by Beth Byers
“Are you all right?”
Violet turned to see Jack standing there in the hall. A moment later lightning cracked, and the electricity went out.
“Vi?”
She crossed to him, following the sound of his voice while she heard others cursing in the distance.
“Should we find candles? Or just wait until the servants find us?
Jack took her hand. He chuckled and then she felt his fingers trace up her arm, until he found her shoulder. His hand moved from her shoulder to her chin. In the darkness, his fingers traced her lips. She felt his breath against her skin before she felt his lips. They settled on hers. A moment later, she opened her mouth to him. A moment after that, he pulled back, laying a gentle kiss on her cheek, her temple, her forehead before returning to her lips. She could feel his fingers dig into her back for a moment and then heard, “My lady?”
Violet stepped back, chest heaving as Beatrice called again, “Lady Violet? Are you here, Lady Violet?”
“Here I am,” Violet answered and Jack’s hand fell from her back.
A moment later, Beatrice turned into the room where Violet had been sitting. She held a candle aloft as she said, “Mr. Morganson is looking into what happened with the lights, but he fears we’ll be without them until the storm has passed.”
“I’m sure we will,” Jack said, and Beatrice gasped.
“Oh, Mr. Wakefield. I hadn’t realized you returned.”
“Only just,” Jack told the maid. Together, the three stepped into the hall together, and the maid led the way to his room, leaving him where his man had already brought candles. “We should see about finding some lanterns.”
“I’ll see to it,” his man said.
Violet glanced back and found Jack’s gaze on her. She wasn’t sure what he saw, but the weight of his gaze made her shiver. She wanted to ask him about the case. To find out if Jones had really been murdered. To throw herself back into his arms and let the strength of him make her feel safe. A feeling she didn’t have any longer despite being in the house with their friends.
Instead she said, “I’ll see you at dinner.”
Candles always added more light than Violet expected. Her room was well-lit within moments and she applied her makeup quickly. With the flickering light, she couldn’t really tell if she used too heavy of a hand with her kohl, but she doubted anyone else would be able to tell either. She didn’t bother with the powder, but added a pretty red lipstick she’d picked up in Cuba.
Her dress was a sleeveless pale blue with fringe that started mid-thigh and ended above her knees. The fabric was shimmery and caught the reflection of the candlelight, making her seem as though she could have stepped out of faerie.
Violet wrapped her long strand of white pearls around her neck and considered whether it was excessive to see if she could find someone to make her a strand of pink ones. Perhaps something she should consider when Victor started talking about buying her apology jewels.
She smirked into the mirror wickedly and added some gold and diamond bangles to her wrists and some earbobs. She stood and spun in front of the mirror, watching the fringe flare and hoping that the look kept her at the front of Jack’s mind.
She winked at herself, blackened her lashes, and then left her bedroom just as the supper gong rang.
“Wherever is Victor?” Kate asked when everyone else had gathered.
“I drugged him,” Violet said casually. “The laudanum should keep him sleeping through the night. The rest of us should pray he wakes improved, as I’m not sure he’ll be accepting tea from me again.”
Denny immediately choked on a laugh, drowning out Kate’s gasp. Jack’s gaze fixed on Violet as she shrugged away their reactions. He didn’t react at all, and for a moment she was concerned that he felt she overstepped.
“I’m surprised you didn’t do it before,” he said, relieving her fears.
“I fear you have to be rather unexpected with things like that.”
Chapter 10
“Are you well?” Jack glanced Violet over and then answered for her, “Of course you aren’t.”
Her lips trembled a little. She’d tried to eat dinner, but it had all tasted like ashes. The sight of Philip’s body was assaulting her mind. She clenched her fists and tried for a merry smile. She guessed by the look on Jack’s face that she failed. At least with the flickering candlelight, it might be a little more difficult to see how shiny her eyes were, and how hard she was fighting tears.
As good as it was to have Jack back at the house, she knew that she’d have to describe what she’d experienced and that forced her to think over and over again about the body.
