Elizabeth Thornton - [Special Branch 02] (42 page)

Gwyn looked at Jason, but he was studiously examining a loose button on his coat. Her pulse began to race.

After a moment, Grandmother Radley went on, “I truly believed that the only salvation for us as a family was for Jason to marry an heiress and pay off our debts. So, I encouraged him to believe that you were in love with George, though I knew it wasn’t true.” She looked at Gwyn. “And I told you that Jason was engaged to some young woman, I forget her name.”

“Charlotte Roberts,” said Gwyn.

“In my own defense, I will say that I thought it was only a matter of time before the engagement would be announced, and I wanted to prepare you for the worst.”

To this point, her voice had been quite steady, but now it turned husky. “When you eloped with Nigel Barrie, I was crushed. I realized, then, how deeply you must have loved Jason. I never believed you were happy with your husband, whatever your letters to Trish said. They were too vague, and too cheerful. And you hardly ever mentioned your husband’s name. And when Jason never married, I knew that I’d been wrong about him too.”

There was a long silence, then Jason stirred. “You’re
taking too much upon yourself, Grandmother. You can’t possibly have known how I felt or how Gwyn felt. We made our own choices and our own mistakes.”

Grandmother Radley rattled her cane. “A blind man could see how you both felt. Gwyn would walk into a room, and the atmosphere around you, Jason, would become charged. Do you know how many sleepless nights I endured, wondering how it would all end? You were both too young to know your own minds.” Her voice lost some of its force. “Leastways, that’s what I thought then.”

Jason was beginning to look amused. “And what do you think now, Grandmother?”

The cane rattled again. “I’m too old for sleepless nights. I’m too old to patrol corridors, making sure that you and Gwyneth are in your own beds. And you’re old enough now to know your own minds. Quite frankly, I don’t know what you’re waiting for. Well, I did my best. I tried to make amends. I can’t be expected to do more than that, can I?” She paused. “All right. I’m sorry, truly sorry for what I did.”

She leaned on her cane and slowly got up.

Jason said, “The attorney said that when the time was right, you would make yourself known to us. When would that have been, Grandmother? I mean, if we hadn’t found you out?”

“When you married, of course,” snapped his grandmother, “as you know very well.”

“You mean,” said Jason, “I was to repay the ten thousand pounds you settled on Gwyn and Mark?”

“Of course. What else?”

Jason rose. “Then let me do it at once. Perhaps you’d like to come with me to the bank?”

His grandmother, standing as though rooted to the spot, said in an odd little voice, “You mean …”

“Yes, Grandmother, I do mean. Well, aren’t you going to wish us happy?”

Grandmother Radley sank back in her chair. For a moment, her face was transformed with joy, but it was only for a moment. Her tongue was as sharp as ever. “You did this on purpose, to rob me of the pleasure of planning your wedding.”

“Not at all,” said Jason. “I did it to save you the trouble of patrolling the corridors to make sure that Gwyn and I are in our own beds.”

Gwyn waited in some trepidation for the explosion to go off. Grandmother Radley surprised her by cackling with laughter.

“Well, well,” she said. “What does it matter as long as it’s done? Of course, I wish you happy. Come here, both of you, and let me kiss you.”

Mark, bursting into the room a few moments later, found his mother sniffing back tears, and his grandmother blowing her nose into a gentleman’s handkerchief. “What is it, Mama?” he cried. “What’s wrong?”

Gwyn managed a watery smile. “Cousin Jason has something he wishes to say to you.”

She pinned Jason with a look and nodded, whereupon Jason took a deep breath and crouched down so that he and Mark were eye to eye.

“What would you say, Mark, if I told you … that is … if …” Jason glanced at Gwyn, who nodded encouragingly. He started over. “Do you remember, Mark, we talked once about why I wasn’t married?”

“Yes,” said Mark. “You said you were waiting for Princess Charming to come along.”

“Well, she did. And I married her. You see, Mark …”

“Oh, no!” Mark’s little face puckered. “I was wishing, I was
praying
that you would marry Mama.”

Gwyn and Jason stood at the edge of the bed, looking down at their sleeping son. “Who would have believed,” said Jason, “that it could have been so easy?”

Gwyn blew out the candle, then arm in arm, they walked along the corridor to Gwyn’s room. “I did,” she said. “I told you, Mark thinks the world of you.”

“I asked him if he would like to call me Papa instead of Cousin Jason, and he’s been ‘Papa-ing’ me all night long.”

“Don’t let it go to your head. He thinks now that I’m Princess Charming.”

They entered their room and shut the door. Jason took his wife into his arms. They were both smiling.

“You know,” he said, “I won’t be entirely satisfied until Mark knows I’m his real father.”

“I don’t think that’s going to be a hurdle. It’s Grandmother I worry about. How can we ever tell her; how can we explain that Mark is her grandson?”

Jason chuckled. “She knows already. No, I didn’t tell her. But I know my grandmother. Gwyn, you only have to look at her with Mark to know.”

“Oh.”

“She’s not going to find fault. She’s going to want the whole world to know. And so do I.”

Gwyn untied her dressing robe, slipped it off, and led Jason to the bed. “I don’t want to talk about Mark and Grandmother,” she said. “I want to talk about us.”

“And I don’t want to talk at all.”

“Jason, one of us has to be first to say those three little words, and I think it should be you.”

