Chapter 22
Alaric stormed through the castle as the voices crying from outside rose in tenor. They were not raised in anger but in surprise. Whatever the cause, it had Alaric’s stomach tightening as he braced for what he sensed was going to be more bad news.
He reached the entrance hall just as the front door swung open.
The cries from outside carried through as if they rode the gale that blew strong and vicious.
The morning sun came with them, glaring bright so that Alaric stopped and threw an arm over his eyes to dim its shine.
But with those cries, with that glaring sun, walked a lone figure who Alaric did not think he would ever see grace his home again.
“You!” Alaric snarled as he lowered his arm. “What … what are you doing here?”
Crispin strode into the hall and stopped several feet short of Alaric.
His clothes were crumpled and stained. His hair was a dirty mess, and his chin was covered in dark stubble.
But his cousin stood tall and proud, possessed of the type of confidence that Alaric had not seen in him for two whole years.
“I have come to pay my respects,” Crispin said, his voice like thunder as he glared at Alaric as if daring him to argue. “Before the funeral on the morrow, I wish to see Aisling’s body one last time.”
Alaric was dumbstruck, and he wondered for a moment if he was seeing things.
“You …” A shake of the head, and he bared his teeth. “You are not welcome here.”
“I am not asking permission, Cousin.”
“How did you get here?” Alaric snarled. “Did you escape? What is the meaning of this?”
This was madness! His cousin had killed Aisling – admitted to it, or so Alaric had been told. He ought to have been in chains, locked up, left in a dark hole where he would rot until his memory lay forgotten.
“I do not wish to argue with you,” Crispin said without backing down. “Please. Allow me this one courtesy, and you will never see me again.”
“I …” Alaric could hardly believe what he was hearing. “Courtesy? You ask me for … how dare you! How dare you think to show your face here after what you did!”
“As I said, I am not here to argue,” Crispin continued. “Step aside, Cousin. Please, for Aisling’s sake, I need this.”
Several staff members rushed into the hallway, each coming to a sudden stop when they saw Lord Crispin. Peregrine, too, lumbered into the hall and gasped in surprise.
Alaric paid them no mind.
It was the mention of his deceased wife’s name that did it. Her murderer, invoking her name as if that might somehow convince Alaric to find calm – using her! Abusing her memory! Crispin dared to come here, to look Alaric in the eye, and ask not for forgiveness, but for the right to mourn!
I will kill him!
Alaric saw red, and he charged his cousin like an enraged bull with a mind geared toward one thing only.
Crispin’s eyes widened when he saw Alaric coming, but he was too slow to move. With his fist curled, with rage to fuel him, Alaric swung hard and true, his fist connecting with Crispin’s nose so that its thwack rang across the hall.
“Argh!” Crispin cried as his head snapped back and as blood sprayed.
“How could you!” Alaric swung again, but Crispin dodged.
“For two years –” He leaped at Crispin, taking him by the collar and pulling his face close so that his spittle sprayed his cousin’s face.
“You lived in my home! You looked me in the eyes! You killed her!” He pushed Crispin back, hard, enough force given so that Crispin tumbled to the ground.
And then Alaric was on him.
“Why did you do it?” Alaric did not recognize his own voice. He was out of his body and his mind, watching on from a corner as a stranger who looked like him pummeled and beat Crispin without care. “How could you? After all I have done for you! This is how you –”
“Alaric!” the voice cried from behind him.
“No!” came another.
They were on him a second later. Two arms wrapped around his waist, pulling him from Crispin. He snarled and lurched to try and free himself, but the arms that had him were too strong.
“Not like this.” It was Peregrine who pulled him back.
“Please …” Next came Miss Kavanagh. She stood in front of him to block out Crispin. And when she met Alaric’s eyes, he saw the plea for mercy shine brightly. “You are better than this. Please.”
He thought to elbow Peregrine out of the way and charge his cousin again. Crispin was slow in pushing himself from the ground, blood dripping from his nose, and oh, how Alaric wanted to add to it. He was like a rabid dog with the bit between his teeth, hungry, vengeful, and savage.
But Miss Kavanagh’s eyes … her mere presence. It was like a tonic, and as she looked pleadingly at him, he felt calm washing over his body as if she had somehow burrowed into his mind and forced it.
Perhaps she is what my sister says …
“I’m fine.” His breathing was heavy. “I said I am fine!” He wrenched his body free from Peregrine.
“You!” He pointed an accusing finger at Crispin.
“I do not know how you managed to speak yourself out of prison. I do not know what you want. But if I see you again …” His stare was murder.
“What happened right now will feel like a warm bath compared to what I will do to you.”
Crispin stood up, adjusted his collar, and wiped his nose. “Understood, Cousin.”
“Come here …” Peregrine took Alaric by the arm and dragged him away.
Miss Kavanagh continued to look pleadingly at him, but there was something else in her eyes that Alaric failed to miss. It looked like guilt and shame, as if she blamed herself for what had just happened. And no sooner did their eyes meet than she turned away, that shame seeming to weigh on her.
“Have you lost your mind?” Peregrine snapped.
“You are on his side?” Alaric snarled.
“Of course not!” Peregrine cried. “I …” He groaned and rubbed his eyes. “Let us go to your study for a drink, Alaric. Come on.”
