Once a Duchess (25 page)

Marshall exhaled slowly. Then he walked to the window and braced his hands on either side of it. Isabelle longed to wrap her arms around him. She thought of poor Naomi in the hands of that monster and clamped an arm across her middle at a sudden wave of nausea.

“All right.” Marshall turned from the window. He shoved his hands into his pockets. “He has Naomi and two horses. It’s clear this was a planned attack. He gained admission to the stable under false pretenses to get close to her. The question is: Where is he going? What does he plan to do with Naomi?”

“Ransom, perhaps,” Alex ventured. “Unless he means to do her ill.”

Isabelle’s head swam at the implications. She cast a tortured expression to Marshall. He stood stock still, staring at Alexander. Only the twitching muscle at his jaw betrayed the slightest hint of his unease, but Isabelle knew he was as horrified, if not more so, as she.

Marshall’s eyes narrowed a fraction. “We cannot wait for a ransom note that may never come.” His voice was cold and hard as steel. “The search begins immediately. If a ransom demand comes, so be it. In the meantime, I’ll not allow my sister to be mistreated. I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to her, and I hadn’t done anything to prevent it.” He opened the study door and called for the butler. The servant materialized so quickly, Isabelle wondered if he hadn’t been standing near the door, eavesdropping.

In less than fifteen minutes, sixteen men had left their various posts around the house and grounds and assembled in the entry hall. Marshall divided them into three groups of six.

Marshall’s group would ride back toward London. Naomi would not be cooperative, Marshall reasoned, and so Gerald would be forced to take a slower route off the main roads so as not to draw attention. They would have the advantage and cut him off before he reached town, if he meant to take her to a hideout in one of the capital’s criminal sanctuaries.

The second group would take the road in the other direction, alerting the neighboring farms and estates and searching abandoned structures. Meanwhile, the third group would delve into Bensbury’s hundreds of wooded acres, in case Thomas Gerald had not yet removed Naomi from the property. A man from each group would return to the house every hour to see if the other groups had made any progress.

As the groups readied to leave, Isabelle grabbed Marshall’s sleeve. “I want to come with you. I can’t sit by and do nothing.”

Marshall touched her face with a warm, firm hand. “I’ll bring Naomi home safe and sound, I swear to you. But you will stay here.”

Isabelle started to protest.

Marshall raised a hand. “You have your brother to look after. My mother and Grant will be here soon, too, and you must see to them.”

The thought of keeping company with the two people in Marshall’s family who despised Isabelle more than anything was not the plum assignment she’d hoped for.

“Isabelle,” Marshall said in a warning tone. “I see that look in your eye. Please. If you care anything for me at all, do as I ask and stay put. It will be a comfort to me to know you’re safe.”

Isabelle sighed. When he put it like that, what choice did she have?

He pressed a brief kiss to her lips, and then he was gone. A few minutes later, the thundering of hooves filled the air as Bensbury’s stable was emptied to carry the search parties on their missions.

An hour after they left, the first three men from the search parties returned. They gathered in the study to exchange information. There was none. Their reports represented just the first few minutes of the search, Isabelle knew. Something would come up soon.

In the next intervening hour, Mr. Turner arrived from town, then rushed to join the search after Isabelle brought him up to speed. His departure was followed almost at once by Caro and Grant’s appearance.

Caro looked a fright. Lines creased her forehead and the corners of her eyes, and she had obviously dressed quickly and without care. Several buttons on the back of her dress were misaligned with the buttonholes, as though she hadn’t been able to wait for the maid to do them properly. She gave Isabelle an anguished look.

Grant stoically asked for the latest news. Isabelle passed along the meager report. Caro pressed a handkerchief to her lips, visibly fighting to restrain tears. Unexpected pity for the woman who had tormented her for so long washed over Isabelle. She couldn’t imagine how helpless a mother must feel in such a situation. She laid a hand on her arm before Grant gently led her to a sitting room.

Isabelle ordered tea for them, then went to Alexander’s room where the surgeon was attending him. She waited in the hall while the wound in Alex’s scalp was stitched closed.

