by Sofia Daniel
Mother lowered her lashes and bobbed her head up and down.
I leaned forward, my brows furrowing. That didn’t sound like Mr. Burgh at all. On Christmas Eve, he caught Orlando and me in a passionate clinch, but he didn’t explode with anger or act like it was my fault. Apart from looking like he wanted to wring Orlando’s neck, he warned me that Orlando was just as lewd as Maxwell. Mr. Burgh wasn’t the sort of person who would throw away his daughter just because she got pregnant.
Was he?
My gaze drifted from Billy Hancock, who had stopped eating to grin, and back to Mother, who still wouldn’t look up from her plate. “I don’t know what happened between you two, but he’s in the biggest trouble of his life and for something that wasn’t even his fault.”
Mother slammed her palms on the table, making her golden knife and fork clank against the expensive plates. Everyone stiffened. Even Billy Hancock stopped snickering and paid attention.
“You would take his side,” she said in a dull voice.
I glanced at Kendrick. He furrowed his brow, mirroring my own confusion. Was this the booze talking or was Mother lashing out because Billy Hancock just seated another woman at the family dining table?
“Of course I would,” I replied in a voice I might use to calm down a dog about to attack. “The other side is Lady Liddell.”
Mother’s nostrils flared, and she pressed her lips so tightly the fine lines around her mouth deepened into ridges. “Maybe he is your father. Have you ever thought about that?”
All the blood drained from my face and gathered in my twitching heart. We’d had this conversation before in the cafeteria of St. Luke’s Hospital. Back then, she said Father Neapolitan had raped her on a school trip.
She had been under the influence of coke at the time and could have been talking gibberish, but all the evidence I’d found matched up with her story. Why the bloody hell was she changing her mind, now?
Bile surged to the back of my throat. She was protecting the Liddells. Throwing poor Mr. Burgh under the bus so I would turn my attention away from that shitty family of snakes.
“I went into your old room, you know,” I said. “There’s a fuck-load of creepy letters from Thomas Neapolitan that back up the story you told me the last time we met. There’s also a picture of a younger version of you looking really cozy with Billy.”
Billy Hancock raised his palms. I ignored him, remembering he’d told me about the childhood bout of mumps that had turned him sterile.
“Why would you lie about something as important as this?” I said. “Mr. Burgh could lose his job and spend the rest of his life in prison.”
Mother stared ahead, her hands balled into fists. She was shutting me out. Shutting me out the same way she did whenever I would tell her about Billy Hancock dangling me over his growling and snapping dogs, whenever I would plead at her to leave this wretched house, and when she kicked me out of the only home I had known for setting Billy up with the police.
I pulled back my chair and rose to my feet. “You know what?” My voice was thick and trembling with emotion. “In the few months I’ve been with Mr. Burgh, he’s been more of a parent to me than you’ve ever been my entire life.”
She didn’t even wince. Of course, she wouldn’t. I meant absolutely nothing to the woman.
Despair hollowed my chest, leaving me breathless and on the verge of sobbing. “I don’t know what the Liddells have over you, but they’re ruining my life. Yesterday, Lady Liddell sent a girl after me with a gun.”
Mother’s head snapped up, and she swept her gaze down my form. Her eyes lingered on the bandages around my arms, but she made no other comment.
The skin around my eyes grew hot, and my breaths became ragged. If I didn’t leave this shithole, I’d collapse on this table in front of the bastard staring at me through the eyes of a reptile. “If you want to stay out of this, fine,” I said from between clenched teeth. “But I’m going to get a paternity test of my own to prove Lady Liddell a liar. And when I prove Thomas Neapolitan my father, I’ll claim the Liddell fortune out of spite.”
Her eyes widened, and my insides roared with triumph. At last, a fucking reaction.
I paused for a few heartbeats, expecting her to speak or share something that might exonerate Mr. Burgh, but she lowered her gaze back to the congealing chicken.
