* * *
“You’re not having fun, are you?” Harriet asked that night at Brooke’s second ball.
Brooke sighed. “Not really. I know this is the logical thing to do, continue as we would have, but too much has happened and . . .”
“Good grief, don’t cry again.” Harriet quickly led Brooke out onto a terrace where there were only a few people. “What you’re feeling will pass, I promise you. I had so hoped these entertainments would have cheered you up by now. Another man could make you forget about that man if you’d just give one of them a chance.”
“And if I don’t want to?”
Harriet put an arm around Brooke’s shoulder and squeezed. “I should have known a broken heart wouldn’t mend in just a few weeks. Go ahead and cry, precious. We’ll say it was just dust in your eyes.”
Brooke almost laughed, but did admit, “I wasn’t going to cry again. I have been distracted, though, by that letter of Eloise Wolfe’s that had been hidden in her fan. It was from an abbess, telling Ella she already had a wonderful family from the quaint town of Sevenoaks in Kent who would take her baby and love it as their own. The abbess expected Ella to arrive soon at her foundling house, where she could deliver the baby peacefully.”
“No one has a baby peacefully,” Harriet insisted. “It’s an utter impossibility.”
“I’m sure a peaceful environment was what the abbess meant, but in either case, it doesn’t sound like Ella was going to kill herself, though Dominic thinks she did and that’s a very big part of his rage. I’m not so sure now if that was really her intention.”
“You think she went off to have the baby in secret first?”
Brooke blinked. “Maybe, or she intended to but died before she could give birth.”
Harriet’s eyes widened. “Are you saying there’s a possibility that I have a grandchild somewhere in England?!”
“Shh, not so loud, Mother. I don’t actually think that a’tall. I think her death was really an accident that day. Her body was found at the time and identified, so it was her. And there wasn’t time for her to have her baby first. She fell in love with Robert during her first Season and died that fall nearly two years ago, before anyone even knew she was pregnant from that indiscretion.”
Harriet sighed. “That’s two grandchildren I’m never going to get to meet. I do want some, you know. I’ve truly been looking forward to it.”
Since Harriet ended that by giving Brooke a pointed look that clearly said, Hurry up and give me some, Brooke quickly continued, “But if I’m right and she didn’t die by choice that day, that could change Dominic’s perception of the matter entirely. After all, Ella was a willing participant in her seduction, so Robert was only half to blame for that, even if he did mislead the girl. And if I could prove that to him, it might remove the hate he has for our family.”
“Oh, precious, don’t count on that. Men view these matters differently. Robert damned himself in Lord Wolfe’s eyes when he refused to marry his sister.”
“I would still like to prove my suspicion. That abbess may still have a letter from Ella, inquiring about delivering her baby to the nuns for adoption. She could well have planned to go home after that with some story of lost memory, et cetera.”
“Or go off to really kill herself afterward, and if that’s in her letter, then it’s not something you would want to show to the wolf.”
“She wouldn’t confess that to a nun,” Brooke insisted. “But the abbess might know in either case.”
“Very well, where is that foundling house? We’ll pay them a visit tomorrow just to be sure.”
Brooke smiled gratefully, even though she knew she was putting too much stock in the outcome. Ella might well have intended to sail to the foundling house that very day and only to pretend to be lost at sea so no one would look for her, but got caught in the storm instead. Brooke wouldn’t be able to suggest anything beyond that to Dominic, not when she remembered him repeating Ella’s words from those missing diary pages that he’d burned, that she’d intended to “seek peace and solace in the sea.” Ella did want to die, had felt she had no choice, but she apparently hadn’t wanted to kill her baby with her. She’d wanted to have it first and be assured it would have a good home before she ended her life. Dominic needed to at least know this, if it was true, that her death was an accident. That alone might help him to heal from that loss.
And give her a reason to see him again. . . .
Chapter Fifty-Three
THE ABBESS LIED TO them. Even when she was handed her own letter, she denied writing it, denied ever meeting Eloise Wolfe, even though she admitted Lady Wolfe was such a generous benefactor that her donation allowed their foundling house to expand into an actual orphanage. But the abbess was stern, abrupt, and so obviously not telling the truth, at least not about the letter. She even tore it up into small pieces and tossed it aside! Now Brooke didn’t even have that to show Dominic.
It was the last thing Brooke expected to happen when they got there. All she’d wanted was confirmation or at least a letter that Ella had written, but she got neither and had lost what little evidence she’d had. Seeing how disappointed she was, Harriet got furious and lambasted the devout woman before dragging Brooke out of there. But a young nun ran after them as they were getting into their coach.
“There was a lady who came here in the fall that year with her maid.”
“You were listening to our conversation with your abbess?” Harriet asked.
“I was in the next room. I—I—”
“Don’t blush,” Brooke said quickly with a smile. “Eavesdropping is a habit of mine, too.”
“What can you tell us about that girl?” Harriet asked. “D’you know if she was Eloise Wolfe?”
