to apply the King’s justice to your fat backside.”
The crowd laughed as Dev and Val obligingly escorted their charge in the constable’s wake. The earl was left with Anna in his arms and more questions than ever.
“Come.” He led Anna to his horse and tossed her up, then climbed up behind her. He was on Dev’s big young gelding, and the horse stood like a statue until Westhaven gave the command to walk on. Anna was silent and the earl himself in no mood to hold a difficult discussion on the back of a horse. He kept an arm around her waist while she leaned quietly against his chest until they were in the mews.
When the grooms led the horse away, Westhaven tugged Anna by the wrist across the alley and through the back gardens, pausing only when Morgan came into sight, a basket over her arm.
“Morgan!” Anna dropped the earl’s hand and rushed to wrap her arms around her sister. “Oh, thank God you’re safe.”
Morgan shot a quizzical look over Anna’s shoulder at the earl.
“We ran into Stull in the market,” the earl explained, watching the sisters hugging each other. “He was of a mind to take his betrothed north without further ado. I was not of a mind to allow it.”
“Thank God,” Morgan said quietly but clearly. Anna stepped back and blinked.
“Morgan?” She eyed her sister closely. “Did you just say ‘thank God?’”
“I did.” Morgan met her sister’s gaze. “I did.”
“You can hear and speak,” the earl observed, puzzled. “How long have you feigned deafness?”
“When you went out to Willow Bend, Anna.” Morgan’s eyes pleaded for understanding. “Lord Val took me to see Lord Fairly. He’s a physician—a real physician, and he was able to help. I’ve not wanted to tell you, for fear it wouldn’t last, but it’s been days, and oh, the things I’ve heard… the wonderful, beautiful things I’ve heard.”
“I am so happy for you.” Anna pulled her close again. “So damned happy for you, Morgan. Talk to me, please, talk to me until my ears fall off.”
“I love you,” Morgan said. “I’ve wanted to say that—just that—for years. I love you, and you are the best sister a deaf girl ever had.”
“I love you, too,” Anna said, tears threatening, “and this is the best gift a deaf girl’s sister ever had.”
“Well, come along you two.” The earl put a sister under each arm. “As pleasing as this development is, there is still a great deal of trouble brewing.” As both sisters were in tears, it clearly fell to him to exercise some rational process, otherwise the lump in his own throat might have to be acknowledged.
He ushered them into his study, poured lemonade all around, and considered the situation as Anna and Morgan beamed at each other like idiots.
“Don’t forget your sugar,” Anna said, turning her smile on him. “Oh, Westhaven, my sister can hear! This makes it all worthwhile, you know? If Morgan and I hadn’t fled York, she might never have seen this physician. And if you can hear and speak…”
“I cannot be so easily declared incompetent,” Morgan finished, grinning.
“Unless…” Anna’s smile dimmed, and she glanced hesitantly at the earl. “Unless Stull and Helmsley convince the authorities you were feigning your disability, and that would be truly peculiar.”
The earl frowned mightily. “Rather than speculate on that matter, what can you tell me about this betrothal contract Stull ranted about. Is it real?”
“It is,” Anna said, holding his gaze, her smile fading to a grimace. “It is very real. There are two contracts, in fact. One obligates me to marry him in exchange for sums he will pay to my brother; the other obligates Morgan to marry him in the event I do not, for the same consideration.”
“So your brother has sold you to that hog.” It made sense enough. “And you were unwilling to go join him in his wallow.”
“Morgan was to have come with me,” Anna added, “or I with her. Whichever sister he married, he agreed to provide a home for the other sister, as well. Even if I married him, I could not have kept Morgan safe from him.”
“He is depraved, then?”
“I would not have rejected a suitor out of hand,” Anna said, her chin coming up, “just for an unfortunate fondness for his victuals. Stull makes the beasts appear honorable, though.”
“And you know this how?”
“Grandmother hired on a twelve-year-old scullery maid,” Anna said wearily. “The girl was nigh torn asunder trying to bear Stull’s bastard. The baby did not live, but the mother did—barely. She was not”—Anna glanced at Morgan—“mature for her years, and she had no family. Stull preyed on her then tossed her aside.”
“Who is he? He comports himself like a man of consequence, at least in his own mind.”
“Hedley Arbuthnot, eighth Baron Stull,” Anna said. “My betrothed.”
“Don’t be so sure about that.” The earl looked at her, frowning. “I want to see these contracts, as in the first place, I don’t think a conditional betrothal is enforceable, and in the second, there is the question of duress.” And a host of other legal questions, such as whether Helmsley had executed the contracts on behalf of his sisters, and if Morgan was a minor when he did. Or did he sign on behalf of Anna, who was not a minor, and thus bind himself rather than her?
And where in the tangle of questions did the matter of guardianship of the ladies’ funds come into it?
The earl looked at Morgan. “You are going to let my brother escort you to the ducal mansion. Stull does not know where you are and does not know you have regained your ability to speak and hear. It is to our advantage to keep it that way.”
“You”—the earl turned an implacable glare on Anna—“are going to go unpack your damned valise and meet me back here, and no running off. Your word, or I will alert the entire staff to your plans, and you will be watched from here to Jericho unless I am with you.”
“You have my word,” she said quietly, rising to go, but turning at the last to give Morgan one more hug.
She left a ringing silence behind her, in which the earl helped himself to the whiskey decanter, pouring a hefty tot into his lemonade.
“So what hasn’t she told me?” The earl turned and met Morgan’s gaze.
“I don’t know what she has told you.”
“Precious bloody little.” The earl took a swallow of his cocktail. “That she was keeping confidences and could not allow me to assist her. Christ.”
“She was. My grandmother made us both promise our situation would not become known outside the three of us. Anna and I have both kept our word in that regard, until now.”
The earl ran a hand through his hair. “How could this come about? That Anna could be obligated to marry a loathsome excuse for a bore—or boar?”
“It was cleverly done.” Morgan sighed and stood, crossing her arms as she regarded the back gardens through the French doors. “Helmsley sent Grandmother and me off to visit a friend of hers, then took Anna aside and told her if she didn’t sign the damned contract, he’d have me declared incompetent. In a similar fashion, he told me if I didn’t sign the contract, then he’d put a pillow over Grandmother’s face. Anna doesn’t know about that part, and I don’t think he’d do it…”
“But he could. What a rotter, this brother of yours. And lousy at cards, I take it?”
“Very. We were in hock up to our eyeballs two years ago.”
“So he probably told your grandmother some Banbury tale, as well,” the earl said, staring at his drink. “What do you think would make Anna happy now?”
“To be home,” Morgan said. “To know Grandmother is safe, to see Grandpapa’s gardens again, to know I am safe. To stop running and looking over her shoulder and pretending to be something we’re not.”
“And you, Morgan?” The earl shifted to stand beside her. “What do you want?”
“I want Anna to be happy,” Morgan said, swallowing and blinking. “She was so… So pretty and happy and loving when Grandpapa was alive. And the past two years, she’s been reduced to drudgery just so I would be safe. She deserves to be happy, to be free and safe and…” She was crying, unable to get out the rest of whatever she wanted to say. The earl put down his drink, fished in his pocket for his handkerchief, and pulled Morgan into his arms.
“She deserves all that,” he agreed, patting her shoulder. “She’ll have it, too, Morgan. I promise you she’ll have what she wants.”
When Val and Dev joined him in the library less than an hour later, Anna was still unpacking while Morgan
