Whisper of Magic (17 page)

Trevor looked grim, and Sylvia looked frightened, but
neither argued with her assessment.

“Spoken like a true Capricorn,” Lady Aster said with a small
smile. “Let us hope the solicitors will give us enough rope to hang him.”

Celeste clenched her fingers and vowed that she would use
every ounce of her persuasive gift to ensure that the solicitors did exactly
what she wanted of them.

Remembering the night of the riot when Lord Erran had
apparently used his bellows to counteract her charm . . . she
shivered. She must hope they had the same goals.

In a black humor after the bomb incident, Erran watched
grimly until the ladies were inside the house, then rode around to the mews to
stable his horse. With the animal in good hands, Erran stalked in the direction
of the gate, just as Trevor darted out of it.

“What happened?” the boy demanded.

“Nothing,” Erran snarled, pointing to indicate that Trevor
return to the yard.

Workmen had piled construction materials along the path. The
bags of Portland cement and stones would make excellent obstacles to trip up
intruders, but the piles of lumber would aid an arsonist. He despised thinking
like this.

“The team spooked. That’s not nothing.” The young baron looked
almost as shaken as Erran felt. “Are my sisters in danger? Do we need to move
them elsewhere?”

“That’s precisely what someone wants.” And what they were
likely to get, because Erran couldn’t think of a way to keep them safe in the
city. But then, it wouldn’t be safe for Ashford either, and his brother would
never come to London if he couldn’t have his own home.

And without Dunc here to whip the Whigs in line, the Tories
would win again.
Filth and bother!
Was that the whole point of this torment? Someone was trying to make Duncan
stay away?

“Dressing up and going to parties won’t be enough, will it?”
Trevor asked, speaking what Erran was thinking.

“We’ll talk to the solicitors first.” He couldn’t see a
positive outcome, but he needed to know where they stood. He needed the solid
ground of law beneath his feet before deciding on action.

No man should be above the law. If a law was wrong, then it
should be changed, not trampled beneath the feet of men powerful enough to
escape punishment. Righting wrongs was what he’d wanted to do with his life.

He hadn’t wanted to
bellow
people into submission. That was the same as bullying and totally, irrevocably
wrong.

Although Miss Rochester thought it was perfectly fine to
charm
people into compliance, Erran
realized later as they gathered in the study with the solicitors.

Theo had arrived with documents from Ashford allowing Erran
to speak on the marquess’s behalf. Their Uncle Pascoe had shown up just to
intimidate with his official, imposing presence. On the surface, Pascoe dealt
in transporting goods, but anyone with connections to government knew he had
influence with the king and others in the cabinet. Erran suspected his uncle
transported more information than goods.

The Rochester estate had sent Mr. Herrington, a plump older
gentleman who kept nervously polishing his spectacles. Erran thought Mr.
Luther, Lansdowne’s solicitor, looked more like a card shark than a man of the
law. Balding, narrow-eyed, and skinny, he appeared to be gauging the other
players and arranging his documents in order like a hand of cards.

Lady Aster had insisted that she and Sylvia stay out of the
crowded study, but she hadn’t been able to dissuade Celeste or Trevor from
taking part in their fate. As Erran listened to Celeste speak with the
compelling voice of angels, he wished he’d locked her in the cellar. The damned
female was trying to
charm
hard-headed lawyers.

“It is only a matter of time until my father’s will is
found,” she said with crystalline sweetness that had the idiot solicitors
actually bobbing their heads and hanging on to her every word. “His majordomo
was witness to the document and has provided an affidavit attesting to our
father’s wishes. I am of an age to take charge of my share, and the marquess
has generously offered to act as guardian for my siblings. I think this is a
very simple matter, if you’ll agree.”

“Yes, yes, of course, Miss Rochester,” Herrington, her
father’s lawyer, agreed, crossing his hands over his paunch in satisfaction.
“The baron gave all indication that he meant for the three of you to share the
estate. We’ve read your letters and seen the affidavit. It’s all very proper
and in order.”