Kendrick walked around the table and wrapped an arm around my waist. “In case you change your mind, we’ll be in the Gravetye Manor Hotel.”
When nobody acknowledged his words, he guided me out of the room and down the marble hallway toward the front door.
If Mother didn’t speak up, poor Mr. Burgh was screwed.
Chapter Fifteen
The moment we stepped out into the gloomy afternoon, Kendrick ordered an Uber, which the app said would take five minutes to arrive. I turned around and glared through the front door’s glass panels into the hallway. Mother was the first to step out of the dining room and floated toward me in that long dressing gown like a ghost.
My heart somersaulted up to my throat, and I held my breath, hoping she would come to the door and offer to make a statement to exonerate Mr. Burgh. She didn’t even need to come up to Glasgow. I was sure someone in our local police station could arrange a video conference or even hear her side of the story and send it up via email.
Mother stood in the hallway and stared at me for several heartbeats.
Kendrick leaned into me and whispered, “Has she changed her mind already?”
I shook my head. Only a psychic could know what Mother was thinking. Right now, she could be reconsidering or just waiting for us to leave. Sometimes, when I saw her around Richley, she would freeze and stare at me like that. The few times I approached her, she just turned her head.
An electric blue Toyota Prius pulled into the driveway. Kendrick placed a hand on my elbow. “Perhaps if she saw us about to leave—”
“It would make no difference.” I turned to the car and opened its back door.
My throat felt like someone had rubbed it raw with steel wool and my insides fared no better. I was a bloody idiot for coming here. A bloody idiot for thinking Mother would want to help Mr. Burgh, when she could barely speak to the man that time we met in the police station. And now Kendrick got to witness first-hand the shitty characters in my former life.
He waited several moments, staring in the direction of the front door before following me inside. As the car pulled out of the driveway and into the road, he turned to me and frowned. “I’m sorry.”
I met his sorrowful, gray eyes. “What for?”
“Max or Orlando would have said something by now to make you laugh. I never know how to act around girls when they’re upset.”
I placed my hand over his. “The memory of you beating the shit out of Sammy will bolster my spirits for a lifetime. Where did you learn to fight?”
The corner of his lip curled into a smile. “Captain of the boxing team.”
I swatted at his arm. “You should have told me. I was worried Sammy would punch you senseless.”
Kendrick’s eyes dimmed. “That man hid behind the door, caught Max by surprise, and kept hitting him even after he’d fallen. I should have knocked out his teeth.”
I exhaled a long breath, wondering what other aspects of his personality Kendrick kept hidden.
He cleared his throat. “Your mother’s conduct today was… disappointing.”
I shook my head. “Let’s not talk about her.”
An hour later, our Uber stopped within the landscaped gardens of a three-story Elizabethan mansion set within acres of countryside. Kendrick explained that Gravetye Manor Hotel was only a twenty-minute drive away from Gatwick Airport. We could have a meal there and wait if Mother changed her mind about helping Mr. Burgh.
Gray clouds covered the sky, but bright lights shone from a huge, glass sunroom where people dined around white-clothed tables. My stomach rumbled and I hoped they had enough space in the restaurant for two more.
We stepped out into the cold evening, and into a reception area of wood panels, brass wall lights and snowdrops in crystal vases. Until now, I’d never really considered the difference between old money and new but coming here after Billy Hancock’s place showed me that a person didn’t need wads of cash to look classy.
As we stood at the front desk of polished walnut wood, he leaned into me and asked, “How is your concussion?”
It took a moment for the dull ache to register in the front of my mind. That uninterrupted night of sleep on the train had been exactly what I needed. “Much better.”
His eyes softened. “And you?”
Forcing a smile, I shook my head. “Not so good.”
The receptionist stepped in from a side room, asking if we wanted a room or a table at the restaurant. Kendrick asked for a table for two, and the receptionist guided us to the bar, saying there would be an hour’s wait for food. My stomach spasmed with hunger, but the scents of roasted meat wafting through the hallways promised that it would be worth a wait.
