But Gran thought Thoroughbred racing was a gambler’s sport, and gambling was a waste of good blunt to her.
Not that he cared. She’d ruined his life enough with this marriage business. She wasn’t going to ruin his future in racing, too. This was his insurance policy in case Celia chose not to marry.
“So what do you plan to do with the Thoroughbred?” she prodded.
“That’s none of your concern,” he said as they neared the drawing room. “It’s my horse. I bought it out of the funds I’ve accumulated from wagers I win in carriage racing. Whatever I do with it is my own business.”
She walked into the drawing room. “Not if you use Oliver’s stables to—”
“What’s Gabe using my stables for this time?” Oliver asked from his seat on the settee.
Gabe started as he saw Oliver, along with the rest of his family, ranged around the room. The only ones missing were Jarret’s stepson George, who was visiting his family in Burton, and Minerva’s husband Giles, who was probably too busy with a trial to come. But Jackson Pinter, the Bow Street runner, was here.
Damn, he’d forgotten that he’d asked Pinter and his siblings to assemble in Halstead Hall’s drawing room at noon today. Now there was an audience for this discussion.
“I bought a horse that I’m keeping in the old stables,” Gabe said, preparing for a fight. “I mostly see to Flying Jane myself. But if that’s a problem—”
“I didn’t say it was a problem,” Oliver countered.
“It’s not just a horse,” Gran snapped. “Gabriel has bought a Thoroughbred. For racing, no doubt.”
“Good for him,” Jarret said. When Gabe’s jaw dropped, Jarret winked at him. “It’s about time the Halstead Hall stables were used for something other than our few riding and carriage horses. There’s plenty of room for Thoroughbreds.”
Gran looked as if she might explode. “That’s easy for you to say. The stables aren’t yours to maintain.”
“No,” Oliver said sharply, “they’re mine. You keep forgetting that, Gran. The estate is well on its way to supporting itself. So you don’t have a say in what I allow in my stables.”
Oliver was agreeing with him, too? Gabe couldn’t believe it.
Gran looked utterly flummoxed. She glared at Oliver, then at him. How gratifying to see her at a loss for words.
Gabe grabbed the opportunity to explain himself. “I’m paying for the filly’s upkeep myself and giving the grooms extra to take care of her when necessary. I’m not relying on Oliver for anything but space in the stables, which, as Jarret pointed out, there’s plenty of.”
“Are you really planning to race the horse?” Jarret’s wife Annabel asked.
He hesitated. But since they were all being so reasonable . . . “I’m training her for the St. Leger Stakes,” he admitted.
“You’ve lost your mind,” Gran grumbled.
“And he loses it so brilliantly, too,” Minerva said, her green eyes twinkling. “I can’t wait to see how Gabe’s new venture turns out.”
“Stop encouraging him,” Gran snapped. “It’s a fruitless endeavor.”
“At least we don’t have to worry about him killing himself, since he won’t be riding in these races,” Celia pointed out.
“Of course not,” Gabe said, pleased that his siblings were taking this so well. “Though I’ll need to find a jockey.”
“I know of a decent jockey looking for a position,” Jarret offered.
“So do I,” Pinter said, to Gabe’s surprise.
“You’re all mad,” Gran said with a sniff. “Every last one of you.”
Taking pity on her, Gabe looped his arm about her shoulders. “Relax, Gran. I’m doing my best to marry, too. Isn’t that enough?”
Minerva’s eyes lit up. “You’ve chosen someone?”
“I have.”
Celia gave a start that shot him through with guilt.
Although there were three years between him and his younger sister, and only two between him and his older one, he and Celia had always been closer in spirit. Minerva had mothered them both while Jarret and Oliver were off at school, so he and Celia had become partners in crime. He’d been the one to teach her to shoot; she’d lied for him whenever he snuck out to races.
Now the look of betrayal in Celia’s eyes cut him to the heart. But her plan to have them both hold firm against Gran would never have worked, so he had to try things his own way. If he played his cards right, he might still win her freedom.