Theo sent Erran a look expressing his surprise at this easy
capitulation. This was the solicitor who had handed the estate over to the earl
without a qualm. Unable to explain what Celeste was doing in terms even
remotely logical, Erran shook his head and waited for the axe to fall.

Luther, the rat-faced solicitor from Lansdowne’s firm, was
looking as if he’d eaten lemons, even though he’d nodded agreement.

Erran suspected
charm
only went so far. He watched with interest as Luther clenched and unclenched
his fists and moved papers about on the desk as if fighting a compulsion.

Which he could very well be doing. It would take strength
and determination to overcome Celeste’s persuasive tones.

“Your father . . .” Luther shoved forward one
of his documents, stumbling for words. “The firm you say drew up the will, has
no record of it. This is their affidavit.”

Pascoe’s thick eyebrows raised, but he waited for Erran to
speak.

Erran snatched the letter, made note of the firm’s name and
Jamaican address, and compared that to the papers he’d found in the baron’s
trunk. Without holding one against another, he could not immediately determine
if the signatures were identical.

“The majordomo . . . is an African slave
belonging to the estate,” Luther said sluggishly, searching for words as if
shaking off a spell and needing to find his argument again. “His testimony is . . .
irrelevant. The law is clear. As head of the Rochester family, the earl must
act in his cousin’s place.”

Celeste seemed set to argue. Erran slapped a hand over her
arm and shook his head at her and his uncle. He wanted to hear the entire
argument before she began twisting words and heads.

Apparently finding his way again, Luther picked up speed.
“Unfortunately, Miss Rochester’s birth outside of legal wedlock prevents her
from inheriting any part of the estate. Her father was still married to another
woman at the time she was born. The earl would like to place the younger
siblings in the proper schools and have their half-sister, Mrs. Guilford,
preside over their household until they come of age. Miss Rochester, of course,
being of the age of consent, may choose her own way.”

Celeste and Trevor gasped. Pascoe almost looked amused, so
he saw through the ruse too. Good.

Without questioning Luther’s scandalous assertion, Erran
merely placed his hands over the documents on the desk. Letting the Jamaican
one fall to the floor where he could collect it later, he crumpled the others,
and said, “No.”

He tossed the papers at the grate. “As marquess and head of
the baron’s maternal family, Ashford has greater jurisdiction. We will take the
case to court. Until such time, the children, including Miss Rochester, are
under his protection. I have already filed documents with the banks preventing
anyone from access to their funds until this matter is settled.”

The injustice and outright fraud of naming Miss Rochester a
bastard almost had him bellowing with his Courtroom Voice, but Erran’s sense of
fairness prevailed. He was in the right. He didn’t need to savage a bonehead.
Yet. “Should the earl dispose of
any
assets, we can and will sue the earl for everything he owns. The plantation and
its inhabitants are the property of the estate until such time as this matter
is settled, and the courts will appoint a neutral executor. We have notified
the Jamaican authorities accordingly.”

“You have no basis for this wholesale takeover of the earl’s
responsibilities,” Luther shouted.

“But he does, sir,” Celeste said sweetly. Erran could hear
her fury but she had marvelous control. “We are of Malcolm descent, and as
such, the property passes through the female line. I do not believe the earl is
female.”

Erran almost choked on surprise and laughter. She was
feeding him Aster’s nonsense, and both the men of business were willing to eat
it up—because of her damned voice and not any logic that he could discern.
Female line! As if such a thing were possible under British law.

Caught in her spell, without any prepared document or
counter-argument, Luther spluttered incoherently. Even Theo and Pascoe didn’t
protest the idiocy.

“We’ll provide the proper credentials to the court, of
course, gentlemen.” Pascoe finally spoke, while standing up to dismiss the
company as if he were judge and jury. “The king will stay apprised of the
proceedings. Good meeting you, Herrington.” He held out his hand to shake the
hand of the Rochesters’ solicitor. “Keep up the good work. Ashford will be
pleased.”

Luther looked prepared to protest.

