Chapter 3 #3
No matter. Money could overcome their reserve if he offered enough of it. Jules’s frown deepened. What little he had was going quickly. It would not be long before his funds once again ran dry and his friends became aware of his dire straits.
Once Grayson arrived and Jules learned the truth, he could send Claire and his friends away and return to this impoverished state . . . alone.
As the door to the library closed behind Jules and his new wife, a whisper of cool air entered the room. Jane shivered as she waited for the footsteps to silence in the hall. She turned to her husband. “What are we to do about Claire?”
“Nothing, at present,” Nicholas replied with the steadied calm that often had a similar effect on her. Today, his steadfastness had no effect on her nerves whatsoever.
“Is Claire truly Jules’s wife?” Jane asked, as a million questions raced through her mind. It felt good to finally air the suspicions she had, they all had, of Claire and her connection to Jules. They had played along with her because of her knowledge of Jules’s solicitor.
“He did not denounce her.” Nicholas considered for a long moment. “Only time will tell, but your plan to follow Claire to Kildare Manor was a good one. We are here to support Jules should the need arise.”
“He seemed to know her,” Jane said. Jules had gone along with the woman easily enough.
But Jane had seen that look of hesitation when he had first seen Claire.
That one look had given Jane pause, and doubt had taken root.
She knew Jules better than anyone else. She knew the nuances of her friend’s emotions.
And the look she had seen pass between Jules and Claire a short while ago had been completely foreign to her.
“However, I fear Jules could be in trouble.”
“Most men are when it comes to love,” Hollister said with a smile. He drew his pregnant wife against his side and wrapped an arm protectively around her.
Margaret chuckled. “Jane, dear, we will all be here to keep an eye on things. What could possibly go wrong?”
“Jules seems happy to me,” David replied. “But then again, I am not very savvy in matters of the heart.” He sighed. “I say we give them time alone. If there is something amiss here, the pressure of them being together will bring it out.”
“I could not agree with you more,” Nicholas replied.
Another whisper of cool air brushed Jane’s neck and shoulders. She pulled her shawl more tightly around her shoulders, holding back the shiver that threatened as frustration dragged at her, taunted her.
Jules was married. Or at least he appeared to be married. She should be ecstatic. Yet something did not feel quite right.
Nicholas frowned at this wife. “Do you not agree, Jane?”
“I am not certain of anything at present,” Jane replied. “All I know is something is not right here. I am not certain if it is Jules, this house, or Claire that has me worried, but something does.”
“Very well,” Nicholas said with a nod. “Perhaps we accepted Claire’s word too quickly. What we need is proof.” He folded his arms over his chest and met his wife’s gaze. “It is time for us to find out more, a lot more, about Claire Elliot MacIntyre and what she means to our friend.”
“I believe we must intrude into Jules’s finances as well,” Jane said with a frown. “Kildare Manor is not what it should be for an earldom that goes back to James V.”
Nicholas’s expression darkened. “Jules will not like our intervening.”
“How can we not?” Jane worried her hands before her. “He has nothing left. With the crofters gone, there is no way for the estate to produce an income.” Her gaze travelled the chamber. “I will not allow a friend of ours to live like this when we can easily afford to provide assistance.”
Nicholas nodded. “I will speak to Jules and find a way to assist him without insulting him.”
Jane smiled at her husband, greatly relieved. “Perhaps this whole situation with Claire is a blessing, for without her, we never would have known what kind of misfortune had befallen Jules’s estate.”
Nicholas did not return her smile. “Misfortune has been a part of this estate for so long, I doubt even an infusion of funds and some new furnishings can turn the place around. But we will see.”
Jane straightened, ready to accept the challenge.
In a shadowed corner of an inn on the border between Kildare Manor and the village of Kildare, a dark-cloaked woman sat before the minion she’d hired to spy on the new laird.
“I am disappointed in you,” she said, her voice sharp. “You have nothing to report? Surely you can get close enough to hear what they are talking about.”
The man didn’t answer directly. “He keeps himself surrounded by friends. It has been difficult to get close without anyone seeing me.”
“When did he have time to make friends, having spent so many months in gaol?” Her anger flared. She had wanted Claire to go in, do as she’d been told, then leave her to finish the ruination of Lord Kildare. “Who are these friends?”
“They are no danger to your plans. They merely brought his bride to him. They will desert him, I’ve no doubt, when they see the ruin of his estate.
Two of the women are pregnant. Surely their husbands will want to keep them out of harm’s way by taking them back to their homes.
Kildare will be alone with the girl before long. ”
Despite the hood that shielded her face, she stared at the man, hard.
Pleasure flooded her when he flinched. “Don’t come back here until you have something to report.
If you disappoint me again . . .” She let the words trail off, but she knew the man understood their intent.
She would threaten and she would punish those who did not do as she commanded.
The twisted, lifeless body of the man’s predecessor was proof of that.
She might be a woman, but she did not fear soiling her hands if it achieved her goal of tormenting, then burying Jules MacIntyre.
Claire would be the means by which she would gain her revenge, thanks to Jules’s father.
She had blackmailed James Grayson into revealing the intentions of Jules’s father.
But instead of a gift to his son, the father had given her a means to Jules’s end when he’d found a “real” Claire to play the part of the fabricated bride.
The man had meant to finally make amends to his son for a lifetime of neglect.
Instead, he had provided the perfect vehicle for her own revenge.
Death would be a welcome relief when she was through with this last and final Lord Kildare.