She should have thought better of getting Victor to sleep. If he’d been awake and rabid, she’d have been distracted from what she’d seen. The quiet dinner that had turned too often to what Violet had seen had made it impossible for her to relax. Only Jack’s presence made her feel safe.
Why had someone killed a country gardener? Why would anyone do such things to another human being? It didn’t matter that she’d been involved in more than one murder investigation, she still found the act of murder to be inexplicable.
“Violet, darling.” Lila pressed a glass of ginger wine into Vi’s hand moments after they entered the parlor. “I think you need this.”
“The last time we pressed alcohol on her after seeing a body, she was nearly useless. I need to hear about what happened.” Jack cleared his throat. “I do need the details of everything, Vi. Please.”
“Ginger wine is Violet’s comfort. She doesn’t get zozzled on it. She sips it and calms down.”
Jack’s head cocked as he examined Violet. “How did I not know this?”
“Perhaps that penetrating, alert gaze of yours that seems to know all is just an act?” Denny poured himself a glass of ginger wine as he said, “Violet has made me love the stuff too. I also like ginger beer these days. It’s her fault I’m addicted to chocolates too. I feel certain that must be true.”
“Yes, that could only be my fault. I’m sure you had never had them before meeting me.” She knew she was being waspish.
Denny winked at Violet and propped his feet up on an ottoman. “I certainly have no recollection of them before you. It must be so.”
“Mmmm.” Violet sipped her mind and ignored Denny’s cheery nonsense. She had the impression it was merely to distract her, but she found it impossible to be distracted.
“You’re a hard woman,” Denny told Vi. “Lila would never drug me.” He patted his wife’s knee. “Unlike you—”
“Oh, laddie,” Lila muttered, cutting him off. “You had better stuff it, darling.”
Kate glanced among them all, shaking her head. “Are you never serious, Denny?”
“I was quite serious when I had to work. Pretending to work all of the time was exhausting. Reports that had to make sense but didn’t have all the facts. I suppose they’d have sent me on my way before long, but my dear, sweet aunt saved me from slaving away.”
The others laughed as Violet rose and crossed to the paintings on the wall. Her gaze settled on a familiar face. Aunt Agatha smirked down from the wall. Violet felt as though her aunt were sharing a joke with her. It had been, Violet remembered, Aunt Agatha who’d first put a little something in Victor’s tea after he’d become ill and vicious.
Violet’s eyes burned as she stared at her aunt, mother of her heart, mentor, and the first person Violet knew who had been murdered. It had been such a hard journey since Aunt Agatha had died. Even with meeting and falling in love with Jack, even with the addition of Kate to their family, even…
Someone set a soft hand on Violet’s arm, and she glanced over to see Kate looking at Aunt Agatha as well. “I wish I could have known her.”
“She’d have liked you.” Violet felt a rush of pain at the realization that her beloved friend would never meet the woman who had raised and loved Violet and Victor. Someday, Violet would raise children and only be able to tell them stories of A
gatha.
“Are you all right?” Kate asked gently, but when Violet turned to truly face her friend, she caught the concerned gazes of Jack, Lila, and Denny.
“No,” Violet admitted.
“Tell us what happened,” Jack said.
“You heard Victor….”
“We did,” Kate agreed. “He deserved to have his ears boxed.”
“What you didn’t know was that I had asked Mrs. King about walks nearby. Once I decided to leave, I wanted to explore on my own. I didn’t want to rehash how Vic was being awful. I didn’t want to be commiserated with. I needed a break.”
“You do—”
Lila elbowed Denny before he could finish his statement. No doubt it was something to the effect of how Violet set Victor off. She knew she did. She didn’t take it when he lashed out at her, and she wasn’t going to start. Not even if he was ill.
“I stopped in the graveyard. I knew the walk was behind it, but I wasn’t quite sure where it started. I wasn’t in a hurry. I did feel guilty about leaving you with my bicycle but decided that Victor deserved it.”
