Pamela Sherwood (32 page)

“Perhaps even sweeter,” Robin agreed, mouth curving in a faint smile. “I should go and congratulate the happy couple. We haven’t spoken much before—” He broke off, stiffening beside her, his gaze arrowing across the room over her shoulder.

“Robin, what’s wrong?”

His voice was taut. “Look, over there.”

She turned her head, following the direction of his gaze. “Sir Lucas and—his wife?”

They were standing by Grace and John, offering their good wishes no doubt. Sir Lucas looked uncomfortable, Sophie was pleased to note, but Constance Nankivell, a petite brunette with a round, softly pretty face, was smiling.

Robin’s hand closed about her arm like a vise. “Lady Nankivell is wearing Nathalie’s diamond necklace.”

Sophie snapped her attention back to him. “What? Are you sure?”

He nodded, tight-lipped and flint-eyed. “Entirely. The circumstances in which I saw it are impossible to forget.”

Sophie winced, remembering what he’d told her in Oxfordshire. “What do you want me to do, dear heart?” she asked, pitching her voice for his ears alone.

His mouth twisted in a parody of a smile. “Why, procure me an introduction, of course.”

“Of course.” Sophie kept her tone mild and pleasant as she slipped her own social mask back into place.

She stole a glance at Robin as they crossed the room, uneasily aware of something… dangerous behind his eyes, something more than anger—tightly contained for now, but lethal if allowed to escape. Even when she looked away, she could feel it radiating from him like heat from a furnace.

The Nankivells were just turning away from the engaged couple as Sophie and Robin approached. Sophie glanced first at Sir Lucas, and saw a look of dismay cross his face before his gaze slid away from them both. Remembering the many times he’d tried to injure or humiliate Robin, the last just a few days ago, Sophie felt a stab of vindictive satisfaction at his discomfiture. Suppressing it as best she could, she turned to his wife.

Constance Nankivell looked younger than she had from a distance, nearer to Sophie’s own age, and her round brown eyes, along with the pale pink gown she wore, added to the impression of youth and artlessness. Trying not to stare at the diamond pendant blazing splendidly, even garishly about her smooth throat, Sophie opened her mouth to begin the introduction, but Lady Nankivell spoke first.

“Miss Sophie Tresilian?” The brown eyes were guileless, even friendly. “I wanted to tell you how well you sang tonight.”

Any opening was a start. Sophie smiled brilliantly. “Thank you, Lady Nankivell. I am glad you enjoyed my performance.”

“Oh, call me Constance, please,” Lady Nankivell entreated. “I still haven’t got used to my title, even hearing it from friends—or those I should like to consider friends.”

Sophie decided Lady Nankivell was much nicer than her husband deserved. “Constance, then,” she agreed. “Grace tells me you have but recently returned to Cornwall?”

Constance colored slightly. “I’ve been visiting my parents in Birmingham for the last few weeks. But Cornwall is my home
now
.”

Sophie did not miss the emphasis on that last word, and wondered whom it was Constance was trying to convince. “And a wonderful home it is,” she agreed. “I’ve been away for several years myself, but I still consider Cornwall the home of my heart.”

Beyond his wife’s shoulder, Sir Lucas was shifting from foot to foot, clearly desiring nothing more than to remove himself and his wife from the vicinity. Fortunately, Constance showed no inclination to oblige him. “That’s not surprising if your roots are here. I understand the Tresilians are one of the county’s oldest families?”

“Oh, we are, along with many of our neighbors.” Sophie sensed Robin coming to a point beside her, like an actor preparing to make his entrance. “Talking of which, may I present to you Mr. Robin Pendarvis, an old friend of the family?”

“Pendarvis?” Constance’s eyes widened, then a slight flush mounted to her cheeks. “Oh, you are… pray accept my condolences on the loss of your wife. I was—not well-acquainted with her,” she rushed on, her flush deepening. “But what a terrible thing to happen, all the same.”

“Thank you, Lady Nankivell,” Robin returned, bowing punctiliously over her hand. “It was terrible, indeed.”

His grave, measured tone seemed to irritate Sir Lucas beyond bearing. “In light of your
terrible
bereavement, Pendarvis,” he broke in, “I am surprised to see you in attendance tonight.”

