Once Upon a Wager (7 page)

As he crept down the main stairs, he heard someone singing softly, which made no sense. Not in a house shrouded in black. The sounds were coming from the small chapel, located off the Great Hall, where Gareth's body rested in repose on a block of ice. Astley Castle was said to be haunted, and in the dark of this night, he could well believe it.

As he edged closer, the singing grew louder. A woman's voice filled the chapel, plaintive and ghostly. He looked past the doorway into the heart of the room lit by candelabra, and the hairs rose on the back of his neck. Beside his friend's catafalque sat Lady Layton, clad in a wrinkled dressing gown, hair tangled about her head, her face tortured with grief. She was singing an old nursery song, the same one she'd sung when Gareth and Annabelle were small and crying over scraped knees. The one they had always relied on to make their pain go away and set everything right.

Alec's heart was in his throat. There was no way to set things right.

As he turned back toward the hall, the singing suddenly stopped. He could hear the quick approach of her bare feet on the stone floor, and he turned to face her. “Lady Layton, I am so very sorry …” The words died in his throat. Her eyes were wild with loathing.

“You did this. You killed my son!” She advanced on him, her breath coming in quick pants.

“Lady Layton, I assure you …”

Holding a letter in her hands, she thrust it toward his face, moving so close he could feel her anger like a palpable thing.

“This arrived earlier,” she hissed. “Read it!”

Numb with shock, he took the note. He could just make out its words in the dim light.

Like a blow from a hammer, his heart slammed in his chest, air rushing from him in a single breath.

He
hadn't
inspected his carriage on the morning of the race. Surely he'd have noticed a weakness in the wheel if he had. He'd been so caught up in his anger that he'd been unforgivably careless. He could've prevented the debacle to begin with. He'd practically forced the race with his outrageous bet. He could see that now. He'd had a direct role in Gareth's death, in Annabelle's suffering.

“I am so sorry,” he whispered. He was burning up in the cold room, sweat trickling over his brow.

“Don't you dare apologize. It does no good. It will not bring my son back.” Lady Layton's hands were in her hair, fingers entwined with clumps of it, pulling so viciously that the skin on her face was distorted.

“I do not know what to say.” Guilt pounded through him.

“I carried him in my womb, and gave birth to him in a wash of blood. I raised him, coddled him, kissed him. Look at him now.” With a shaking hand, she pointed at Gareth's pale, gray body in the candlelight.

“It was a terrible accident,” he said. Yet his had been the defining role in the whole tragedy, setting events in motion until they crescendoed in destruction.

“I know what you are about upstairs. You sit like a specter, haunting my daughter's bedside, waiting and watching.”

“I am only trying to help Annabelle.”

“I won't allow you to ease the burden of your guilt.” Her voice was rising now, gaining power. “You'll not take my last child from me. I want you gone from this house. Vow that you'll never return.”

He stilled. “But Annabelle …”

She slapped his cheek in a burst of fury, snapping his head to one side. “As long as I live, if you dare approach my daughter, I will kill you myself.”

“Lady Layton … please.”

“You'll never see my daughter again. You'll never speak to her, or write to her. Swear it!”

He didn't think he could. He couldn't leave Annabelle like this. She needed him. God in Heaven, Lady Layton was in no condition to care for her.

“She'll despise you when she learns what you've done,” she said. “If you have a shred of honor, you'll leave and never return.”

He took a deep breath, trying to force back air into his lungs, and fight off a mounting sense of anguish. He'd caused Annabelle so much pain. In such a real and tangible way, he was responsible for the whole of it. Hadn't his father spoken of recklessness and repercussions? Could it be that honor was all he had left?

Perhaps it was.

“I swear it then,” he said softly. He turned and made his way toward the door, his footsteps ringing like a death knell in the empty hall, their sound following him into the dark night.

• • •

He watched from a distance as the cortège accompanying his friend's body made its way to the Layton's burial plot at St. Mary the Virgin church. Alec could see Paul, the young Earl of Linley, and Benjamin, Lord Marworth. He walked with an arm around Gareth's visibly shaken father, and Alec was grateful that the baron had Marworth's steadying presence beside him. Sir Layton walked with his head down, his shoulders stooped, and with a grief so profound that Alec could feel it radiate to where he stood with his horse, hidden a hundred feet away. A woman shrouded in unrelieved black walked beside them. Though her face was covered with a heavy veil, Alec knew it must be Lady Layton.

Another wave of intense guilt rushed through him. Annabelle was not there. Even the consolation of mourning her brother properly had been taken from her. According to Mary, who had crept over to Arbury Hall with the news, Dr. Chessher was encouraged by Annabelle's improvement. She was confused, though, during her fleeting moments of consciousness. Mary had promised she'd send additional updates when she knew more. Would Annabelle's leg ever heal, or be of any use? It was devastating to think that her spirit and vibrancy might be confined to a chair. And that he was to blame.

He had written a last letter to Annabelle. Despite Lady Layton, he could not leave without saying goodbye. She had to know that he was horrified by his actions and by what they had cost her. She had to know that if she ever needed him, she had only to write and he would be there, honor be damned. He'd bribed a footman to see that Annabelle got it. By the time she was well enough to read it, he'd be gone. He only hoped his departure would bring her family, and most especially Annabelle, some measure of peace.

He turned from the distant scene, spurring his mount toward Arbury Hall. Given his plans, he had much to prepare for, even as this horrible afternoon slipped into evening.

• • •

“I warned you, Alec, did I not? I knew that going to the Layton boy's party would bring no good result.”

