Redemption (15 page)

“But you
have never said anything about this before,” she whispered,
wondering if this was some sort of trick. “I haven’t received word
from the solicitor, or you, to tell me this upon reaching one and
twenty weeks ago. Why have I not heard about this
before?”

Julian
shrugged. “You were fifteen when our parents died. You were hardly
old enough to understand what it was all about, or inherit half a
house the size of Pendlebury and know what to do with it. The
solicitors put the money in trust for you. I kept Bristledown, but
ignored it because I don’t like the place.”

“But I
am not fifteen now,” Lizzie protested. “Why have the solicitors not
written to inform me of my inheritance as soon as I reached an age
where I could be responsible for it? I turned one and twenty
several weeks ago, Julian. You have had a long time to tell me and
haven’t, nor have I received any correspondence from the solicitors
informing me of my wealth.”

She
studied the sly look that suddenly shone in Julian’s eyes. It
appeared and disappeared so swiftly that if she hadn’t been looking
at him she would have missed it.

“Maybe
the solicitor’s weren’t able to contact you,” Julian said quietly,
leaving her to fill in the gaps.

Silence
stretched between them. She struggled to retain what he was saying,
and watched his mouth move, but she didn’t hear what was said at
first because she was struggling to absorb the depth of his
betrayal.

“You
have been stopping my letters, haven’t you?” Lizzie whispered. “As
my guardian, you have been in complete control of everything, and
have been hiding the letters that informed me of my
inheritance.”

He made
no attempt to deny the allegation.

“You
were hoping that if I never found out, you could claim Pendlebury
House as yours in its entirety, and I would never learn of your
deceit. You could live there for the rest of your life and have no
challenge for it, especially if I wasn’t even in London and nobody
knew where to find me.”

She
could see the horrifying truth unfold in front of her and stared
across the table as though she had never seen her step-brother
before in her entire life. Tears loomed. She hated him. She wanted
to reach across the table and slap him for his arrogance, but then
she didn’t want to sully herself by sinking to his level. If he
became aware of just how upset she was he would relish his victory.
She had no intention of awarding him for his behaviour in any way,
and worked hard to keep her face devoid of all emotion while she
tried to absorb the new, startling change of
circumstance.

Julian
suddenly jumped up and slammed his fist on the table. “Pendlebury
should be mine in its entirety, damn it,” he snarled.

“Sit
down,” the guard snapped. He slammed Julian back in his chair so
hard that he nearly toppled backward. “Do that again I shall return
you to your cell. You can have an hour’s hard labour to teach you
better manners.”

Lizzie
stared at him and realised then that she had never really known her
step-brother at all. Not only had he cast her aside like she was
flotsam and jetsam, but he had also lied to keep her inheritance
from her.

“You
were hoping I would never find out.” It wasn’t a question. Taking a
random guess, she pointed across the table at him. “So, now you
need help and have the audacity to call upon me. What do you expect
me to do exactly? What else do you want from me? I am sure that you
haven’t called me back to London to inform me of your lies. What
else has gone on that you haven’t told me about? I have never been
informed by any solicitor that the house should be half-mine. As a
result, I can hardly be held to account for anything that goes on
there. You, on the other hand, have been residing there and have
undoubtedly run up debts on the back of what you claimed you had.
If you have gotten yourself in a mess then I suggest you get
yourself out of it.”

Feeling
slightly overwhelmed by the enormity of his news, she stood up and
made her way to the door. “I take it Broghampton and Hallerton are
the solicitors who have the details of the inheritance?”

Julian
glared at her but didn’t speak. She took his silence for
confirmation and knew that she would find out soon enough anyway
because the solicitors were next on her list of people to visit
today. She looked at Patty, who understood her need to leave and
moved to join her.

“Well, I
warn you now that if you have deliberately blocked them from
contacting me to ensure that the legalities are not drawn up that
will award me what is rightfully mine, I shall notify the
magistrate and ensure you remain here and serve the rest of your
punishment. You have always been selfish and greedy, and given no
consideration to anybody else’s feelings but your own. Don’t expect
me to consider your wants and needs in return.”

“Lizzie.” His voice lashed across the room but Lizzie ignored
it. She felt soiled and dirty, and desperately wanted to leave so
she could take a bath and wash off the grime of being in such
hateful place. His next words stopped her progress out of the door
though. “Pendlebury is no good to you at the moment.”

Lizzie
sighed and shook her head at the guard who was looking
questioningly at her, silently asking her if she was leaving or
not.

“Then I
suggest you tell me what else you have done, Julian, and be quick
about it.” She sat back down and glared hatefully at him. “This
time, I demand the truth and nothing less. I am not fifteen years
old any more. Don’t even attempt to try to lie to me.”

She was
vaguely aware of the guard smiling a little but didn’t look his
way. She was glad now that he had chosen to stay inside the room
because she suspected that he was the only reason Julian hadn’t
tried to bully or threaten her.

“I owe
money to the bank,” he sighed reluctantly, glaring at Patty as
though it was all her fault.

“How
much do you owe?”

“My half
of Pendlebury House,” Julian replied.

She
would have believed him too, if he hadn’t hesitated for a fraction
of a second before he spoke.

“All of
it?” she asked.

He named
a sum that made her close her eyes in stunned disbelief. She didn’t
know the property value but suspected that it was not worth much
more than the sum Julian mentioned.

“Why on
earth did you borrow that much?”

Julian
sighed impatiently. “I had creditors who needed payment. I could
hardly go to loan sharks. I have a reputation to uphold, you
know.”

Lizzie
snorted. “Not much of one, you don’t. Your reputation was in
tatters before I left. From what has happened to you since I have
been away, I seriously doubt that it has improved any.” She leaned
back in her chair. “How much do you have in the bank?”