Sophie stiffened, thinking the same could be said of the baronet. Had he not lost a mistress, after all? To say nothing of the baby he might have fathered. She leveled a withering stare at him. “Mr. Pendarvis is here at
our
express invitation, Sir Lucas. We do not deny our friends the comforts of our home and our companionship in times of trouble.”

Constance looked uncomfortable, but Robin did not even deign to acknowledge Sir Lucas’s remark. All his attention, his single-minded focus, was on the baronet’s wife. “What a magnificent necklace you’re wearing tonight, Lady Nankivell. Might I ask how you came by it?”

Constance touched the pendant. “It was a gift from Sir Lucas, on my return.” She paused, eyeing Robin uncertainly. “Why do you ask, Mr. Pendarvis?”

Robin swallowed, but his gaze and voice were perfectly steady. “Because the last time I saw that necklace, it was around the throat of my late wife, Nathalie.”

Constance stared at him, the color draining from her face as the significance of his words sank in. “But Sir Lucas…” Her voice trailed off in confusion.

“Absurd!” the baronet interrupted again. His face was flushed—with anger or with nerves? Sophie suspected it was both. He stabbed a furious forefinger at Robin. “
You
are delusional, Pendarvis! I gave this to my wife and my wife alone!”

Now Robin looked at his nemesis, and Sophie caught her breath at the icy rage that had uncoiled in his eyes. Only his voice was colder. “I know what I saw, Nankivell. And when I saw it. As should
you
, for you were present at the time.”

“Come, my dear.” Sir Lucas took his wife’s arm. “I will not stay here to be maligned.”

“Oh, I think you will, Nankivell,” a new voice remarked.

Harry had appeared behind Sir Lucas—and he was flanked by James, John, and Arthur. Silently, the four men formed a circle around the baronet, cutting him off from the rest of the room. Sir Lucas’s eyes darted from one face to the other, but found no mercy in any.

Was he remembering how they’d taken him down five years ago? Not for the first time, Sophie wished that she’d seen it.

“I suggest we remove ourselves to the library,” Harry continued. “As we did before.”

Mouth tightening, Sir Lucas drew himself up haughtily. “I don’t have to go anywhere with you, Tresilian. Let me pass, all of you!”

No one moved. Robin said coolly, “Shall we send for Inspector Taunton? I am sure that he, and perhaps even his superior, would be interested in knowing just where my late wife’s stolen property has turned up.”

Constance stifled a gasp, her hand straying to the pendant, then dropping away at once in revulsion. Sophie felt a pang of pity for her—the innocent dupe of an unscrupulous man.

Sir Lucas, who’d paled visibly at the mention of Taunton, now rounded on Robin. “How dare you distress my wife, Pendarvis, with your talk of police and stolen property! I will not stay to be insulted further!” He bent over Constance in a display of solicitude as fulsome as it was false. “Come, my lady, let us depart at once.”

“No.” The word was faint but definite. To everyone’s amazement, Constance swallowed and repeated more firmly, “No.” Freeing her arm from her husband’s clutches, she straightened to her full height and faced them all. “I am not going anywhere at present, Sir Lucas. I want to hear what Mr. Pendarvis has to say. All of it.”

***

Sophie knew from bitter experience that there was no easy way to break a woman’s heart—or shatter her illusions, at the very least.

To his credit, Robin made the effort to do so with a minimum of cruelty, speaking calmly and without heat of finding Nathalie and Sir Lucas together—his tone left no doubt as to his meaning—and seeing the necklace around Nathalie’s throat. All the same, it was painful to watch the color, along with any remaining vestige of hope, drain from Constance’s face as she listened.

Sir Lucas had lapsed into defiant silence, arms crossed, refusing to look at anyone in the library. No doubt he was recalling his previous defeat at the hands of Robin, Harry, and James—and seething that they’d brought him to this point again. John had gone back to the party with Grace, but quiet, watchful Arthur remained, pen and paper close at hand should some record of this meeting become necessary. Sophie herself had flatly refused to be dismissed.

“So, how did that necklace come to be back in your possession, Nankivell?” Harry inquired conversationally. “Did you pinch it when Nathalie wasn’t looking, or did she throw it at you in a fit of pique? I can’t see her parting with it otherwise.”

The baronet glanced at him with dislike, his mouth compressing mutinously.

“Answer him, Sir Lucas,” Constance spoke at last, her voice pitched high and taut with strain. “I want to know how I came to be wearing your dead mistress’s jewels!” She reached up, fumbling with the necklace’s catch, and all but flung it from her when it came undone. It fell almost soundlessly to the carpet, where it glittered like a diamond snake.