After the surgeon spoke to her and departed, she went in to see Alex. A bandage wound around his head and he lay perfectly still. Isabelle’s eyes widened in alarm, but she reminded herself he’d had laudanum.

She remained at her brother’s bedside for several minutes. Too anxious about Naomi to maintain a vigil, Isabelle sent for a footman to sit with Alex and instructed the servant to alert her as soon as he was awake.

Isabelle’s imagination concocted every sort of evil scenario into which her loyal friend may have been tossed. She closed her eyes against the distressing thoughts and hissed.

A bustle of activity from the entrance hall alerted her to the return of the search parties’ representatives.

She rushed over to find two of the three men speaking with Grant. Marshall’s brother dropped his face into his hands. Isabelle’s heart skipped a beat.

“Has something — ” she started, too afraid of the possibilities to finish the question.

“No,” Grant said. “No news.”

Isabelle exhaled. She nodded weakly. No news was preferable to bad news, but it was still a blow.

A few minutes later, the third searcher returned from Marshall’s group. He shook his head. “Nothing.” Then he turned and strode back out to his waiting horse. The other two followed close on his heels.

Isabelle stood for a moment, staring blankly at the heavy wooden door after it closed behind the men.

“There’s no need for you to stay, you know.”

Isabelle slowly turned to face Grant. Though his coloring was lighter than Marshall’s, the lines of his face resembled his older brother. His gray eyes were like cold gunmetal.

“I beg your pardon?”

“This is a family affair.” Grant’s lips pressed together in a hard line. “It would be best if you go now.”

She drew back. Even now, Marshall’s family still had the energy to act so spitefully toward her? “What have I ever done to you?” she asked, her quiet voice full of hurt and bewilderment.

Grant turned his head. “You didn’t see him after he found out about you and your friend. He lived in a bottle for a month. We were all afraid he was going to do himself harm, so I stayed with him until he snapped out of it.” He raised his brows. “Did you know that, Fairfax?” he asked, pointedly refusing her his family name, “Your infidelity nearly killed Marshall.”

Isabelle rubbed her tired eyes. She started to argue with him, but what was the point? Nothing she said or did would ever convince Grant or Caro that Isabelle was not the scheming adulteress they so wanted her to be.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she finally said. “And his divorce nearly killed me. But he and I have a chance to get past that now. I hope you will, as well. Either way, Marshall asked me to be here. You don’t have to like it, and you don’t have to like me, but I’m not going anywhere.”

Grant’s jaw tightened. Isabelle raised her nose a fraction of an inch and walked down the hall in even, gliding steps.

She found Marshall’s Aunt Janine in the library. The older lady was sitting in the same chair by the window where she’d been when Isabelle first met her. She held a book loosely in her hands. Isabelle noticed it was upside down. “Do you mind if I join you?”

Aunt Janine lifted her left hand. Near the base of her thumb, Isabelle saw a small red welt. “Look at that,” she said mournfully. “Nothing. Nothing at all. I ought not have left her. My father died of a bee sting, and I’ve been afraid ever since. But I shouldn’t have abandoned her.”

Isabelle gently laid the book in Lady Janine’s lap and took her hands. “No, my lady. Please don’t. If you’d stayed, you might have been attacked, as well. Don’t blame yourself, Lady Janine.”

She sniffed loudly, her chin all aquiver. “That’s
Aunt
Janine to you, missy,” she declared in a wounded tone. “Don’t make me tell you again.”

Isabelle smiled and nodded.

“If you don’t mind, dear,” the older woman said, “I think I’d prefer to be alone. But you will come the instant there is news?”

“Of course, my lady.”

Aunt Janine mumbled her thanks, then she lifted her book, still upside down, and gazed blankly at the pages.

The minutes passed in agonizing slowness. When the door opened, Isabelle sprinted to the front hall. Mr. Turner was among the three returning men this time. Neither he nor the others had found Naomi.

When he heard the reports, Grant shot a hard look at Isabelle and left without a word.

Fear gnawed at her middle. Isabelle ran her hands up her arms, and turned to the investigator. “How much longer can this go on?”

His shoulders slumped at her question. “It could be hours. Days. Soon, though, every watchman in London and every magistrate throughout the country will be on the lookout. Lady Naomi will be recovered, miss.”

