“But I never made any such request. Nor did I ask them to invest in mustard plantations or purchase an Arabian menagerie.” Ransom flicked aside another pile of paper. “This explains the erratic record-keeping and purchases. They’re trying to make me look unstable. I’m being set up.”
“Set up?” Izzy echoed. “By the solicitors? Why would they do that?”
“They’re working in concert with my heir, most likely. You’re not the only one with a grasping cousin. Mine wouldn’t dare throw me in a pond or lock me in a root cellar, but he’d happily take the title and control of my fortune, given the chance.”
Izzy sifted through the pile of notices. “This is beyond my expertise. You need help. A new solicitor, perhaps.”
He dismissed the idea. “I can’t trust anyone.”
“I know, and that’s a problem. You need to start trusting people, Ransom. Start by letting them know you. Not just your strengths, but your weaknesses, too.”
He paced back and forth on the stone floor. “Let them know the real me. All my weaknesses. Yes, I’ll make plans to do that. Right on the heels of your announcement that Izzy Goodnight isn’t a girl anymore but a twenty-six-year-old woman who likes her nipples pinched.”
Izzy supposed his point was valid. They were both hiding parts of themselves. But the consequences weren’t quite the same.
She tapped a stack of papers to tidy them. “I’m just saying that matters progressed to this stage because you were too ashamed—”
“Ashamed?”
“Yes. Ashamed.” Izzy was tired of dancing around it. He was the one who’d insisted he didn’t want coddling. “You’re a duke, and your intended bride ran off with a lowly farmer. Then the farmer bested you in a duel, leaving you blinded. That had to have been humiliating.”
“The farmer did not best me in anything, damn it.” He stopped by the windows. “Do you know the only thing more dangerous than fencing against a master swordsman?”
“What?” she asked.
“Fencing against a love-drunk fool who hasn’t a goddamn clue what he’s doing. It’s like defending both sides at once. He’d never even held a sword before. I had to try like hell not to run him through.”
What was he saying? That he’d incurred his injury while trying not to win?
She rose from the table and moved toward him. “Ransom . . .”
“I couldn’t kill him. What good would that have done anyone? I only chased after them because I feared she hadn’t gone willingly. On that point, I was corrected.”
Izzy ached for him. Now she regretted using the word ashamed. He shouldn’t feel ashamed of his actions. He’d risked everything to protect that girl. He should wear that scar like a badge of pride.
“It was good of you.” She said it firmly. Not as a placating gesture, but as a fact she wouldn’t let him contradict. “You must have cared for her.”
“I was planning to marry her,” he said. “Of course I cared. As much as a man like me is able to care. No, we didn’t share any grand passion or meeting of hearts and minds, but I thought she was . . . practical. Interested in becoming a duchess and spending my money, and patient enough to put up with my faults in exchange.” He flexed one hand. “In the end, it seems I misjudged.”
Izzy felt a powerful twinge of guilt, thinking of Lady Emily’s letter. “She was so young. Probably just impressionable and frightened.”
“No, no. I think it’s the other way round. She was more perceptive than I gave her credit for.” He turned back toward the pile of correspondence. “When I lose all control of my fortune, she will be able to celebrate her narrow escape.”
If you lose all control of your fortune, what becomes of me?
Izzy chided herself for thinking it, but the fear was creeping in fast. It would seem the castle was legally hers, after all. But she’d never be able to keep the place—or find another home—without the wages he’d promised her.
“My goodness.” Abigail and Duncan entered the room, surveying the drifts of paper. “What’s happened here?”
Ransom rose to his feet. “Treachery. That’s what’s happened here.”
“Was there another body in the walls?”
“No.” Izzy lifted the letter that had come express. “We’re expecting important visitors next week. Apparently, His Grace is to be the subject of a mental-competence hearing.”
“A lunacy hearing? But that’s absurd. The duke’s not mad.” She turned and whispered to Izzy, “He isn’t mad, is he?”
Oh, Abigail. Izzy lifted her eyebrows and shook her head no.
The vicar’s daughter continued in a not-quite-confidential murmur, “I mean, he did behave rather strangely last night.”
Ransom cleared his throat. “Miss Pelham, I am standing right here. I am not deaf. And as it will be plain for the lawyers and doctors to discern, I am not mad.”
But he was blind.
That was the true unspoken source of concern, and everyone was thinking it. Blind people were often put in asylums even if they were otherwise of sound mind. Considering the neglected state of his business affairs and his prolonged, dramatic absence from society, Ransom wasn’t going to have an easy time of this. If his solicitors wanted him gone, the truth would be a heavy stroke against him.
“Christ.” He pushed both hands through his hair. “I could lose everything.”
“No, you won’t,” Izzy said. “We won’t let it happen. Because if you lose everything, so do I. For that matter, so do Duncan and Abigail.”
If Ransom wasn’t the duke any longer, Duncan wouldn’t have a post. If Izzy had to abandon the castle for lack of funds, Abigail would lose the support for the local parish.
They were all in this together now.