“I never saw her. No one did other than the abbess. She stayed with us many months. Crying was heard from her room occasionally, but none of us attended her, only her maid did. She was in complete seclusion to protect her identity, at least until the birthing, when the midwife was summoned. The couple who were to take the child were sent for, but that was before the yelling, or the abbess would probably have waited.”
“What yelling?”
“We were all called to chapel to pray for mother and child when the midwife was heard to yell there were complications—too much blood loss. I’m sorry, but the mother rarely survives when that happens.”
“You can’t tell us for certain?”
“Only that there was a freshly dug grave in the graveyard the next day, and not just a small one. One or both of them had died.”
“Surely your abbess at least told you and your sisters the outcome after you prayed for a good one?” Harriet asked. “This might be my grandchild we’re talking about.”
Brooke started to remind Harriet that was impossible, but the nun answered first. “You don’t understand. Only ‘ladies’ demand complete anonymity when they come to us, and that includes into death, which is why the grave has no marker and why the abbess will never speak of it or reveal their identity. She’s bound to silence.”
“But you aren’t?”
“I am, but I have too much compassion, or so I’m told. You obviously knew the girl and grieve for not knowing what happened to her. I’m so sorry I can’t tell you what you hoped for. The common women who come here to give up their babies, they aren’t secluded and we aren’t kept from them. Too often they die in childbirth, too. And I’ve said too much. I’ll get in trouble if I’m seen talking to you. I must go.”
Brook nodded and thanked the nun. She’d expected so much more from this trip. But as she got into the coach, Harriet said behind her, “We’re going to Sevenoaks. Ella might have died with those complications, but the child might have survived. I have to be sure.”
The young nun hadn’t even been talking about Ella. Ella had died two years ago. If an orphaned baby was being raised in Sevenoaks, it belonged to some other lady who’d had a similar indiscretion. Harriet was pulling wishes out of a hat, hoping Ella ha
d somehow faked her death even when they’d found her body. But Brooke was too despondent to remind her mother of that.
But Alfreda, who’d been waiting for them in the coach, wanted to know, “And how will we find this baby in a haystack?”
“I’ll speak to the mayor and every priest in Sevenoaks. Someone will know if a couple came home with a baby last year in, when might it have been? April or May? Or if they came home disappointed instead. If they were waiting to adopt one, it would be exciting news for them that they would share with their friends and neighbors. Now let me take a nap, I’m exhausted. I was so excited last night, letting myself hope for the best today, that I got no sleep a’tall.”
Brooke was utterly dejected, berating herself for wanting to go to that orphanage in the first place. She should have taken that letter straight to Dominic instead of handing it to a nun to watch it be destroyed. It wasn’t conclusive proof of an accidental death but it had been something. And he’d never believe Brooke if she still tried to tell him about it. She wasn’t tired herself, but she leaned against Alfreda for comfort.
“Are you really going to let us go all the way to Sevenoaks for nothing?” Alfreda whispered to her a while later when Harriet was softly snoring.
“You could have told her,” Brooke whispered back.
“It wasn’t my place, but if that baby survived, you need to mention that it can’t possibly be any relation to her.”
“I will if it comes to that, but we probably won’t find any baby there, so she’ll conclude on her own that it died with whoever its mother was, which is undoubtedly what happened. But I’m in no hurry to get back to London today; in fact, I’d as soon return to Leicestershire.”
“Now don’t say that. You won’t be finding any husband there.”
“Who says I want one now? Maybe come the winter Season I’ll feel differently, but now—pretending to enjoy these social events has been extremely difficult when all I can do is think about him. This was a crushing disappointment today, Freda. It was my only chance to end his rage over what he thinks happened to his sister, my only chance to win him back.”
“Back?”
“I was very hopeful that our marriage would be a turning point for us, but I didn’t get to find out.”
Alfreda must have sensed tears were imminent because she abruptly changed the subject with an interesting tidbit. “Gabe seemed out of sorts when he visited me prior to leaving London. He was quite gloomy, actually, and wouldn’t fess up to why.”
Brooke glanced aside. “I didn’t know he left, or that you’ve seen him since we changed households.”
“Of course I have.”
Brooke perked up. “How was Dominic? Did he say?”
“Unapproachable. Not pleasant to be around.”
“But Dominic got what he wanted. Why isn’t he gloatingly happy?”
“Gabe doesn’t know. The wolf is apparently keeping it to himself, what’s put him in another black mood. Likely his mother is the cause and he can’t berate her while she’s still recovering.”
“I suppose he might be angry that he had to give up his coal mines to obtain his goal,” Brooke guessed. “As for Gabe, if he was in the doldrums, it was probably because he was leaving town with Dominic and knew he wouldn’t see you anymore.”
“No, he said they’d be back, he just didn’t know when. But he seemed out of sorts on our trip to London, too. That he didn’t want to discuss any of it finally got me so annoyed I showed him the door.”
“He came to the house?”
“To my room.”
“Oh,” Brooke said without blushing.
“Freda, are you getting married?” Harriet asked in surprise, not sleeping after all.
Alfreda snorted. “He’s too young for me.”
“No, he’s not,” Brooke put in.
