To Catch A Thief (Saved By Desire 2) (22 page)

Once again, he had failed to follow through on his promises. In spite of the careful watch he and his colleagues had on the house they had still failed to protect the one person in the world who really mattered to him.

Right there and then he made himself a promise that if she survived, he would spend the rest of his days making it up to her. She would live in the safe and luxurious confines of Briggleberry, where he could provide her with whatever her heart desired. He would quit the Star Elite just so he could see her every day and see for herself that she was alright.

As long as she was by his side, he would sacrifice anything just to be with her. If only he got the chance to tell her that then he had a future. If she left him, then his future would die with her.

While he waited for the doctor to appear, Jeb gathered her into his tender embrace and began to pray.

When the doctor ordered Jeb to leave, at first he protested. Until it became evident that the more he objected, the longer Sophia had to wait for the medical help she so desperately needed.

Once outside in the corridor, lingering frustration made it impossible to stand still.

To begin with he began to pace backward and forward across the entire length of the upper hallway until the space became too small. The walls began to close in on him. He had to do something or would go stark raving mad. When Barnaby’s voice suddenly increased in volume, Jeb hurriedly made his way downstairs.

“I am telling you now that you won’t like what prison has to offer,” Barnaby growled just as Jeb walked in.

Jeb stood beside Marcus and Joe, and watched Barnaby try to get information out of the stoically silent woman. It irked Jeb to see the callous way the woman stared dispassionately down the empty garden as though contemplating whether to chance a walk or not. It was only the dark look Barnaby threw him that kept Jeb from grabbing the woman and violently shaking the truth from her.

“You will answer me, or I swear that I am going to slam you into the darkest, grimiest prison cell I can find and throw away the key. You have been seen this morning attempting to murder your niece. Given this was also the way Mrs Banks and Tabitha have been killed, I can only assume you have killed those unfortunate souls too. What have they ever done to you? Tabitha was a young girl, minding her own business. She was nothing to you, I say. Nothing.”

Barnaby suspected she hadn’t killed them, Bamber or Myers had, but wanted to prod her to get her to start to talk. It worked too because Delilah suddenly gasped and glared at him.

“I didn’t kill them,” Delilah snapped.

She suddenly released a falsetto laugh and opened wide eyes to look at Barnaby a little too blankly.

Barnaby snorted, thoroughly unimpressed by the spectacle.

“Don’t even try to go the madness route. You are no more insane that I am so I suggest you stop,” he growled. “Unfortunately for you, Sophia is alive. She will attest that you are not mentally deluded, and so will Jeb. You have witnesses in authority who can confirm you have cold-bloodedly tried to kill your niece. Until you can prove your innocence, you will also be considered to blame for the murders of Mrs Banks and Tabitha. That will see you are put away for the rest of your life.”

Panic began to build on Delilah’s face.

Jeb stared blankly down the garden but saw nothing of lush green grass and blossoming flora and fauna. It was hard to tear his gaze away from the spot he had witnessed the horrifying sight of his beloved in a lifeless heap on the floor. Everything, though; the entire focus of his being, remained with the heart and soul of his life: Sophia.

“Why kill her? What has she done to you?” Barnaby demanded.  

Delilah stared down the garden, but Barnaby wasn’t going to be ignored. He moved sideways and blocked her view. She had no choice but to look at him. It was something he knew made her uncomfortable from the way she quickly dropped her eyes to her fingers and still refused to look.

“There is also the man in the woods,” Barnaby murmured. He couldn’t put a name to the man, mainly because he didn’t know who he was yet, but suspected the woman before him knew. “My, my, you have had a busy day, haven’t you?”

“What?” Delilah sucked in a startled breath and looked up at him. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“That man you killed in the woods this morning. What has he done to you?”

“I didn’t kill any man,” Delilah protested. She threw a panicked look at Marcus, but when she got no reaction from him, she turned her desperate gaze to Barnaby. “I didn’t. I don’t know what you are talking about. You can’t blame me for that.”

“There is another body?” Jeb asked with a frown.

Marcus nodded. “In the woods.”

“Show me,” Jeb ordered, and stalked out of the kitchen before he demanded answers from Delilah himself.

