Then Comes Murder

Accusations and Alibis (part one)

Secretly kissing an unmarried lady with no intention of marrying her was not gentlemanly, but Jacob would not have considered it a crime. From the accusatory expressions from the peers he meant to avoid, their faces made gaunt by the hearth's roaring light, it seemed the men disagreed.

It had taken time to cool his temper, among other things, and standing in the rain had been the only cure available for his heated blood. As had cursing the day he'd laid eyes on Eleanor Fane. Hell, he'd never felt so humiliated by a woman.The way she stormed off, as if he'd been the one to hunt her down. She'd kissed him, hadn't she? 

Admittedly, Jacob did feel guilty for how things happened, but it wasn't his fault that he'd assumed Eleanor and Maxwell had been lovers. And it wasn't as if he was entirely mistaken: no blushing virgin could kiss like that. He'd never felt so ready to lose himself to a woman. When she'd appeared in the garden, ethereal as some dark fairy queen, Jacob would have never dreamed of taking her in full view of the world. But that perfect, full mouth tasted like spice and wine and secrets, and it coaxed him to mad passion.

She could have commanded him with a word and, instead, she'd condemned him to suffering.

Women, he'd bemoaned as he stood there, the fool.

He'd meant to quietly trudge to Charlies room to change out of his wet clothes and, perhaps, beg Carter to send up enough hot water for bath. Too caught in his irritation and prickling pride, Jacob had not noticed that the music had ended early. He did not notice the party had from the ballroom to the library. As he passed, drenched to his core, the men inside fixed their gazes on him as if he were the foulest man alive.

"Jacob!" George called, his voice dark. "Good God, man! Why are you wet?"

The worst part about kissing Eleanor Fane, Jacob decided, is that he wanted to do it again. Hell, he really was the most pathetic sort of bastard. He deserved whatever chastising his brother would give him for tasting his pretty wife's cousin.

Entering the dim library, he realized that the faces judging him were far too grim for a garden dalliance. No, it was as if all the fraternal affection and trust had boiled into black suspicion. No matter standing or sitting, drinking or smoking, every man wore the same dark expression. These were men on the precipice of mutiny.

"I got caught in the storm walking back from the village," Jacob said slowly. He surveyed the room of dark, flickering eyes. "What on earth's happened?"

No one wanted to speak. Fidgeting with their glasses of brandy, their cigars, their buttons, every man swallowed his tongue. Ian Maxwell scoffed. Marcus would not meet his eye. Lord Grey put his hand on George's shoulder. The rest of the group—among them a flustered James Alton and a nervous Ashley Cooper—glared. It was so quiet, Jacob could hear the old clock chiming the hour from the hall.

"George," Jacob said.

"Father is dead," his brother answered flatly.

Jacob swallowed. His thoughts buzzed with a strange energy that seemed to ring in his ears. It was as if he were watching himself from outside his own body. As if his thoughts and breaths and heartbeats were not his own. Every eye turned to him, as if to watch every flicker of his face, every twitch, every wrinkle.

"Dead?" he asked. His tongue felt thick in his mouth. "How can he be dead?"

His brain flickered towards a callous hysteria. Monsters do not die. Jacob almost laughed.

"We don't know," George said slowly. He shrugged off Lord Grey's hand to stand before the fire. "Doctor Fane hasn't returned from the village."

"Enough with the subterfuge!" Charlie cried. His eyes were bloodshot and wild. "Jacob, father has been murdered!"