Awakening His Duchess (42 page)

The woman had grasped her under the arm and pulled her to
her feet. Now she was leading her toward the church. No, not last rites. Did
the Church of England do last rites?

She picked up a foot and moved it forward with no more
thought than a puppet. Lifted the other foot and moved it forward. People
around her were talking, but her ears were buzzing and she couldn’t hear. On
the other hand they seemed too excited. Didn’t they understand death was not
anything but a cold drain on those left behind? But it must seem exciting to
villagers who had little change in their lives from day to day.

She stared up at the spires and wondered why all her prayers
were ignored—or worse than ignored—laughed at, turned on their heads, and spit
back at her.

As she took monumental step after step, her mind churned
over the last hour. She tried to still her thoughts, but Henri...it had been
like thinking one had reached the bottom of Dante’s inferno only to realize
there was a deeper pit, a worse hell with more torturing and more suffering
below.

How could Henri have killed so many? What kind of man could
take the deaths of his children and his first wife, with such aplomb? It was
obscene. She wished she could scrub his presence from her mind, his touch from
her body. It was as if she had looked into the eyes of a beast and been pulled
down into his filthy lair.

“Yvette!”

She turned slowly, believing she imagined Beau’s call. The
curricle stood on the road, the horse lathered and sides heaving while Beau
pushed Henri and jumped down behind him.

Henri stumbled, but Beau caught his arm, holding him. Henri
looked in her direction and looked through her. “
Salope immonde
”

Beau backhanded Henri.

The crack of his hand against Henri’s face seemed to jar
loose the sound around her. Henri’s head whipped to the side and there was a
collective gasp from the villagers.

“Do not speak of my wife. Don’t ever let her name cross your
lips.”

“Do not let him anger you,” she warned. “He will use your
emotions against you.”

Beau’s gaze jerked toward hers and softened. “It’s all
right. The sheriff is taking him prisoner. We’ll demand a trial straight away.”

Beau spoke with several of the men around him and passed a
tied Henri to one of them. “If he gets away, I will have every one of your
heads. He murdered my brothers and tried to murder my father and me.”

And Etienne.
But she couldn’t force the words from
her lips.

Beau moved away from the group of men, coming toward her.
“Are you hurt?”

Her? Hurt? “No.” Not in any way that would show outwardly.
“Etienne.”

“Have you not seen him yet?” asked Beau, his face wrinkling
in concern.

She shook her head.

“They told you, didn’t they?”

Oh God! Had they told her? Told her he was dead while her
ears were buzzing. Or had her ears been buzzing because she didn’t want to
hear? Wasn’t ready to hear.

Beau kept moving toward her.

She shook free from the woman at her side and took a step
back, holding out her hand. “I can’t do this.”

“Give us a moment, please,” Beau said, moving relentlessly
forward.

Raw pain threatened to shred her inside out. She looked down
half expecting to see blood. She should be bleeding. “I cannot, Beau. Please do
not ask it of me.”

The villagers stepped back, a couple of men ushering the
ones who were too caught up in listening to step back of their own accord.
Respect for a grieving mother.

“It will be all right,” he said softly.

“NO!”

Her scream shocked the villagers. Shocked her, but she
couldn’t hold it in any longer.

Beau closed the distance between them and caught her arms.
She tried to bat him away, but he pulled her against him and cradled her head
against his chest. “Yvette.”

“I cannot do this. I cannot have my heart broken again.”

“Shh, sugar. It’s over. Henri can never hurt you or Etienne
or anyone ever again.”

“Maman!”

She shoved free of Beau and whirled around. The little
figure trotting toward her couldn’t be real. But the villagers were parting for
him.

Like a lightning bolt had driven through her chest she couldn’t
have been more jolted. Her remaining son was alive?

“Etienne!
Mon Dieu,
Etienne.”

Beau’s arm came around her cupping her elbow as if she might
fall. She opened her arms, but Etienne drew to a halt just short of her.

“Will you not hug your maman?” Beau asked gently.

Etienne put his head down and dug his toe in the dirt. “You
are not mad at me?”

She dropped to her knees and gripped his shoulders. “No, no,
how could I be mad at you?”

