s bare knee against his palm.

“Of course, my dear.
Later
.” Much, much later.

Axel returned from his morning with the Stoneleigh ledgers bearing a sack from Mrs. Jensen and a brown glass bottle with an inch or so of liquid in the bottom. He also brought a list of questions for his guest.

“If you are up to further interrogation over the noon meal,” he said when he found Mrs. Stoneleigh in the library, “I’d like to ask you about Stoneleigh’s finances.”

“I’ll manage.” She rose from the sofa, her movements a little stiff, a little careful. When they were seated in the breakfast parlor, steaming bowls of chicken soup before them, Axel considered a bit of small talk might be in order.

Though not witty repartee—never that. “What did you find to do this morning?”

“I finished putting away my clothing, acquainted myself with the layout of your house, investigated your stillroom, replied to the notes of condolence I’ve received so far, copied Gregory’s obituary for Sir Dewey, and stared at the same page of some book or other for several years.”

How well Axel knew that last activity. “What preoccupies you?”

He asked the question out of curiosity, but also because Mrs. Stoneleigh had started on her soup.

“With your staff off to market, this morning is the first time I’ve had real solitude since Gregory died, and I find myself… He was here, on this earth for nearly sixty years. He got up one morning, rode out as he always did, spent the morning in the kennels, stopped in at the Weasel for his customary pint, perhaps chatted up the vicar, Sir Dewey, who knows who else… A typical day, and then he’s gone forever. No more Gregory Stoneleigh.”

She put her spoon down, took a measured breath, and rose. “Excuse me.”

Well, hell
. Axel caught up to her at the door, foiling her escape with a hand on her wrist. She’d spent the morning brooding, and he’d forgotten this was market day. Not well done of him, to leave her without any company at all.

“Go ahead and cry. It won’t be the last time.”

“I’ll be fine,” she said, staring at Axel’s cravat even as he drew her into his arms.

“You will,”—unless the murderer went after her too, or Axel had to arrest her—“but your husband’s life was ended too soon and wrongly, and that is sad enough to make any wife cry, or it should be.”

Her weight settled against him, too slight, too angular, for all her endowments. “Our soup is getting cold. You’ll chide me if I don’t eat.” Then, more softly, “I hate to cry.”

Gregory Stoneleigh’s widow went down to defeat silently, shuddering against Axel in slow, drawing sobs that cut him like a winter wind. He held her and stroked her hair, smoothed his hands in circles on her back and nape, hoping simple proximity and touch comforted her.

Holding her, he had time to notice exactly how her bones were too prominent under his hands, though she fit him; her body lined up with his such that he could rest his chin at her temple and take all of her weight against him.

He snatched a linen serviette off the table for her to use as a handkerchief. “Do not apologize for crying, or letting the soup get cold, or anything else.”

“Then shall I apologize for seeking my room?” She drew back, but didn’t entirely leave Axel’s embrace. “After such a performance, you can’t expect me to sit at table, can you?”

“After such a performance, I know you need sustenance more than ever. Will you join me in the library if I put some of this food on trays?” Every morsel of it, in fact.

“I will, though you must not badger me to eat. I seldom have much appetite at times like this.”

Times like…? Axel recalled her furious blush over breakfast.

“I don’t badger, I merely suggest.” And occasionally lecture. He was capable of exhorting in a pinch, and admonitions were also within his reach. Axel stepped away from her and rummaged in the sideboard for trays, then set about assembling two full plates, cutlery, and glasses of wine.