Celeste rose, and etiquette forced all the men to rise as
well. “It was lovely clearing the air, gentlemen. I do thank you for your
concern. I’m sure we’ll remember your kindness when Lord Rochester comes into
his estate. It was good of you to come. Jamar will be happy to see you out.”

And the solicitors left as if they were puppets on her
strings. Erran could barely keep from gaping, even though he knew what she was
doing—he could hear her sarcasm beneath the syrup.

Apparently, although her charm didn’t work on Erran, his
family had soaked it up right along with the solicitors. But after Celeste quit
speaking and lapsed into angry silence, Theo and Pascoe shook their heads as if
to clear them and watched in disbelief as the angry solicitors filed out
without argument.

“What just happened here?” Pascoe demanded once the study
door closed on their departing guests. “I came here prepared to take the matter
to the Crown, and they just run off as if a hound is on their heels.”

Having experienced some of his wife’s weird abilities, Theo
was a little slower to react. He glanced questioningly at Erran, and then to
their hostess.

Who promptly broke into tears. “He called me a
bastard
! My mother and father would
never ever do anything improper. How dare that dastard suggest such a thing?
How
dare
he!”

The glass on the oil lamp shattered.

Sprawled across her bed, sobbing, Celeste ignored the
timid knocks at her chamber door. Fire bombers, runaway carriages, nasty
lawyers, and bastardy had shattered her too-brief joy at walking about shops as
the lady she’d once been. While indulging in fabulous fabrics, she’d even
allowed herself hope that she might have some small part of her life back.

But the reality was that she would never be her father’s
pampered daughter again. Her world had irrevocably changed to one of chaos and
anarchy. And even though she knew she was engaging in self-pity, she couldn’t
control her tears of pure terror and loss.

Burying her head in the pillow to hide her weeping, she
scarcely heard Lady Aster’s worried call through the locked door.

If only she could just shrivel up and blow away! Or go home.
She so very much wanted the comforting familiarity of blue skies and warm
breezes and the soft murmurs of patois . . . .

But that seemed long ago and far away, in a time when her
father had handled all difficult matters and all she had to do was choose menus
and gowns. Those days were gone. She cried harder, burying all her bottled up
grief and despair into her pillow, where she hoped she couldn’t hurt anyone or
anything.

She’d shattered glass.
She had never, ever used her voice as a weapon of destruction. What had she
become?

What was this house doing to her?

She didn’t hear the key in the lock but was instantly aware
the moment Lord Erran’s imposing presence crossed the threshold. She couldn’t
look up. Her face would be all blotchy and wet from crying. “You don’t belong
here. Go away,” she said, using her most compelling voice.

He ignored her command, as usual. Why was she cursed with
the company of a man who couldn’t be seduced by her voice?

“You’ve missed dinner,” he said. “The entire household is on
edge because of you. I’ve sent your sister off with Aster and have your brother
patrolling taverns. Jamar wanted to break down the door, but I said I’d try
civilized methods first.”

Celeste scrubbed guiltily at her damp cheek, realizing how
she’d let everyone down to indulge in selfish megrims. She refused to look at
him, even though it was difficult to keep her head averted when she so much
wanted him to
do
something, to make
things better—
as her father had once done
.

That realization struck her painfully. She could not, would
not sink down that hole again. She must stand strong and on her own—in the
morning, after her tears had dried. “Where did you find a key?” she muttered
into her pillow.

“I didn’t. I made one. Hundred-year-old locks are very
crude. I’ve been unlocking them since childhood.”

Of course he had. This man knew no boundaries, as evidenced
by his appearance in her room. It wasn’t as if anyone, anywhere,
cared
if she lost her reputation!
Instead of causing another bout of weeping, that made her angry.

The bed sagged from his weight. She was painfully aware of
the incongruence of his masculine size in her dainty surroundings. She’d chosen
this room for the rose-printed calicoes and spring green walls. She’d decorated
with the gauzy summer bed hangings from home. It wasn’t a room meant for men.
He would be wearing the black coat that reminded her of mourning, and she
couldn’t bear the dark cloud of gloom.