“Forget everything I said about honesty. If these solicitors have been lying to you, you can lie right back to them. They never have to know the extent of your injuries. When I arrived at this castle, it took me hours to realize you were blind.”
“You were unconscious for most of them,” he pointed out.
“Just the same. You know what I mean. You know this castle in the dark, and you can focus well enough that your eyes don’t wander. All you have to do is bluff your way through this one interview. Once they’re gone, you can sack Blaylock and Riggett and hire new solicitors.”“But the castle, Miss Goodnight.” Duncan looked around. “It doesn’t look like a ducal residence.”
“Then we’ll make it one.” She squared her shoulders. “We have a week. The castle—the public parts of it, anyhow—need to be immaculate. But we mustn’t change the arrangement of the rooms by even one inch. The duke will need a wardrobe. For that matter, I could use a new gown or two.” Izzy twisted her fingers. “And we’ll need servants. A great many servants. To clean, garden, serve at table . . .”
“Refreshing the duke’s wardrobe will be a distinct pleasure,” Duncan said.
“And Izzy, you know I’d love to help with yours. We’re all ready for hard work. But that last bit—the servants—will be a challenge.” Abigail looked regretful. “It was already difficult to convince the local people to come work at the castle . . . what with its bloody history, the ghostly rumors, and the duke’s months of seclusion. But after the bones were found in the wall . . .” She shook her head. “In time, I’m certain I could convince them to come back. But this week?”
“Even if we did manage to hire them,” Duncan said, “I don’t know that I could train village folk to an acceptable standard in that time. Then there’s the matter of uniforms and livery. It all seems rather hopeless.”
“It can’t be hopeless,” Izzy said.
Abigail smiled. “You’re right, Izzy. Would Cressida and Ulric just give up? Of course not. We’ll pull through somehow. Doubt not.”
And with that, all four of them fell silent.
Doubting.
But they couldn’t waste much time with doubt. Not when there was so much to be done.
Over the next few days, everyone in Gostley Castle worked hard. And no one more so than Ransom.
A few days later, Izzy watched from the entryway as he scrawled a line of script across a blank page—once, then again and again. After ten repetitions, he lifted the paper and held it to the light, as if trying to judge the straightness of the lines.
Apparently dissatisfied, he cursed and crumpled the paper into the grate.
She held her breath and waited for all the evidence to be destroyed. Only when he drew out a fresh sheet of paper did Izzy gather the courage to approach.
“I’m busy, Goodnight.”
He knew her footsteps too well.
“This won’t take long,” she assured him.
“Let it wait, then. Go sweep a cobweb from the rafters or polish a mirror. There must be some household task that needs attention.”
“There is a task that needs attention. It’s this one.” She set her tray on the tabletop next to him. “You need to eat.”
He ignored her.
She sliced a pear into wedges, then offered him one. “Your eyesight is better when you’ve eaten. And you need your eyesight because I have something important to show you.”
“Fine.” He reached out, catching her by the wrist. Then, using his teeth, he took the slice of pear straight from her fingers and devoured it. “There.”
She offered him another slice. “More.”
He ate more. Slice after slice until the pear was gone. He finished by licking her palm and sucking the juice from each finger in turn. That wicked tongue of his swirled around her knuckles and teased the sensitive webs between her fingers.
At last, her littlest finger slid from his mouth with an audible pop.
“Now,” he said. “What’s this important thing you have to show me?”
Dashed if Izzy could remember after that sensual onslaught. She had to shake her head to clear it.
Oh, yes.
“Your new bedchamber.”
His mouth tipped in that roguish half grin. “Perfect.”
As she led him up the stairs and down the corridor, Izzy felt rather like a chicken leading a fox straight to his own den.
“Here it is,” she said nervously. “The ducal bedchamber. We blocked out the bats with shutters, then cleaned the chimney. The bed hangings and tapestries are all new. The drapes, as well.”
He strode to the center of the chamber, nodding thoughtfully. “I like what you’ve done with the place.”
She laughed a little. “You don’t have to contrive compliments. That wasn’t my goal. I just wanted to give you a chance to map out the room, before the . . . Before the new servants arrive.”
“It’s not a contrived compliment. I can hear the difference.” He took another measured step. “The whole room is softer. The echoes are muted, the hard edges are gone. It’s cozy.”
Izzy smiled, and her nerves lost their edges, too. He didn’t need to praise their hard work, but it meant a great deal that he did.
“What about the bed?” he asked.
“It’s . . . still there. Exactly where it was before.”
“Show me.”
She took the hand he offered and led him to the edge of the enormous four-poster bed. “Here. There’s a new mattress, of course. And we restrung the frame with new ropes.”
He pushed up and down. “Hm.”
Then he caught her in his arms and launched them both onto the bed. Izzy shrieked as they landed in a tangle in the center of the bed.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m testing something.” He wrapped his legs over hers, then rolled them back and forth over the length of the bed. When he stopped in the center again, he said, “I was right. Large enough for a duke and six women besides.”