“Whom are you planning to marry?” Annabel asked, all smiles and eager anticipation.
“Is it someone we know?” Minerva prodded.
“Come on, man,” Jarret said. “Tell us who it is.”
“It’s Miss Waverly,” Gran said.
An incredulous silence fell over the room.
It was punctuated by Minerva’s cry, “But she hates you!”
“She does not hate me.” She had given him ample proof of that in the stable.
His family began to talk all at once.
“Speaking of fruitless endeavors . . .” Oliver muttered.
“Does she know you mean to marry her?” Jarret asked.
“What about her grandfather?” Minerva asked. “He’ll never allow it.”
Celia sat there smirking, obviously less worried now that she knew who his prospective wife was.
Gran surprised him by answering for him. “Miss Waverly is well aware of Gabe’s intentions, and I believe she is not as opposed to the idea as she pretends. She was just here to arrange a race with your brother. And I am hoping you will all attend. Might as well show her we are not the monsters she has created in her mind since Roger’s death.”
That sparked a new round of questions which Gabe answered, though he refrained from mentioning the wager attached to the race. When he started explaining about the Waverly family’s dire financial situation, Celia rounded on the Bow Street runner.
“I should have seen your meddling hand in this,” she snapped.
Pinter blinked, clearly taken off guard by her attack. “I beg your pardon?” he asked in his thick, raspy voice.
“As well you should.” Celia rose and strode over to glare down at him with her hands propped on her hips. “You probably suggested the woman to Gabe. You won’t be satisfied until you see us all married and miserable.”
Pinter’s eyes narrowed, and he looked on the verge of a hot retort when Oliver said, “Here now, Celia, I’m not miserable. And as far as I can tell, neither is Jarret.”
“Nor am I,” Minerva put in.
“This doesn’t concern you lot!” Celia cried. “It concerns my future! And if Gabe marries, it means that I . . .” She trailed off with a huff of frustration. “Oh, you wouldn’t understand. I thought Gabe did, but clearly he’s in Gran’s pocket, too.”
She turned on Pinter again, her eyes alight. “And you, sir, ought to be ashamed of yourself to let Gran buy you, body and soul.”
Pinter stood, his brow lowering into a black frown. “While you, my lady, ought to be ashamed to fight her so. Be careful that in biting the hand that feeds you, you don’t break your teeth on it.”
Her cheeks rosy, Celia thrust her face up to his. “It’s not your purview to lecture me, sir.”
He towered over her. “I’m merely pointing out that your grandmother has your best interests at heart, something you seem incapable of recognizing.”
“Because unlike you, who are paid to support whatever she says and does, I can see that she’s wrong. So if you think I’ll stand here and listen to my grandmother’s lackey lecture me—”
“Celia!” Gabe snapped, noting the sharpening of Pinter’s gaze. The man had a dark side that he hid very well, but one of these days he was going to let it fly if Celia kept provoking him. “Pinter came all the way out here today at my request, so I’d appreciate it if you’d treat him civilly.”
She scowled at Gabe, then at Pinter. “If I must,” she said stiffly, then turned to go back to her chair.
Pinter’s eyes followed her retreat with an interest that gave Gabe pause. Could Pinter want Celia?
No, the idea was absurd. They fought constantly. And Gabe knew for a fact that she despised the man.
The way Virginia despises you?
He shoved that unsettling idea from his mind as he took a seat. “Pinter, I asked you here so I could tell you what I know about the events of the day my parents were killed.”
That got everyone’s attention. “What do you mean?” Oliver demanded.
Gabe took an unsteady breath. This wasn’t as easy as he’d expected. But after their despicable cousin, Desmond Plumtree, had revealed that he’d seen a man riding toward the hunting lodge after he’d heard their parents being shot, it had set Gabe to wondering again about the man he’d met that day.
“I was in the stables shortly after Mother rode out to the hunting lodge.” He told them everything about his encounter with the man that he could remember, then added, “You remember how Desmond said that the horse he saw was black with a face blaze and one white stocking on the left hind leg? Well, I’m fairly certain that the stranger in the stable that day chose such a horse.”