“Well, I’m happy enough just enjoying him when I feel the mood to.”
Harriet rolled her eyes before trying again to nap. Brooke closed her eyes, too, wondering if Dominic hadn’t made an effort to see her before he left London because he was angry about something else, specifically his mother’s high-handedness. He might want to get over that before . . . Who was she kidding? He had no reason to ever approach her again, and she’d lost hers.
But Alfreda must have been stewing over the previous subject because, an hour later, she said in another whisper, “I thought this trip was just to prove that Lady Eloise’s death was an accident. You know if that baby didn’t die with its mother and is in Sevenoaks, you’re going to have a devil of a time stopping your mother from demanding it be given to her. Why is Harriet drawing the wrong conclusion? You did tell her Eloise’s body was found in Scarborough, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but she got it into her head that Ella faked her death so no one would look for her.”
Alfreda snorted softly. “With her own body?”
“With a piece of Ella’s—” Brooke sat up and stared wide-eyed at Alfreda. “Jewelry. The body was only identified by that, and her maid stole her jewelry that day. That could have been the maid who died on that beach, killed and robbed for the rest of the jewelry and tossed in the sea to disappear! Ella might really have sailed to that orphanage that day.”
“The woman who went there to have her baby had a maid with her.”
Brooke sank back into her seat, having forgotten that. Now she was grasping at straws just like Harriet—unless . . . “She could have gone there with an older servant she’d known all her life, rather than a young maid she might not have trusted yet. And they could have been far enough down that coast to have missed that storm completely.”
“She still died, either way.”
“Yes, but if her baby is in Sevenoaks—my God, Freda, if I could bring Dominic her child, it would change everything!”
“And put your two families at war for a new reason.”
Brooke ignored that to say excitedly, “Tell the driver to drive faster!”
Chapter Fifty-Four
“DON’T BE ALARMED,” DOMINIC told Willis, who was staring agog at the two animals Gabriel was trying to get into the town house. “They’re big, but harmless.”
The improvised leashes were proving useless. Storm slipped her head out of hers and raced across the hall and up the stairs. Wolf ripped his loose from Gabe’s hand to follow, as usual.
“Storm must have caught Lady Brooke’s scent,” Gabriel suggested with a sigh as he came through the door.
“After two weeks? It’s more likely the house, one they’re not used to. They’ll settle down as soon as they’ve sniffed out every corner.”
Willis finally cleared his throat to say stoically, “Welcome back, m’lord.”
But then they heard a screech upstairs and Anna’s alarmed cry. “What are two wolves doing in my house?!”
Dominic yelled up, “Actually, Mother, there are three of us here.”
Anna appeared around the upstairs corner so delighted to see Dominic back in London that she rushed down the stairs to hug him. She was apparently fully recovered, dressed fashionably, cheeks blooming with health instead of fever. He should be pleased. He would be, if he weren’t still so angry at her.
He returned her embrace, but quite stiffly. “The animals are just large dogs from the moors. I brought back the white one because it’s Brooke’s pet and I need to return it to her.”
Anna stepped back to peer at him hopefully. “Dom, have—”
He cut in curtly, “If you’ll excuse us, Gabe and I need a whiskey after the long ride today.”
He led Gabriel into the parlor and closed the door on his mother. He simply wasn’t ready to talk to her yet, but he did need a drink. Pouring them each one, he raised his for a telling toast. “To bad luck: I’m forced by the Prince Regent to marry my enemy’s sister. Worse luck: I fall in love with her. Worst luck: My mother interferes, the Regent retracts his decree, and I lose the woman I love.”
Gabriel refused to drink to that. “You’ll win her back.”
“You don’t really believe in that stupid old curse, Dom!”
“I didn’t used to. But now with this recent string of horrendous luck on top of Ella’s death and my father’s premature demise, I’m beginning to wonder. . . .”
“Well, stop wondering. There is no curse. I know because . . . because I’m the one who’s supposed to kill you.”
Dominic raised a brow. “Kill me? Are you trying to make me laugh? I think you’ve found a winner of a distraction from my misery, Gabe. Much appreciated.”
“As much as I’d like to accommodate, no. You might want to sit down.”
“You might want to explain a little faster.”
“It’s that bloody curse,” Gabriel said in disgust. “And it’s not even yours. The only curse you have is my family, and it’s been mostly believed since it was screamed in the 1500s by that damned ancestor of mine, Bathilda Biscane. She was the one who was mistress to the first Viscount Rothdale. The village priest at the time, another relative of mine, had already believed her to be a witch. How else could she have bedazzled her way into a noble’s bed if not by casting a spell on him? But the priest couldn’t get at her while she was under their lord’s protection—until the night she came home to the village in tears. He immediately accused her and sentenced her to burn, but before they could get her to the stake, she cursed her own family, promising that if a Biscane firstborn doesn’t kill every titled Wolfe firstborn from that day forward, and before the end of their twenty-fifth year, then all of their firstborns will die instead. And she killed herself in front of them, screaming those words and using her own blood to seal the curse.”
“And you believe that?”
Make Me Love You Page 28