We settled by a crackling fireplace into a comfortable, two-seater sofa upholstered in purple velvet. It was more like a living room than a pub, with people sitting around low tables on matching sofas and armchairs. On the far left of the room stood a wooden bar that matched the paneled walls.
Kendrick passed me a menu, and one of the employees took our order for food and drinks. Right now, the thought of alcohol turned my stomach, and I ordered a hot chocolate to keep my hunger at bay. He ordered an Irish coffee, which was black and topped with thick, white cream.
When my hot chocolate arrived, it was a thick concoction covered with chocolate cream, dark chocolate sauce, and sprinkles. I took a sip, letting the rich, heady flavors of cacao, vanilla, and hazelnut mingle on my tongue. It was the thickest, most velvety thing I’d ever tasted, and I lost myself in the sensation, letting the bitterness of the afternoon fade to the barest aftertaste.
He exhaled a long breath and shook his head. “We had a great-grand aunt in the same situation as your mother.”
My throat dried, and I dropped my gaze to the chocolate the server had left on the table, wondering what on earth Kendrick had gathered from his encounter with Mother.
“She was a sought-after heiress in her youth but married a man who only wanted her dowry and the income that came with her estate.”
My brows drew together. That didn’t sound like Mother at all. “What happened to her?”
“The husband confined her to an attic room, while he acted as though the wealth he had married into was his own.” Kendrick took a long drag from his Irish coffee and licked the cream from his lips. “No matter what my grandfather said, she wouldn’t admit to needing help. Eventually, she stopped answering letters or allowing visitors. The last our family heard about her was an announcement of her husband’s remarriage.”
I slumped in my seat. “You think my mother’s life is at risk?”
“Your stepfather is as odious as he is dangerous.”
Kendrick was right. Billy Hancock wasn’t about to plot Mother’s murder but might bring about her death from drink and drugs and domestic violence. I wrapped my fingers around the warm mug, my mind swirling around the unsolvable dilemma that was my mother.
Sometimes, I didn’t know if I was fixating too much on Billy Hancock being the root of her addiction. Until recently I’d discovered that her problems started with Father Neapolitan, the Liddells, and the fallout from her getting pregnant with me.
A rush of guilt tightened my chest. I cleared my throat, pushed thoughts of being the product of rape to the back of my mind, and took another sip of the hot chocolate.
Kendrick set down his mug. “You must have a tremendously strong will to have escaped those people unscathed.”
I raised my shoulders. “Because of Billy Hancock, I’m terrified of dogs.”
He nodded, realization flickering across his eyes about the barbed comment the older man made about keeping the kennels shut. “I have a newfound respect for your resilience. If you can survive a man like Hancock, you can survive the Liddels.”
“But Mr. Burgh—”
“The plan you told your mother was sound. Even if she won’t raise a word in the headmaster’s defense, clinical evidence that Mr. Burgh is your maternal grandfather will disprove Elizabeth’s allegations.”
“I wish there was something I could do about her,” I muttered.
Kendrick tightened his lips but didn’t reply.
“What?” I said.
“Elizabeth is…” He rotated his eyes to the side.
Now it was my time to purse my lips. I hoped this wasn’t the part of the evening where he defended the honor of the girl who strung him along for years.
Kendrick met my gaze. “Elizabeth isn’t intelligent enough to have concocted everything by herself.” I opened my mouth to speak, but he raised a palm. “She’s vindictive, resourceful, and determined, but this plan to discredit Mr. Burgh must have come from her mother.”
I nodded. Everything he said so far made sense. The mere fact that Elizabeth decided to use the cocaine she’d received from her family instead of planting it in my room said she wasn’t the mastermind behind the plot to tear me down. “But what are you saying?”
“There might be a way to resolve this with Elizabeth’s help.”
I shook my head. “She’ll never side with me against her family. Besides, she’s crazy.”