Jack snorted.
“That he did.” Lila patted Denny and added, “I am taking notes, darling husband. Violet is showing me the way of keeping you in line.”
Violet ignored them, speaking directly to Jack though she paced as she did, fiddling with her bracelets. “Eventually, I started down the path. Picked a flower, said hello to a horse whose pasture linked up to the path. It was while I was saying hello to that fine fellow that we both heard something.”
“He hadn’t been dead long when I saw him,” Jack said.
Violet shuddered, and Kate wrapped a comforting arm around Violet.
“Does that mean the killer might have been right there?” Lila gasped. Her gaze flit from Violet to Jack to Denny, and they all looked shaken.
“Possibly.” Jack’s voice was deep and rough as though he were holding back something intense.
“I didn’t see anything,” Violet told him. “I saw the body. Ran. Realized he could be alive, returned to check. When it was clear that it was too late, I ran for you.”
“You did just right,” Jack said. “Thank God that you were all right. If the killer had been there…”
They all shivered at the idea of the killer watching Violet stumble over the body. What if the killer had been on the other side of the body? What if she’d run the wrong way? Violet sniffed and Jack muttered, “I’m not sure I can ever let you go off on your own again.”
Both Kate and Lila snorted at that, and Jack’s ears turned red. Denny laughed straight out at his reaction as the girls mocked him.
“I’m fine,” Violet told Jack.
“That remains to be seen.” He took her hand when she paced by him again and pulled her down next to him. “You are, however, safe now. I’ll help the locals find this killer, and it’ll all be over.”
“What did you find out, old man?” Denny asked as he rose to make cocktails, refilling his own glass of ginger wine as well as Violet’s before making G&Ts for everyone else.
“I was officially called in and helped the local boys lay down the start of the case. Sent the body off with the coroner. Talked to anyone who might have seen something—no one did.”
“Or no one will admit to it,” Kate added.
Jack didn’t disagree. “I went to tell the wife what had happened. She has a little cottage not far from here. She wasn’t well.”
“Wasn’t well how?” Lila cut in this time. She glanced at Violet and then said, “I suppose you heard about how they lost four children on one day?”
“I hadn’t heard that.” Jack shook his head. “Mrs. Jones looked as though someone had roughed her over. I asked her who had done it, but she wouldn’t say. Her brother came by while we were there. He’d heard rumors of his brother-in-law’s death. The two of them didn’t seem so friendly with each other.”
“Mr. Freckleton?” Violet turned her bracelet on her wrist slowly, trying to imagine having been beaten and then finding out that you were a widow. If her husband had been the one who hurt her, was she relieved that he was dead? Perhaps not.
If her husband had not been the one who hurt her, who had? Could that person be the killer of Jones?
“Why would she protect whoever hurt her?” Lila sounded as baffled as Violet felt.
“Maybe it was her husband,” Kate suggested. “If he hurt her and then was murdered, maybe she’s afraid that someone will think it was her who killed him.”
“How did he die?” Violet asked. “I…I…didn’t look. I didn’t want to see.”
“He was stabbed.” Jack took Violet’s hand. “Don’t imagine it. I know you have a vivid mind that can paint that picture, but don’t do that to yourself.”
Violet glanced around the parlor. The fire was crackling, and it was romantic with the burning candles lighting the room. Her friends were all staring her way as she paced again. She just might slip a little laudanum into her own wine and let it take her to sleep. She wasn’t sure why Jack, who didn’t have to work, got involved in investigation after investigation, but it wasn’t something that Violet enjoyed.
“Was Mrs. Jones lovely?”
Jack paused before he answered. Long enough that Violet wasn’t quite sure why he was waiting. She turned to face him and his sharp gaze was fixed on her as though he could read her thoughts.
“She was quite beautiful. Though too thin and very pale. Like a ghost of a beautiful woman, really.”
