“What was in Vanessa’s journal and how did you get it?” Ariana asked, her stomach knotted with dread.
“You don’t really want to hear this,” Baxter warned.
“Let me be the judge of that.”
He sighed … heavily. “I found the journal beneath Vanessa’s pillow the day after she died. It was almost as if she’d left it there because she wanted me to find it.” He rubbed his temples. “If the journal had been there prior to that day, Theresa would have stumbled upon it when she straightened up. So I can only assume that Vanessa placed it there … that night.”
“Go on.” Ariana leaned against the side of the desk, struggling for composure.
“It contained recountings of Vanessa’s courtship with Kingsley. The madman coveted her like some cherished possession … one he controlled. As long as she was by his side he was content. But when she wasn’t, he became irrational. He hired men to follow her, to see where she was going, whom she was meeting. His twisted jealousy evolved into a hideous, insane obsession. As the months went by, he became more and more unbalanced, totally convincing himself that Vanessa was being unfaithful to him … repeatedly, wantonly … like some common street trollop.”
“And was she?”
“Never.” Baxter bit out the words. “But that didn’t deter Kingsley. If a gentleman so much as tipped his hat in Vanessa’s direction, he suspected the worst and threatened to kill the man on the spot. When Vanessa eventually rebelled, he threatened to kill her too. She was paralyzed with fear.”
“You witnessed all this?” Ariana whispered.
“I didn’t need to!” Baxter snapped. “I knew Kingsley was unstable; I’d seen enough evidence of that. And I knew he had some kind of unique hold over Vanessa. … Initially, I assumed it was merely because of how much she loved him. But as time passed, I watched her change before my very eyes. She became depressed, jumpy, withdrawn. She rarely left the house except when Kingsley summoned her. Then she sped to his side, as if she were terrified of keeping him waiting. That’s when I intervened, begging her to sever their relationship. She refused, insisting that she loved him with her whole heart. Had I known all her journal later revealed, I would have murdered the bastard in cold blood. Instead, I learned the truth too late.” Baxter’s voice broke. “He’d already killed Vanessa.”
“The journal couldn’t possibly have stated that,” Ariana gasped, paling.
“The implication is there,” Baxter spat out, exuding raw hatred. “Whether it was suicide or murder, the end result remains unchanged: Trenton Kingsley killed our sister.”
“Dear Lord.” Ariana covered her face with trembling hands.
“So … at last you believe me?”
She raised her chin, ignoring Baxter’s question in lieu of her own. “Despite these monstrous possibilities, you allowed me to marry him?”
Baxter didn’t flinch. “Yes.”
“How could you?” Her voice shook.
“As I’ve said before, I knew you’d be safe.”
“You knew I’d be safe? How in the name of heaven could you know that?”
Guilt flashed briefly in Baxter’s eyes, ugly memories rearing their heads. “I gave you that answer the day Kingsley brandished his royal decree at Winsham. No one has forgotten the unresolved tragedy of Vanessa’s death … and suspicion has resurfaced along with Kingsley’s re-emergence from the Isle of Wight. All eyes are upon him, and he knows it. No, Ariana, Kingsley wouldn’t dare harm you.”
Ariana dashed bitter tears from her cheeks. “I want to see the journal,” she demanded, needing something more tangible than Baxter’s accusations to strip away her last filaments of intuition and faith.
“I don’t have it.”
“Who does?”
“Kingsley.”
Weakly, she sank into a chair, her eyes widening with shock. “You’d better explain.”
With a defeated sigh, Baxter nodded. “At this point I might as well tell you everything.” He clasped his hands behind his back, studying Ariana’s face to monitor her mental state. “As I said, I discovered the journal beneath Vanessa’s pillow. On her nightstand was a letter she’d written to me the day before she died. It was heartbreaking, filled with torment. … And its message was painfully clear.” He paused to compose himself. “Our sister was saying good-bye.”
Ariana dug her fingers into the arms of the chair. “A suicide note?”
“Seemingly so … yes.”