Etienne looked above her at Beau. “I am sorry, sir. I should
have told you about
mon pere.”

“You did nothing wrong, my son,” said Beau. “There is
nothing for you to apologize for.”

She tried to tug him closer, but Etienne put his hand
against her chest and pushed.

“Etienne,” she whispered, his rejection searing through her.

His face turned red and he whispered, “I wet myself.”

“I do not care,” she said pulling him into her arms. “I
thought I lost you. I thought I lost both of you.”

She kissed Etienne’s face again and again. Beau ruffled the
boy’s hair. She breathed in deeply of him, which smelled faintly of sweaty
little boy and urine. But he was alive, and seemed unharmed.

“Ma-man,” he protested.
  

“I brought clean clothes,” she murmured, unwilling to let go
but trying not to hold him so tight as to crush him.

“You knew I was going to have an accident?” Etienne
squeaked.

“No, no. I knew you had not changed since yesterday. Oh,
Etienne, I am so sorry I did not watch you better.”

“I think
mon pere
must be a bad man.”

“Yes, a very bad man,” echoed Beau. “And he tricked a lot of
people. A lot of adults. But he won’t trick anyone ever again.”

Etienne put his head down. “I told the maid that untied me
to take me to the sheriff straight away. But I shouldn’t have gone with him at
all. I don’t think he meant to take me back to Saint-Domingue or get me any
bananas.”

“No. Likely he would not,” she said.

She should have warned Etienne not to trust Henri, but why
would she have when she didn’t know he was alive? But then as he said, she hadn’t
checked to see if he was alive. Hadn’t wanted to feel the tug of obligation and
duty to care for him if he was. Still it was all because of her. She hugged
Etienne tighter. If not for Henri’s evil scheme to live off her son one day,
she knew he would have killed her child just for being a cuckoo in his nest.

Finally Henri’s odd favoritism of the one son that wasn’t
his made sense. He knew her marriage to Beau was legal. Otherwise he wouldn’t
have stood a chance of installing Etienne as a duke’s heir. Yes, Etienne was
the spitting image of Beau, but that wouldn’t have mattered unless his claim
was legitimate.

She stood and grasped Etienne’s hand. Following the group
that was leading Henri away, she found the sheriff. “Search him.”

The man turned around and said, “Pardon?”

“Search him. He has paperwork that belongs to me.”

Henri’s dark eyes flickered. She’d surprised him, but there
was no denial there.

“Do not give him a chance to destroy it.”

The corner of his mouth tilted up. With his immobile scarred
face, she couldn’t tell if it was a full smile or a smirk. “You are too late,
ma
cherie.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

The sun had fallen to the horizon before Beau turned the
curricle into the drive of Haven Castle. Yvette held Etienne on her lap
although they could have all squeezed together on the seat.

He’d had to swear out a warrant for Henri’s arrest and had
sent Yvette and Etienne to the inn to change then joined them to eat before
starting home with the rested horse.

Yvette had said little, and he hadn’t wanted to discuss the
matter too much in front of Etienne. Trying to relay to the magistrate all that
Yvette had extracted from Henri was hard enough. Both of his brothers murdered
and an attempt made on his own life, all to make way for Etienne’s succession.

Even knowing that Etienne had been bound and gagged for
hours grated his soul raw. And Yvette was like a house battening down for a
massive hurricane. He could almost see her closing the shutters and locking
them. After her relief at having Etienne back played out, her eyes had grown
shadowed and tracked Etienne’s every move.

Beau wanted nothing more than to retreat to their suite and
digest what he’d learned. But as he drove toward the castle, the front door was
thrown open and two women skipped down the steps. His sisters. Another
grey-haired woman holding the arm of a very pregnant young lady walked sedately
behind them. Little Julie. All grown-up and expecting.

“Beau,” shouted two of the young women racing toward them.
“You’re home.”

His sisters and mother mobbed him before he was able to step
out of the curricle. He turned to hand Yvette down, but she had already
descended on the other side with Etienne’s hand in hers.