Sir Lucas lurched forward in his chair as though he meant to scoop it up, only to desist at a barrage of condemnatory stares. He slumped back, sullen and defeated.

“Nathalie and I parted company a few days before her death.” He gave a short, forced laugh. “To tell the truth, I can’t think what I ever saw in her. And as our association was at an end, I demanded the return of the necklace.”

“And she gave it to you, just like that?” James sounded skeptical.

Sir Lucas shrugged. “There was a bit of a scene—she was a Frenchwoman, after all. But in the end, I convinced her to part with it.”

“So you took the necklace when you broke with my wife.” Robin’s tone was neutral, his face expressionless, but for some reason, Sophie felt her scalp prickle when he spoke.

Nankivell contrived to look down his nose. “That’s what I just said, Pendarvis.”

“You lie.”

In an instant, Robin had surged from his chair and seized Sir Lucas by the throat. Constance made a sound that was half gasp, half shriek, as the other men leapt to their feet.

“You lie,” Robin repeated through clenched teeth now, as he drove the struggling baronet backward, slamming him hard against the nearest wall. “Nathalie’s maid, Enid, saw the necklace among her things when she undressed her for the night. It was in her jewel box—and you know that because you were
there
! You killed her, didn’t you? You murdered my wife!” His hand tightened about Sir Lucas’s throat, and the man began to choke and gag, his face turning an alarming shade of puce. “She was
pregnant
, you bastard—and you killed them both!”

Sophie heard a faint whimper from Constance, then someone—probably Harry—swore. But her own attention was fixed on her lover, and the murderous rage darkening his eyes. “Robin, no!” she said sharply. “Let me summon the constable!”

Harry and James had already converged on the pair, trying to wrest them apart.

“Let him go, Rob!” Harry caught his friend by the shoulder. “He’s not worth soiling your hands on.”

James had pinioned Sir Lucas’s arms, but the baronet, doubled over and crowing for breath, made no attempt to resist.

“I didn’t kill her!” he rasped out, hanging limp in James’s grasp. “As God is my witness, she was dead when I got there!”

***

“I took the necklace,” Sir Lucas repeated, some minutes later, his voice still hoarse but clearer. “But I swear she was already dead when I entered her chamber—just after midnight.”

He sat slumped in his chair again, pale, disheveled, all his arrogance gone. Robin’s attack and the threat of arrest had taken the remaining fight out of him. Now he swallowed painfully. “It was—
horrible
. Her face…”

He paused, looking about the room with the air of one expecting… sympathy? understanding? Encountering only stony stares, he dropped his gaze to the carpet.

“We
had
broken with each other, before.”

“Her decision or yours?” Sophie surprised herself by asking, but she was even more surprised when Sir Lucas responded.

“Hers, damn her. She said she was weary of me.” Insult flickered briefly in his eyes. “Not as weary as I was of her, I told her, and I demanded the necklace back. She laughed in my face.” His hands clenched in his lap. “Mercenary bitch. But I still had the key she gave me. I knew where she kept her jewels, and that she slept like the—like the dead, after…”

After
sex
, Sophie finished silently. Sir Lucas had probably hoped to enjoy Nathalie’s favors one last time. She stole a glance at Robin and saw by his sardonic expression that he’d arrived at a similar conclusion.

“Anyway, she was dead,” Sir Lucas resumed, his voice and expression harder this time. “I could not tell how long. I didn’t want to touch her. And there was her jewel box, just sitting on the vanity. I took what I’d come for… and a few other things as well.”

No comment greeted this disclosure, but the accusing silence said it all.
Adulterer. Coward. Thief
. Sophie did not know whether she was more appalled by the baronet’s theft or his self-serving decision not to raise the alarm when he discovered Nathalie’s body hours before her maid.

“Well, why shouldn’t I have taken it?” Sir Lucas demanded, looking up defiantly. “The necklace was mine, bought and paid for—it wasn’t going to do Nathalie any good.”

“
Mine
bought and paid for, you mean,” Constance reminded him. “You used my family’s money, my dowry, to buy gifts for that—that French slut!” She flushed at having to utter such a vulgar word, but she did not retract it.

“And I realized not a moment too soon that you were worth twenty of her!” Sir Lucas broke in hurriedly.