“Mr. Freckleton seemed quite well-educated. He couldn’t have been happy when his sister married a gardener.”
“How do you know Freckleton?”
“I met him in the graveyard when I read the children’s graves.”
“Still mourning over dead children.” Denny shook his head and set aside his wine. “Maybe Freckleton killed Jones due to something about those little ones.”
Violet bit her lip and then shook her head. “They died years ago. If someone was going to get murdered over them, it would have happened then. We don’t know how they died, either. It could have been a terrible accident.”
“It’s not a good thing that he was so nearby where Jones died surely?” Lila tucked her hair behind her ear and took Denny’s hand, shivering at the idea of Violet chatting with a murderer.
“But certainly, I am his alibi,” Violet said. “I had just seen him. Why would he kill his brother-in-law now? His sister had married low years before. She’d had and lost four children. If Jones was violent with his wife, surely that wasn’t the first time. Mr. Freckleton might have reason to hate Jones, but don’t you think he’d have killed the man long before?”
“We don’t know why he died.” Jack shoved his hands through his hair. “Until we find out why someone might have wanted to kill Jones, we can’t make any conclusions. Violet makes a good point though. I’m far more concerned over the husbands of the women we saw him with. Or, the women themselves, if they really did have a relationship with him and perhaps were led to expect something from him.”
Violet couldn’t imagine any of it. That was the problem. In the end, as snobbish as it sounded, Philip Jones was a gardener. He took care of a house that had been mostly empty and was run down. As much as Vi hadn’t liked him, she still asked herself: Why kill a gardener?
Chapter 11
Violet had heard Jack leave the next morning. It wasn’t that he was loud, but the person who’d come to pick him up had an auto that was downright rambunctious. Violet fancifully thought that it sounded a bit like a mechanical bear. The vehicle woke her enough to order some tea for Victor. She doctored a cup for him with additional laudanum, and then grabbed Denny as he went down to the breakfast room to deliver a second doctored cup when Victor inevitably rejected hers.
“I am not drinking that,” Victor told Violet. His frown was ferocious, and Violet deliberately lifted a brow and pretended to have a sip of Victor’s first cup of doctored tea.
“I’m just trying to help your t
hroat,” she lied with a fierce scowl. She called, “Denny! Give Victor your cup!”
Denny walked in, lowering the teacup from his mouth and examining Victor. “I suppose you can have this one, old boy.”
On any other day, Victor would have caught the smirk on the corner of Denny’s mouth and known that both cups were doctored, but he missed it entirely. After swallowing aspirin and the doctored tea, he fell back to sleep before even realizing he had been drugged once again.
“You’re a good friend,” Violet told Denny, patting him on the arm. “Enjoy your breakfast.”
Violet went back to her bedroom and snuggled back into her bed. Victor might not willingly sleep the morning away, but Violet was not so particular. Her night had been interrupted with nightmares of dead bodies, of being chased through the wood, of ghosts of small children crying out for their father. Violet sniffed and curled into her pillows, forcing her mind to think of nothing but Cuba, ocean crossings, and dancing.
When she woke again, the sun had risen well into the sky. Beatrice had come and gone with Violet’s dog, Rouge. No doubt the dog had been walked, played with, fed, and brushed. Violet assumed the creature was following Beatrice around.
Vi rose and dressed, trying to keep herself from thinking of the murder, but she wasn’t able to. She had seen someone killed for their money. Violet’s sister’s fiancé had been killed out of jealousy. Violet knew a woman who had been killed for manipulating her lovers. There had even been a girl that Violet had met who had been killed because a man had been obsessed with her. She intended to leave their village, and it had cost her the remainder of her life.
She tried to keep her mind from the murder, thinking of Victor’s house. She didn’t like it. In fact, she hated it. She didn’t like that it was so far from Jack. Any visit to Victor, if Violet married Jack, would have to be well thought-out. She couldn’t imagine spending weeks apart from her twin, let alone months and months.