He
stared at her without answering and she knew he had told her the
truth and his accounts were empty.

“So you
have spent several thousands of pounds, and loaned yet more money
from the bank using the house as collateral knowing firstly that
you didn’t own all of it, and secondly that you weren’t in a
position to pay it back.” She stared at him in disbelief, unsure
whether his actions were down to ignorance or arrogance. She rather
suspected it was both but wasn’t entirely sure what to think about
any of it. “So where do you expect the money you need to sort
yourself out to come from?”

Julian
looked at her frankly. “You.”

Lizzie
stared at him as the horrible realisation sank in of why he had
contacted her at all. “You expect me to pay your debts for you out
of my inheritance?”

“No. I
haven’t borrowed on the entire house, just my own half.”

Lizzie
watched him as he spoke and knew from the furtive way his gaze kept
flickering around the room that he was lying.

“You,
sir, are a liar,” she declared coldly. “You claimed to own all of
it, didn’t you? The bank isn’t aware that you have committed
fraud.”

Julian
merely looked at her arrogantly. “I did what I needed to do. You
haven’t looked after that place; seen to its repairs, or kept the
staff in work there.”

“That’s
because I didn’t know that I owned any of it,” Lizzie shouted. She
pushed out of her seat and began to march backward and forward
across the tiny room in agitation. Fury made it impossible for her
to sit still. “That’s fraud. You borrowed against something you
knew you didn’t own. No bank would hold me accountable in any way,
especially given you have known where I have lived and been able to
contact me all these weeks yet haven’t seen fit to notify the
solicitor of my whereabouts. You have known they have been trying
to find me and have deliberately blocked them so you can live a
life you cannot afford.” Lizzie shook her head in disgust. She knew
from the look on Julian’s face that she was right. “What about
Bristledown? Have you borrowed off that as well?”

Julian
snorted. “The house is a mere carcass. Not only would nobody buy it
in the state it is in but it is worth next to nothing. No bank
would loan anything on the back of that place.”

“It has
several smaller cottages that must be worth something,” she
challenged.

“Yes,
for workers with nowhere to work,” Julian retorted. “Without
Bristledown, the cottages are next to worthless.”

“So you
haven’t tried to sell it?”

“It has
to be repaired before it can be sold. I am not sinking good money
into that pit,” Julian countered with a shudder. “Even if I had
some.”

“Not
when you can spend it on whoring, gambling, and God knows what
else,” Lizzie countered flatly.

“You
have the money you inherited from father,” Julian
reported.

She
pierced him with a steady stare. “Please tell me that you haven’t
spent that too?” She watched and waited. It seemed to take him an
age to reply.

“No, the
solicitors placed it in trust for you. I cannot touch
it.”

The
disgust in his voice warned her that he had tried to get his hands
on it but had failed. She wanted to thank the solicitors for their
diligence, and glared at Julian with renewed disgust.

“God,
you would steal from the Devil himself if you had to in order to
quench your greedy thirst for money,” she accused.

Ignoring
that, Julian learned forward in his seat, his once handsome face
full of earnest persuasion. “You should have enough to pay the
loans off and then Pendlebury will be safe from the bank. I will
buy your half off you when I am out of here.”

“But you
don’t have any money,” she reminded him pertinently.

Julian
shook his head. “Once I am out then I can work out what I am going
to do to pay everything off.”

Lizzie
snorted. Men like Julian couldn’t be bothered to work. It was
something lower class people did. Julian would beg, steal and
borrow, or even blackmail to ensure that he retained the lifestyle
he considered was his right. However, he would never work. He
wouldn’t know how.

“I will
find a way to earn the money to pay you back,” Julian replied
obliquely.

“So you
don’t have a job, and have no way of paying me back for the
foreseeable future, if I was foolish enough to spend my
inheritance, which you have tried to deny me, on your self-centred
lifestyle.” Lizzie shook her head. “If you were in my situation,
what would you do?”

Julian
looked up at her. “You are my step-sister. It is your
responsibility to help family out in their hour of
need.”

“Ha!”
Lizzie spat. “Where were you in my hour of need? Oh, I remember
now. You were on your way to your mistress’ house having thrown me
out of the house. It’s a pity you didn’t remember your familial
obligations when I needed someone to turn to. You are a disgraceful
specimen for a human being, you are.”

“Elizabeth Pinner, I demand you get me out of here this
instant. Do you hear me?” Julian boomed when she stomped toward the
door.

She nodded to the guard to open the door and turned to face
her step-brother for one last time. “I am going to speak to the
solicitor about this and find out what is in
my
bank. I am then going to take a
look at Pendlebury, or what is left of it, and see what else you
have helped yourself to that isn’t yours. I warn you now that if I
find out that you have tried to block me receiving anything else
that should rightly be mine, I shall see that you feel the full
weight of the law. Meantime, I think you had better go back to your
cell and ponder your disgraceful behaviour. I am horrified to think
that I am related to you. Once you have signed on the line and
transferred Bristledown over to me, I shall inform the magistrate
as to my whereabouts. Whether or not I inform him of your fraud is
questionable at the moment.”

“My, my,
how the sweetness has turned sour, Lizzie,” Julian murmured coldly.
“First you are holier than thou, now you are a
blackmailer.”

“Blackmailer or not, I have the weight of the law behind me.
I shall arrange for the solicitor to bring you the transfer papers.
If you wish to get out of here, no more tricks Julian. Sign them.
If not, I shall be the first one calling upon the bank with the
evidence of the true ownership of Pendlebury. I will have no
hesitation in showing them just how much of a liar you are. Until
you sign on the dotted line, Julian, you shall remain
here.”