“Alas, they’re all mm-ga-ga-gees,” said Sebastian, just as a knock sounded at the distant front door. He looked over at Hero. “Expecting someone?”
A stranger’s voice could be heard below, mingling with that of their majordomo, Morey. “No,” she said.
Tiring of his book, Simon scooted off the ottoman and tottered over to the long-haired black cat curled up in one of the cane chairs near the bowed front window. “Mm-ga-ga-gee.”
The big cat looked at the boy through slitted green eyes and lashed his magnificent long, thick tail—a movement that was not generally a sign of either affection or pleasure.
“Careful there, young man,” said Sebastian, rising to his feet as Morey appeared in the doorway.
“A gentleman to see you, my lord,” said the majordomo. “A Mr. Liam Maxwell. He says it’s about Mrs. Ambrose.”
Sebastian exchanged a quick glance with Hero. “Show him up.”
Hero moved to retrieve the fallen book and thrust it in a drawer. “Do you know who he is?”
Sebastian shook his head. “I’ve no idea.”
The man who entered looked to be in his late twenties. Of medium height and slim build, he was respectably rather than fashionably dressed, with fierce dark eyes and windswept dark hair that glistened with wet from the snow. It was obvious he was laboring under barely suppressed emotions, his features pinched with what looked like profound grief. “Lord and Lady Devlin,” he said with a perfunctory bow. “My apologies for interrupting you at this hour.”
“That’s quite all right,” said Sebastian. “Please come in and sit down, Mr. Maxwell. How may I help you?”
Their guest made no move to take a seat but continued to stand just inside the door, his hat in his hands, his posture stiff enough to be almost hostile. “I’m here because of Jane—Jane Ambrose.”
Sebastian walked over to the small table where a decanter of brandy and glasses were warming by the fire. “You knew her?”
Maxwell hesitated just a shade too long before saying, “I’ve known her for years. Her brother and I once published a newspaper together.”
Sebastian looked up, the brandy decanter in one hand. “I’d no notion James Somerset was involved in journalism.”
Maxwell shook his head. “Not her twin, James. I meant her younger brother, Christian. He and I were in school together at Westminster.”
“Christian Somerset is Jane’s brother?” said Hero, as if the name meant something to her. Sebastian himself had no idea who Christian Somerset was, but Hero was staring at Liam Maxwell as if she now understood something that had escaped her before.
Maxwell nodded. “I’m told your lordship is looking into the circumstances surrounding Jane’s death, which doesn’t make sense if she truly slipped on the ice the way the papers are saying.”
Sebastian poured a healthy measure of brandy into two glasses. “There will be no official inquiry into Jane Ambrose’s death because the palace will never allow any hint of scandal to touch the Princess. But Jane did not slip in the snow and hit her head. It’s not clear whether her death was murder or manslaughter, but she didn’t die in the lane where she was found. Someone moved her body there after she was already dead.”
“Dear God.”
Sebastian held out one of the brandies, and after a moment’s hesitation, Maxwell took it and drank deeply. “I want to help find whoever is responsible for this.”
“You have an idea who might have killed her?” asked Hero.
Maxwell glanced over at her, the features of his face tightening with what looked very much like animosity. “Not exactly.”
“But you have some suspicions?” said Sebastian.
“To be frank, I thought you might suspect me.”
“Oh? Should I?”
A muscle jumped along the man’s clenched jaw. “Jane and I were very close.”
“Were you lovers?”
The abrupt frankness of the question seemed to take Maxwell by surprise. Rather than answer, he cast another glance at Hero, only this one was more embarrassed than hostile.
The meaning of that look was not lost on her. Stooping to swing Simon up onto her hip, she said, “If you’ll excuse us, Mr. Maxwell, young Simon here and I will say good night.”
He gave a curt bow. “Of course, my lady.”
The boy began to fuss in protest as they moved toward the stairs, and Sebastian could hear her saying softly, “Let’s count the steps, shall we? One, two, three . . .”
“So, were you lovers?” Sebastian asked again.
Maxwell went to stand before the hearth. “No; we were not. But I can understand how someone might think we were. Jane was . . . very dear to me.”
“Was the feeling reciprocated?”
Maxwell turned his gaze to the flames. “We were old friends. Nothing more. Nothing.”
Sebastian studied the man’s half-averted face. In the distance he could hear the low murmur of Hero speaking to Simon’s nurse, Claire, followed by the whisper of her footsteps coming back down the stairs and slipping into the adjoining morning room. “Do you think Edward Ambrose suspected that his wife was being unfaithful to him?”
Maxwell’s head came up, his nostrils flaring. “But she wasn’t!”
“Yet he could have suspected it, couldn’t he? If, as you say, you were close enough that some might think it.”
Maxwell hesitated a moment, then nodded.
“Which means he had a reason to kill her.”
“Ambrose didn’t need me as an excuse to kill Jane. Their marriage had long ago turned into something more closely resembling an armed truce than a marriage. The deaths last year of Benjamin and Lawrence—Jane’s two children—ended what little good was left between them.”
“Did Ambrose ever hit her?”
Maxwell nodded again, his nostrils pinched. “He gave her a black eye at least once that I know of. And several times he left a mark on her face, just here—” He touched his fingertips to his left cheekbone at exactly the same place where someone had struck Jane moments before she died.
“She told you he hit her?”
“No. She always came up with some tale to explain the marks—she’d even laugh at herself for being so clumsy. But she wasn’t clumsy. She wasn’t clumsy at all. I could never understand why she protected him the