Minutes later, they drew to a stop beside the body. Marcus leaned down and lifted his jacket off the dead man’s face. Jeb cursed.

“Do you know him?” Marcus asked, covering the man over again.

“Yes, I do.” Jeb sighed and turned back to the house. He didn’t want to be gone too long. He wanted to see the doctor before he left. “Let’s go.”

Marcus didn’t get the chance to ask him anything else. The speed in which Jeb raced through the woods toward the house left him breathless, and he considered himself fit. He didn’t think Jeb’s haste had anything to do with his desire to question Delilah. His friend needed to get back to find out how Sophia was.

Panting, he caught up with him in the kitchen where they found Barnaby still trying to get Delilah to talk.

“You were seen trying to strangle your relative on the outskirts of those woods. Now there is also a man lying a little further into those woods, who has also been strangled at some time this morning. Unless there are two stranglers running around these parts, you are the one who is going to be held responsible for his killing too,” Barnaby warned her.

“I didn’t kill him,” she protested. “Look, I don’t know who you are to come into my house like this, but I am not speaking to you about anything.”

“You are going to,” Jeb snarled. “This isn’t your house either, Delilah. It is one of the reasons why you have not been able to throw Sophia out. It belongs to her father. Sophia told me. If anyone should be tossed out on their ear it should be you. I work for the government, or at least a crime fighting part of it run by the War Office. If we say you go to jail then off to jail you go. You tried to kill Sophia. Why, for God’s sake?”

He might have considered that Delilah had wanted to kill Sophia so she could steal from the Squire, but after finding the body in the woods he knew that theory didn’t have any credibility. His eyes met Delilah’s. In the depths of that calm gaze, Jeb saw nothing but defiant arrogance and suspected that her fate still hadn’t dawned on Delilah. It made him all the more determined to inform her of what awaited her, especially when she made no attempt to answer him.

“Do you know something? Prison is too good for the likes of you. I think you will enjoy getting up at dawn to wash out your dingy cell, which will have no more than one small barred window in it. You will empty your bucket and dress. Your breakfast will be meagre at best after which you will go to sew bags, work in the jail’s laundry room, or sweep and clean the corridors. If you don’t do that you will have to undertake some other laborious work you will stay at until sunset when you will be given another meal and confined to your cell for the night. You have no candles, nothing but a blanket, enough food to survive on but no more, absolutely no freedom with which to go where you want when you want, and will be beaten if you don’t comply. It is harsh. It is cruel. It is mercilessly cold because your cells won’t have a nice, cosy fire. There is nothing but bare walls and stone floors. Your jailer will decide if you are allowed out of it or not. If not, then you stay within those frozen confines all day, with nothing more than a few feet to move about in. You will be allowed out once a week to exercise, and will have to wash communally. There is a bath once a month if you are lucky, and you are not likely to ever be released. As far as I am concerned, that is still too good for you. I shall have no greater pleasure than making sure your stay there is even worse than that,” he promised in a voice that was as cold and as merciless as Delilah.

“You are lying,” Delilah whispered.

“No, he is not,” Barnaby drawled. “That is the harsh reality of prison life. But I am sure you will get used it.”

“How can you make that worse?” she challenged, some of her arrogance now replaced with horror.

“I can make sure you get solitary confinement.” Jeb stared at her. “Just think of it,” he taunted. “There will be nobody to speak to; to hear you moan, or give a damn whether you are alive or dead. You can stay that way throughout your entire sentence. Just think, Delilah, never speaking to anybody again. Given the risk you pose to the other convicts, the jail will have no qualms about agreeing to our request that you stay away from everyone else. Unfortunately, in prison, the only way to do that is to keep you in your cell – alone.”

It was enough to secure her compliance.

“I didn’t kill the man in the woods,” she whispered. “I swear it wasn’t me. I-I don’t even know who he is.”

If he was honest, although he now despised the woman, and wouldn’t trust her as far as he could spit, he suspected that she hadn’t murdered the Squire. The odds didn’t stack up that she could kill a man. She was outclassed in size and strength, and not maniacal enough.

“Why Sophia? She is your relation, Delilah. Does that not mean anything to you?” Barnaby growled.