Oliver leaned forward, his black eyes stormy. “That business with Desmond was almost two months ago. Why didn’t you say anything then? For that matter, why didn’t you tell us about the man years ago?”
“Until earlier this year, when you finally deigned to discuss your argument with Mother that day,” Gabe said, “none of us knew that Gran’s story of what happened wasn’t entirely accurate. I had no reason to believe that the man I saw had anything to do with our parents’ deaths.”
With a muttered curse, Oliver settled back in his chair. His wife, Maria, took his hand. Her pregnancy was beginning to show, and she had a sweet glow that seemed to soothe Oliver’s dark mood.
For some reason, Gabe felt a stab of resentment. No one had ever leaped to soothe his dark moods. “Then you and Jarret decided that Desmond might have killed them, so I still had no reason to think the stranger was involved. Even after Desmond admitted to having seen a man ride toward the scene, I couldn’t see how it was relevant. The man was kind to me. He didn’t seem upset, or interested in finding anyone. I figured it was pure coincidence that he’d ridden near the scene.”
“Except that he never told anyone what he saw,” Jarret pointed out, his eyes flashing in the candlelight.
“Yes, I considered that. But would you tell anyone if you’d stumbled across two dead bodies? Wouldn’t you worry that you might be implicated in their deaths, even if you’d done nothing? And that’s assuming he went inside and found them.”
Silence fell upon the room, only broken when Minerva asked, “If you considered his presence there irrelevant, why are you telling us now?”
Gabe threaded his fingers through his hair. “Because we haven’t gotten anywhere in our efforts to find out the truth. It’s been two months, and Pinter seems to have lost track entirely of Benny May, our old head groom.”
“I haven’t lost track of him,” Pinter countered. “I just can’t find him.”
“You found him easily enough a few months ago, when Jarret sent you looking for him,” Gabe said. “Don’t you find it odd that he disappeared only a couple of months after revealing how Mother cautioned him not to mention to Father where she was going that day?”
“He didn’t disappear,” Pinter said coolly. “He went up to visit a friend near Manchester. That’s what his family said.”
“Yet they haven’t heard from him.”
“Benny couldn’t exactly write a letter to them,” Gran said. “He isn’t literate.”
“True,” Gabe said. “But Pinter’s trip to Manchester last week didn’t turn him up.”
“Only because he took a different road there,” Pinter said. “Once I picked up his trail in Manchester, I was only a few days behind him. But he must have stopped off somewhere near Woburn, since that’s where I lost him. Nor has he returned to his family.”
“Which I find troubling,” Gabe said. “I suppose it’s possible he may just not want to be found. Perhaps he knows something. Perhaps he too saw the man, but recognized him.”
“Did you not recognize the man yourself?” Annabel asked.
“I didn’t see his face. I was hiding down in the stall, afraid of getting into trouble. All I heard was his voice. And that was no help in figuring out who he was. I was nursery age so I didn’t meet any of the guests.”
“We’re not even sure he was a guest,” Jarret pointed out.
“He had to have been,” Oliver said. “No one else would be so bold as to walk right in and steal a horse. Besides, Gabe said he knew our names and guessed Gabe’s identity. That was no horse thief.”
“If we could find Benny, we could learn whether the horse was ever returned to the stable, and by whom,” Minerva said.
“That’s why I haven’t broached this subject until now,” Gabe told them. “I knew we couldn’t move forward without speaking to him. I was hoping he would turn up and identify the man.”
He rose to pace. “But it’s been too long. I’ve begun to worry about Benny. If he did see or know something, and he did approach the man . . .” He shook his head. “I have an uneasy feeling about his disappearance.”
This time the silence that fell upon the room mirrored his unease. It seemed the more they delved into their parents’ deaths, the more nasty business they uncovered. Sometimes Gabe wondered if they were making a mistake even trying to get to the bottom of it. It had been nineteen years, after all. Nothing could bring Mother and Father back. And yet . . .