Baxter’s dubious tone found its mark. “You still believe she was murdered … why?”
“Because Vanessa’s final journal entry, penned the same day as her letter, revealed far more than her note.” Baxter shuddered, remembering. “I had gone out that evening. Apparently, sometime during my absence, Kingsley delivered a message commanding Vanessa to meet him at once. Whatever his words, the tone was obviously far beyond reason or sanity. Vanessa’s terrified state of mind was chillingly evident in her writing. Her references to Kingsley were sinister, ominous. She was obviously petrified about what Kingsley planned to do to her.” Baxter’s jaw clenched. “I’ll never forgive myself for being away when Vanessa needed me.”
“What did you do once you’d read the letter and the journal?” Ariana prompted, a hairsbreadth away from collapse.
“Do?” He leveled his gaze on hers. “Right after Vanessa’s mutilated gown was found washed up on shore, I ordered Kingsley to Winsham. I confronted him with both documents.”
“What was his reaction?”
“He coerced me into giving him the journal.”
Ariana shot up like an arrow. “Coerced you? How did he coerce you?”
Bitterness twisted Baxter’s features into a mask of hatred. “He threatened me, swore he’d strip me of everything I had left if I didn’t turn the journal over to him. I knew by the burning lunacy in his eyes that he was capable of anything … even murder. I had you to consider, sprite. You were my responsibility … and all I had left. He’d already robbed me of Vanessa. So I gave him the journal.”
“But if you’d delivered it to the authorities—”
“They’d say it was the unstable ramblings of a suicidal woman,” Baxter cut in. “The journal was rife with implications, Ariana, but no concrete proof.”
“Yet Trenton insisted on having it.”
“Of course he did! There wasn’t enough evidence to convict the bastard, but there was certainly enough to destroy his name and ruin his family. Society is not nearly so discerning as the courts: They would condemn him on Vanessa’s words alone.”
Ariana nodded numbly. “So you gave him the journal.”
“Yes. All I wanted was to expel Trenton Kingsley from our lives forever.”
The irony of the situation was almost too much for Ariana to bear. The man Baxter had sought to banish from their lives was now her husband.
“I never expected him to return, Ariana,” Baxter said softly, reading her mind. “Even though no one ever saw the journal, news of Vanessa’s probable suicide quickly spread … along with speculation about its cause. The combination of Kingsley’s own guilt and public pressure was too much for him. He fled to Wight six years ago and hasn’t returned … until now.”
Baxter’s words triggered a thought in Ariana’s mind. “Where is Vanessa’s suicide note?”
Baxter kneaded his taut neck muscles. “I have it.”
“Please show it to me.”
“Sprite …” Baxter began gently, bending to reach for her hands, “I don’t think that’s a good—”
“I want to see it, Baxter.” Ariana snatched her fingers away, defying her brother for the first time in her young life.
“Very well,” Baxter agreed, his brow knit with concern. “I’ll get it.”
Ariana sank back into the chair the moment she was alone, trying to absorb the shock she’d suffered—and the one she had yet to bear. Her sister’s suicide note. What would it say? And what of the journal Baxter had relinquished? Had it described Trenton as a madman, a mu
rderer? Ariana closed her eyes, lowering her head to ward off the bleak despair. It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true. How could she have been so totally wrong about her husband?
Violent, groundless jealousy. The memory of Trenton’s unwarranted tirade yesterday stirred to life, in Ariana’s mind, refusing to be stifled. Had jealousy been its cause? Jealousy, incited by discovering her with Dustin? Irrational … groundless. Yes … both. Violent. Lord, yes … Trenton had been capable of almost anything. But … murder?
As if from a great distance Ariana heard Coolidge’s voice asking if Her Grace were feeling well, and her own automatic reply, assuring him that she was perfectly fine. Gratefully, she accepted a cup of tea, then dismissed him, sitting back to await her brother’s return.
Baxter reached the study just as Coolidge emerged.
“The telegraph?” Baxter asked at once.
“Everything has been arranged, my lord. The telegraph will be sent immediately.”
