Once Upon a Wallflower (26 page)

She shivered beneath his bold scrutiny. “Thank you, my lord.”

His eyes searched the crowd behind her before he turned his full attention back to her. “Would you care to accompany me on a turn around the circle? I believe there is a troop of jugglers and magicians on the far side, and we might see some of the braver young men leap through the bonfire. For luck, you know.”

He offered his arm, and Mira could think of no polite way to decline. Setting her hand upon his forearm, she allowed him to lead her away.

“So, Miss Fitzhenry,” Blackwell began, leaning down so that his mouth was only a whisper away from her ear, “if you will permit me to say so, you seem to have blossomed over the past few weeks. Your new clothes and the style of your hair suit you.”

Mira’s cheeks burned at the unexpected flattery. “Thank you, my lord,” she responded, through lips that barely moved.

“You are not the only one who has changed,” Blackwell continued. “Ashfield is a new man entirely, and I believe that you may be the reason for his transformation.”

Blackwell stopped, his hold on Mira’s arm forcing her to do the same. “Ashfield has already lost one potential bride. Take care that he does not lose another.”

Mira could not think what to say. Blackwell’s words sent a shiver down her spine, but she could not tell whether he meant them as threat or warning. Thankfully, she was saved from having to respond.

“Here you are,” Nicholas said, neatly insinuating himself between Mira and Blackwell, his body sheltering hers, claiming her as his.

“Ashfield.” Blackwell inclined his head politely and took a step back, relinquishing his position by Mira’s side.

“My lord.” Nicholas’s tone was frigid.

“Well, if you two will excuse me, I see Lord Bexley over from Pelmeth Moor, and I intended to speak with him about a brood mare of his. It seems I am still in the market. So,” he turned an intent gaze on Mira, “I hope you will heed my advice. But for now, I bid you good night.”

As Blackwell made his way past the revelers, in the direction of an enormously fat man wearing tiny-heeled shoes and an outdated wig the size of a small sheep, Mira turned her face to Nicholas and gave him a grateful smile.

He did not return her smile, but instead looked profoundly suspicious. “What was that all about?” he questioned. “What advice?”

“Oh, nothing, my lord.”

“‘My lord’? Are we back to that then?” The thought seemed to sadden him, and Mira opened her mouth to correct her mistake, but he held up a hand to stop her. “No, it is fine. I have something I must tell you. Something I should have said before. Something I should have done before.”

In that instant, a thousand thoughts ran through Mira’s mind. He is going to tell me he loves me. He is going to tell me he despises me. He is going to tell me he is leaving me. He is going to tell me he dislikes blood pudding.

He is going to confess.

“You were right,” he said, and Mira’s breath left her body in a dizzying rush.

“I was right? About what?”

He took her by the arm and began to lead her away from the thick of the crowd, toward the dark shadows on the far side of the stone circle. “About my father,” he said. “And about justice. I am prepared to swear out an information against my father.”

Chapter Nineteen

Mira stared at Nicholas in amazement. Nicholas was going to help her. He was going to see justice done.

A shrill scream of delight from within the stone circle shook Mira out of her daze. “Are you certain? Are you certain you are willing to do this?”

Nicholas held her gaze unwaveringly, nodded solemnly. “It is over.”

A bubble of laughter welled in Mira’s throat. “After all of this…this worry, it comes to something so simple? You take me aside and calmly tell me that you are ready to accuse your father?” Mira shook her head in wonder. “I have been torn to pieces inside over this mystery, worrying that I would never know for certain, worrying that I might miss something vital, worrying that my logic would fail me and my heart lead me astray, worrying that I might be so confused that I had actually fallen in love with a murderer! And now you announce, tepid as tea, that it is over?”

As her mind caught up with her mouth, Mira grew still. She stared at Nicholas with wide, worried eyes, wondering if he had caught her slip.

The sudden silver fire in his eyes told her he had.

“What did you say?” His voice resonated with a low, vital energy.

“Hmmm?”

“You heard me, Mira-mine. Did you just say that you love me?”

Mira looked down at her hands as her insides turned to water. She had said it—and meant it—and he had heard her. There was no point denying her feelings. But what if he took a disgust of her, thought her weak and clinging? What if he found it amusing that he should have such power over her?