If it had been murder, then his parents deserved justice. And their killer deserved to suffer the full wrath of those he’d orphaned. Because what good was thumbing one’s nose at Death when Death still got away with the worst crime of all?
“Has it occurred to anyone else that the man might have been Major Rawdon?” Jarret said. “He and his wife left in a hurry the evening of Mother’s and Father’s deaths. We assumed it was because of the incident with Oliver, but it might have been something darker. If his wife was cheating on him with Father—”
“She wasn’t,” Pinter put in.
They all gaped at him.
Oliver in particular scowled. “She had to be. Mother said, ‘You already have him.’ What else could she mean?”
“I don’t doubt that your mother thought your father was cheating on her with Mrs. Rawdon, given his past actions,” Pinter remarked. “But that doesn’t mean he was. I tracked down your father’s valet a few days ago. He said he knew all your father’s secrets, and that wasn’t one.”
That shocked them all. “He could be lying,” Jarret pointed out.
“He could, but I don’t think he is. He’s no longer in service and came into some money from his mother, so he has nothing to lose by telling the truth.”
“Oh God,” Oliver said hoarsely. “If that’s true, then why did the woman seduce me?”
Pinter shrugged. “Because she could. Or perhaps she’d tried to seduce your father and failed, so she tried for you next. Or perhaps she just didn’t like your mother.”
Oliver shuddered. “I can’t believe this.” He gazed at Pinter. “So if Mother did kill Father out of anger over Mrs. Rawdon, it might have been for nothing? Because she was jealous?”
“I’m afraid so. I still wish to speak to the Rawdons, but the captain has been posted in India for some years. As soon as you mentioned their friendship with your parents, I sent a letter to him and his superiors with numerous questions, but it will be months before I receive a reply. And they may be reluctant to speak of your mother’s penchant for violence in a letter.”
“Mother did not kill Father,” Minerva said stoutly. “Giles is almost sure of that. Or at least not in the way we originally assumed.”
“We haven’t ruled it out entirely, though,” Pinter said with a pained look. “Besides, even if it was Captain Rawdon whom your cousin saw, he couldn’t
have been the one to kill them. Desmond made it clear that the mysterious man arrived at the hunting lodge after the murders.”
“So we’re back to needing to know what that man saw, and why he went there in the first place,” Gabe said tightly.
“All right then,” Oliver said. “Here’s what we shall do. Pinter, go back and find the other grooms, the ones from your initial interviews who said they saw nothing, and find out if they remember that horse and who might have returned it. Ask about their association with Benny, too. Some of them may still see him from time to time.”
“Very well,” Pinter said. “And if you wish, I’ll speak to Benny’s family again, see if they know anyone else with information on his exact whereabouts. If all else fails, I’ll make another trip to Manchester.”
“Anything you can do will help,” Oliver said. “If you do head for Manchester,” Gabe said, “let me know. I want to go with you.”
The nagging sense that Benny might hold the key to what had happened that day just wouldn’t leave him. Until he talked to the man and satisfied himself that Benny knew nothing, he couldn’t rest easy.
Chapter Six
“It’s a nasty day for a race,” Virginia’s grandfather said as they headed for Ealing.
She scowled out the carriage window at the dark sky that threatened rain. Her horses, which had been sent on ahead to the race site hours ago, ran like demons in good weather. Bad weather could scuttle everything, especially if the wind picked up. Horses did not like wind.
“Is the weather what’s got you in such a foul mood?” Pierce asked. He would have returned home yesterday if not for the race. Apparently he was needed back at his estate.
“Of course,” she lied.
Her foul mood had started the day she’d left the Halstead Hall stables. That devil Gabriel wouldn’t get out of her head. She kept feeling the press of his firm body against hers. He had the kind of muscles that made a woman just want to dig in and hold on. Such a fine physique had to be criminal.
And the way he kissed? Pure heaven. She couldn’t stop thinking about his hot mouth and wicked tongue exploring hers.
To Wed a Wild Lord Page 8