“Good.” Baxter glanced past him into the study. “Is my sister all right?”
“I’m not sure. She’s terribly pale. I poured her a cup of tea.”
“Thank you, Coolidge.” Baxter removed the folded sheet from his pocket and stared down at it. How long had it been since he’d read Vanessa’s final words? “I’ll take care of things from here,” he vowed quietly.
“Of course, sir.” Coolidge held the door ajar for Baxter to enter, then closed it securely.
“Ariana?” Baxter frowned at her bent head and glazed expression.
Ariana stood at once, placing her teacup on the table and advancing toward her brother, hand extended. “Let me see the letter.”
Wordlessly, Baxter gave it to her, standing protectively by her side while she read.
Ariana’s hands shook as she smoothed out the page, instantly recognizing Vanessa’s bold, flowing hand.
Dear Baxter:
I never meant for it to come to this, but my choices have all been seized. Each day I prayed for it to end, for the sun to shine again, yet my prayers went unanswered. The pain that possesses me becomes more than I can bear, and even you, dear brother, can do nothing to stop its perpetual assault. All I crave is peace, and there appears to be but one way to attain it. Do not be angry, with me or yourself, for numbness will mean blessed relief and I am too much a coward to refuse it.
Know always that I love you and that you were right about Trenton. Had I only listened, we could all have been spared these months of sorrow.
My course is set. Prosper and grieve not.
Vanessa
Ariana raised her head, tears trickling down her cheeks. Wordlessly, she thrust the letter back at Baxter, internally numb, outwardly limp and unresisting as he gathered her against him.
“I’m sorry, sprite,” he murmured, stroking her hair. “I tried to warn you.”
“And you’re saying that the journal is even worse than this?” she asked in a small, strangled voice.
Baxter swallowed audibly. “Yes. This letter implies suicide … the journal alludes to something much worse.”
Ariana pulled away. “I have to leave now.” She drew a quivering breath and headed for the door.
“Where are you going?”
She turned, every trace of the innocent child gone from her eyes. “Back to Broddington. There are ghosts to uncover and put to rest. And I intend to do just that.”
Instinctively, Baxter took a step forward, then checked himself, halting in his tracks. Perhaps it was better this way. She was angry now, all fragments of her earlier softening having vanished. If she returned to Broddington now and confronted Kingsley, it could only serve to broaden the chasm between husband and wife, unraveling the fragile relationship that had apparently been forged.
Massaging his throbbing forehead, Baxter silently cursed Kingsley for all he had taken, all he was still taking.
But it was far from over. Ariana was a Caldwell: She would return to Winsham. Next time, Baxter would tell her of his plan.
Reflexively, he gripped Vanessa’s letter tightly in his hand.
At long last, he and Ariana would bring Trenton Kingsley to his knees.
CHAPTER
12
SHE HAD TO FACE Trenton.
Ariana stood in the sheltering warmth of the conservatory, her instinctive haven at Broddington. Lulled by the warmth of the summer sun, she drank in the solace of the fragrant flowers and velvet greenery that surrounded her.
But in this case, nature alone was not enough to comfort her. In truth, nothing could truly alleviate the turmoil wrecking havoc in her heart and mind.
What would she say to him? How should she behave?
Vanessa’s letter had been the writing of a desperate woman. And Trenton was the cause of her desperation: Of that there was no doubt. The questions remaining were several: How far had Trenton allowed his rage to carry him? And how much of Vanessa’s ramblings had been actual truth, how much distorted perceptions of it?
Most important of all, did Ariana dare continue to trust her own instincts when it came to Trenton? Could she permit herself to care for a man who was a cruel and possessive blackguard—or worse? Would she be his next victim?
Ariana rubbed her closed eyelids with her fingertips, praying she could somehow, some way, separate fact from fiction, delve into the past so the present was clear, the future fathomable.
“Well, my wayward bride returns.”
Ariana whirled about, her startled gaze finding her husband where he lounged in the open conservatory doorway, watching her with scorching intensity.
