‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Of course you do.’ Maxwell Sinclair leaned closer, his menacing growl a hairsbreadth from the liar’s mottled face. ‘Twelve years isn’t long enough to wipe a repugnant act of violence from my memory and neither is it gone from yours.’
The image haunts me every day and always will.
Max pressed harder on the broken billiard stick, the polished wood rolling over the cur’s Adam’s apple to settle at the softest part of his neck. A sharp chortle followed as Ludlow gasped for breath, his face bright crimson, eyes enlarged and frantic.
‘Please. Have mercy.’ He choked out the words. ‘It wasn’t my idea. It was Pimms.’
‘An insignificant detail. You eluded me for years and now that I’ve dragged you from the hole where you hide, I’ll be damned before I waste this opportunity.’ Max shifted his weight forward. ‘You didn’t grant mercy all those years ago, now did you?’ Frustrated with the conflicted emotions pulsing in his blood and wanting to be finished, Max applied more pressure to the cue, satisfied when Ludlow sputtered a desperate guttural breath. There was no need to prolong the altercation. No one would dare step into the alley behind the disreputable gaming hell while Max conducted business. Still, he’d dirtied his hands enough.
Dropping the stick, he withdrew as the man’s eyes fluttered closed, the limp body falling to the filthy cobbles of the Whitechapel alley in a crumpled heap.
‘Dump him in the river.’ He turned without a backward glance. ‘Hell’s waiting for Mr Ludlow.’
Two men emerged from the shadows to act on the order. And so the first deed was done.
Vivienne Beaumont stood amidst the flickering wall sconces of the gallery at Nettlecombe House and studied her mother’s portrait. Tears stung her lids but she dashed them away, unwilling to allow them to fall.
Control.
Control remained of the utmost importance and proposed the most difficult challenge. Another breath and she won the battle to reclaim her composure.
Consumption and its slow lingering deterioration stole her mother’s vivacity and led to an early death eighteen months prior; yet while the mourning crepe lifted from the windows, mirrors and fireplace mantels, nothing could allay the sombre weight of grief shrouding Vivienne’s heart.
Her mother had possessed a munificent spirit, a rare combination of intuitive compassion and benevolent wisdom. Widowed before Vivienne could know her father, her mother had raised her with strength and pride, determined to keep a place in society no matter that at times hardship made life difficult. How ironic that her mother had remarried only months before her decline and never enjoyed the security she’d found so late in life. She’d spoken of a pleasant future, optimistic she could grow a family now that she’d begun a new life with the earl.
This portrait, completed only months before she’d taken ill, reflected actuality. The artist had captured her mother’s serene disposition and kind smile with great talent. Fresh tears burned Vivienne’s eyes. The gaping absence left behind seemed dark and endless, unable to be filled by friendship or preoccupation, their relationship an example of steadfast respect and uncommon adoration.
She touched the edge of the gilded frame and wiped for lingering dust, her fingertips coming away clean, a credit to her daily ministrations. The long sorrowful nights Vivienne had tended her mother through sickness did little to prepare her for the stark emptiness of death, and despite evidence of worsening illness week after week, hope had survived, only to be left in a wake of despairing finality.
Now everything had shifted, Vivienne’s world once again poised to change. With the mourning period over she would be forced to re-enter society when she’d much prefer the sanctuary of quietude found in her rooms, at least until the pain of loss subsided. Her eyes watered again and she fought back the tears with a series of fast blinks. It proved hard work to master control over tender feelings, yet no sooner had the thought developed when a misplaced disquiet shadowed her reflection. Footfalls from behind caused her to whirl in wary surprise.
‘Vivienne.’
Her stepfather, Ellis Downing, Earl of Huntley, approached and her pulse hitched as a crawl of gooseflesh dotted her skin. Perhaps he brought with him the brisk air of the hallway.
‘Why do you torture yourself, dear? The gallery is dank and chilly, rarely attended by the servants, and still I find you here more often than not.’ He stopped before her, too close for comfort, and a wry expression lowered his brow. ‘Your mother would never approve.’ His voice deepened. ‘I see so much of her in you.’
The reference brought stifled emotion to the forefront and she drew a sharp inhalation as if to muster strength, though the stale air of the corridor chided the earl spoke true. His mention that she resembled her dear mother cut deep and all effort to prevent sentimentality failed as a single tear overflowed.
‘Do not cry.’ He spoke plainly.
How many times had she heard this command in the past year? How difficult to control one’s heartache, the very same organ that sustained life now lanced raw from the hardship of death.
‘I will do my best.’ She whispered the words though they revealed the mantra of her existence. Will. Unending will to control and continue.
‘Of course you will. You are a Beaumont. You carry yourself with pride as any young lady should.’
Was there mockery in his tone? He smiled, though no gladness reached his eyes.
‘Your mother would never wish for you to prolong your grief. In most circumstances, one cannot control death, but life is filled with possibility and choice.’ In an unexpected gesture, he touched her face, two fingers sliding over her skin from the corner of one eye where tears still threatened across her cheekbone and down to her chin. ‘You look so very much like her before the illness ravaged her inner light. A beauty incarnate.’
A faint warning stirred and a shudder raked her spine, yet she held still, the hesitant reaction sparking another of his derisive grins.
‘I told you it was unpleasant and damp in this quarter of the house. Join me downstairs in the salon for tea where I can provide better conversation than a musty portrait on the wall. I won’t have you catching a draught. We’re improved company together. Wouldn’t you agree?’
She gave an absent nod. Her eyes returned to the painting over her shoulder in a silent apologetic farewell. ‘Perhaps we should have one of the servants move Mother’s portrait to the salon or breakfast room. I would like that.’ At times her stepfather caused her misgivings, but he would not silence her voice. Besides, this request was small.
‘Clever girl, always ready to share an idea or solve a problem.’ He slanted an arm outwards to encourage that they take their leave. ‘If it pleases you, it shall be done.’
She followed his retreating form through shadows, confused and equally cautious. She’d barely adjusted to life at Nettlecombe before her mother fell ill and now, with the mourning period past and a short supply of excuses to remain in her rooms, she found avoiding her stepfather’s scrutiny most difficult.
Perhaps that concern alone would serve as impetus to hurry her back into society’s fold and reclaim the relationships she’d abandoned upon her mother’s infirmity.
The hell was packed tonight. A rush of innate satisfaction filled Sinclair as he peered at a crowd of the privileged and disillusioned from the suite of rooms above. Soaking in the success of the enterprise, one third of it at least, he allowed the fleeting condition to wash away the unpleasant deed he’d committed earlier in the evening.