Page 39 of A Virgin for the Cruel Duke

Annie shook her head mutely.

“It was arsenic. I only ate a little and I am a large man. I was fine. She would have died.”

Annie crammed her hands over her mouth, her eyes overflowing again.

“He wanted you to kill her so that he could use her death to destroy me and my family,” Stephen continued, the truth ruthless on his tongue. “He would have made you a murderess.”

“Please don’t tell her, sir,” Annie said, so softly he had to strain to hear it. “Please don’t tell her the truth.”

He took a deep breath and unclenched his fists, thinking of Elizabeth, her smile when she first saw the girl, her kindness to the family, how she clearly loved the Adams sisters as if they were her own. “I shall not. It would break her heart to know what you nearly did to her,” he felt a little twinge at the wail the girl let out at that, wounded and forlorn. While he might be angry with her, furious at how near a thing it was, and while he might believe her to be impulsive and foolish to not have entrusted at least Elizabeth with the truth as soon as she was safe enough to do so, it was not this girl that was to blame. “You cannot stay here in the meantime, Miss Adams. I will ensure that you face no consequences for your actions, but you will be sent to my estate in Somerset in the meantime to keep you away from the remaining danger until the matter is settled.”

The girl nodded, her hands over her face now to try to hide her weeping. “Will I ever come back?”

“When it is safe,” Stephen said firmly. “I will be having a talk with my brother-in-law. He is to visit soon and I really must ensure that no one further suffers for his obsession with violence.”

Annie shivered a little. “Are you going to kill him, sir?”

“I will make sure he is no longer a danger,” Stephen said, his tone dark with violent promise. “To mine or to anyone else.”

CHAPTER 18

How. Elizabeth turned and walked back on her steps for the twentieth time.How could this have happened. How could it have been Annie.

There was a cold little thought at the back of her mind, a suspicion that she was ignoring as hard as she could because every time it surfaced she felt her heart shrink from it.

Annie had been so normal, so natural. She had been chattering away like there was nothing wrong. She had been listening to Elizabeth talk about how happy she was, how much she loved her new life and all along she had been planning and plotting and intending -

How.

ButAnnie. Her little sister in every way that mattered. A baby she had held when she was just born, a toddler she had taughthow to count, a little girl she had played pretend with in the glades around the big house.

Annie.

Her heart ached and she paused in her pacing and leaned against the wall, pressing a hand to her chest as though that would soothe the pain flaring there. How could she bear it, losing her Annie? Losing her sweet sister? She had barely had her back, just had her for a little while!

“Elizabeth,” Stephen said, standing in the doorway to her room, his face grave. “Come, don’t wear your shoes out.”

She darted to him and then paused, hesitating. She wanted to wrap around him, hold him to herself and beg his pardon for bringing nothing but pain and terror to his life, tell him how sorry she was that he had been caught in this deadly game by her family. But at the same time holding him felt like a luxury that she could not allow herself.

Was it fair to cling and to tell him how much she cared when every moment she was near him was another moment that he was in deeper danger.

He stepped forwards and put his hands on her shoulders, his thumbs rubbing soothing circles into her skin as he bent to kiss her forehead. “Now, none of that. You look as though you are expecting a funeral. I gave you my word, did I not?”

“Idon’t doubt you,” she said quickly, leaning towards to rest her head against his chest. Her temples were pounding with pain, a headache that had been ebbing and flowing since the day Stephen had collapsed. “I am so worried for her. She is so young to have this over her head.”

He hummed, stroking her cheek. “She’s a bold little thing, brave too. I wish she had come to us when she arrived here. Surely she must have realized that no news could have been carried back to reveal what she was doing.”

“Maybe,” she felt herself melt as he ran his fingers through her hair, massaging at the sore points on her scalp and soothing away the tensions of the long days without him. “I think sometimes it is easy to get trapped and forget that help is present if you ask for it.”

She could sense that he was looking at her searchingly then, but did not meet his gaze and he said nothing for a moment, guiding her to the bed so he could sit them both down, pull her against his chest and continue to work the aches out of her scalp with his strong safe hands.

How could she feel so safe with him? It was as though her heart had accepted him too deeply and too thoroughly to ever consider that he might hurt her.

“What have you decided?” she asked eventually.

“I am sending her to the Sandhall Estate in Somerset, one of my properties. She will be safe there for the time being andit will allow me to manage what is happening here so that no further consequences find her.” He paused, and his voice when he next spoke was gentle. “She won’t be brought to cold justice, sweetheart. I will keep her secrets.”

“Oh,” Elizabeth felt the sound rip out of her and she flung herself at him, wrapping her arms around him and allowing herself to finally give in to the tears that had been building for days. “Oh thank you, Stephen. She means the world to me. I - I don’t want you to think I would have sheltered her here and never told you what she did. I was going to send her away myself, but I was so scared for her.”

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