Elizabeth pulled Madelaine back inside with her, and they settled on the bed. The men didn’t sit, but loomed over them, until finally Elizabeth’s eldest brother offered Madelaine a cursory nod. “I’m the Duke—” Grey’s brother abruptly stopped his introduction, his face whitening. “You must be Lady Madelaine?”
Madelaine nodded, but before she could say anything else, Elizabeth scrambled from the bed and stood toe-to-toe with her eldest brother. “What do you mean introducing yourself as a duke?”
“You bloody clod,” Grey snarled at his brother as he took Elizabeth by the arm. It almost seemed he intended to hold her up. Madelaine furrowed her brow. “Liz,” Grey said in a soft voice. “Mother and Father are dead.”
“What?” Elizabeth whispered. The confusion clouding her face mirrored Madelaine’s feelings.
“Dead,” Grey tried again with such heartbreaking gentleness that Madelaine’s nose and throat burned with the sudden need to cry.
“I don’t believe you.” Elizabeth’s voice was raspy.
When her declaration was met by silence, she repeated herself louder. “I don’t believe you,” she screeched, her eyes turning wild, her fingers clawing at her brother’s arms for release.
Madelaine couldn’t move. The scene transfixed her in horror to the bed. Politeness demanded she quietly exit, but she could not make her legs work nor bring herself to abandon Elizabeth and Grey for the sake of politeness.
“They are dead,” Grey reiterated.
“You’re lying,” Elizabeth accused, even as tears streamed down her face. “Why are you lying?” Her voice rose to a higher pitch. Grey gazed at Madelaine. The helplessness in his eyes broke her heart. She stood, intent on taking Elizabeth from him and holding her friend gently to try to make her hear the truth, but Elizabeth’s brother, The Duke of Ashdon, stepped forward and took Elizabeth from Grey.
Madelaine watched in mute horror while His Grace tried for several minutes to rationalize with Elizabeth, but her protests grew in volume until she was screaming. Finally, he shook her. She could have sworn Elizabeth’s teeth rattled together with each violent shake of her body.
“Stop it.” Madelaine gripped the duke’s arm. “You’ll hurt her. Please.” She tugged at the man’s thick, corded arms until he released his sister.
Elizabeth moaned incoherently as Madelaine struggled to get her to the bed. In an instant, Grey was at Elizabeth’s other side and helped Madelaine to guide her to sit. “What happened?” she asked over Elizabeth’s wracking sobs.
Either her imagination was running wild, or Grey was really assessing her as he appeared to be doing. But for what purpose? Were his parents’ deaths horrific? Did he think she too might lose control? Finally, he spoke, his words coming out as if each had been ripped from his throat. “A carriage accident. They had a bad wheel. It broke and the carriage tumbled down an embankment and killed them both.”
At his pronouncement, Elizabeth’s head lulled backward and her eyes fluttered closed. The sudden silence of the room seemed strange after the deafening noise of Elizabeth’s crying. With Grey’s help, Madelaine laid Elizabeth on the bed. Once Madelaine had Elizabeth situated, she turned and caught Grey staring at her. The unveiled pain and anguish in his eyes tore at her. She reached toward him to soothe him, but he flinched away, as if he could not bear her touch.
She understood the pain of losing a parent, better than most, but he seemed more than pained, seething with an anger that was directed at her. Maybe, it was simply the shock of everything, yet she felt very out of place, very much an intruder. She wrung her hands together. She didn’t want to leave Grey or Elizabeth, but she didn’t feel welcome here. “Maybe I had better go to my own room,” she said, moving to leave.
In a flash, Grey stood between her and the door. “There’s something I have to tell you.”
She would have been relieved that he’d stopped her, but his foreboding tone scared her, and sent shivers of wariness over her skin. “What is it?”
Nineteen
Grey shot his brother a warning look to remind him to keep to their agreement. If the price of protecting Madelaine was that she might later hate him, he’d gladly pay the ransom. He did not want to lie to her, to use her as a pawn, but he’d given his word to protect the king, and he’d keep it. He glanced at his sister who was stirring on the bed. “We cannot speak here.”
Madelaine followed his gaze. “Where then?”
“The tower. Your father is being kept there.”
“What?” All color leeched from her face, making her appear frail and frightened. He hated that he was causing her fear, but there was simply no choice.
“Come.” He took her by the elbow to lead her out the door. She opened her mouth to ask him a question, but he shook his head and handed her cape to her. “Keep your questions for now and put this on.” She seemed as if she would argue, but after a moment, she took the cape and shrugged it on.
His heart lurched. Even in drab wool, she was beautiful. “Raise the hood,” he commanded as he closed the door to his sister’s bedroom without a backward glance. Edward would be waiting to hear a report, giving Grey just enough time to play the sympathetic suitor, take Madelaine to her father, and peer through the peephole in the room where they kept him to listen and see if Stratmore let anything slip or made a confession. Gravenhurst would see Liz safely home, far away from any possible taint of scandal.
Grey was still angry with his brother and Gravenhurst, though they only did what they must to protect the king as well as themselves. And so would he. He would protect the king, but God help him, he would protect Madelaine as well, if it were possible.
He glanced at her as they walked silently through the halls. She turned her head enough that he could see her face drawn with worry. Did she sense his stare? He grasped her arm to stop her and fought back the fear that someone else would see her and then question what she was doing. At this late hour, his fear was no doubt unfounded, yet it choked off his air just the same.
He pulled her hood tighter around her face so that if anyone was still lurking in the halls they’d mistake her for a lady of the night. Reaching down, he clasped her cold, clammy hands and blew on them to warm them. “Keep your face hidden.”
She nodded, her hand going to the closure of her cape and holding it tight under her chin. His gut twisted as he pressed a hand to her back to lead her out of the castle. Since the moment his brother had told him of Pearson’s death and his belief that Stratmore had killed him, Grey had gone through every possible way this could end. There was no good way, unless Stratmore was innocent of everything, and Grey’s gut told him otherwise. The worst ending would be Stratmore being hung, and Madelaine being thrown on the mercy of the Court. Likely they’d toss her from Court and take her father’s property. Or what if they decided she’d helped her father? Would they go so far as to hang her right beside him, unless she was protected by someone? Fear made his heart pound faster.
She was an only child with no other living relatives. She had no one. No one but him. If the worst came to pass, he would marry her to give her the protection of his name, but then who would protect her from the dangers his life would likely present them both? That was a worry for much later. One concern at a time.