The bedroom door opened and brought him back to the present and when it closed he didn’t look up. He knew it was Eliza even before the scent of violets filled his senses, before the seat next to him dipped slightly when she sat. “Are you all right?”
Darius snorted. “Define all right.”
“You didn’t come down for supper and your men worried. They say your appetite is larger than your ego and that you never miss a chance to eat.”
He ignored her attempt to lighten the tension. Nothing she could say would do that. “I lost my appetite today when I dug up a dead man.”
She sighed. “Was it very bad?”
He threw his head back and took another long swig of brandy. He didn’t feel the burn of the liquor down his throat or in his stomach. He didn’t feel anything more than red-hot fury and the notion that she’d tricked him. The notion that he couldn’t and shouldn’t trust her. The notion that his need to rescue the weak had once again clouded his better judgement. “Why did you marry me, Eliza?”
“You know why. I had little choice.”
“But you had a choice and you chose me. A bastard and a pirate with nothing to offer. Why?”
“We couldn’t do it on our own anymore—you said it yourself more than once. Then there was the letter Father wrote you. After that, the decisions were too difficult.”
“Ah yes, the letter. Did he actually write it?”
“Of course he did.”
“Were you holding the gun to his head even then?”
She jumped to her feet. Indignation or nervous tension from the lies? “Are you drunk?” she accused.
Darius stood and towered over her, threatening in his stance, hoping to terrify the real story from his untruthful bride. He threw the bottle against the wall behind her, glass and brandy exploding at the same time his temper did. “You lied to me!”
Instead of cowering or running from the room, her spine straightened and she looked him right in the eyes as she replied, “I did what I had to do.”
Chapter Seventeen
Darius stilled, clenched his fists at his sides, fought not to pace or shift his stance. “I just don’t understand. You had your father write a marriage contract for you and a man you had never met and then you killed him? Did he see the bullet coming? Or did you surprise him? Where did the suicide note come from? I knew nothing added up but the fool that I am, I didn’t see past your pretty face or your tears.”
“You have it all wrong.” Her voice was cold and devoid of emotion as she sat, her hands wringing in her lap the only outward betrayal now that she was anxious, that she was anything other than caught.
“Then tell me.”
She thought about it. It was plainly obvious she waged a war between the truth and what she thought he wanted to hear.
Darius sank to his knees on the carpet in front of her, his own personal battle waging within. He wanted to believe her good. He wanted to still believe himself a reasonable judge of character. He wanted to believe himself the knight in shining armour, the dragon slayer she kept hinting towards. He wanted her to need his rescue, not his arse in a trap, someone to pin a murder on if the finger was pointed in her direction. He gritted his teeth. “You have to tell me what happened.”
“It wasn’t me…”
He grabbed her by the arms and shook her a little, hoping to dislodge actual honesty and maybe loose the edge of his temper without really hurting her. “Someone was there with him. He had two bullet holes and could only have inflicted one and not the other.”
She tried to cover her face but he would not let her. He batted away her hands and took hold of her cheeks, forced her to look him in the eye. “Who shot your father, Eliza?”
“I did.”
“You’re lying. Try again.” He tightened his hold on her face while trying desperately to stem his fury.
“Gabriella,” she finally whispered. “Gabriella shot him in the heart. I shot him in the head.”
“Why?” He loosened his grip at her confession but as the first of her tears fell he didn’t let her go. No longer would he be moved by the moisture dropping from her eyes. She could have been an accomplished actress rather than the daughter of a duke.
“Most of what you know is the truth. Gabriella found our father writing his notes, about to end another bottle of liquor, and his life. He was to give Gabriella to Montrose, his debt repaid with the dowry.”
“Not you? But your name is all over everything.”
“I forged the rest to save her. She is only sixteen. Too young to be sold to a stranger. When she yelled at our father that he couldn’t do it, that she would kill herself before being handed over to a foreign man she knew nothing about, he told her Grace could take her place and fetch a much higher price. I never meant to marry anyone, only to gain the time it would take Montrose to come and collect me. Nathanial would have been a duke and able to turn Montrose away at my change of heart.”
A sinking feeling dragged at his chest. “But the debt was mine. Not Deklin’s.”
She nodded, sniffled. “I had to do something. Anything. When the windows were shot at and the children put in harm’s way, real harm’s way, you became our only choice.”
“You said you shot him in the head? Why?”
“Men don’t shoot themselves in the heart. In all the books I’ve read, all the newspaper articles, the man always shoots himself in the head. It’s easier to reach with both hands on the pistol.”
“You read all that?” What else could he say? She hadn’t killed him. His new bride hadn’t been the one to end the duke’s