His father was pacing the library at Dorset House, caught up in the scandal that Alec had brought back from Nuneaton. For the past hour, the earl had lectured him on the ramifications of irresponsible behavior, while Alec stood ramrod straight, hands clasped behind his back—a habit from his childhood. But Alec could not keep his focus. Not when the moss-green Aubusson carpet on the floor recalled Gareth dead in the grass. Not when the red Chesterfield sofa reminded him of the blood covering Annabelle. Or when the massive fireplace beside him looked like a portal to hell, with flames licking up at him.

That had always been one of Father's tricks, to have him stand next to the fire. As a child, Alec had never known if he was sweating because of its heat, or because he was frightened by the punishment to come.

This time, no punishment would be harsh enough.

“The only consolation,” his father continued, “is that it happened far from London, and that gives us time to mitigate your part. Everyone knows Layton was headed for a bad end.”

“And what of Annabelle?” Alec asked quietly.

“At least she had not yet made her debut. It would be harder if she had. As it stands, she is nameless, faceless to almost everyone here. We will agree that it was a tragedy, and offer all the proper commiserations. But that part of it will pass quickly.”

In that moment, fists clenching, Alec hated his father.

“It will not pass quickly for me.”

The earl stopped pacing, and looked at Alec, focused and intent. “You have tried to hide your attraction to the girl, but I know you better than you know yourself. In the end, her role in this only proves that I was right to push for the distance between you.”

No matter her role, there was every chance she would spend the rest of her life paying for his mistakes. “Annabelle did not deserve any of this.”

“Whether she did or not is a moot point. We must redouble our efforts to introduce you to the proper circles in Parliament. The members will forgive this youthful indiscretion if you show them what you are made of, the intelligence that you have.”

Ironically, Alec's reputed intelligence had been the very thing that had recalled his father's attention to his only son. He had taken first honors at Oxford in
literae humaniores
and in mathematics. When his father had asked for a sampling of his supposed knowledge, Alec had recited Cicero's famous speech before the Roman Senate in 63 AD, castigating the counsel, Catiline, for his abuse of power. Of course, he had recited it in Latin, all 317 lines of it.

How long, O Catiline … will that madness of yours mock us? To what end will your unbridled audacity hurl itself?

His father had watched him quietly that afternoon, his surprise evident in the first genuine smile he'd ever offered. When Alec had finished, he'd said, “I had no idea you might be worth something.” Not the warmest compliment to be sure, but even so, the words had felt like a benediction. Because after that, Alec and his mother were no longer forgotten, packed away like an ill-fitting suit of clothes. All of his life, Alec had been desperate for his father's approval. And now, he would throw it away.

“Father, I cannot take up the seat in the House of Commons. I cannot stay in London.”

The earl halted in mid-stride, turning toward Alec, his expression disbelieving. “Don't be absurd. It is more important than ever that you take your place here, and prove that you're not the worthless fribble that Layton was.”

“I am going to serve with the army on the Peninsula. I have used the money that Grandmother left me to purchase a commission. And this has nothing to do with Mother. She should not be blamed for my actions.”

The heat coming off the fire was nothing compared to the fury of his father. With a curse, he turned on his heel and walked toward his desk, yanking the stopper from a brandy-filled decanter set upon it. He sloshed a long pour into a waiting glass, and flung back the contents in a single gulp. After a deep breath, he turned back to face him. The disdain in the earl's face made Alec feel stupid and unworthy, all his gains lost in a single moment. But in this, he would not back down. He could not.

“So you will fight in Spain,” his father spat. “Or Portugal, or wherever they send you, and for what?”

“For penance. To make some good out of this horror.” Alec looked down. Shadows from the fire were flickering across his hands. Absorbed as he was in them, he barely registered his father's disgusted exhalation.

“Parliament needs you far more than Wellington does. Would you risk the earldom's heir? When you know the future I have planned for you? Are you turning your back on your honor? On our legacy?”

“I am trying to be honorable. This is the only way I know how.”

“How to what?” his father cried. “How to give up your birthright to Stansley, that pompous fop, who will inherit if you die during this appalling indulgence of your guilt?”

“It is the only way I know how to stay away, Father. Especially now, after all the pain I have caused. And I must stay away. I have sworn it.”

April 21, 1812

Nuneaton

Annabelle's left leg was very good at telling her when it had had enough. Enough of horseback riding. Enough of long mornings spent working in the gardens. Enough of walking. It was speaking quite loudly now, come to think of it, sending a sharp pain from her knee up into her hip in a fit of pique. But she decided that she would ignore it. It had tried far too often in the past to dictate what she did. Not to mention those terrifying months when it had refused to work at all, and she had wondered if she would ever walk again. She would never take the luxury of putting one foot in front of the other for granted.

Of course, she hadn't planned on hiking so far. She took a long walk each morning, but today she'd gone all the way to Arbury Hall, with its tall spires gleaming in the early light. She'd always loved the beautiful Elizabethan mansion, which was surrounded by lakes and lush parkland. In the distance, she could just make out the grazing fields for the estate's famous Southdown sheep, but the Hall itself was shuttered, its windows and doors draped in mourning cloth. She had read the black-bordered announcement in the news sheets. Lord Dorset, Alec's father, had died suddenly. She was very sorry for Lady Dorset, whom she remembered with fondness.

She refused to feel any sympathy for her son.

Annabelle had no memory of Gareth's accident, nor of how she had come to be in the carriage with him. Even the dark days that had followed were lost, and perhaps God had been kind in that. But there was one thing that she did know. She'd never really known Alec Carstairs. The Alec she'd believed him to be would never have watched his oldest friend die, only to leave for London before Gareth was even buried in the ground. He would never have abandoned her, bloodied and delirious, no matter how rash her behavior. And she feared it had been catastrophically rash, with consequences she could not bear to consider.