Alaric let himself be led, knowing he needed to be away from Crispin lest he do something he might regret … no, something that Crispin would regret.
However, as he was dragged away, he looked back one final time, and he saw Crispin stepping into Miss Kavanagh.
She leaned away as if in disgust, but he rested a hand on her shoulder and forced his whispers into her ear.
Alaric watched for just long enough to see her eyes widen in surprise, and then Crispin nodded to her as if to confirm the truth of whatever he had said.
What on earth…
Peregrine had him by the arm, and Alaric’s gaze was torn from his cousin and Miss Kavanagh as he was led down the hall toward his study.
“That was not well handled,” Peregrine said as soon as the door was closed behind them. “And in front of the staff …” He scoffed as he made for the liquor cabinet where he quickly poured two glasses of whiskey. “Know this to be true: within a day, the entire village will hear of this.”
“Let them hear it.” Alaric sat down and snatched the glass of whiskey from Peregrine’s hand. “The man is lucky that I did not kill him.”
“Ah yes.” Peregrine slunk around the desk and took a seat. Then a deep sigh as his body dropped before he took a sip of whiskey. The man looked tired. “Avenging your wife’s murder by sending yourself to the gallows. How noble.”
Alaric snarled. “What is he doing here, Peregrine? How did he get out? I have half a mind to call the magistrate here and see that he –”
“Crispin did not escape from captivity, Alaric,” Peregrine cut him off. “And he was not released on account of his charm. He was let go.”
“Clearly! And why? So that he could pay respects to the woman he murdered? It makes no sense!” Alaric had another long mouthful and sucked his teeth from the tartness of it.
“He was not released so that he could come here and pay his respects,” Peregrine said rightly. “His being here is his own doing – done only because he was free to do it.”
“What are you saying?”
“I am suggesting that the magistrate released him with cause …” Peregrine raised an eyebrow at Alaric. “Clearly, Crispin has been singing a new tune, one that does not tell of his guilt. They believe him innocent is what I am saying.”
“That’s impossible! He admitted it!”
“Did he, though?” Peregrine countered.
Alaric blinked in shock. “What … what are you saying? You were there, Peregrine! You heard him confess.” Alaric stared dumbfounded at his friend, certain that he was losing his mind.
“I have been thinking about that, Alaric.” Peregrine had another sip of whiskey, and his brow furrowed in consideration. “Technically, Crispin never actually confessed to the murder.”
“Yes, he did,” Alaric snapped.
“No …” Peregrine looked pointedly at Alaric. “What he said was that he was responsible for her death. Not that he did it.”
“That …” Alaric shook his head and reared up, desperate to keep hold of his conviction. “Semantics, Peregrine. It is the same thing – why are you defending him!”
“I am not defending him, Alaric. But like you, I wish to know what happened. Would you not rather see the true murderer brought to justice? And not a man who is clearly suffering like you are.”
“Do not …” Alaric seethed and spat. “Do not dare compare my suffering to Crispin’s. We are not the same!”
“I am not trying to upset you, Alaric. Nor is my intent to besmirch your wife’s memory.
But think about it logically for a moment.
Put aside your anger and think.” Peregrine leaned forward.
“What do we know? We know that Crispin was in love with your wife. We know that this love was not returned as he might have liked –”
“Which is likely why he killed her!”
“Perhaps …” Peregrine stroked his chin. “But I am not so sure. There is something else here that we are missing. A final piece of this complex puzzle that we cannot see. Your wife ended up in that boat for a reason, Alaric, but I am not so sure that Crispin is the one who put her there.”
Alaric glared down at his friend.
He wanted this done. He wanted it behind him. He wanted to feel as if this wasn’t his fault somehow. Deep down, Alaric knew that he should have known about Crispin’s feelings for his wife, as he should have done something about it when he had the chance. If he had …
Alaric’s marriage had been a lie. Oh sure, he loved her as any husband should do.
They were happy in a way that satisfied their friends and family and helped to sell the lie that they were meant for one another.
But it had never been a true love match, and Alaric had never been the husband to his wife that he could have been.
And that was why he did not mourn her as he wanted … as he should have done. And that was why the guilt that lived inside him would never die. At least it would not, until he avenged her death.
I must believe that will be enough. It is all I have left …
“There is one person who might know.” Alaric bowed his head as his anger slowly seeped away into nothingness. He was shaking by now, reduced to a pitiful wreck of a man who hated what he had become. “I ought to have seen it … I suppose a part of me did but did not want to believe.”
“Verity,” Peregrine nodded.
“Yes, Verity,” Alaric sighed. “She knows something. I am sure of it. And if anyone has the answers, it is her.”
Peregrine said nothing because nothing else needed to be said. He just sat and watched, waiting for Alaric to do as he needed to do.
Alaric lifted the glass of whiskey to his lips and drained it to its last drop. He let it settle, needing the courage it gave him for the confrontation to come.
And then, with no other option left, answers needed, he rose from his seat, strode across the study, and made his way to his sister’s feather room.
What might come from this confrontation, he could not say.
What he did know, that which was an inescapable truth, was that his world and all he held dear would never be the same again.
It was time for the truth to come out, once and for all.