Page 126 of The Duke's Wicked Widow
Who would have thought such a fierce man could fall so hard for his wife?
Ellie glanced at the far corner.
Fawkes was staring at her, a lock of auburn hair across his forehead, his dark green eyes difficult to read from this distance. But he was watchingher, and that made her feel warm.
I love ye.
He’d said that to her, as if it was the truth. As if it were the only truth. As if what they’d shared hadmeantsomething. But he’d been keeping secrets from her.
Yes, but he apologized for that.
Did he know thatsheloved him?
Rourke was the one to clear his throat. “I believe, if ye dinnae mind, Lady Danielle, we should start with yer code.”
Nodding, Ellie reached for her satchel.
“I have been able to decode all of the messages in the last few days, thanks to Fawkes contacting the newspaper office.” She didn’t look his way, but concentrated on spreading out the papers on the small table in front of the sofa. “And as you can see, they confirm our father was very much his brother’s business partner, rather than just a supporter.”
She explained to the gathered ex-agents how she’d attacked the code, trying to work her way through the different possibilities, before deciding that the conjunction of the “GED” combination in some of the messages finally convinced her there was a keyword.
“It was my stepdaughter Merida, who is with Fawkes’s mother now, who helped me crack the code on Christmas,” she offered, using a pencil to point to the relevant notes, as the men craned their heads to follow along.
Demon loomed over the table, his arms across his chest, frowning at the code. “The day of the week was the keyword?”
“Yes. It is a simple key, once you know which word to use at the beginning. Our father would have been able to encode the message in minutes, and Blackrose—our Uncle William—could decode it even faster, as long as he knew which day it was published in the paper.”
“Which of course he would,” Thorne offered, “because he would have the full newspaper.”
One of Rourke’s long fingers tapped against the arm of his chair. “When Calderbank confronted Wilson, who’d been loyal to Blackrose all along, we learned Wilson had been shipping his master copies of the newspaper, per Blackrose’s request.”
“Aye, that’s how the bastard got his brother’s updates of the schemes back home.”
Demon grunted his agreement with Thorne. “These messages are fairly damning.” He glanced at his wife. “I’m sorry, love.”
“Fairly?” Georgia shook her head. “Theyaredamning. They prove Father was as guilty of treason as his brother.”
“And that last message…” Rourke shook his head. “We should be able to use that—the fact Bonkinbone left instructions after his death—to trap Blackrose. We just have to figure out how…”
Ellie’s hands curled into fists, wrinkling the paper she held. “When Uncle William came to me, after his return…” she whispered, “he had such convincing things to say about Father. He seemed so heartbroken about his death.”
Rourke snorted. “He wasgoodatseeming. Besides, hewouldbe heartbroken, if yer Father was his contact back home.”
“But Bonkinbone’s death meant Blackrose is now an earl, which is what brought him back to Britain,” Demon pointed out. “He thinks the evidence against him was destroyed, so if thereisa trial he believes it’ll be his word against ours, and as a fellow lord, it would be difficult to convict him without that evidence.”
Rourke hummed in agreement. “The plan had been to make Bonkinbone ill, to lure Blackrose back home. Seems like the arsehole had the good manners to die, saving us the trouble. Och, nae offense, Georgia, Danielle.” The last part was said in a hurry, as if he’d suddenly remembered he was sitting withthe arsehole’sdaughters.
It was Georgia who shook her head, and said what Ellie was thinking.
“Our father was not a very nice man. He was not cruel to us, exactly, but…well, yes, hewasrather cruel, was he not?”
“I was not surprised to discover evidence of his evil deeds,” Ellie offered, her attention on the papers spread over the table. “Our home had been about obligation, not love, and when I found that evidence what surprised me was my lack of response.”
“Yes, that is it, exactly!” Georgia shifted the baby at her breast. “The man was, as my husband would say, a festering shitebaboon, and we had no love for him.”
Demon’s bark of laughter almost drowned out the last part of that sentence.
Since when did Georgia speak like her husband?