The next several hours were maddeningly repetitive. No news. Never any news. The men saw nothing. They found nothing. No one they spoke to had seen or heard anything that could lead them to Naomi.

As evening approached, Isabelle thought the waiting would drive her mad. The last group of men looked peaked. The search parties were surely tired, hungry, and flagging in strength. Isabelle decided to fix baskets for the next round of searchers to take back to their groups. The men needed to eat, and Isabelle needed something to occupy her time.

The kitchen level was not as abandoned as it had been last time Isabelle was there, but still quiet. A couple of maids worked in the scullery. In the kitchen proper, a lad on hands and knees scrubbed the flagstone floor with a stiff-bristled brush. An elderly liveried footman emerged from the pantry, holding a tin of spice. He gave Isabelle a baleful look.

“Where’s the cook?” Isabelle asked the man.

He tipped his chin to the interior of the pantry. Isabelle peeked into the small, gloomy room. The cook sat on the floor, hugging her knees to her chest with her face pressed against them.

“Excuse me,” Isabelle ventured. “I’d like to make baskets of food for the search parties. Would that be all right?”

The woman’s head reared up, her round face blotchy and streaked with tears. “Who could think of food at a time like this?” she wailed. “Not when our young lady’s been taken!” She bit her fist and choked out a sob.

Isabelle tried reasoning with the grief-stricken woman. “But the men must eat. How will they have the strength to keep up the search with empty stomachs? Wouldn’t you like to help me?”

The cook only shook her head and cried harder.

Isabelle sighed. Fine. She would do it herself.

In the larder, she found a large ham. She brought it to the table and carved the meat into a pile of slices. She made short work of a wheel of hard cheese, and several loaves of bread. Then she set about assembling sandwiches, which she wrapped in napkins.

She packed them into the baskets, and carried them upstairs. When she reached the entry hall, the butler was closing the door.

“Did I miss them?” At the butler’s affirmative reply, she stomped her foot in vexation. “No news, either, I suppose?” she grumbled.

“No, ma’am.”

Frustrated tears pricked the backs of her eyes. She set her load of baskets on the floor. “All right,” she said, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. “Here’s food for the men. Make sure they get these, if I’m not here next hour.”

• • •

Fatigue slumped Marshall’s shoulders. Beneath him, his mount plodded wearily. Marshall thought ruefully that Amadeus would have better endurance than the gelding he rode, but his favorite stallion had stayed behind in London. His search party had ridden hard and fast down the road to London, hoping to catch up to Thomas Gerald if he was taking his sister back into the city. They’d gone as far as Lambeth, but careful questioning of the villagers revealed that Gerald and Naomi had not passed that way. When the party had reconvened, the eyes of Marshall’s grooms and footmen had turned to him for guidance.
What now?
those expressions all asked.

With despair and fear gnawing at his gut, Marshall adopted the same tone he’d used when addressing his company in Spain. “We’ve gathered,” he said matter-of-factly, “that Lady Naomi is not being taken into the city — at least not by this road. Good, that’s valuable intelligence.” In truth, it was worthless. It was akin to lifting a single straw from the proverbial haystack, and upon discerning the absence of the needle announcing, “Not here!” That still left the entire blasted haystack to sift through — or in Marshall’s case — every village, byway, and port in England. The more time passed, the larger the haystack became.

Still, his forthright attitude reassured his men, who nodded sagely at his words. “We shall fan out,” he’d announced, “and explore every track and drive in the area. Having foregone the speed of the main road, we can assume Gerald prefers the solitude of the less-traveled paths. Break into two groups. You two,” he swept his finger at the group, gathering a pair of men with his gesture, “backtrack toward Bensbury. Check the farms we saw earlier, off to the west. You two,” he nodded to the others, “explore the woods to the east. If he’s going to send a ransom demand, he might be headed for a house, a shack, something of that sort. Look for anything suspicious. I’ll take the turn going back to Bensbury this time.”

On the way out of Lambeth, Marshall encountered another member of his party, Henry, returning from meeting the other searchers at Bensbury. Henry met Marshall’s questioning gaze and shook his head once. “Nothing, m’lord.”