Kendrick picked up his drink and took two long sips. “She wasn’t nearly this erratic last year. And you said yourself, she acted as though she was high on cocaine.”
The server came and guided us out of the bar area and into a gorgeous sunroom restaurant. Three of its walls were floor-to-ceiling glass, with a vaulted glass atrium that reflected the cloudy, dark sky. Outdoor lights beyond the windows illuminated manicured gardens of snowdrops and violas growing among colored shrubs.
Moments after we sat at a corner table, the waiter brought our first course, cured salmon on a bed of roasted fennel and aioli, a garlic mayonnaise sauce.
“You want me to appeal to her better nature?” I asked.
“Appeal to her weaknesses.” His gaze swept down my body. “With hindsight, I understand why she got those other girls expelled. They were blonde, petite, pretty, and had refused her advances. She would do anything to stop the knowledge of her preferences from going public.”
I clutched at my knife and fork. “If you’re saying I should seduce her—”
“Not at all.” His cheeks turned pink, and he lowered his forearms over his crotch. “Elizabeth spent years leading others to believe they stood a chance at winning her. In doing so, she amassed a crowd of followers, willing to do her bidding.”
Nodding, I cut a slice of salmon and let his words percolate in my head. I’d feel shitty about pretending to like someone, even if it was Elizabeth. She was also as strong as an ape and powered by insanity. Getting into a room alone with her could be disastrous. I shook off those thoughts. Kendrick’s idea was outlandish. Not because of the girl-on-girl part, or the potential danger, but I couldn’t look at Elizabeth without wanting to cave in her face with my fist.
“Think about it.” He picked up his water glass and gazed at me with a twinkle in his eye.
I leaned forward and grinned. “Admit it. The thought of her and me together gets you hot.”
He huffed a laugh and took another sip. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“You can’t hide from me.” I pulled my foot out of my shoe and trailed my toes up his muscular calf.
“Lilah Hancock,” he said through clenched teeth. “Restrain yourself.”
I dropped my foot and leaned back in my seat. Maybe things weren’t so bad, after all. Even if Mother didn’t turn up at the hotel, I had an entire plane ride to tease Kendrick to make up for the disappointment. If I could drape a blanket over his lap, I might work him into a frenzy.
Kendrick dropped his gaze from mine and focused on his salmon. I
suppressed a smile. If this had been Orlando or Maxwell, they would relish the chance of an under-the-table footjob.
Later, as we ate a main course of roasted pheasant with celeriac mash, glazed parsnips, and Brussels sprouts, Kendrick put down his knife and fork. “About that police raid. Were you terrified?”
I finished my mouthful of food and swallowed. “No right-minded person could take something like that in their stride.”
“But they brought dogs.”
I set down my knife and fork and gazed into his eyes. The old me might have made a joke about it, but my family had been through too many machinations to brush off the ordeal. “It was a living, humiliating, and terrifying nightmare.”
“We didn’t know you had a phobia.”
Nodding, I dropped my gaze to my plate and tried not to think of the German shepherd that jumped on my chest. The chef had arranged the food Michelin style—placed into a pretty pile at the center like a work of art with swirls of a rich sauce to provide both color and taste.
“Lilah.” He reached across the table and placed his hand on mine. “We would never have subjected you to something so horrific if we had known.”
“Why did you agree to something so shitty?” I asked.
“Revenge.” He brushed his thumb over my knuckles. “At the time, I thought you had lured my best friend and brother into a trap and uploaded incriminating videos of them in a compromising position. Max was almost disinherited.”
I pulled back my hand and placed it on my lap. “How much about the raid did you know?”
“Elizabeth told me you were dealing cocaine and needed Max to go undercover and gain your trust.” He exhaled a weary breath.“So, while I took Max’s punishment, he was supposed to gather information and get you in place for the raid.”
“That’s why she was so outraged when she discovered we’d had sex.”
“It was a surprise to us all,” Kendrick said with a half-smile. “You were supposed to be a dangerous element bringing the academy to ruin.”