Marshaling all her courage, she raised her eyes to meet his. “Yes, Nicholas. I did say that.”

A breathless silence ensued, both Nicholas and Mira standing unnaturally still in a magic circle of their own. The laughing and singing and music of the festival seemed far away, and only the pixie-light of the bonfire offered any evidence that they were not utterly alone.

“Then why are you leaving?” Nicholas whispered.

Mira frowned. “Leaving? I am not leaving.”

He shook his head stubbornly. “I heard George give you the money to leave. I heard you take it.”

“He gave me the money, and the choice. I could hardly refuse his generosity. And I admit that I gave his offer some thought. But I decided against it. I decided to stay.”

“But I stopped at your room this evening, thinking to tell you about my father then, and I saw that your bags were packed. There were trunks and valises piled nearly to the ceiling in your room.”

Now Mira shook her head. “My bags were not packed, sir. The bags must have been Bella’s.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Mira bit her lip, reluctant to break Bella’s confidence. She needed to explain the baggage in her room to Nicholas, however, and she did not think he would try to interfere with the elopement. After all, he had once offered to give up his own bride, to be jilted and played for a fool, in order to allow Jeremy to elope with the girl of his heart.

“Bella and Jeremy are planning to elope tonight,” she explained with an apologetic shrug. “Bella asked me if she could hide her baggage away in my bedroom. I told her I did not think it was necessary, and that I did not want to be involved. But she insisted. And I just could not bring myself to deny her,” she added with a small smile of apology. “I confess that with everything that has happened in the last few days, I had almost forgotten about that aspect of her plan. And I was not certain whether the elopement would actually happen, or whether one of them would come to their senses. But apparently she went ahead and had her bags moved to my room after I left. No wonder she was late coming downstairs this evening.”

“Bella. Bella is the one who is leaving?” Nicholas sounded dazed, as if he could not quite grasp what Mira was trying to tell him.

“Yes, Bella and Jeremy. Not me.”

Nicholas closed his eyes briefly, his entire body sagging with relief. But then he opened his eyes, and a sly smile crept across his face. “Well, that is an interesting turn of events. Beatrix will not be pleased in the least.”

“No, she will not be happy. She seems to dislike poor Bella immensely. And Aunt Kitty will not be happy either.”

“No?”

“No.”

Nicholas cocked a questioning brow.

“No money,” Mira replied.

“Ah.” He shook his head, visibly shifting his attention back to more immediate concerns. His smile turned warm and intimate. “So, you are staying and you love me?”

Mira’s breath caught in her throat.

“Yes,” she whispered. The frightful promise of the moment, the dread and terror and hope all tangled together, left her feeling strangely calm, every sense attuned to Nicholas, focusing on how he would react.

He stared at her for what seemed like an eternity, his smoldering smile unwavering, his eyes burning into her. But he said nothing. Finally, he reached out one hand to stroke a wayward curl of her hair.

“Have I mentioned how lovely you look tonight?” His voice was velvet.

Mira shook her head.

His hand trailed down to brush her shoulder, following the broad, deep neckline of her gown. “You look like Aphrodite rising from the sea,” he said, quirking one eyebrow at his own whimsy, “all waves and fire and soft, creamy skin. Lovely.”

“Thank you.” She could only manage the faintest murmur.

“No, Mira-mine. Thank
you
.”

He leaned down, then, his body curving around hers, making her feel small and delicate and cherished. His heat washed over her in a luscious wave, bearing the scent of cloves and sea air and woodsmoke. Lightly, his lips brushed hers, a gossamer hint of a kiss, but it was enough to spark a fire deep in her belly.

She yearned toward him, her body seeking contact as though compelled by some natural force, something stronger than her own will. With a soft sigh, she abandoned herself to that compulsion, allowing instinct to guide her.

“Oh, ho, ho! What do we have here?”

Mira pulled away from Nicholas in alarm, peeking around his shoulder to see Lady Marleston tittering into her hand.

The older woman looked like an overblown rose, abundant flesh overflowing the ruched bodice of her scarlet gown, hair amassed in a pile of exuberant curls atop her head, her features lax and ruddy from intoxication. She swayed slightly on her feet as she leaned forward to speak in a conspiratorial whisper. “Antishi…ansnishi…ahem, anticipating the wedding, are we?”