He scratched his chin. “I was thinking the same thing, only in reverse. I think you should say those words to me.”

“Why should I?”

He stretched out beside her and with a lover’s knowledge kissed the hollow of her throat, making her tremble. “Because,” he said, “you owe it to me, Gwyn.” He kissed her lips, silencing her protest. “You owe me for all those inadequate substitutes I was
forced to make do with because I couldn’t have you; you owe me for all those empty years when I thought you were happy with Barrie, never sparing me a thought; you owe me for making me fall in love with you, all over again, just when I thought I was getting over you. So you see, you have to say the words first.”

Her heart was singing. “Well, when you put it like that, I suppose it’s only fair. I love you, Jason Radley. I always have and I always shall. Well, aren’t you going to say the words to me?”

“I thought I already had.” He winced when she punched him on the shoulder. “I love you,” he said quickly when she would have hit him again.

After several minutes of pleasurable activity, he raised his head and looked down at her. “You’re different,” he said. “You’re very sure of me now, aren’t you?”

Her smile was smug. “Oh, yes. Grandmother opened my eyes to so much that I hadn’t understood before. And you didn’t contradict her. So I knew it had to be true. All these years, you’ve really loved me.”

“Yes, well, she opened my eyes to a few things about you. If only—”

She covered his lips with her fingers. “Who cares about ‘if only?’ We’re here, where we belong.” She looked up at him, her face radiant with love. “Our time has come. Let’s make the most of it.”

“I intend to,” he said, and with a wicked grin, he began to disrobe.

Jason lay awake as Gwyn slept. He stroked her hair, he kissed the corner of her mouth, and smiled when she huffed in her sleep and tried to edge away from him. He wouldn’t allow it. She was never going to get away from him again.

It seemed incredible to him, lying here with his wife in his arms, how everything had turned out. Tomorrow, he decided, he would thank his grandmother for her part in bringing them together. Whatever she said about making amends, he knew that she’d been playing matchmaker.

There was someone else he had to thank, and that was Richard Maitland. Gwyn had hardly mentioned his name in the last two days. She’d come round in time. She must see that it was men like Richard who made it possible for them to sleep easy in their beds at night.

Gwyn stirred and made snuffing sounds that were perilously close to snoring. For some obscure reason, this delighted him.

With his lips close to her ear, he whispered, “Princess Charming you are not.”

“Mmm?” Gwyn’s lashes fluttered. “What did you say?”

“I said, my darling wife, that you’re Queen of my Heart.”

R
ichard Maitland read Jason’s letter, folded it, and tapped it absently against his desk. It wasn’t often that he was thanked for doing his job. It made him feel a little better about Lord Ivan, a little better about the agonizing interview he’d had with Lord Ivan’s father.

So Jason had married Gwyneth Barrie. He felt a small pang of regret. He had liked her, really liked her. And she had liked him, until she’d witnessed what she’d imagined was an execution. Then she’d visibly chilled.

He was used to it.

But it wasn’t an execution. It was a suicide. Lord Ivan hadn’t wanted to be taken alive. He could not face the disgrace.

He tossed the letter aside. He had some leave coming up. It would be a relief to get away from murder and mayhem for a while. He could do a little fishing, scale a few peaks, breathe in the fresh, untainted air of the Scottish Highlands; mix with ordinary, decent people.

He looked at the folder on his desk. It was a new case. He wondered why he was hesitating. He knew damn well he wasn’t going to let anyone get away with murder if he could help it.

He opened the folder and began to read.

Special Branch, in my story, comes from my imagination, and is inspired by the real Special Branch (Irish), which did not come into existence until 1883. It was set up in Scotland Yard and was a police force within a police force, established to combat terrorism.

Best-selling award-winning author Elizabeth Thornton was born and educated in Scotland, and lived in Canada with her husband for over thirty years. In her time, she was a teacher, a lay minister in the Presbyterian Church, a full-time writer, and devoted grandmother to her five grandchildren.

DON’T MISS ELIZABETH THORNTON’S CAPTIVATING ROMANCE …

THE PERFECT PRINCESS

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R
ichard Maitland decided that he wasn’t ready to die yet. Not that he had much say in the matter. A black mist was closing in on him. They must have fed him some powerful sedative, for his brain was telling him to give up and go to sleep. His death would be painless. But it would be ignoble, and that’s what kept him fighting to stay awake.

His murderers would get away with it because they were clever and he’d played right into their hands. He was a lone wolf—a fatal character flaw, according to Harper. In this instance, Harper was right. No one knew what he’d been up to in the last little while. He was supposed to be in Scotland, enjoying a well-earned rest from his job as chief of staff of Special Branch. Though his friends wouldn’t accept the neat little scenario that had been laid out for them, they wouldn’t know where to begin to look for answers to why he had to die.

He wasn’t sure he knew himself.

Who would want him dead?

His laugh turned into a dry, rasping cough, and he clamped his arm across his chest to stifle the stab of pain. He’d made enemies in his time, scores of them. Soldier, agent, chief of staff of Special Branch—a man in his position attracted enemies like flies to a rotting corpse.

Hard on that thought came another.
Lucy
.

The black mist faded as his mind grappled with a burgeoning fear. Lucy. Where was she? What had they done with her? He remembered …

He could smell the blood. The air was ripe with it. Lucy’s blood. His blood. He had to open his eyes, had to get his bearings.