He stopped forward when he saw anger flash in Jeb’s eyes, and knew his colleague’s emotional connection to the woman fighting for survival upstairs meant that he was far from rational toward her tormentor. There was no knowing what Jeb was apt to do if Delilah challenged him in any way. It was best if he was able to keep his mind on his work, and focus on what the Star Elite needed to do to get the woman put behind bars for her attempted murder. However, he also knew that his friend needed to vent a little fury, and if scaring the woman into talking was Jeb’s way of doing that then as far as Barnaby was concerned he could terrify the woman.

“Tell me!” Jeb roared when at first Delilah didn’t speak. He thumped the table with a beefy fist and leaned forward when Delilah jumped back.

“I am fed up of her poking her nose into everything and refusing to go home,” she snapped coldly.

There was nothing but condescension in her eyes and that irked Jeb. He had to draw upon all of his experience with the Star Elite to keep his mind focused on defeating the enemy; in this case, Delilah.

“She has come to see you,” Jeb snarled. “I have to say that you have been a less than gracious hostess.”

“I didn’t invite her,” Delilah all but shouted. “The damned fool girl just turned up one day with her bags and helped herself to my house. I didn’t want her here. Why would I?”

“You invited her in the letters you wrote to her,” Jeb protested. He knew Sophia well enough to know she wasn’t the kind of person who would just impose on anybody.

“Pah! Rubbish,” she scoffed. “I did nothing more than mention in passing that should she happen this way she would be welcome to call upon me. At no point did we make any official arrangements, nor did I ever extend the invite to include an overnight stay. The stupid woman has practically taken over the whole house. I have done my damnedest to get her to go. I have been rude, churlish, and often unkind, but she just won’t take the hint.”

“She was only doing what Hooky told her to do. He ordered her to come here to help curb your spending because you are damned near bankrupt because of your frivolous ways. You don’t work and have no credible source of income. Did you not stop to consider that your crimes would catch up with you?” Jeb countered.

“Clearly not,” Barnaby answered for her. “She has carried on regardless and refused to correct her crimes even when her niece caught her red-handed. Of course, when Sophia threatened to take it to the magistrate if you didn’t stop then you knew you had to do something to silence her, didn’t you Delilah? What better way to get rid of her than killing her in those woods.  Given how remotely you live, those woods are practically your own. Who would be around to hear her scream?”

Jeb placed his hands flat on the table, primarily to stop himself reaching for her. “So you decided to kill her because you wanted to go back to your thieving, didn’t you? Especially given the orders you had from your contact to steal the jewels from the Squire.”

Delilah looked up in shock.

“Oh, yes, we know all about the jewellery you have been ordered to take next from the Squire’s house,” Jeb murmured sinisterly.

“W-wha-?” Her gaze flew from Jeb to Barnaby and back again.

“We have him too. Your contact, Myers. He is in prison now. He has told us all about your little plan. Unfortunately for you, Sophia had already threatened to report you if you didn’t stop stealing so you had to get rid of her to be able to take the jewels. With the Squire’s ball in a few days, you had to take matters into your own hands. You had to get rid of her. However, how on earth you expected to go to the Squire’s ball when you were recently aggrieved by the death of your-” Jeb paused and thought about that for a moment.

Suddenly the penny dropped, and he realised then what she had intended to do.

“That was the perfect cover for you, wasn’t it? I mean, you wouldn’t go to the ball at all because you were busy grieving for your newly departed niece, so nobody would expect you to be in the house. You would have the perfect cover to steal the jewels, wouldn’t you?”

Delilah remained quiet.

Barnaby snorted shook his head in disbelief. “So why kill Morwenna Banks? What had she done to you?” He lifted a finger when Delilah opened her mouth to speak. “I warn you now that if you try to tell me any lies it shall add to the sentence the magistrate issues.”

“I swear to you on the Holy Bible that I didn’t kill Tabitha, the Squire, or Morwenna. I didn’t. It wasn’t me.” Delilah’s voice was thick with fear and worry. She looked at Jeb with a frown. “Who are you? You have been sniffing around Sophia to get information on me, haven’t you?” Before Jeb could reply she burst out laughing. “Oh, how rich! Hooky’s precious Sophia has been conned by a lothario.”