She laughed again, sending a hot blast of moist, alcoholic breath directly into Mira’s face. Lady Marleston was redolent of some strange liquor, something sweet and yet peppery, sugary but with an awful bite. Something familiar.

Mira drew back and stared at the woman in amazement.

Nicholas cleared his throat, drawing Lady Marleston’s confused attention.

“Madam,” Nicholas said, his voice slow and firm, like the tone one would take with an obstinate child, “madam, I believe you are quite drunk.”

He might have gone on, chastising Lady Marleston for her vulgar observation and sending the woman on her way, but Mira cut in.

“Lady Marleston, might I ask what you have been drinking?”

With a wild swing of her head, Lady Marleston shifted her attention back to Mira. “Pardon me, dear?”

Slowly, Mira repeated, “What have you been drinking?” Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Nicholas frowning in puzzlement.

Lady Marleston also frowned, in earnest concentration. “Oh yes,” she replied, her face lighting up with a self-satisfied smile. “But, oh no. I have not been drinking at all, dear. I simply took a tonic.”

“What tonic?” Mira said, struggling to keep her patience in the face of Lady Marleston’s drink-addled wits.

“Beatrix gave me a tonic for my head. Her physician recommended it for her megrims, and I was coming down with one this evening. Nasty stuff, even when you mix it with sugar. But Beatrix swears by it. I took the dose she gave me, and when that didn’t work, I took a little more. And then just a teensy bit more.”

Mira turned an expectant gaze on Nicholas.

“Absinthe,” he said, seeming to anticipate her question.

“Absinthe?”

“Yes, it is a decoction of wormwood in an alcohol base. Spices are added to make it more palatable, aniseed and who knows what else. Some Frenchman produces it for sale on the continent, and he claims it cures all sorts of maladies. Beatrix takes it for headaches.”

“Does anyone else in the household take this remedy?” Mira asked, tension stretching her voice taut as a bowstring.

“Not that I know of,” Nicholas responded. “Mira, why the sudden interest in Beatrix’s headaches?”

“I—”

“This is dull.” Lady Marleston lowered her brow and pouted her lip in a petulant sulk. “You are dull. I’m going to find Henrietta Bosworth. She’s a card.” Lady Marleston swung about on her heel, tilting precariously to one side, and then forged off into the crowd.

Mira shook her head, watching her go, and then turned back to Nicholas. “I’m not interested in her headaches but in that odor. It was the same scent I noted when the horseman ran me off the path to Dowerdu. Only it was faint then, just a whiff in the folds of the rider’s cloak as it brushed past my face.”

“You smelled absinthe when you were run off the cliff?” Nicholas spoke with a sense of unreality, as though he were repeating words in a foreign tongue without having any clue of their meaning.

“Yes,” Mira murmured, squinting at a button on his waistcoat as she thought through all of the implications of this new twist.

“Hmmm. I was not aware that my father ever partook of Beatrix’s remedies. I would have thought him more inclined to take a stiff gin. Something a little more English, if you take my meaning.”

“Your father did not do it,” Mira muttered, still staring at Nicholas’s button.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Your father did not do it.”

“Mira, you have just spent the better part of a week reaching the seemingly inescapable conclusion that he very much did do it, and I have even agreed to swear out an information against him.”

“Mmmm, no,” Mira replied with a tiny shake of her head. She leaned back to look Nicholas in the face. “I am afraid that I concluded tonight that your father is not, in fact, the murderer.”

“And how, pray tell, did you reach this conclusion? I thought we were in agreement as to his guilt.” A hint of annoyance had crept into his tone. “As you took such pains to explain to me a few short days ago, the fact of his affairs with two of the victims strongly suggests that he is the murderer.”

“Yes, well, I thought so as well. But not any longer. When I spoke with Uncle George earlier, I asked him about his activities yesterday. Uncle George was with Blackwell all day. They left at dawn to go to a neighboring village to inspect a brood mare. Uncle George said they rode for hours to get there, so they must have ridden for hours to get home, as well. Blackwell would have been miles away from Dowerdu when I was run off the cliff. He did not try to kill me.”