This was the homecoming he’d craved when he first arrived,
except now was the worst time. He’d never felt less like smiling. He needed to
talk to Yvette. He needed quiet in their rooms to come to terms with
everything. He needed to hold her and reassure himself that she and Etienne
were safe and unharmed.

“We came as soon as we heard you were home,” exclaimed his
oldest sister Shirley. “But we had to travel slowly because of Julie.”

His mother was petting him in the same way Yvette had done
with Etienne earlier. As if she couldn’t believe he was alive without feeling
for herself. She was smiling and crying while he hugged her fiercely, alarmed
at how frail she seemed and how her hair was now more silver than simply
graying.

“I cannot help it if I need to stop every hour.” Julia
nudged through the group. “Peter didn’t want me to travel at all, but the wait
was killing Mama. She wouldn’t leave me, but I could tell she wanted to come
home. I told her the baby could be born here at Haven just as easily as at
home.”

They chattered nonsensically, filling him in on the last ten
years in haphazard fashion, asking him questions and then in typical Havendish
fashion not waiting for his answers. He gathered from his glance at Danvers and
Mazi and their shaken heads that the women had not been filled in on the reason
for his absence when they arrived.

They would have to learn some time, but now would be cruel.
Perhaps later when their excitement at having him home cooled.

“You will have to tell us all about the Caribbean. Lady
Beaumont won’t ever tell us anything. And all Etienne ever talks about is bananas.”
Julie put a hand under her belly as she bounced on her toes.

“Diana and her girls are here too,” said his mother.

“All the children are looking forward to meeting you,” added
his middle sister Mary.

“Shouldn’t we go inside?” Beau searched Yvette’s face. She
stood to the side, her hands on Etienne’s shoulders. He reached out a hand for
her, but she’d dropped her head and was headed for the stairs, steering Etienne
in front of her. “Etienne, offer your arm to your mother and to one of your
aunts.”

Yvette looked back at him, her face as still as a porcelain
doll’s, betraying nothing. Now who was wearing a mask? But then again she had
probably learned to hide her feelings living with a man who was evil. After a
few hours of just listening to the man Beau felt soiled.

“Come, Beau, how is it that you didn’t write for all these
years?” Shirley questioned.

Three pairs of blue eyes were trained on him. And he didn’t
know how much they knew of Yvette’s
marriage
to Henri.

“I never had any paper.”
Or the wherewithal to afford
post.
“When one is under the spell of a witch doctor who is intent on
stealing one’s soul, writing letters is not allowed.”

His sisters gasped as a collective, and his mother’s grip on
his arm became painful.

“Why, I might have been rescued, and who wants to be rescued
from paradise?”

His sisters laughed.

“Stop teasing,” said his mother. “You will tell us what you
were doing all these years over dinner.”

“As you wish, madam. I can tell you the stories are true. It
is never cold, the trees are strangely shaped, and the women are beautiful.”

Yvette moved forward as if she hadn’t heard.

“We knew that,” said Julie with an exaggerated head nod
toward Yvette. “But what were you doing all this time?”

He watched his wife disappear inside. “Mostly harvesting
sugar cane.” He offered his arm to his mother and Julie. “So when am I going to
meet these husbands of yours? And just how many nieces and nephews do I have?”

“You weren’t harvesting sugar cane truly, were you?” asked
Shirley.

Beau sighed. He wasn’t going to be able to evade their
questions, so better to direct them. “You know how I like sugar, but one can’t
appreciate the effort that goes into it without being part of the harvest. Do
you know they burn the fields first? The air is full of the smell of it, like
caramel. There are tons of little black ashes floating on the air. Once the
foliage is gone, cutting the stalks is much easier. Of course the first
business is making certain the fires are contained.”

He led them up the steps, trying to not lean too heavily on
either of them. Yvette and Etienne disappeared inside the main hall.

Hours later he’d finally managed to exhaust their questions
and turned the conversation to learning about all the new additions to the
family in the last ten years, but as he looked around the drawing room his
brother’s absences glared. Everyone else but him had time to grow accustomed to
their loss, but it hit him that his brothers weren’t off on summer visits. They
wouldn’t be returning. Ever. When the rest of his family was gone too, he could
almost believe their absences were temporary.