“Trenton …” She could hear the hollow, phobic quality of that one uttered sound as it reverberated through the vaulted room.
Trenton heard it too. He dropped his lit cheroot to the grass, crushing it beneath his heel, and stalked menacingly toward his wife.
Trenton Kingsley killed our sister. Baxter’s earlier accusations crashed down in torrents, the litany a harsh, stinging blow to Ariana’s composure. The madman coveted her like some cherished possession. … His twisted jealousy evolved into a hideous, insane obsession. … Kingsley was unstable. … He killed our sister.
Ariana visibly recoiled.
“I commend your brother,” Trenton commented bitterly, halting only when he loomed directly over her. “He’s done his job well.”
“W-what do you mean?” Ariana groped behind her, clutching the thick stalk of a potted fern for balance.
“An ineffective weapon, at best.”
“Pardon me?”
Trenton gestured behind her. “The fern. Surely you can find a more compelling object than that with which to fend me off. I hardly expect to be felled by a plant.”
Ariana released the stem at once. “Do I need to fend you off?”
“What do you think?”
His voice was low, chilling, his body ominously still, emanating the controlled power and turbulence of a coiled viper ready to strike.
Torn between the urge to run for her life and the equally pressing urge to beseech her husband to deny all she had just uncovered, Ariana did neither, merely staring at him in bewildered silence.
“Poor misty angel,” Trenton droned, his husky tone alluding to something that could have been either tenderness or derision, “you look like a terrified doe.” Ignoring the inadvertent stiffening of Ariana’s body, he slid his hand around her nape, stroking softly, running his fingers through the thick waves of her hair. “Frightened at last?” he taunted.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “Should I be?”
His grip tightened. “What did Caldwell tell you?”
She paled. “Tell me?”
“Ah, what an atrocious liar you are,” Trenton mocked, drawing her nearer. “As I said, your brother has done his job well.”
“Please, Trenton …” She flattened her palms against his chest, staving him off.
“Please … what?” The question was a tantalizing caress, completely belied by the furious sparks flaring in his e
yes.
Apprehension constricted Ariana’s chest. “Let go of me,” she commanded, softly at first, then insistently, struggling to free herself. “Let me go!” She jerked loose of his grasp, retreating backward a dozen paces.
Trenton made no move to follow but held his arms rigidly at his sides, fury radiating from his massive frame. “How much do you want?”
“What?” Ariana was lost … lost and afraid.
“How much did he tell you to ask for, dammit!” Trenton sliced the air with his open palm, knocking over an entire line of geraniums, sending ruined flowers scattering at Ariana’s feet.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” she cried.
“Your brother…” Trenton ground out between clenched teeth. “He wants money … as always. How much did he tell you to bleed me for?”
Ariana straightened, her own eyes smoldering as comprehension dawned. “Money? Baxter and I never discussed money!”
Trenton threw back his head and laughed: an eerie, disbelieving laugh. “Never? I find that dubious, at best. Jewels, then? Or valuable paintings? Or perhaps every bloody treasure Broddington has to offer?”
“Baxter and I want nothing from you!” she shot back, the emotional impact of the day converging to explode inside her. “You got what you wanted when you coerced me to marry you! Now all I want is for you to leave me alone!”
“Leave you alone?” Trenton’s laughter faded, replaced by a forbidding stillness that was far more frightening. “Funny, that’s not the plea I recall hearing in our bed last night. Or was that coercion too, my indignant wife? Did I coerce you to give me your beautiful body, not once but countless times? Did I take you against your will, command you to lie with me? Did I, Ariana?”
Ariana’s lips trembled, but she didn’t flinch. “No,” she said in a tiny voice, admission and sadness reflected in her magnificent turquoise eyes, “that I did on my own.” With heartwrenching candor, she added, “And I don’t regret a single moment of it.”
A muscle flexed in Trenton’s jaw and he dragged his gaze from the honest emotion in hers. “If you and your brother didn’t discuss wresting my sizable fortune, what did you discuss?”